Our community is once again on fire, and we need your help.The UndocuFund for Fire Relief in Sonoma County has reopened to support undocumented families who have lost homes, jobs, wages, or been displaced by the still-growing Kincade Fire.
Would you consider donating once again to help our community recover?Your incredible generosity allowed us to distribute more than $6 million to undocumented fire victims in Sonoma County following the 2017 Northern California fires. Thousands of donors like you, along with dozens of benefits and volunteers, allowed us to give direct financial aid to nearly 2,000 families who lost homes, possessions, and earnings due to the fire. We hope you can support us again.
There are an estimated 38,500 undocumented immigrants in Sonoma County. Unlike other fire victims, they do not qualify for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Undocumented victims are also less likely to pursue other benefits for which they qualify due to fear of immigration enforcement, lack of familiarity with official institutions, and limited English proficiency.
Help your undocumented neighbors get back on their feet after this terrible disaster. Any amount helps.
There are many ways to support us beyond donating:Sharing the news with your friends, family, and on social media to let others know UndocuFund has reopened.Holding a fundraiser or benefit, either in-person or virtually, to raise money for UndocuFund and spread the word.If you are bilingual and want to volunteer, please contact Susan Shaw of the North Bay Organizing Project at sshaw@northbayop.org.
You can also follow us on Facebook to receive future announcements about volunteer needs and other updates.We do not have capacity to receive physical donations at this time, but we encourage you to donate to one of the many organizations are able to process donations.
The Kentucky Supreme Court has sided with a print shop owner who refused to make a gay pride T-shirt because he says it was against his religious beliefs.
The state’s high court dismissed the claim after two lower courts also ruled in favor of Lexington print shop Hands-On Originals. The company declined a T-shirt order from Lexington’s Gay and Lesbian Services Organization for the city’s 2012 Gay Pride Festival. The design said “Lexington Pride Festival” on the front.
The high court ruled Thursday that the gay advocacy group lacked standing to make a claim against shop owner Blaine Adamson because the city’s gay rights law was written to protect individuals.
“While this result is no doubt disappointing to many interested in this case and its potential outcome, the fact that the wrong party filed the complaint makes the discrimination analysis almost impossible to conduct, including issues related to freedom of expression and religion,” the justices wrote in the ruling.
Adamson said after a hearing before the Supreme Court in August that the T-shirt he was asked to print “goes against my conscience.”
Lexington’s Human Rights Commission ordered Adamson in 2012 to print the shirts and attend diversity training. Adamson appealed and won rulings from the circuit court and state court of appeals. The appeals court said in 2017 the printing business was subject to the city’s fairness ordinance but nothing in that ordinance prohibits a private business “from engaging in viewpoint or message censorship.”
Archaic anti-gay laws in Jamaica and discrimination against LGBT+ people are costing the nation around $11billion per year, according to the Caribbean Policy Research Institute (CAPRI).
CAPRI held an event on Tuesday, October 29, called “Paying for Prejudice”, at which it looked into the financial costs to the country as a result of anti-LGBT+ discrimination.
In Jamaica, anal sex is prohibited and punishable by life imprisonment for any individual, any sexual encounter between men is illegal, and there are no protections for LGBT+ people against discrimination.
According to The Gleaner, although a lack of LGBT+ visitors to the tourism-dependent country is causing financial losses, there are more serious ways that discrimination is affecting the economy.
LGBT+ people in Jamaica are three times more likely than non-LGBT+ people to suffer from mental health problems, which puts a huge strain on services.
Damien King, co-executive director of CAPRI, said at the event: “The incidence of mental health in the LGBT community is 69 per cent. It is more than triple the rate in the general population.
“Treating mental health costs Jamaica about $5 billion each year – only a third of which is public cost. The rest is a private cost.
“That $5 billion gives you a sense of what would be both the public and private savings that could be put to other uses if we were able to have a better attitude towards this marginalised group.”
