Collections by Michelle Brown

Earlier this year we introduced you to Jerry Peterson, Executive Director of the Ruth Ellis Center located in Highland Park MI.

The Center is named after Ruth Ellis,  an African-American woman who became widely known as the oldest surviving open lesbian, and LGBTQ rights activist at the age of 100 who died in 2005. The Center is a youth social services agency with a mission to provide short-term and long-term residential safe space and support services for LGBTQ youth in Detroit and Southeastern Michigan. Since incorporating in 1999, the Center has offered core services including Its residential housing program, the 2nd Stories Drop-in Center and Family Group Decision Making. Most recently it added integrated behavioral and primary healthcare services, allowing the Center to take a critical step forward to meet the ever-changing needs of the young people they serve.

More than a space and programs, The Ruth Ellis Center is people, a community that includes not only staff but the youth it serves.

Joining Collections by Michelle Brown are Amara one of the young people who has been coming to the Center for five years. She participates in many of the 2nd Story programs and is finding her voice as a youth advocate. From the staff side joining us is Pamela E. Alexander the Deputy Director of Programs at the Center. Alexander has been active in the LGBTQ community for many years before joining the staff at the Ruth Ellis Center.

They share a conversation about their experience with the Center and how their lives intersect.

Wellesley College graduate Marseille "ML" Allen  moved to Flint, Michigan at what some might consider the worst possible time, as the Flint water crisis broke. She started delivering water to help residents. She also entered and won $10,000 in a GoFundMe contest for her cause. She continues to serve the people of Flint and is committed to being there for the long haul. She continues to serve th Flint community as Vice President of the Morris Peterson Jr. Foundation.

Allen is also president of The Warriors Trust Fund a 501(c) 3 organization established in 2015 to raise awareness and provide funding for the various needs of United States Armed Forces combat veterans, including, but not limited to Veterans associated with the Oakland Combat Veterans Treatment Court (C-VTC). In addition to supporting the C-VTC, the Warriors Trust Fund has expanded to the greater Combat Veteran community and now assists participants in the Veterans Treatment Court at the 45th District Court of Oak Park.

The Warriors Trust Fund provides drug and alcohol testing, substance abuse treatment, mental health treatment, transportation and emergency services to combat veterans – a helping hand to veterans who have stumbled under the weight of the lingering effects of combat, conflict, or search and rescue or recovery experiences. One-hundred percent of all funds raised by the organization goes towards supporting combat veterans in the criminal justice system.

Allen is Legislative Liaison of UAW Local 6000

During the month of November we celebrate Transgender Day of Rememberance (TDOR), which memorializes victims of transphobic violence.

Unfortunately As of October 2017, 23 trans people have been reported killed by violence in the U.S. Often after being discriminated against and  targeted for violence in life, trans women and men continue to be victimized in death misgendered in initial police reports and the edia even by family members.

Although nothing can take away the pain of the loss of these trans women and women, this year has been historic for the TLGB community with the election of several openly transgender candidates across the country on November 8th in Virginia, ]in California, in Pennsylvania and in Georgia. But perhaps the greatest win of all was in the city of Minneapolis where Andrea Jenkins and Phillipe Cunningham were elected to the City Council. Jenkins became the first openly trans woman of color elected to a major city’s city council. 

Earlier this year we spent time with Andrea talking about her poetry, her work collecting the oral history of our trans sisters/brothers and dreams of representing Minneapolis Ward 8. To celebrate her historic win and as a reminder that Trans Lives Matter, Collections by Michelle Brown will rebroadcast our earlier interview with Councilwoman-elect Andrea Jenkins. 

Her fierce spirit, unwavering commitment and unapologetic voice as a proud trans woman of color is something we can all truly be thankful for!!

During the month of November services are held for Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR),  memorializing victims of transphobic violence.

Unfortunately As of the end of October 2017, 23 trans people have been reported killed by violence in the U.S. Often after being discriminated against and  targeted for violence in life, trans women and men continue to be victimized in death where they are misgendered in police and media reports even by family members and are not identified immediately as transgender.

