Latest news with #EqualityOhio
Yahoo
3 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Research nonprofit reaching out to local LGBTQ+ community
A research fellow from the Center for Community Solutions is reaching out to Ashtabula County's LGBTQ+ population to understand what issues they're facing. Andrew Snyder is running the Greater Mahoning Valley LGBTQ+ Community Needs Assessment, which is focusing on Ohio counties bordering Pennsylvania. Snyder said the assessment is part of his Ph.D dissertation at Kent State University's College of Public Health. CCS is partnering with Equality Ohio, a nonprofit that researches policy issues, to do outreach, Snyder said. '[Equality Ohio] recently hired a Mahoning Valley organizer whose goals align closely with ours: to connect with the community, understand its needs and raise awareness about policies that impact LGBTQ+ Ohioans,' Snyder said. Part of the community needs assessment consists of a confidential 30-40 minute survey for members of or people with a meaningful connection to the LGBTQ+ community. Children 12 and older can also do the survey with a parent or guardian's permission. Allies to the LGBTQ+ community can also take the survey, but will be asked a different set of questions. Survey questions focus on issues like housing, education, safety and health, and can be skipped if participants do not want to answer, Snyder said. Snyder is seeking at least 700 responses to the survey, from across all four counties, he said. 'This is our big call to action,' he said. People can find the survey at Participants can enter a raffle to win a $75 Visa gift card. Winners will be chosen in January 2026. The community needs assessment will have a table at the Ashtabula Pride Festival June 21 at Walnut Beach. Alongside the surveys, it will have confidential focus groups. They will consist of a 90-minute listening session, where participants will be asked questions relating to their lives. People can sign up for focus groups at the community needs assessment website. Snyder said there will be a confidential focus group from 6-7:30 p.m. Aug. 20. There are a total of ten spots open. 'It's us listening to the communities,' he said. Focus group participants will receive a $30 gift card. CCS has done similar assessments in the Cleveland and Akron areas. 'Eventually, we would like to do it state wide,' Snyder said.
Yahoo
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Ohio lawmakers revive Statehouse bill to restrict drag queen shows
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — Ohio legislators have introduced another 'adult cabaret performances' ban that LGBTQ+ advocates say will outlaw drag queen shows in public. House Bill 249 was introduced at the Statehouse on Tuesday to ban 'adult cabaret performances,' defined as a show 'harmful to juveniles' that features 'entertainers who exhibit a gender identity that is different from the performers' or entertainers' biological sex.' The bill would prohibit these shows in all locations other than 'adult cabarets,' meaning 'a nightclub, bar, juice bar, restaurant, bottle club or similar establishment.' Dwayne Steward, Equality Ohio executive director, condemned the legislation as 'censorship' that would restrict any gender nonconforming performance in public. Steward argued the bill is 'a blatant attempt by politicians to suppress cultural expression under the guise of protecting children.' Ohio marijuana festival wants to pay five random people $1,000 each to judge products 'Across generations from immigrant families, Black communities to LGBTQ+ Ohioans, art has been more than expression; it has been a declaration of existence, resilience, and pride,' Steward said. 'Drag is a powerful embodiment of that spirit. It is vibrant, unapologetic, and deeply rooted in our cultural fabric. … Drag isn't just performance, it's power. And it's here to stay.' Coined the 'Indecent Exposure Modernization Act,' the bill is being proposed by Reps. Josh Williams (R-Sylvania) and Angela King (R-Celina) with the support of 42 out of 65 Ohio House Republican representatives. The legislation, which also prohibits nudity and sexual conduct in public, is meant to 'protect children and families from sexualized performances taking place in public spaces,' the lawmakers said. 'As a mother and as a legislator, I believe Ohio families should feel safe taking their children to a city park without the risk of coming across an event or person performing in a way that incorporates themes, imagery, and acts intended for mature audiences,' said King in a release. H.B. 249 is identical to a previous bill introduced by Williams and King also banning 'adult cabaret performances.' Williams has long argued the bill's intention is to modernize revised code regarding obscenity viewed by minors, not to ban drag. He previously stressed that the proposal only means to ban shows 'harmful to juveniles,' with events like drag story time readings and plays like 'Mrs. Doubtfire' covered under the First Amendment. Franklinton residents seek modernization, but fear gentrification 'We are seeing trends of indecent exposure and oversexualized performances taking place in public in the presence of children,' Williams said in Tuesday's release. 