According to CAPRI’s data, LGBT+ discrimination alone adds $175 million to the Jamaica’s annual mental health treatment costs.
Even more costly is treating HIV in Jamaica, and because of discrimination LGBT+ people struggle to access care and information, worsening the problem.
King added: “Each untreated case of HIV costs half a million dollars. It is estimated that each HIV-positive person is likely to pass it on to two other persons in the absence of treatment… When you add all that together, taking account of our estimate, an additional 7,000 persons become infected simply because of the discrimination.
“Multiplying all of that together, we end up with a cost of $3.5 billion for each cohort that is not treated.”
Unemployment also costs Jamaica, and LGBT+ people face huge struggles in finding work.
According to King: “Employers have said that they would not hire an openly gay person because they do not support that orientation.”
He added that they had surveyed employers, and 54 per cent said they would not hire a gay person. Moreover, 35 per cent said discovering that an employee was gay would be reason alone for dismissal.
As Pete Buttigieg continues his campaign to become the first openly gay US president, a new poll has suggested that America isn’t ready for an LGBT+ commander in chief.
According to the Politico/Morning Consult poll, 44 percent of voters don’t think that the country is ready for an openly gay president, with 40 percent saying the opposite.
But for many, the problem seems to be a societal one rather than any personal prejudice. When asked if they themselves could accept a gay president, 50 percent answered with either definitely or probably, compared to 37 percent who said definitely or probably not.
The results showed that Buttigieg’s sexuality “may be an issue for some voters”, according to Morning Consult’s vice president Tyler Sinclair.
“Notably, 58 per cent of Republicans, 32 per cent of independents and 22 per cent of Democrats say they aren’t ready for a gay or lesbian president,” he continued, per Politico.
“The comparative figures not ready for a female president are 36 per cent of Republicans, 15 per cent of independents and 8 per cent of Democrats.”
Pete Buttigieg trailing Biden, Warren and Sanders in Democrat race.
Whether America is or isn’t ready for a gay president may prove moot, as Buttigeig is currently trailing three other candidates in the race for the Democratic nomination.
According to a RealClearPolitics polling average on Wednesday, October 30, Buttigieg has 7.6 per cent support among Democrats, a full 20 points behind the frontrunner Joe Biden.
At 28 per cent, Biden is currently ahead of Elizabeth Warren (21.7) and Bernie Sanders (17.3).
Researchers quizzed 24 undecided black Democrats in Columbia, South Carolina, and found that a number of men “seemed deeply uncomfortable even discussing” his gayness.ADVERTISING
A report added: “Their preference is for his sexuality to not be front and centre.”
“It feels like a slap in the face to just go directly to the white gay guy, when for decades you’ve been trying to elect a woman and it didn’t happen last time,” said one lesbian Democrat.
“If Pete Buttigieg is elected it won’t feel like a vindication of Hillary Clinton. If a woman is elected, it will.”
Friday, November 15th, 7-9 pm. Occidental Center for the Arts’ Book Launch Series. Ashes in A Coconut,gripping debut novel by Sonoma author, Bo Kearns. Presentation with selected readings, slide show of Bali, Q&A, book sales/signing. Free admission, all donations gratefully accepted. Indonesian treats by donation, beer/wine for sale. OCA: 3850 Doris Murphy Court, Bohemian Hwy at Graton Rd. and is accessible to people with disabilities. For more info: 707-874-9392 or occidentalcenterforthearts.org
A new report from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law found the relatively high rate of poverty in the LGBTQ community is not evenly distributed, with bisexual women and transgender people shouldering a disproportionate poverty burden.
When grouped together, almost 22 percent of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people reported earning less than the federal poverty level of $12,490 per year for a single-person household. The cisgender straight community, on the other hand, reported a poverty rate of almost 16 percent.
When researchers separated the L, G, B and T, however, they found cisgender (or non-transgender) gay men and lesbians reported similar levels of poverty to their heterosexual counterparts, while bisexual women and transgender people (of all sexual orientations) had a poverty rate of almost 30 percent.
