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Rick Gerharter
Governor Gavin Newsom, shown riding in the San Francisco Pride parade with his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, included funding in his state budget for LBQ women’s health.
Sunset lesbian says tyrannical master tenant using chicanery to steal mail by Meg Elison
A
senior lesbian living in San Francisco’s Sunset neighborhood alleges that her neighbor, who’s the master tenant in her apartment building, may have compromised her mailbox. Raquel Guillen said that she had the usual suspicions when her mail and parcels went missing. She assumed simple theft, posting a sign for the U.S. Postal Service not to leave packages outside her building’s locked entrance. However, when certified mail addressed to another tenant in the building mysteriously landed in her mailbox, she realized her problem was much more complicated. She believes someone has access to her mailbox. Six months ago, Guillen, 63, began to experience disruptions in her services and benefits, only to find out that she had been notified by mail but had never received the
CA creates $17.5M health fund for lesbian, bi women by Matthew S. Bajko
I
n what advocates say is a national first, California lawmakers have established a $17.5 million Lesbian, Bisexual, and Queer Women’s Health Equity Fund. The money was included in the state’s 20192020 $214.8 billion budget that Governor Gavin Newsom signed June 27. According to the Los Angeles LGBT Center, it marks the first time a state has earmarked specific funds for LBQ women’s health programs. “After months of advocating for this funding, we are thrilled that California lawmakers recognized the tremendous health needs of lesbian, bisexual, and queer women,” stated Lorri L. Jean, the center’s CEO, in a news release announcing the creation of the fund. “These women have been invisible in health care conversations for far too long, and the consequences have been deadly.” Past Golden State budgets have earmarked funds for health programs addressing the needs of gay men and transgender individuals but never for lesbian and bisexual women, noted Terra RussellSlavin, the center’s director of policy and community building. She told the Bay Area Reporter in a phone interview that center staff had talked about correcting that omission in recent years and decided to make a concerted push to seek funding for LBQ women’s health needs last year. Service providers will now be able to apply for funding under the program through the California Department of Public Health, said RussellSlavin. The programs must serve cisgender and transgender women who identify as lesbian, bisexual, or queer, she explained, adding that some services for transgender men also would qualify. According to the agency, the money can go toward health and mental health care, domestic violence programs, and treatment referrals for smoking, alcohol, and substance abuse. It can also cover the cost of trainings about LBQ women’s health needs for health care providers. “The idea is to create a funding stream within the California Department of Public Health to focus on addressing health disparities for LBQ women, including transgender women. People can be transgender and lesbians,” said Russell-Slavin. See page 14 >>
Vol. 49 • No. 28 • July 11-17, 2019
Raquel Guillen checks the mail at her Sunset district apartment.
letters warning her of deadlines. Her suspicions grew, thinking there had to be a reason. “Letters from my doctors went missing,” Guillen told the Bay Area Reporter by phone. “I asked my doctor to never again send me mail. My banking statement didn’t arrive punctually. I’m not techie, so I don’t use digital statements. Sometimes it arrived, sometimes it didn’t. But I didn’t connect the dots
Meg Elison
until those pieces of certified mail arrived.” Guillen discovered three pieces of certified mail that had been received and signed for, the receipt stubs removed from the back. They were all addressed to the master tenant in her building, and sent by their landlord. Confused, Guillen contacted her landlord. The mystery only deepened from there. See page 14 >>
More queer people than ever living on the street in SF
by Meg Elison
A
ccording to the Point-in-Time Count released over the holiday weekend by the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, more queer people than ever – 1,054 – are living without safe, permanent housing on the streets of San Francisco. The general street count was conducted on January 24. Two years ago, the number of queer people found living on the streets during the count was 1,014. These figures are of course part of a larger one: more people of all kinds are living on these streets than ever before, with the number coming in at 8,011, a 19% increase over the same count in 2017. Twenty-seven percent of these people are LGBTQ, roughly the same percentage as were counted in the previous report two years ago. Yet even though percentages stayed the same, the hard number is larger this year. For homeless youth, the executive summary states that there were 1,145 in the 2019 count, down slightly from the 1,274 reported in 2017. This year, 46% of youth age 24 and under identified as LGBTQ+. Queer respondents to this survey were more likely to report first experiencing homelessness as a teen or young adult than their straight counterparts (58% vs. 40%). More transgender people were reported in this
Rick Gerharter
A man slept on Market Street near Collingwood Street last month.
year’s survey, as well. In 2017, 9% of the LGBTQ homeless respondents were transgender people, and in 2019 the proportion had jumped to 13%. The 2017 survey did not specifically offer a nonbinary option, but included those respondents in a larger category marked “other.” This year, 3% of the LGBTQ homeless identified themselves as genderqueer or nonbinary. An estimated 12% of San Francisco’s general
{ FIRST OF THREE SECTIONS }
SUNSET PIANO & SAN FRANCISCO BOTANICAL GARDEN PRESENT 5TH ANNIVERSARY
FLOWER PIANO JULY 11–22
And get tickets now for Flower Piano at Night on July 18–20!
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population identifies as LGBTQ+; meaning that the 27% of the homeless who are queer represent a disproportionate ratio. The breakdown among the homeless is 55% gay or lesbian, and 29% bisexual. There were two other categories wherein the queer homeless population of San Francisco stood out from the majority of respondents: domestic See page 14 >>
Twelve Days of Pianos in the Garden