'King and I and many other Ohioans don't agree with these acts taking place in the open. This legislation is simply updating already existing law to the times that we are living in.' Like Williams and King's previous proposal, H.B. 249 outlines the following penalties if entertainers are found violating the legislation: A misdemeanor of the first degree if a performance occurs in the presence of a juvenile under the age of 18. A felony of the fifth degree if the performance is 'obscene.' A felony of the fourth degree if the performance is 'obscene' and occurs in the presence of a juvenile under the age of 13. The bill's language is modeled after a Tennessee law that also bans 'adult cabaret performances.' The contested measure was ruled 'unconstitutionally vague and substantially overbroad' by a district judge in 2023, but then reinstated by an appeals court last year. In February, the Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to the law. A conservative Lancaster group advocated for city council to adopt a measure with the same language last year after they argued a performance during a LGBTQ+ Pride event with a drag queen was 'pornographic.' Small business owners in Lancaster said they experienced an influx of customers after their shops were included on a social media post tying them to the debated event. Bellefontaine, a rural Ohio city, was originally supposed to be the first in the state to vote on whether to ban such performances in public. However, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled last October that the proposed ordinance, which also used the 'adult cabaret performance' wording, would not appear on the ballot given it was submitted fraudulently. House Bill 6's repeal, Delta-8 THC among bills moving through Ohio Statehouse 'I know a lot of queens who are scared to do certain things now because we are being put under such a microscope,' said Blonde Vanity, the Columbus-based drag queen who sparked Bellefontaine's proposal. Next, H.B. 249 will be assigned to a House Committee, where it will receive hearings open for public testimony. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Mental health service to minors without parental consent banned under Ohio bill
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — A leading advocacy group said a new Ohio bill to prohibit mental health service to minors without parental consent would stifle youth experiencing abuse at home and prematurely 'out' LGBTQ+ teens. House Bill 172 was introduced at the Ohio Statehouse in March by Rep. Johnathan Newman (R-Troy) and would ban a mental health professional from treating a minor who 'presents for the diagnosis or treatment of a gender-related condition' without first obtaining consent from a least one parent or guardian. Columbus City Schools reverts to birth names for transgender students 'The general assembly maintains that a parent has a fundamental right to make decisions concerning the upbringing and care of the parent's child,' the bill states. Newman's bill also reiterates regulations set by Ohio's incoming 'Parents' Bill of Rights' law, including a provision requiring schools to provide parents the opportunity to review instructional material that includes 'sexuality content.' A school is also required to notify a parent of a student's change in counseling services, emotional or physical health, or well-being. Watch a previous NBC4 report on the Parents' Bill of Rights in the video player above. However, Equality Ohio argues both measures will cut off 'a crucial lifeline' for LGBTQ+ youth who live in unsupportive homes and confide in their therapist or school counselor. The organization also said HB 172 could prevent all young people, not just those in the LGBTQ+ community, from speaking with a counselor, even in cases of abuse. Dwayne Steward, Equality Ohio's executive director, said HB 172 continues the Ohio Statehouse's trend of 'anti-LGBTQ+' legislation and that the measure would force youth out of the closet 'in very, very dangerous situations where they're already experiencing crisis.' 'The bill would remove the confidentiality of a trans student who was experiencing mental health needs, and it could delay or keep a child from going and getting the mental health care that they need,' said Steward. 'It's extremely dangerous, and another way in which our legislature is failing trans students.' Olentangy schools defends LGBTQ+ anti-bullying policies in federal court Steward pointed to a national crisis hotline that said it received a significant increase in calls from LGBTQ+ youth in Ohio within hours after Gov. Mike DeWine signed the Parents' Bill of Rights into law in January. The executive director said trans youth recognize that they're 'part of this political conversation,' which is leading to 'increases within the community when it comes to suicide and self-harm.' Still, proponents of the Parents' Bill of Rights and similar measures like Newman's HB 172 assert that the bills ensure parents, and not the government, are making healthcare and education decisions for their children. 'Parents don't sign away their rights when their son or daughter goes to school. They have every right to know what is going on inside the classroom, and any suspected abuse possibly coming from inside the home can be reported to law enforcement,' Senate Republicans spokesperson John Fortney said in a previous statement. 