Gay and Gray - at the crossroads

Thanks again to The Centralina Area Agency on Aging for sponsoring the Gay and Gray conference these last two days. It was an honor to be there and to have the opportunity to share from a first person transgender perspective.

The event was more than I expected. There were issues presented that hit home in a rather personal way. Today was primarily aimed at the helping professionals. As always there was time to meet old and new friends, along with some networking. It was a most worthwhile two days.

As a follow up on the murder trial of Allen Andrade, murderer of Angie Zapata, most people have heard by now he was convicted of a bias motivated crime. As such he will serve a lifetime sentence with no possibility of parole.

This is a landmark case inasmuch as it was the first conviction of the murderer of a transgender person based upon hate crime legislation. We hope the day will come when all states have equal protection. At this moment, South Carolina has no hate crime legislation while North Carolina's statutes are sorely lacking.

In that same line of thought, Equality North Carolina makes the following announcement:

"4/29/2009 - In a whirlwind of legislative action today, the Senate Mental Health & Youth Services Committee passed both the School Violence Prevention Act (SB 526) and the Healthy Youth Act (HB 88). The bills now go to the Senate floor for a vote, possibly as soon as early next week. Equality NC and our coalition partners are working to ensure passage of both bills."

If you live in North Carolina, you are encouraged to email your state senator and urge passage of this important legislation.