The study found gay men had the lowest rates of poverty at 12 percent, followed by cisgender lesbians at 18 percent. These percentages were statistically indistinguishable from the poverty rates of their heterosexual male and female counterparts at 13 and 18 percent respectively. Overall, for gay and straight people, women face higher rates of poverty than men. Bisexual men reported a poverty rate of almost 20 percent, significantly less than their bi women counterparts.
Bianca Wilson, one of the study’s authors, said researchers have some hypotheses for why poverty levels are elevated in these communities, including that they could be due to “experiences of discrimination, maybe the impact of minority stress, the impact of mental health concerns that come from experiencing discrimination. However, how that explains the particularly high rate among bisexual women is not clear.”
Robyn Ochs, a bisexual activist, said it doesn’t surprise her that bisexual people report higher levels of poverty, because it’s “pretty typical, historically, for bisexual people’s experience to be lumped in with gay and lesbian experience.”
“Bisexual people have a much harder time finding community and safe space,” Ochs explained, “even when there’s an established LGBTQ community, it’s often not fully inclusive of bisexual-identified people.”
During the Obama administration, Heron Greenesmith, a bisexual activist and researcher, participated in several White House summits devoted to issues specific to the bisexual community.
“The news is that we have been talking about this for years with empirical, peer reviewed data on national data sets, and nothing has increased the programs and services dedicated to alleviating poverty where it really matters in the LGBT community,” Greenesmith said.
Ochs noted that a fraction of 1 percent of all funds designated for the LGBTQ community is earmarked for bisexual issues specifically, according to a report by Funders for LGBTQ Issues. Greenesmith said that this lack of funding results in “a lack of structure in bi communities, which produces a lack of leaders” that can advocate for community needs.
Overall, Greenesmith said she thinks biphobia is a major component of many disparities the report unearthed.
“It can have different names, you can call it bi erasure,” Greenesmith said. “As I research the right as well, I am finding more and more data to show that sexual fluidity, as can be exemplified by the existence of bi folks, makes people really confused and nervous.”
As for the high rate of poverty among the transgender community, Gillian Branstetter, media relations manager for the National Center for Transgender Equality, found the Williams Institute figures “deeply unsurprising.”
“It’s quite simple: If you do not have stable access to housing, you are more likely to face violence. If you do not have gainful employment, you’re more likely to face violence. And the prejudice and bias that denies so many people access to these opportunities leaves them exposed to any number of risk factors, including poor health and positive HIV status, as well as abusive situations like intimate partner violence,” Branstetter said.
“It shows the massive potential for harm posed by the three Title VII cases before the Supreme Court to allow employers to avoid any consequences for discriminating against transgender people,” Branstetter added. “It is not merely a philosophical, etymological matter of the definition of sex — it is literally the right of equal economic opportunity for every member of society that’s in front of the Supreme Court right now.”
The burden of LGBTQ poverty is also uneven across location, according to the report. While straight people face poverty in urban and rural areas at roughly the same rate (approximately 15 percent), rural LGBTQ people have a poverty rate of 26 percent compared to their urban peers at 21 percent.
Study author Bianca Wilson says that with so many unknowns presented by the data, her next project at UCLA’s Williams Institute will be a qualitative study that will interview subjects and attempt to answer why certain groups within the LGBTQ community are so disproportionately impacted by poverty.
A gay police officer has won $19 million in damages from his employer, after he was told to “tone down” his sexuality.
Sgt. Keith Wildhaber, an officer within Missouri’s St. Louis County Police Department, had filed a lawsuit in 2017 after he was passed over for promotion to lieutenant despite 15 years’ service.
Police officer was told his sexuality is a ‘problem’
According to Wildhaber’s lawsuit, a member of the St. Louis County Board of Police Commissioners had told him: “The command staff has a problem with your sexuality. If you ever want to see a white shirt [be promoted], you should tone down your gayness.”
