With new digs and funding, a local nonprofit is helping queer and trans residents find safety, and a path off the streets. by Anna Del Savio

In October, Portland’s first day center for unhoused queer and trans people opened in Southeast.

The Marie Equi Center’s new Brooklyn neighborhood day shelter is intended to welcome visitors “just coming in to regulate their nervous systems in the space and hang out, or to get connected to our peer services,” center director Katie Cox said.

“We say that we’re a really LGBTQ-affirming city and space, but the services and the infrastructure have needed more support,” Cox said. The new funding, which comes from Metro’s Supportive Housing Services tax revenue via Multnomah County, “feels like folks putting their money where their mouth is,” Cox added.

Peer support and community health workers are on-site to offer basic wound care, emotional support, recovery mentoring, health education, referrals, and assistance navigating social service systems. But the 13,000-square-foot Trans & Queer Service Center also has space for visitors to come in off the street to simply sit and decompress. 

For many unhoused people, “you don’t have a safe place to be during the day where you actually feel welcome and your whole nervous system has a chance to relax and just be,” Equi program director Madeline Adams said. “So much of what we do as humans to heal or to overcome what we’ve been through requires, as a baseline, an environment… where we can come back to a semblance of having all of our faculties.”

A large room at the front of the building hosts community events that run the gamut from karaoke nights to crash courses on budgeting and cleaning for newly housed folks. 

Smaller rooms are used for one-on-one meetings with community health workers who provide emotional assistance, harm reduction, basic first aid, recovery support, health education, help navigating over services and systems, and gender-affirming referrals. 

“That can look a lot of different ways, but the goal of it is to walk alongside folks, to help them address barriers as they come up and access the resources and supports that they need,” Cox said.

Before the move—which also came with a name change from Institute to Center—the Marie Equi Institute primarily offered services out of an office in the Q Center on North Mississippi Avenue.

Scarlet Meadows first came to the Q Center two years ago for the free food pantry, but found her way into the Equi Institute’s office.

The institute’s peer support workers “helped me out a lot emotionally with the stress of being a new mom as well as being part of the queer community,” Meadows said. “There were days where I went there just to be, because it was a safe space.” Meadows ended up in Portland when their housing plans fell apart en route from Kentucky. From the Equi Center mentors, Meadows found spiritual and emotional support, and help navigating bureaucracy like Medicaid enrollment. 

“Sometimes I would go there specifically to make a phone call, just to have that support and someone who knows what questions to ask,” Meadows said.

Meadows hadn’t sought out peer services before coming to the Equi Center.

“I was still dealing with a lot of trauma and kind of stuck in my own head about certain things,” Meadows said. 

Peer health workers at Equi “move at the speed of trust,” Adams said. Rather than jumping right into tasks, workers have to build relationships with their houseless clients before those clients will open up about their needs. The bigger space allows staff to connect with visitors who need more time before opening up to a peer worker. 

When Adams was houseless, one of the hardest parts was that “people just couldn’t comprehend what I was dealing with or why I wasn’t housed,” she said. “It was always just so awkward and you could tell that people didn’t want to hear. The last thing you want to do in that situation is to ask for what you need, because by the time you reach someone that’s going to say yes, you’ve already learned that it’s not really safe to be asking.”

The Marie Equi Institute was founded a decade ago, named for “Doc” Marie Equi, a lesbian doctor and activist working in Oregon in the early 1900s (and the namesake of the local lesbian bar Doc Marie’s). The institute was created to provide queer and trans-specific primary care, right after Oregon Medicaid started covering gender-affirming care. Many of the Equi Institute’s clients came to the organization after fleeing other areas of the country where there wasn’t access to gender-affirming care, Cox said.

The center has seen a growing number of visitors who came to Portland to escape anti-LGBTQ legislation and violence in other states.

When the pandemic hit, the institute had just hit pause and started to reassess operations after their clinical director took medical leave.

The institute joined the C(3)PO coalition, which created three outdoor tent camps for homeless Portlanders early in the pandemic. Starting in sheds in the C(3)PO villages, the Equi Institute built up a community health program working “at the intersection of homelessness and public health,” Cox said. 