Although nothing can take away the pain of the loss of these trans women and women, this year has been historic for the TLGB community with the election of several openly transgender candidates in Virginia, in California, in Pennsylvania, and in Georgia on November 8th.

Perhaps the greatest win of all was in the city of Minneapolis where Andrea Jenkins became the first openly trans woman of color elected to a major city’s city council. 

Earlier this year we spent time with Andrea talking about her poetry, her work collecting the oral history of our trans sisters/brothers and dreams of representing Minneapolis Ward 8.

To celebrate her historic win and as a reminder that Trans Lives Matter, Collections by Michelle Brown will rebroadcast our earlier interview with now Councilwoman-elect Andrea Jenkins.  Her fierce spirit, unwavering commitment and unapologetic voice as a proud trans woman of color is something we can all truly be thankful for!!

Sinister Wisdom, Inc., a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, publishes the journal and provides outreach and educational programs in support of building vibrant lesbian communities. Publishing since 1976, it works to create a multicultural, multi-class lesbian space opening, considering and advancing the exploration of lesbian community issues.

Originally from Michigan, Enszer was involved in the LGBTQ community in the metro-Detroit area. After leaving Michigan she continued her work with the community working with the Human Rights Campaign in Washington DC. She has her MFA and PhD from the University of Maryland.

Enszer is the author of four poetry collections , Avowed, Lilith’s Demons, Sisterhood and Handmade Love. She is also the editor of The Complete Works of Pat Parker, which won the 2017 Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Poetry and Milk & Honey: A Celebration of Jewish Lesbian Poetry, which was a finalist for the 2012 Lambda Literary Award in Lesbian Poetry. . She edits and publishes Sinister Wisdom: A Multicultural Lesbian Literary & Art Journal. uest Editors edit a special, thematic issues of Sinister Wisdom. These guest editors solicit, assemble, select, edit, and proof-read a full issue of Sinister Wisdom or work on a special dossier.Sinister Wisdom provides free subscriptions to women in prison and mental institutions; currently, Sinister Wisdom mails about fifteen percent (15%) of each issue of the journal to these women. It offers reduced price subscriptions for lesbians with limited/fixed incomes.

Individuals enlist for military service for a multitude of reasons but all in service to this country. Many, including LGBTQ service members, make the ultimate sacrifice. Each year on November 11th we celebrate Veterans Day honoring and thanking them for their service. In a series of tweets, Pres. Trump announced that transgender people would be banned from serving in the US military “in any capacity” attempting to reverse an Obama-era decision to support those who would live openly and authentically as transgender while in service of their country. A federal judge has partially blocked enforcement of key provisions of Trump's memorandum banning transgender people serving in the military while LGBTQ and human rights organizations challenge its enforcement in the courts.

Char Davenport  a Navy Veteran from the Vietnam era conflict. She is alos a member of the trransgender community.

She is the Michigan Field Organizer for the National LGBTQ Task Force’s Faith-based Gender Justice and Allyship Project. She has helped pass non-discrimination ordinances across Michigan and works with the National Center for Transgender Equality. You'll often find her in Washington DC lobbying her representatives, including a recent trip to support measures to curb gun violence.

She studied Journalism, English and Creative Writing. She was a journalist based in Washington DC before becoming a leading market research analyst in the photographic and digital printing industries. She has taught at high schools and colleges in Michigan and New York. 

Char has dedicated her life to achieving equality for the transgender community in the wok place, health care, public accommodations, voter rights and education helping train dozens of new advocates and leaders in the Trans-Activism movement.

Thank you Char, and all veterans, for your service!

Betty Couvertier was the founder, producer and host of “Alternative Perspectives,” an LGBT radio show that continues to air on the community-owned and operated. “Alternative Perspectives” started from a notion that LGBTQ news was important news and that our voices together could get a message out to the public. Since retiring Betty keeps her eye on local and national political shenanigans, the LGBTQ community and has discovered more alternative perspectives as she travels about the country. . She is relentless, outspoken, courageous in providing an authentic voice and alternative perspective. 

