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SPOTLIGHTING LGBT HOMELESSNESS: Alston House celebrates a decade in operation
LGBT youth shelter named after slain D.C. activist
‘We are dealing with homeless youth that are isolated and rejected by the community,’ said June Crenshaw, executive director of the Wanda Alston Foundation.
This story is part of our contribution to the 2018 #DCHomelessCrisis news blitz. Local media outlets will be reporting and discussing stories about ending homelessness in the nation’s capital all day. The collaborative body of work is cataloged at dchomelesscrisis.press.
The first LGBT youth-focused shelter in D.C. is continuing its legacy of serving one of the most vulnerable demographics.
The Wanda Alston House and Foundation, now in its 10th year of service, serves LGBT individuals ages 16-24. The residential home-turned-shelter currently houses eight people, and hundreds have been through its doors over the last decade. The house is named after the late Wanda Alston, a D.C.-based LGBT activist who was murdered near her home in 2005.
Individuals enter the program based on their level of vulnerability and what kind of care the city’s homeless management providers think will best fit that person’s circumstances. The facility provides 24-hour support for residents through counseling, mental and medical health services. Tuition assistance and professional development is provided and other life skill services such as learning how to balance a checkbook, shop for groceries and manage a credit score are also offered. Residents receive three meals a day, clothing and toiletries as well as other necessities like Metro cards.
Full-time staff is trained, culturally competent and trauma-informed to ensure that all residents are supported. The operations manager and case manager work full-time at the house to make sure that everything runs smoothly and a clinical supervisor is also full-time to provide assessments and connect residents with the support they need.
The staff works together as an agency and as individuals to connect with the youths and help them cope, give support and help them navigate their lives. Sometimes that can be difficult and residents can respond by acting out.
“We are dealing with homeless youth that are isolated and rejected by the community,” says June Crenshaw, executive director of the Wanda Alston Foundation. “They’re forced to survive some unspeakable situations. Most, if not all, arrive having experienced some severe trauma. This can show up in less-than-positive ways like addiction, inability to cope with stress or not being able to navigate positive communication skills. But they’re human and they’ve had to endure circumstances that most of us couldn’t survive.”
Crenshaw, a self-identified “old-fashioned” lesbian and woman of color, says most youth in the program are women of color.
“When I started in this role two years ago, a resident came to me and said she never saw a person that looked like me in a leadership role. That stuck with me,” she says. “I’m proud to be a brown woman of the community that’s working hard to make things better.”
The program at the Wanda Alston House is slightly different from the programs at other LGBT shelters, she says. There are certain requirements that the residents must participate in that help them accomplish their personal goals within the 18-24 months they live there.
“We provide connections and care in all the ways that a person would need,” Crenshaw says.
After leaving the house, individuals stay connected to the care at the facility for 90 days-six months. Staff continues to support them however they need it — like buying groceries, clothes or Metro cards and finding housing and employment as well as providing case management to help them navigate other support and services available.
Crenshaw says there’s an “epidemic of LGBT homelessness.” Around 50 percent of the homeless youth in D.C. are LGBT-identifying. At the Wanda Alston House, residents “talk and share experiences around being treated differently, misgendered, disrespected, attacked and discriminated against.”
She says the city is committed to the youth but that in homeless centers that are not culturally sensitive to LGBT people, “grave mistreatments” can occur.
“Our population is trending as the most affected by homelessness and mental health issues,” she says. “We have a responsibility to do better by our youth, make sure they stay safe and are allowed to thrive. Facilities like ours are needed as long as these circumstances exist.”
The facility costs slightly over half a million dollars to run each year and most comes from local government offices such as the Mayor’s Office of LGBT Affairs. Grant dollars are used to run the shelter and pay staff, but that doesn’t cover all the expenses. They also rely on fundraising and the LGBT community and allies to support them. Donations amount to 25 percent of the budget.
Although D.C. has some of the most progressive laws in the nation and has been widely noted as one of the U.S. cities LGBT individuals can feel most open and supported, the competitive job market and high cost of living creates difficulties for LGBT people. LGBT people of color are more likely to be unemployed and represent a large portion of impoverished individuals and victims, Crenshaw says.