Last fall, the Multnomah County Board of Commissioners approved $3 million in funding for day shelters, including $830,000 to the Equi Institute, in preparation for Portland’s public camping ordinance taking effect. But the institute didn’t get the contract from the Joint Office of Homeless Services until March. The funds had to be spent by the end of June, leaving just a few months for the center to find a new location and use up the money. 

The institute signed a lease in June and got to work on renovations with Gensler, an architecture firm that also led the renovation of the Rose Haven day center. 

The building has showers, laundry services, a gymnasium, food pantry, kitchenette, computer lab, reading nook, and art space. 

Cox said staff are working on plans to use the gym as an overnight shelter during severe weather.

“We know this is going to be a big learning curve for us, having our own building,” Cox said.

Thanks in-part to the SHS funding, the Marie Equi Center has doubled in size to 15 staff, including a new peer services coordinator and a center operations coordinator. The center ended up spending $752,000 from JOHS last fiscal year and was awarded $857,000 for the current fiscal year.

A Homelessness Response Action Plan finalized by the city and county earlier this year specifically calls for more culturally-specific services, including the creation of a shelter for LGBTQIA2S+ adults.

Existing culturally-specific providers like the Marie Equi Center “know what their communities need, are doing what their communities need, and just need that funding piece and support from their partners in government to be able to make that happen or do more of it,” JOHS equity manager Emily Nelson said.

Cox wanted to add a housing navigator to the center’s expanded team, but the Joint Office didn’t award enough funding to cover that position in the current fiscal year. 

“As we expand day services and expand shelter, we have to make sure that we have ways to connect folks to permanent housing through day services and shelter,” Nelson said.

Cox said the center’s peer workers struggle to connect clients with housing services that are safe and affirming for queer and trans people. 

One of the hardest parts of the work “is the heartbreak of knowing exactly what people need and deserve and not being able to get that to those people in a real way,” Adams said.

Transgender houseless people are less likely to find shelter. Nearly 54 percent of transgender houseless people are unsheltered, compared to 39 percent of cisgender houseless people, according to the National Alliance to End Homelessness. 

The new day center won’t only serve people while they’re living on the streets or in a shelter. Trans and queer people face disproportionate discrimination in housing, both in affordable housing and market-rate rentals, so support is needed for newly housed people.

“If it’s not the rental company discriminating against you, it could be other people in the building, and then your new home is starting to feel very unsafe,” Cox said. Having a queer or trans peer who can offer support in navigating those challenges “increases the likelihood that folks are going to be able to stay housed,” they said.

“As people navigate the transition from being unhoused to being housed, they often feel like they lose their community of folks that they were living with unsheltered,” Cox said. “The more we can start to bridge those gaps early on and create that community building, the more successful we’ll be at keeping people housed.”

For more information, visit www.marieequi.center. 

When we began publishing Solar Installer in 2008, our intent was to educate the readers of Plumbing & Mechanical about systems that use the renewable energy source of the sun to heat water and buildings. We

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BISHKEK, 22 July 2016 – Three public discussions on the regulatory legal acts regarding the use of natural resources and environmental protection are being organized from 19 July to 27 July 2016 by the OSCE Centre in Bishkek and the local Aarhus Centre in the districts of Toktogul, Aksy and Kadamjay in southern Kyrgyzstan.

The discussions are gathering representatives of environmental services, the local authorities, village- and district-level state administrations, local council deputies and public organizations, to exchange ideas on environmental problems and discuss how to address them through active public scrutiny.

“Local stakeholders should be aware of the environmental legislation upfront. This will help them to prevent conflict arising from the use of natural resources,” said Dmitry Prudtskikh, Environmental Officer at the OSCE Centre. “I am glad to see that the Aarhus Centre in Osh has established a platform for communication between governmental, public and private structures, with the support of the OSCE.”

Kanybek Isabaev, Director of the Aarhus Centre in Osh, said: “For several years, we have been disseminating information to the public and our partners on the legislation regarding environmental protection, the rational use of natural resources, and subsoil and environmental safety in our country. It is very significant that citizens can participate in decision-making in the area of ecology, a sphere that is becoming increasingly important in Kyrgyzstan.”

