In the News: Bay Area Reporter

'Encampment' brings attention to homeless LGBT youth

NEWS

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Published 05/19/2011

by Matt Baume

	Homeless youth and their allies staged a "street sweep" in the Castro last Saturday to bring attention to budget cuts for social service programs. Photo: Matt Baume

The May 14 encampment was part of a nationwide demonstration to raise awareness of homelessness among a demographic known as transition-age youth. Homeless and foster youth between 16 and 24 years old can face unique housing challenges, particularly as they age out of the foster care system and learn to navigate services for adults.

"We're here to engage the community on homelessness, and specifically queer homeless youth issues," said organizer Beck, who uses only one name. "We're in kind of a state of emergency, saying, 'hey community, wake up.'"

Saturday's action started at Civic Center with games, an unveiling of protest banners, and hot meals served by Food Not Bombs. A march proceeded to Harvey Milk Plaza, where speakers read poetry and called for improved access to services to get off the street.

Their requests included housing with kitchens, rather than single room occupancy hotels with no facilities for food preparation; employment opportunities for youth who are unable to complete school; and an end to the sit-lie ordinance.

According to local organizers Trans Youth Rise Above, there are 5,700 homeless youth in San Francisco, of which at least 1,000 are queer.

Operation Shine America, which coordinated similar rallies in other cities, estimates that there are 2 million homeless youth in the country. Queers for Economic Equality Now also organized the San Francisco event.

Beck explained that organizations like the Lavender Youth Recreation and Information Center and Larkin Street Youth Services' Castro Youth Housing Initiative have faced repeated budget cuts, reducing services that can prevent youth from living on the street.

Jodi Schwartz, executive director of LYRIC, agreed that times are tight. "There has been a sizable decrease in investments in LGBTQ youth services," she told the Bay Area Reporter. "Just for LYRIC, if we were to lose the last piece of dollars for transition-age youth workforce, our decrease in funding would be 72 percent over the last four years."

Larkin Street Executive Director Sherilyn Adams told the B.A.R. that the extent of cuts won't be known until Mayor Ed Lee releases a budget later this month.

"There's no proposed cuts to the Castro Youth program," she said, but added, "it does not begin to meet the need."

To address the potential consequences of such cuts, Lee recently convened a stakeholder group consisting of representatives from organizations that advocate for homeless youth. Based on feedback from that group, the mayor asked that the Department of Children, Youth, and Their Families prioritize funding for LGBT and undocumented youth.

While organizations hope to turn around the recent budget cuts, local organizers are seeking ways to demonstrate how the city's rate of youth homelessness could worsen.

After Saturday's protest concluded, about three dozen homeless youth spent parts of the night camped out around the Muni station, according to organizer the Reverend Megan Rohrer, director of the Welcome Ministry, a coalition of 12 churches that seek to provide a faithful response to poverty.

Rohrer is currently working with the GLBT Historical Society to raise visibility by drawing inspiration from past struggles. She incorporated a "street sweep" into Saturday's protest, in which participants swept Castro Street sidewalks with brooms to evoke a similar 1960s-era protest.

In that action, LGBTs protested the city's negligent sanitation and police roundups by pushing brooms through the Tenderloin.

New Living Lutheran Blog Post

As an ELCA pastor, you’d think I’d feel more comfortable praying in public. But I confess that nearly every time I pray in public, I feel self conscious, like my words weren’t moving, poetic or spirit-filled enough.

Because it’s my job, I can’t refuse to pray during worship or when someone in tears pleads for private prayer. Thankfully, I’m required to practice praying out loud.

I’ve found it helpful to read the Psalms, which show me that prayer can be an expression of awe for God and the wonders of the earth, confusion about injustice in the world, cries for help and healing or even anger at God, when God seems to have forgotten to be as present as is promised.

I’ve also found it helpful to memorize some of the beautiful prayers that almost always touch people’s hearts. Words like: “Now I lay me down to sleep,” “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want,” “God grant me the serenity” and “Our Father, who art in heaven.” Recently, I’ve enjoyed using hymns and spirituals as prayers and find that they touch my heart in a particularly moving way. Some of my favorites to sing are: “Jesus loves me this I know,” “Amazing Grace,” and “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.”

Read the rest of the blog here.

Help Megan Win the Citizen of Tomorrow Award

Megan has been chosen as a finalist for the Bay Area Citizen's Citizen of Tomorrow Award, for her work using community gardening to help the homeless and individuals with severe mental health issues to improve their quality of life.

Of the 5 finalists for the award, 3 will receive cash prizes for the projects of their choice. The winners are chosen through internet voting.

If Megan wins, she will use the prize money to buy seedlings for the garden she helped create at Bethlehem Lutheran in West Oakland, to buy bicycle powered smoothie machines for 3 community gardens and food and supplies for SF Refresh events.

SF Refresh is a project that Megan created and coordinates as Project Homeless Connect's Growing Home Community Garden Manager, in collaboration with the San Francisco Department of Public Health, which coordinates free whole body health care at community gardens throughout the city. You can learn more about SF Refresh here.

Please vote for Megan (#5 SF Refresh) - you can vote once a day until May 16th.

Tree, another finalist for the award is one of Megan's co-collaborators on the Free Farm project. Tree will be donating any prize money that he wins to the Free Farm. So, if you choose not to vote for Megan, please vote for Tree!