'There is absolutely no reason for information to be concealed.' Aaron Baer, president of the Center for Christian Virtue, celebrated DeWine's signing of the Parents' Bill of Rights and said the legislation protects children by safeguarding parents' rights to make important decisions. Columbus City Schools bars religious release organizations from giving out candy, trinkets 'Whether it's a decision about healthcare, a decision about when a child has a discussion about sexuality, or a decision over whether a child can access a religious released time program like LifeWise Academy, HB 8 puts parents back in control,' Baer said. HB 172 has been referred to the Ohio House Health and Human Services Committee, where it could receive hearings open for public testimony. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Ohio woman recalls prison time, among those charged under ‘outdated' HIV laws
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — An Ohio woman who served prison time for allegedly failing to disclose her HIV status to her ex-fiancé is sharing her story as part of an effort calling for the modernization of state laws criminalizing HIV. Equality Ohio and the Ohio Health Modernization Movement released an update in late February to their report outlining six state laws that yielded at least 214 HIV-related criminal prosecutions from 2014 to 2020. The revamped report features interviews with Ohioans who have been impacted by these laws, to 'highlight the human cost of outdated laws and the necessity for policies that reflect current scientific knowledge about HIV transmission.' One interview details the story of Kelley Bean, an Akron woman who was arrested in 2010 and charged with felonious assault for failure to disclose her HIV status to her ex-fiancé. While Bean asserts that the accusation is untrue, she went on to serve five years in prison before being released in 2018. Ohio Statehouse revives bill to ban anti-LGBTQ+ conversion therapy, as cities take action Despite her charge being centered on her HIV status, Bean claims that the prison didn't test her for HIV during the first five months of her incarceration. In the report, she recalls when officers made discriminatory comments about her, including statements like, 'This is the infected one,' and 'Make sure you put gloves on when you take the cuffs off.' 'People would say stuff like they didn't want to use the toilet or the shower right after me,' Bean said. 'People wouldn't even want to or try to help me when I'd get injured or need help with anything.' Seventy-seven of the more than 200 HIV-related prosecutions were litigated under the same felonious assault charge Bean faced, penalizing those with HIV for engaging in sexual conduct without divulging their medical history. More than half, 120 cases, charged the defendants for exposing others to their bodily fluid, like by spitting or biting. All 214 charges originate under six Ohio laws that were passed to reduce transmission and end the AIDS epidemic. However, the statutes have not been reviewed by the legislature since the 1990s and are 'outdated' given they do not reflect current scientific understanding of HIV, the report argues. Ohio predicted to be key cannabis market if state law does not change That's why former Ohio House Rep. Sara Carruthers (R-Hamilton) introduced a bill last fall to repeal Ohio's revised code penalizing individuals with HIV who attempt to donate blood, and another bill altering the five other HIV laws. However, both proposals only received one hearing. Watch a previous NBC4 report on Carruthers' bills in the video player above. More than 30 years of HIV research and biomedical advancements to treat and prevent transmission show that the laws 'are now outdated and do not reflect our current understanding of HIV,' Carruthers said. Instead, these laws 'have been shown to increase stigma, exacerbate disparities, and may discourage HIV testing.' '[Both bills] would remove stigmatizing and inaccurate language from several laws and would provide protections against non-consensual HIV testing and HIV information disclosure,' Carruthers said. The lawmaker told NBC4 at the time she was looking for a representative to continue advocating for the bills after her term ended last year. Since the new General Assembly began in January, similar bills have not been introduced. Carruthers' claims are backed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which states HIV is not spread through saliva or unbroken skin and there are no documented cases of the virus spreading through spitting. Those living with HIV also cannot pass the virus through sex when they have reached an undetectable level of HIV in their blood, achieved through medication estimated to be 100% effective. The remaining 17 cases from 2014 to 2020 were related to sex work, under solicitation and prostitution laws that can penalize HIV-positive Ohioans for activities that don't lead to the transmission of the virus. Marysville's LGBTQ-friendly Walking Distance Brewing permanently closes Most recently, a Marietta sex worker was charged with engaging in solicitation after a positive HIV test, leading police to issue a public health notice. The woman was indicted in Washington County for allegedly engaging in sex acts with at least 211 individuals from early 2022 through May of last year. Equality Ohio and OHMM's report also told the story of a transgender woman under the pseudonym Anna, who was arrested in Cleveland in 1998 by an undercover detective for solicitation. The report says that Anna's charge traditionally would've been a misdemeanor, but because she confessed to being HIV positive it was elevated to a felony. 