The officer alleged he was passed over 23 times for promotion, and also said that when he filed a discrimination complaint, he was transferred in retaliation.
Sgt. Keith Wildhaber, an officer within Missouri’s St. Louis County Police Department
On Friday, a jury in St. Louis County Circuit Court sided with Wildhaber, after a hearing that saw testimony from senior police officials repeatedly contradicted by other evidence.
According to the St Louis Post-Dispatch, a police captain denied having ever met one witness who accused him of making homophobic remarks about Wildhaber, before photos emerged of them in a “friendly embrace.”
Police force will see ‘changes’ after discrimination case
County Executive Sam Page said in a statement: “Our police department must be a place where every community member and every officer is respected and treated with dignity.
“Employment decisions in the department must be made on merit and who is best for the job. ”
Page said that there would be “leadership changes” on the police force, starting with “the appointment of new members to the police board, which oversees the police chief.”
The St. Louis County Police Union said: “While we are extremely embarrassed of the alleged actions of some of our Department’s senior commanders, we look forward to the healing process that can begin to take place now that this has been heard in open court.”
A new LGBT+ Muslim Pride festival is just £400 away from reaching its crowdfunding goal.
Imaan, Europe’s biggest charity sporting LGBT+ Muslims, is trying to raise £10,000 to put on an event which will “provide a space for LGBTQI Muslims from across the UK to be empowered, engaged and to make no apologies for being practising Muslims and LGBTQI people”.
With a day left until the campaign ends on Tuesday afternoon, October 29, the crowdfunder is £403 short of its goal.
Imaan posted on Twitter: “With now just 1 day left – dare we dream we can do it? The pressure’s too much!! PLEASE chip in anything. A LIKE/SHARE IS A FREE WAY TO HELP.”
Imaan originally sought to raise £5,000 for the event, a target it smashed in September.
The crowdfunder was extended to £10,000 in order to “produce a bigger, bolder, more exciting event and subsidise a number of places for those who cannot afford to attend”.
New Pride festival will provide a safe space for LGBT+ Muslims.
A spokesperson from Imaan told PinkNews that the festival, which will be held in London in spring 2020, aims to show that people can be both LGBT+ and Muslim.
“Often LGBTQI Muslims are caught in the middle of Islamophobia and homophobia, so we want to provide a safe and inclusive space where people feel like they do not have to choose between identities and that they can be LGBTQI and Muslim without pressure from those who say otherwise,” they said.
Imaan will also be recruiting volunteers to support the festival and will be calling on both LGBT+ and Muslim organisations for practical support.
Often LGBTQI Muslims are caught in the middle of islamophobia and homophobia, so we want to provide a safe and inclusive space where people feel like they do not have to choose between identities.
Plans for the festival come at a time when reported incidents of both Islamophobia and homophobia in the UK have spiked in recent years.
In March, it was reported that Islamophobic incidents in the UK rocketed by nearly 600 percent in the week after a terror attack on mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, which killed 51 people.
And, in June, a Guardian investigation revealed that hate crimes against LGBT+ people have more than doubled in the past four years.
Imaan praised for setting up LGBT+ Muslim Pride festival.
Campaigners from LGBT+ faith organisations have praised Imaan for working to setup the festival.
Matt Mahmood-Ogston, who set up the Naz and Matt Foundation, which works to tackle homophobia triggered by religious and cultural beliefs, praised Imaan for creating the “fabulous” new event.
“The launch of the festival will create an exciting new platform that will inspire hearts, and help many more people understand and celebrate the beauty of LGBTQI+ Muslim culture,” Mahmood-Ogston told PinkNews.
“Too often members of the community, and many of the LGBTQI+ Muslims who come to our charity for support, are forced into choosing between their religion and their queer identity.
“This festival will become a safe place – an event to look forward to – where this choice never has to be considered. We can’t wait for the festival to begin!”
Apicha Community Health Center wanted to run advertising on Instagram (which is owned by Facebook) to promote public awareness of PrEP, a drug which can prevent HIV transmissions.