During the discussions, participants will gain knowledge on issues of environmental protection, public access to environmental information, the normative legal acts of the Kyrgyz Republic on ecology and the basic principles of the Aarhus Convention.

The event was organized as part of the OSCE Centre's project on promoting environmental security through dialogue and enhanced disaster risk reduction.

“I am tabling the Bill entitled the Water Resources Amendment Act 2024; legislation that will ensure that Bermuda maintains the highest quality of groundwater,” Minister of Home Affairs Walter Roban said in the House of Assembly on Friday. The Minister said, “The proposed amendments will: “Establish pollution limits for the ground to help reduce the […]

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources [DENR] responded to the Coalition’s concerns on Clean Air and Water Resources Acts. A Government spokesperson said, “The Department of Environment and Natural Resources [DENR] notes the Coalition’s concerns about the Clean Air and Water Resources Act and welcomes the opportunity to clarify several key points. “The public […]

[Capital FM] Baku, Azerbaijan -- President William Ruto says Africa's natural resources and biodiversity place it in a unique position to lead global climate solutions, highlighting the continent's role beyond participation.

Re-release; Lavoie, D (ed.); Dewing, K (ed.). Geological Survey of Canada, Bulletin 609, 2022, 322 pages, https://doi.org/10.4095/326074
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Bingham-Koslowski, N; McCartney, T; Bojesen-Koefoed, J; Jauer, C. Geological synthesis of Baffin Island (Nunavut) and the Labrador-Baffin Seaway; by Dafoe, L T (ed.); Bingham-Koslowski, N (ed.); Geological Survey of Canada, Bulletin 608, 2022 p. 409-432, https://doi.org/10.4095/321859
<a href="https://geoscan.nrcan.gc.ca/images/geoscan/gid_321859.jpg"><img src="https://geoscan.nrcan.gc.ca/images/geoscan/gid_321859.jpg" title="Geological synthesis of Baffin Island (Nunavut) and the Labrador-Baffin Seaway; by Dafoe, L T (ed.); Bingham-Koslowski, N (ed.); Geological Survey of Canada, Bulletin 608, 2022 p. 409-432, https://doi.org/10.4095/321859" height="150" border="1" /></a>

Harrison, J C; Saumur, B M; Skipton, D R. Geological synthesis of Baffin Island (Nunavut) and the Labrador-Baffin Seaway; by Dafoe, L T (ed.); Bingham-Koslowski, N (ed.); Geological Survey of Canada, Bulletin 608, 2022 p. 389-407, https://doi.org/10.4095/321858
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GLS and SF, China's largest integrated logistics service provider, are excited to announce a bilateral network partnership.

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Each Mp3 or Video offers important information, encouragement or teaches an important Biblical concept.

Each Mp3 or Video offers important information, encouragement or teaches an important Biblical concept.

CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE: LECTURES TO PROFESSING CHRISTIANS (1836-37). DELIVERED IN THE CITY OF NEW-YORK, 1836 AND 1837. BY CHARLES G. FINNEY - What is the gospel, and what is Christianity? Are there false converts in the church? What is the real difference between true and false converts? Why do Christians struggle to live a life of obedience, and to win the lost to Christ? Does salvation really produce holiness? Does Christ actually make us holy so that we can enter heaven? Is this the message of the gospel? And how can we ourselves become HOLY?

Identification of the biblical emphasis in the thought and life of Francis and Edith Schaeffer, with a focus on the development of their early ministry in the United States and Europe and the founding of L'Abri. The course considers issues related to spiritual growth, the Christian family, the unity of the church, Christians and the arts, and various aspects of Christian ministry.

Christian Faith Downloads -- "1st Corinthians 2:5 That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God."

Guest Resources announces expanded accredited skills training, focusing on human resource learnerships and national certificates. These programs aim to empower South Africa's workforce by bridging the skills gap and enhancing employability, supporting economic growth.

There are so many things you need to know about before opening your own business, and it can get pretty overwhelming at times. You need to take advantage of any resources you can find that will help you to get where you need to be, and operate a successful small business, from information on creating business plans to the actual daily operations. Some resources are very helpful, while some are just a waste of time. To help keep you from wasting your time on the not-so-great resources, here are our 9 favorites.

