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What We Do
A drive for safe, intersectional, intergenerational 2SLGBTQIA+ community in Eastern Washington and North Idaho is at the core of everything we do. We strive to create virtual and in-person community spaces, build a culture of care, commit to advocacy and allyship, provide education and facilitation services to organizations/individuals, and fill gaps that arise through pop up events.
Pop-Up Events
Though having a permanent physical space is our goal, we also prioritize hosting virtual and in-person pop-up events! Insights from our community survey and focus groups revealed a strong need for queer community in spaces that aren’t centered around alcohol and nightlife. Conversations about centering accessibility led to hosting virtual spaces like our Book Club and Queer Trivia Nights, which we plan to continue, and lowering transportation access barriers by holding events in different neighborhoods and cities in our service area.
Community Care
We are passionate about creating a culture of community care. The vaccination clinics we hosted with partner organizations have played a critical role in our care, providing over 1,000 people with protection against COVID-19 and connecting folks with other resources. We also run our Gender Affirming Products Program (GAPP) all year round, which provides free, no-barrier-to-entry gender-affirming products and services to transgender, nonbinary, two-spirit, genderqueer, genderfluid and gender nonconforming folks in the Eastern Washington and North Idaho region.
Advocacy, Activism and Community Building
The queer community is not isolated, it’s intersectional, and we believe that our advocacy and activism must be intersectional as well. By sitting on regional and statewide advisory boards for issues like transportation, healthcare, and education, as well as other queer issue specific councils, we advocate to create equity for all. Through the deep relationships we have built with community partners like SCAR, UNYO, APIC, INDEx, PJALS, and many others, we have a network we show up for and do activism work with, as well as give rapid responses when the need arises. You can often find us tabling community events like Pride, cultural days, and resource fairs at the local universities.
Education & Facilitation
We offer workshops and trainings year-round to increase queer cultural fluency! Through individualized trainings, consulting, and group workshops, our team of trained facilitators introduce people to language, issues, and experiences related to our LGBTQIA2S+ community. We want to develop allies and co-conspirators outside our community, and help make spaces safer by building the knowledge and comfort levels of the folks who run them. Some of our most popular trainings include Working with LGBTQ+ Communities, Creating Equity through Chosen Names and Affirming Gender Identities (a pronoun training), and Intersections of Identity. Click here (Insert hyperlink) to request a training or find out more details, contact Aiden, our Director of Operations, at as@spectrumcenterspokane.org.
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