Despite Facebook’s newly-relaxed rules around political advertising, the New York-based centre – which serves people of colour and the LGBT+ community – was told that it could not run the adverts because it “hadn’t been authorised to run ads about social issues, elections or politics”.
“They said the copy was the problem but were unable to tell us what part of the copy was too political,” Phillip Miner, Apicha’s director of grants and communications, told Vice.
Since PrEP was introduced in the US in 2012, rates of HIV transmissions among white, black and Latinx men who have sex with men in New York has fallen almost consistently. But among Asian and Pacific Islanders (API) men, the number of new cases has remained stubbornly static.
In an attempt to change this, the Apicha Center’s Instagram account has been posting content created by and featuring API men which talks about PrEP.
It wanted this content to form the basis of a paid advertising campaign, which would have meant that API men who don’t follow its account would see the posts in their feeds.
Miner told Vice that Instagram offered to authorise the campaign if they could authorise every employee who uses its social media accounts through Facebook. This wasn’t possible due to privacy concerns for one member of staff.
The company quietly withdrew a policy of banning false claims in advertising – including in political advertising – in early October, sparking concerns that it could be used to deceive voters.
Zuckerberg appeared visibly shaken on Wednesday, October 23, as Ocasio-Cortez asked him whether she would be able to “pay predominantly black zip codes advertise them he incorrect election date” or “run advertisements targeting Republicans in primaries saying that they voted for the Green New Deal”.
Zuckerberg said that adverts which could cause census or voter suppression would not be allowed, but did not say whether mistruths would be taken down.
“So, you won’t take down lies or you will take down lies? I think that’s just a pretty simple yes or no,” Ocasio-Cortez asked.
In response, Zuckerberg obfuscated, citing “context”.
A day of calm winds and an intense air attack aided firefighters battling the Kincade Fire Monday to gain a foothold on the western edge of the massive blaze, allowing evacuation orders for nearly a dozen communities including Guerneville and Sebastopol to be downgraded to warnings.
The Sonoma County Sheriff said residents of the far western reaches of the massive evacuation zone that extended from Geyserville, Healdsburg and west to the Pacific Ocean at the height of the firefight over the weekend could return home.
Officials said residents could return to their homes unimpeded by law enforcement officers patrolling the area.
“This means that you can return home now at your own risk,” the sheriff’s department said in a news release. “This area is still at risk from the Kincade Fire, and much of this area does not have power or natural gas due to the power shutoff. Remember, if you hear the hi-lo sirens, it’s time to evacuate.”
“There will still be more peace officers in your neighborhood,” authorities said. ” You do not need to check in with anyone and you do not need a peace officer escort.”
Here are the areas where the evacuation order has been downgraded to an evacuation warning.
ZONE 7
Jenner
Bodega Bay
Bodega
Occidental
Monte Rio
Rio Nido
Duncans Mills
Cazadero
Guerneville
Forestville
Graton (west of Highway 116 only)
Zone 8
Sebastopol
Twin Hills
Western unincorporated Santa Rosa
The situation was much improved than over the weekend when strong winds drove the massive wildfire beyond containment lines, growing to 66,231 acres – 103 square miles – by early Monday and destroying 96 structures, including 40 homes.
Cal Fire said there were 4,000 firefighters manning the lines early Monday and they were being assisted by troops from the California National Guard. Nearly 80,000 homes were being threatened by the blaze.
“The fire was extremely active during the day yesterday (Sunday),” Cal Fire Battalion Chief Mike Blankenheim told reporters at a Monday news conference. “The fire more than doubled in size and that did present some challenges for us. The priorities for today (Monday) are we are going to work on the Mt. St. Helena area in the northeastern corner (of the fire.) Working in the Mark West area and the Shiloh area.”
“The fire made it that far south last night,” he added. “We are going to be really aggressive today, working on perimeter control.”