D.C. has the highest number per capita of LGBT individuals compared to other American cities. Crenshaw says not enough of the resources the city provides for homeless people are going to LGBT organizations and there is a lot of work yet to be done to resolve this epidemic.
The Wanda Alston House, however, has survived the turbulence of 10 years of operation and Crenshaw says they are ready and looking forward to at least another 10.
a&e features
Memorial for groundbreaking bisexual activist set for May 2
Loraine Hutchins remembered as a ‘force of nature’
The Montgomery County Pride Center will host a celebration honoring the life and legacy of Loraine Hutchins, Ph.D., on May 2. People are invited to attend the onsite memorial or a livestream event. The on-site event will begin at 10 a.m. with a meet-and-greet mixer before moving into a memorial service around the theme “Loraine a Force of Nature!” at 11 a.m., a panel talk at 12 p.m., break out sessions for artists, academics, and activists to build on her legacy at 1 p.m. and a closing reception at 2 p.m.
Attendees are encouraged to register for the on-site memorial gathering or the livestreamed memorial. The goal of this event is also to collect stories and memories of Loraine. Attendees and others can share their stories at padlet.com.
An obituary for Hutchins was published in the Bladelast Nov. 24, where people can learn more about her activism in the bisexual community. A private service for friends and family was held in December but this memorial service is open to all.
Alongside her groundbreaking work organizing for U.S. bisexual rights and liberation including co-editing “Bi Any Other Name: BIsexual People Speak Out” (1991), she also integrated faith into her sexual education and advocacy work. Her 2001 doctoral dissertation, “Erotic Rites: A Cultural Analysis of Contemporary U.S. Sacred Sexuality Traditions and Trends,” offered a pointed queer and feminist analysis to sex-neutral and sex-positive spiritual traditions in the United States. Her thesis was also groundbreaking in exploring the intersections between sex workers and those in caregiving professionals, including spiritual ones.
In an oral history interview conducted by Michelle Mueller back in August 2023, Hutchins described herself as a “priestess without a congregation.” While she has occasionally had a sense of community and feels part of a group of loving people, she admitted that “I don’t feel like we have the shape or the purpose that we need.”
“I’ve often experienced being the Cassandra in the room, the Cassandra in the community. Somebody who’s kind of way out there ahead, thinking through the strategic action points that my community hasn’t gotten to yet, and getting a lot of resistance and hostile responses from people who are frightened by dissent and conflict and not ready for the changes we have to make to survive,” she said.
“For somebody who’s bisexual in an out political way and who’s been a spokesperson for the polyamory movement in an out political way, it’s very exposing. And it’s very important to me to be able to try to explain and help other people understand the connection between spirituality and sexuality,” she explained citing how even as a graduate student she was “exploring how to feel erotic and spiritual, and not feel them in conflict with each other in my own spiritual contemplative life and my own sensual body awareness of being alive in the world.”
“Every religion has a sense of sacred sexuality. It’s just they put a lot of boundaries and regulations on it, and if we have a spiritual practice that is totally affirming of women’s priesthood and of gay people, queer people’s ability to minister to everyone and to be ministered to be everyone, what does that do to the gender of God, or our understanding of how we practice our spirituality and our sexuality in community and privately?”
“There’s no easy answer,” she concludes, and she continued to grapple with these questions throughout her life, co-editing another seminal text, “Sexuality, Religion and the Sacred: Bisexual, Pansexual, and Polysexual Perspectives,” published in 2012. Her work blending spiritual and queer liberation remains groundbreaking to this day.
Rev. Eric Eldritch, a local community organizer and ordained Pagan minister with Circle Sanctuary who has worked for decades with the DC Center’s Center Faith to organize the Pride Interfaith Service, is eager to highlight this element of her legacy at the memorial service next month.
History
Julius’ Bar ‘sip-in’ laid groundwork for Stonewall
Tuesday marked 60 years since four gay activists held protest
While Stonewall is widely considered the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ rights movement in the U.S., a lesser-known protest inside a Greenwich Village bar three years earlier helped lay critical groundwork for what would follow.
Tuesday marked 60 years since the Julius’ Bar “sip in.”
On April 21, 1966, four gay rights activists — Dick Leitsch, Craig Rodwell, John Timmons, and later Randy Wicker — walked into Julius’ Bar and staged what would become known as a “sip-in” to challenge state liquor regulations on serving alcoholic beverages to gay men — with a drink.
