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Published Every Two Weeks On Recycled Paper • Volume 14, Number 19 • February 19, 2000 • FREE
Final report issued on Charlotte Community Center
Samantha Gellar
Lesbian honored
by NC ACLU
by Dan Van Mourik
Special to Q-Notes
CHARLOTTE, NC—On February 5, the
American Civil Liberties Union of North Caro
lina bestowed its most significant award on 18-
year-old high school student Samantha Gellar.
Gellar is the youngest ever to be so honored.
“This is a young woman who did not cave
in to public pressure,” said Keith Martin, the
man who nominated her. “She was a voice that
others attempted to silence and she made sure
her voice was heard. To have that kind of forti
tude in one so young displays a maturity far
beyond her years.”
Gellar, a senior at Charlottes Northwest
School of dv. Arts, wrote a one-act play, Life
..Wiersus the Paperback- Romance, about two
women who meet on a bus, fall in love and
share a kiss. The play was chosen as one of five
winners in the Charlotte Young Playwrights
Festival. The winners had their plays performed
at the festival — except for Gellar.
The contest sponsors — Childrens Theatre
of Charlotte and Charlotte-Mecklenburg
Schools — said her subject matter was not ap
propriate for the festival’s middle and high
school audiences.
“We have to be sensitive to our audience and
in Charlotte sexuality is a sensitive issue,”
Childrens Theatre spokesman Rob Odum said
at the time.
By refusing to produce a play with a homo
sexual theme, the festival sponsors revived the
controversy started by the Mecklenburg Board
of County Commissioners regarding homo
sexuality and the arts.
Gellar called the refusal to perform her play
an act of discrimination. With h^p from Time
Out Youth, a support group for gay and les
bian youth, she began a media campaign to
draw attention to what had happened.
Her story was printed in newspapers across
the country, including The Village Voice, The
New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. And
that began a movement among New York’s gay
and lesbian theater artists to bring Gellar and
her play to New York.
Last March, Gellar’s play was given a read
ing to over 400 people at the Great Aunt Stella
Center in Charlotte. And last June, her play
was read at the Public Theatre/New York
Shakespeare Festival in Manhattan.
Before the New York production, Gellar
spoke to the sold-out audience of 270, includ
ing Pulitzer-winning playwright Tony Kushner
and actress Mary-Louise Parker, who starred in
the New York production of her play. Gellar
told them one word can make a difference.
“If you want to change the world, society,
anything, one word can do it.” Gellar said that
word is “No.” “[I said it] to the Children’s The
atre, the school board and the anti-gay atmo
sphere in Charlotte.” Gellar becomes the sev
enth recipient of the ACLU of North Carolina
Award, given only when someone in the state
does something remarkable for civil liberties in
a given year. T
by Robert Marcus James
Special to Q-Notes
CHARLOTTE, NC—After nine months of
j=, conversations, town meetings, site visits and
g surveys, a final report of the findings of the
.§ study of whether or not Charlotte’s lesbian, gay,
^ bisexual and transgender community wanted
^ and could support a Community Center has
2 been issued by Naomi Swinton, facilitator of
£ the study.
“The LGBT community expressed over
whelming enthusiasm and support throughout
the exploratory process to make us believe they
are ready to begin working toward a Commu
nity Center,” said Swinton. “This is with the
understanding that the ongoing planning pro
cess itself will require deliberate and long-term
teamwork and relationship building.”
The study was commissioned by
OutCharlotte, which produces cultural pro
grams celebrating the LGBT community, in
cluding the Charlotte Gay & Lesbian Film Se
ries and an annual cultural festival in October.
According to Dan Kitsch, OutCharlotte Ex
ecutive Director, the idea of the study came
about as OutCharlotte was developing its long-
range plan in 1998. “We surveyed many people
about how OutCharlotte could better ser\'e the
community,” said Kirsch. “Over and over,
people stated their desire to have a LGBT Com
munity Center. We decided to make the study
part of our work in 1999 and hired Grassroots
Leadership to conduct the study.”
Twenty-two committee members were
brought together, most representing existing
LGBT community organizations, to work on
the study from April through December of
1999. The study was envisioned to be Phase I
in an ongoing discussion about whether or not
Charlotte was ready for and could support a
Community Center. If the Phase I study re
sulted in a positive recommendation to con
tinue, it would be up to the community to
pursue Phase II and Phase III planning. The
Phase I study was not set up to create a strate
gic plan, fundraising plan or budget. In all,
more than 300 members of the community
were involved in the study.
A section of the Executive Summary reads;
In order to build widespread support, the Com
munity Center should from the beginning have
a visible and public image which presents an
engaging, sustainable and inclusive vision to the
greater public. The Community Center can be
a powerful place for advocacy and change, rep
resentative of the LGBT community in our area
If successful, it will educate the general public
and affect policy and opinion, provide links to
a wide variety of LGBT and non-gay commu
nity organizations, as well as serve as a source
of energy for arts and cultural expression.
Difference and diversity can be celebrated.
and on-going education and experiential pro
grams can help build bridges between constitu
encies. The Center will also profit from a busi
ness-minded, maner-of-fact attitude that does
not force or cry out for attention but proceeds
with confidence, pride and professionalism.