Cal Fire Monday AM update on Kincade Fire:
Firefighters had the blaze 10 percent contained before Sunday’s howling winds whipped it further out of control, expanding the evacuation area from Geyserville to the Pacific Ocean and driving some 180,000 residents from their homes.
Local residents filled evacuation centers from Petaluma all the way to San Francisco, waking Monday morning hopeful their homes would not be damaged or destroyed by the blaze.
By sunrise, containment had tumbled to five percent, but firefighters were able to save homes in Windsor from mass destruction.
“We had a very scary day today,” Windsor Mayor Dominic Foppoli told KPIX 5 Sunday night. “We could have lost a lot of homes in Windsor…Thanks to the absolute valiant effort by first responders…They have been able to save pretty much all of Windsor.”
Sonoma County Sheriff Mark Essink said with the intensity of the fire fight in Windsor on Sunday, had the area not been evacuated far in advance, there would have loss of lives.
“Yesterday in the northeastern area of Windsor, we had a very aggressive fight of the fire by our partners at Cal Fire,” Essink said. “Had that area not been evacuated those firefighters would not have been as effective they were…We had a lot of success yesterday in Windsor…The northern area of Windsor was saved by their efforts.”
Around Healdsburg, several buildings were damaged or destroyed including the more than 100-year-old Soda Rock Winery that was turned into a smoldering pile of ruins with just the front brick wall still standing early Monday.
Two firefighters were injured Sunday fighting the blaze, Cal Fire Division Chief Jonathan Cox said during an afternoon press conference. One suffered minor burn injuries, but another suffered significant burn injuries and had to be airlifted to the UC Davis Medical Center.
Around 10:15 p.m. Sunday evening, the fire flared up again in the area of Markwest/Larkfield Wikiup, where mandatory evacuations had previously been issued.
Deputies used Hi-Lo sirens to warn residents on Faught Road from Shiloh to Old Redwood Hwy in Larkfield-Wikiup. The fire’s movement over the Shiloh Ridge was threatening homes and residents in Napa County by Monday morning.
“If in this area, you need to leave immediately!” the Sonoma County Sheriff asserted to people that hadn’t yet left.
Firefighters were racing from one spot fire to another along the roads surrounding the ridge, trying to limit damage and the blaze’s advance.
Essick said the magnitude of this event struck him while visiting evacuation shelters.
“There is certainly a sense of fear out there,” he said. “A lot of people have questions about what’s going on…Ladies and gentleman, we are doing the right thing by keeping you out of these evacuated areas.”
San Francisco Mayor London Breed issued a proclamation Sunday evening, declaring a local emergency to provide shelter for Kincade Fire evacuees. The city will open a temporary disaster shelter to help those displaced by the fire at the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption at 1111 Gough Street.
“San Francisco stands with our neighbors to the north and is ready to help in every way we can,” said Breed. “Our City departments are working in unison to provide shelter and care to those who have been displaced, while first responders continue to fight the fire in Sonoma County.”
More than 200 law enforcement officers were patrolling the evacuation zones for safety and to prevent looting. Essick said there was one arrest Sunday of a suspicious person in one of the evacuation zones who could not provide a location for where they were headed.
At an evacuation center at Napa Valley College, Francisco Alvarado, 15, said he, two younger brothers and his parents decided to leave their Calistoga home in advance of evacuation orders. Two years ago, the family had to flee, but in the middle of the night.
“I’m pretty mad that we have to keep evacuating,” he said. “I just want to be home. I’m trying to leave here tomorrow; I want to sleep in my bed.”
Hundreds of people arrived at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds in Santa Rosa by Sunday. Some came from nursing homes. More than 300 people slept in an auditorium filled with cots and wheeled beds. Scores of others stayed in a separate building with their pets.
Among them was Maribel Cruz, 19, who packed up her dog, four cats and fish as soon as she was told to flee her trailer in the town of Windsor, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) north of San Francisco. She also grabbed a neighbor’s cat.
“I’m just nervous since I grew up in Windsor,” she said. “I’m hoping the wind cooperates.”
