The ups and downs of a tumultuous year
The last 12 months have a been a roller coaster for the LGBT community. Still suffering a grief hangover from Donald Trump’s unexpected victory in the November 2016 presidential election, when faced with the reality of his inauguration in January, progressives of all stripes stood up to fight back against what many see as a regressive and oppressive regime.
From the women’s marches that saw millions of people take to the streets of cities across the country on Jan. 21, to the Pride parades and marches in June and September; from the crushing results of 2016 election to the renewal of November 2018 when progressive candidates rebounded and at least openly-transgender candidates won office — we look back at six of the stories that shaped our world in 2017.
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Two fires affected the LGBT community this year — one marked the end of an era and another propelled an agency to new heights.
On June 1, an electrical fire at Fort Worth’s Rainbow Lounge started just after 3 a.m. Shortly after firefighters arrived, the roof collapsed, and by 6 a.m., the building was a gutted shell.
No one was in the bar when the fire started, and there were no injuries.
The fire occurred just short of the eighth anniversary of the raid on the Rainbow Lounge, a joint operation “bar check” by Fort Worth police and TABC agents, in which several people were arrested and one man suffered a serious head injury with lasting effects.
The raid occurred the second week the bar was open, on the 40th anniversary of the historic raid on the Stonewall Inn in New York City and led to the formation of Fairness Fort Worth. What started as an adversarial organization soon was embraced by the city, and many changes to city law over the next few years — such as nondiscrimination ordinances — resulted from recommendations made by the LGBT coalition.
Rainbow Lounge’s owners announced they had secured a new location nearby and began work on the property. But by September they announced they were abandoning their attempts to reopen.
The 651 S. Jennings St. location operated as a gay bar for decades.
A month after the fire in Fort Worth, an arsonist set fire to the Abounding Prosperity Community Center on Peabody Street in South Dallas.
Video taken from Peabody Clinic across the street shows a man driving up to the property and pouring a supposedly flammable liquid outside the property and then going into the house just before flames engulfed it.
Abounding Prosperity opened the community center in 2011 to do HIV testing and help HIV-positive clients get into treatment. Groups for both positive and negative clients met in the comfortable setting of the old house.
AP Inc. was about to begin a capital campaign to raise money to build its own building on property acquired along MLK Jr. Boulevard. The fire propelled the organization to move quicker. By World AIDS Day, the agency had rented and renovated a larger space a few blocks from the old community center.
The new community center picks up all the services provided at the old house and adds an essential new service. AP Inc. opened a “bridge” clinic to get newly-diagnosed clients into medical care and on HIV medication. The agency will see clients for three months as they adjust to their new regimen of medications and get into permanent medical care.
— David Taffet