Modeled after the sit-ins that challenged racial segregation across the American South, the protest was designed to confront discriminatory practices targeting LGBTQ patrons in public spaces.
At the time, the Mattachine Society — one of the country’s earliest gay rights groups — was actively pushing back against policies enforced by the New York State Liquor Authority. One of those policies could have resulted in the loss of liquor licenses for serving known or suspected gay men and lesbians. The participants had visited multiple establishments, openly identified themselves as homosexual, and requested a drink — with the anticipation of being denied.
Their final stop was Julius’, where reporters and a photographer had gathered to document the moment. When Leitsch declared their identity, the bartender covered their glasses and refused service, reportedly saying, “I think it’s against the law.” The next day, the New York Times ran a story with the headline, “3 Deviates Invite Exclusion by Bars,” cementing the moment in the public record.
Though initially framed with disrespect — the term “sip-in” itself was coined as a play on civil rights protests — the action marked a turning point. It brought national attention to the systemic discrimination LGBTQ people faced and helped catalyze changes in how liquor laws were enforced. In the years that followed, the protest contributed to the emergence of licensed, more openly gay-friendly bars, which became central social and organizing spaces for LGBTQ communities.
The Washington Blade originally covered when the bar was officially added to the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places in 2016.
Today, historians and advocates increasingly recognize the “sip-in” as a key pre-Stonewall milestone. According to the New York City LGBTQ Historic Sites Project, the protest not only increased visibility of the early LGBTQ rights movement but also exposed widespread surveillance and entrapment tactics used against the community.
Marking the 60th anniversary of the event, commemorations have taken place in New York and across the country. Reflecting on its enduring legacy, Amanda Davis, executive director of the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project, spoke about the event.
“Julius’ Bar is a place you can visit and viscerally connect with history,” said Davis. “We’re thrilled to have solidarity locations across the country join us in commemorating the ‘sip-in’’s 60th anniversary and the queer community’s First Amendment right to peaceably assemble.”
For current stewards of the historic bar, the responsibility of preserving that legacy remains front of mind.
“It’s a privilege and a responsibility to be the steward of a place so important to American and LGBTQ history,” said current owner of Julius’ Bar, Helen Buford. “The events of the 1966 Sip-In here at Julius’ resonated across the country and inspired countless others to stand proud for their rights.”
The timing couldn’t have come at a more important moment, Kymn Goldstein, executive director of the June L. Mazer Lesbian Archives, explained.
“At a time when our community faces renewed challenges, coming together in resilience and solidarity reminds us of the power in our collective resistance,” Goldstein said.
The American Civil Liberties Union, an organization dedicated to defending rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution, is currently tracking 519 anti-LGBTQ bills across the U.S. The majority are targeted at restricting transgender rights — particularly related to gender-affirming care, sports participation, and the use of public bathrooms.
Some additional groups and bars that held their own “sip-in” as solidarity events to uplift this historic milestone are from across the country include:
Alice Austen House at Steiny’s Pub, Staten Island, N.Y.
Bellows Falls Pride Committee at PK’s Irish Pub, Bellows Falls, Vt.
Brick Road Coffee, Mesa, Ariz.
Brick Road Coffee, Tempe, Ariz.
Dick Leitsch’s Family at Old Louisville Brewery, Louisville, Ky.
The Faerie Playhouse & LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana at Le Cabaret, New Orleans
Harlem Pride & John Reddick at L’Artista Italian Kitchen & Bar, New York
JOYR!DE KiKi at Loafers Cocktail Bar, New York
Matthew Lawrence & Jason Tranchida / Headmaster at Deadbeats Bar, Providence, R.I.
Mazer Lesbian Archives at Alana’s Coffee, Los Angeles
New Hope Celebrates at The Club Room, New Hope, Pa.
Queer Memory Project at the University of Evansville Multicultural Student Commons / Ridgway University Center, Evansville, Ind.
Sandy Jack’s Bar, Brooklyn, N.Y.
St. Louis LGBT History Project at Just John Club, St. Louis
The LGBTQ+ Victory Fund National Champagne Brunch was held at Salamander Washington DC on Sunday, April 19. Gov. Andy Beshear (D-Ky.) was presented with the Allyship Award.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
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