'Once they find out that you have that disease, they try to put it to the forefront,' she said. 'That's all they want to talk about is your status. … They don't really want to talk about the charge; they want to talk about your status.' Anna took a plea deal and was sentenced to 18 months in a men's prison, during which she didn't receive trans healthcare known as gender-affirming care, the report states. After her incarceration, she was required to register as a sex offender for 10 years, which she said prevented her from getting a stable job. Read more from Bean's and Anna's stories, in addition to a third interview with an Ohio man who lived with HIV for more than 42 years, in the report below. The-Enforcement-of-HIV-Criminalization-in-OhioDownload Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
06-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
‘There's a lot of fear out there.' Transgender Ohioans respond to Trump's two sex executive order
(Stock Photo by) Transgender Ohioans are grappling with confusion, chaos and fear in the weeks following President Donald Trump's executive order saying there are only two sexes. 'Trans folks have always been here, and transgender communities cannot be erased by the flick of a pen,' said Dwayne Steward, executive director of Equality Ohio. 'However, the chaos that's been created by this has definitely caused severe harm to transgender communities, to the extent that families are planning to leave the state or the country and people are talking about de-transitioning, which will cause major psychological trauma.' On Trump's first day back in office on Jan. 20 he signed an executive order saying the U.S. government will only recognize two sexes, male and female. 'These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality,' according to Trump's executive order. 'Gender ideology is internally inconsistent, in that it diminishes sex as an identifiable or useful category but nevertheless maintains that it is possible for a person to be born in the wrong sexed body.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Dara Adkison, executive director of TransOhio, called Trump's executive order propaganda. 'The laws haven't changed, the policies have not officially been changed, but we are seeing in some places both anticipatory and preemptive compliance with potential policies that can be enacted, and that is doing some real harm, but it's also what is causing so much confusion right now,' Adkison said. The U.S. State Department has stopped issuing U.S. passports with 'X' gender markers and has suspended processing all applications from Americans looking to update their passports with a new gender marker. The executive order does not apply retroactively to current passports. 'Some transgender folks who are trying to get a passport currently or make changes to their passport are having a hard time with that,' Adkison said. 'For people who have applied for one and haven't received it back yet, we don't know what that process looks like, because it's unprecedented, and we're just figuring it out, crowd-sourced information with you know everyone across the state and national partners, and wishing we had more concrete answers for folks.' Steward has seen an increase in people who have been contacting Equality Ohio's legal clinic due to issues they are having with passports and changing their ID. 'The preemptive compliance that is happening from the various agencies around these executive orders is very troubling and dangerous,' Steward said. 'We're seeing some trans folks have reported that their passports or IDs have been confiscated.' The Trump Administration is fostering an environment that is unsafe for transgender people to exist, Steward said. 'They're trying to legislate trans folks out of existence, but trans folks have always existed,' Steward said. The Trevor Project saw a 33% increase in volume of phone calls, text messages, and chats to their crisis line on Inauguration Day (Jan. 20) and a 46% increase on Jan. 21 compared to typical daily rates weeks prior. 'There's a lot of fear out there, and justifiably so, and we're just trying to help people through what is based off of stuff that is actually happening versus what we are being told could happen in the future,' Adkison said. Adkison said this executive order also excludes intersex people, who are individuals born with variations in their sex characteristics that do not fit the typical binary definitions of male or female. It is estimated that up to 1.7% of the population has an intersex trait, according to the Center for American Progress. 'Intersex people are very real and concretely exist as well,' Adkison said. Follow Capital Journal Reporter Megan Henry on Bluesky. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