Join us as we talk about the consequences of the 2016 vote, the impact of the Executive Orders, presidential tweets, the current political climate and how participation in 2017 and the important 2018 elections is not optional, but crucial to change the course of our current politics at the state and federal levels.

She's back to talk not only about what happened, what's happening but what needs to happen in today's unsettling political climate.

In a departure from our usual format Collections by Michelle Brown will be remembering Stephen Maglott and celebrating his life.

Stephen was born in Bangor, Maine on October 26, 1953 but spent his formative years in Harlem and Buffalo, NY. He was drawn to Civil Rights and social justice struggles including creating an outreach program investigating instances where farm workers were held as modern-day slaves, resulting in changes to State laws.

He attended Parson’s School of Design while working for the United Nations, as a researcher attached to the UN Commission on Apartheid. He left school early to work as a Graphics Designer and Art Director for several major agencies. He lived in Los Angeles in the early 1980’s and for a few years in Amsterdam before returning to the US.

He accepted a position with Men of Color Health Awareness Project, in Rochester, NY. He assisted in the formation of the NY State Black Gay Network. He served as Board President of Ujima Theatre, on the Board of the Buffalo Caribbean Islands Festival, the National Conference for Community & Justice and the Faith Leadership Roundtable of Buffalo. NY.

Stephen began the Ubuntu Biography Project after realizing so few resources paid tribute to the lives and contributions of LGBTQ men and women of African descent. Ubuntu is a Nguni Bantu term that is literally translated as “human-ness.” It is an empowering affirmation of humanity’s interconnectedness and of our collective responsibility to cherish one another.

As his health began to deteriorate prior to his death, he reached out to trusted community members asking for help with the Project. Among those he approached are Aundaray Guess, and  Mark Zustovich. They will be sharing memories of Stephen and updates on the Ubuntu Project.

Kristina Schmidgall  is Director of Care Services at UNIFIED - HIV Health and Beyond. Different governments and organizations have declared different months as AIDS Awareness Month including October. We Can Stop HIV, lift the stigma and educate our communities on the truth about living with HIV and AIDS One Conversation at a Time.

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, in the United States alone 1.1 million people are living with HIV and 1 in 7 of them don’t know it. For those infected with HIV, treatment works. The outlook for people living with HIV has significantly improved over the past two decades. Many people who are HIV-positive can now live longer, healthier lives when they’re in routine care. In 1996, the total life expectancy for an infected 20-year-old person was 39 years. In 2011, the total life expectancy bumped up to about 70 years. Someone who is HIV-positive, receiving treatment, and in optimal health may live to be in their late 70s.

Kristina entered this field as a volunteer at Lansing Area AIDS Network in 2000. She was employed at AIDS Partnership Michigan from 2006 to 2013. In 2014, she joined the staff at the Detroit Health Department as a Quality Management Specialist with the Ryan White HIV Program. In 2016, she returned to UNIFIED- HIV Health and Beyond as the Director of Care Services, managing eight care programs.

From Nobel Peace Prize Award Winner Malala Yousafzai’s continued activism for girls’ right to education, to the continued plight of school girls kidnapped by Boko Haram militants even after their release, to the millions of little girls and young women have been subjected to a painful genital mutilation worldwide, to young girls right here in the United States subject to poverty, under education and danger from violence in their neighborhoods - the “International Day of the Girl Child” focuses attention on fulfillment of their human rights. The world’s 1.1 billion girls are part of a large and vibrant global generation poised to take on the future.

London Bell returns to talk about her work as President and CEO of Bell Global Justice Institute and President of the Board of the Greater Detroit Chapter of the United Nations Association to celebrate both the "International Day of the Girl Child" and "United Nations Day" and bring awareness to the UN's important work globally and Locally.

London Bell is a lawyer, community organizer, activist and humanitarian. The native Detroiter has focused her career advocating for policy changes on behalf of diverse communities. She is the President and CEO of Bell Global Justice Institute, a non-governmental organization (NGO) based in Detroit focused on advancing and promoting the international human right to education for girls.