Be Afraid: The Great San Francisco Sleep-In

Dear people who think it's a liability risk to have a sleep-in event:

Thank you! The fact that you think it is unsafe for people to sleep on the streets, even when it is supervised, well organized, rehearsed with the police and led by leaders who have gone on street retreats for years - means you have the ability to understand how much more vulnerable it feels for 100's of thousands of people (and particularly the young adults) to sleep on the streets every night of the year.

Part of the reason that I'll be sleeping on the streets on May 14th as a part of the Great San Francisco Sleep-In and part of the reason I'm encouraging others to join me is not so we can feel comfortable - but so that you and others can worry about us and be moved enough to respond to homelessness. I imagine you will be inclined to do more than if we slept in our beds that night.

How would our country change if we truly understood the part we are playing in the homelessness of our brothers and sisters? How would our country change if we thought every person who slept on the streets was a liability risk and we decided to no longer stand for it?

Whenever I sleep on the streets people care and worry about me, in a way that they do not worry about the others who sleep on the streets each night. If enough of us sleep on the streets on May 14th, we can get the whole country worried about those sleeping on the streets. Join me in person, or virtually (I'll be blogging about this night on the streets). Even if you're busy, don't forget to worry about it - for the purpose of inspiring you to give money, speak out and make change!

You can also read my blogged experiences of some of my past street retreats.

Thanks again for being uncomfortable. Please never get used to me sleeping on the streets. Let's get un-numb to the poverty and homelessness in our country.

Blessings to you all whether you'll sleep in a bed or on cardboard tonight.

Pastor Megan.

Living Lutheran Post: World Malaria Day

The last time I visited my mother’s farm in Minnesota, I remember her laughing hysterically as we carried in the groceries, luggage and items we had just bought in town.

My mother and I were inching our way from the car to the front door, each trying to balance about 10 grocery bags in addition to rolling suitcases, when my mother turned and said, “We come from a long line of German women who refuse to take more than one trip from the car.”

We laughed for a long time wondering why we thought we needed to do everything all at once.

Read the rest of the blog post here.

Gaga Mass & Vanguard Tour

I'm excited to announce that the Lady Gaga Mass will be traveling to select locations along with the Vanguard Traveling Exhibit and Speaking Tour. With the Vanguard Talk at 7pm (featuring Joey Plaster Oral History Chair at the GLBT Historical Society and Mia Tu Mutch trans youth activist) and the Gaga Mass, arranged by Pastor Megan Rohrer (Executive Director of Welcome and co-pastor of the Community of Travelers) at 8 pm. The Gaga Mass offering will raise money for local LGBTQ youth ministries and shelters in the area of our tour.

We'll be adding tour dates, times and locations to this site soon. Start getting excited!

Washington DC - May 22, 2011: HRC Clergy Call
New York - May 27-30, 2011

• 7 pm: Saturday, May 28: Vanguard Talk at Trinity Lutheran Church of Manhattan
  
• 8 pm: Saturday, May 28: Lady Gaga Mass Fundraiser to benefit Trinity Place (shelter for homeless LGBTQA youth) at Trinity Lutheran Church of Manhattan
  
• 11 am: Sunday, May 29: Pastor Megan Rohrer preaching at Trinity Lutheran Church of Manhattan
  

Los Angeles - June 10-11, 2011
Portland - June 18-19, 2011
San Francisco - June 23, 2011: GLBT Historical Society Museum
Chicago - January 5-8, 2012: American Historical Association Annual Meeting

Copyright permission for the Lady Gaga Mass obtained through PERFORMmusic License#6400
Mad love to the Gaga!

Forgiveness Letters

On April 16th, I'm coordinating the first of six SF Refresh events. SF Refresh will provide free whole body care activities in community gardens throughout San Francisco. A number of art projects, created by Melissa Lareau and Ilyse Magy, will appear at The Free Farm, Hayes Valley Farm and the Growing Home Community Garden throughout the day (see the calendar of events). These projects are designed to beautify the garden/farm spaces, inspire wellness and to help us work towards more loving, peaceful, green lives and communities.

The We Forgive You Papers, is a project that I'm particularly excited about. On April 16th we'll be transforming the letters into pots for seedlings that will then be planted into the earth and will eventually compost into the soil. Check out the call for letters to learn how to participate even if you can't make it in person.

Here is my forgiveness letter:

Maya Angelou said, "you do what you can, until you know better."

I forgive myself for not knowing better sooner. I let go of the sense that I ought to have done more in situations where it was perfectly normal to just be a kid, to be afraid or to simply be human. I cherish the fact that I now have a voice and life that is strong enough to not only protect myself, but to speak out for others - particularly those thought to be the most vulnerable.

I forgive the angry men and women in my life who have created a sense in me that chaos is manageable and that I must carry more than is mine to carry. I understand now the systems of violence and generations of baggage that you are carrying. I do my best to not take yours on as my own and forgive myself when I walk the rutted roads of my ancestors that lead only to fear and shame.

I release myself from the useless debates in my brain that think: humility is opposed to achieving my dreams; trivial actions and speech are correlated to the amount of love I experience from the world and loved ones; about what life would be like without my disabilities; and the ways in which I stumbled the past.

I resolve to do what I can, until I know better.

I forgive you and I am forgiven.


Megan Rohrer
San Francisco, CA