Phase II of the process began in early Feb
ruary when a Community Center Planning
Committee was convened. The Planning Com
mittee is co-chaired by Travis Blackwell and
Marcie Rollins. Over the next sbe months, the
Committee will create a strategic plan, program
ming plan, fundraising plan, budgets, scout
locations and incorporate as a not-for-profit
organization. Their goal is to seat a Board of
Trustees this fall, who will work to make a Com
munity Center a reality.
“OutCharlotte is very proud to have been
able to help start this conversation,” said Kirsch.
“As one of more than 20 LGBT community
groups, we will continue to support and par
ticipate in Phase II and Phase III planning as
requested. We look forward to the day when
we can hold film series events and our annual
cultural festival at the Community Center.”
The Community Center Study Committee’s
final report is available online at the
OutCharlotte web site at www.outcharlotte.org.
For more information or referral numbers for
the Planning Committee, call Dan Kirsch at
(704) 563-2699. T
Clinton’s budget increases overall HIV/AIDS
funding, but again falls short on prevention
WASHINGTON, DC—President Clinton
released his new budget for fiscal year 2001 (FY
2001) on February 8, proposing increased
spending on key HIV/AIDS programs, but
coming up short on funding for crucial pre
vention efforts. While the overall budget is laud
able, more prevention dollars are needed —
especially in minority communities where the
spread of HIV continues to outpace efforts to
slow it down, according to the Human Rights
Campaign (HRC).
“We are pleased with the overall funding
which will help initiate new research and im
prove the quality of life for people living with
HIV and AIDS,” said HRC Political Director
Winnie Stachelberg. “Unfortunately, the lack
of funding for prevention will ensure that this
disease continues to march undeterred and
cause even more devastation, particularly in
communities of color.”
The budget proposes an increase of only $40
million for HIV prevention at the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This
increase does not reflect the urgent need to ad
dress CDC reports that there are an estimated
40,000 new infections each year.
The problem is especially acute in minority
populations, according to HRC. For gay Afri
can-American men, AIDS deaths dropped 35
percent in 1997 and 17 percent in 1998, while
comparable reductions for whites were 51 per
cent and 22 percent, respectively. Surgeon Gen
eral David Satcher reported that AIDS death
rates for African Americans remained nearly 10
times higher than for whites.
Adding to these numbers is the CDC find
ing that young African-American gay men were
five times more likely to contract HIV com
pared to other young gay men.
Clinton’s requested eight percent funding in
crease of $125 million for the Ryan White
CARE Act (RWCA), and an additional $26
million for the State AIDS Drug Assistance
Program (ADAP) should be applauded, says
HRC. For over ten years, the RWCA has helped
more than 500,000 p>eople impacted by FIIV
and AIDS who have received care and assis
tance through this program.
“We are looking forward to working with
the administration and Congress on adequate
funding levels for tlje Ryan Wiite CARE Act,
as well as ensuring reauthorization without
negative amendments,” said Stachelberg. “With
more and more people living with AIDS, care
and assistance programs remain a critical com
ponent of caring for families impacted by HIV
and AIDS.”
The president also proposed an increase in
funds for the Housing Opportunities for People
with AIDS (HOPWA) — a program which
provides housing assistance and supportive ser
vices for low-income people with HIV/AIDS
and their families. HOPWA received a $260
million increase for FY 2001, about a 12 per
cent increase over FY 2000.
Clinton also proposed a $105 million in
crease in HIV/AJDS research funding at the
National Institutes of Health (NIH). This fund
ing would be utilized for HIV and AIDS re
search, which will bring our nation closer to
developing a vaccine or a cure and help in de
velopment of new drugs, says HRC. The in
crease in funding will bring the total funding
for NIH HIV/AIDS research to more than $2.1
billion.
The president’s proposed budget has raised
concerns about flat funding for the HIV/AIDS
programs at the Substance Abuse and Mental
Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).
SAMHSA provides HIV counseling and test
ing services, health education and risk reduc
tion information.
The president also helped address the inter
national AIDS crises with a $100 million pro
posed increase to help developing countries
combat HIV/AIDS. Worldwide, there are 33.6
million people living with AIDS and a total of
16.3 million people have died thus far from
the disease. In December, a Joint United Na
tions Programme on HIV/AIDS released its
“AIDS Epidemic Update for 1999," which il
lustrates that 95 percent of the global total of
President Bill Clinton
people living with HIV/AIDS are in the devel
oping world.
Worldwide, as in the United States, infec
tions continue to rise, with 5.6 million people
becoming infected in 1999 alone. In 1999,2.6
million people world-wide died from HIV/
AIDS, a higher global total than in any year
since the beginning of the epidemic.
Last year, the Clinton Administration and
Congress again worked together to provide gen
erous funding for some areas of the fight against
HIV/AIDS. For example, the budget deal in
cluded generous funding increases for vital life
saving programs, including a 13 percent in
crease for the Ryan White CARE Act and a 15
percent increase for medical research at the
National Institutes of Health. The bill also re
ceived a last minute modest funding increase
of six percent for HIV prevention activities at
the CDC. T