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Making the right investment in your small business can mean the difference between growth and stagnation. What that right investment is – marketing, training, technology, labor, personal development – will vary from business to business and owner to owner, depending on a variety of factors.

Several entrepreneurs recently shared their best business investment from the past year, or top planned investment for this year.

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Business owners need to constantly learn in order to be successful. Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned entrepreneur, resources like business experts, books, tools and exercises can help you shape your strategies and cultivate sustained success. Here are some suggestions from members of the online small business community for resources and tips that can help you build a successful business and life.

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Staying tuned in to the pulse of your industry is key to becoming a successful entrepreneur. Public groups, online forums and the like are among the most valuable resources for gathering and contributing industry information. But if someone is looking for in-depth insight into their business niche, locating the right groups where this discussion occurs is the first step. T

I just had a conversation with someone who has formed a Delaware LLC and is ready to invest in growing his business. Specifically, this individual was looking for a paid…

Some of the best cheap Computer resources links to related websites.

Article by Guest Blog Contributor Karen Schweitzer.

Are you an instructor or trainer looking for new ways to entertain and engage your students online? The Internet is loaded with free tools, blogs, and informational sites that are designed to aid and improve your courses. Here is a list of 20 free eLearning and training resources worth checking out:

Tools

• CourseLab - CourseLab offers a free eLearning authoring tool that can be used to effectively create web-based training. Some of the features users will find with this system include layout, editing, rich-media support, rapid development, testing, and interactivity.
• MyiCourse - Instructors can use this site to create free online courses or universities for educational material. MyiCourse gives users the ability to create public or private courses on just about anything.
• Utilium - Utilium is a free beta site that provides instructors with the tools they need for organizing and sharing learning materials. This site makes it easy to inspire and engage students through videos, articles, podcasts, and other rich sources.
• Prezi - Prezi is a unique presentation tool that uses zooming technology instead of slides. With Prezi your ideas flow freely on a stage that can be zoomed in on and out of for further explanation.
• Yugma - This free online conferencing tool makes it easy to host web conferences and online meetings. With Yugma Free, users can share their desktop with up to 20 attendees.
• Open Huddle - Open Huddle is a beta site for presenting or instructing people online. This site provides you with files, video, audio, chat, and drawing boards for interacting and collaborating with your students.
• Campfire - Campfire can be used for online group chat and education. This site allows users to instantly create password-protected chat rooms for collaborating and working out important questions. Campfire comes at a cost, but users can try it free for 30 days.
• Slideshare - Slideshare provides a way to upload and share presentations. Once the presentations are uploaded, they can be shared privately or publicly and work well for webinars.
• SourceForge - This site provides a free authoring application that can be used to assist instructors in creating free eLearning seminars. SourceForge employs the eXeLearning tool which provides the ability to publish web content without knowing HTML or XML markup.
• ClassMarker - ClassMarker features a free way for instructors or presenters to test students online. Simply sign up for a free account for access to an array a quiz creating materials. The quizzes can even be linked directly to websites or emails.

Blogs

• eLearningLearning - eLearningLearning is an online community blog dedicated to organizing and collecting material about eLearning. Within this blog, users can find information about eLearning technology and media, events, and ideas.
• eLearning Technology - eLearning Technology is a blog that provides information and resources on the latest in the business of learning. Just a few of the concepts discussed in this blog include trends, software, rapid eLearning tools, and open source eLearning.
• eLearningSpace - The eLearningSpace blog offers information, knowledge, and networks that are specifically designed for eLearning instructors.
• Corporate eLearning Strategies and Development - This blog provides information that explores technology for eLearning. Within this blog, instructors can find resources, ideas, technology, and more.
• Thoughts from Training Time - This blog deals with the issues and ideas that can be found in corporate and government training.

Informational Sites

• eLearningPost - The eLearningPost site provides blogs and articles that instructors and trainers can use for information. Within this site, users can explore views, news, and stories that surround eLearning, corporate training, instructional design, and much more.
• eLearning Magazine - eLearning Magazine offers a free place for instructors and trainers to find a wealth of information through articles, reviews, case studies, and more. This public information center is also an excellent place to find forums and exchange ideas with others.
• Web-Based Training Information Center - This free info center provides information and resources on web-based training trends, surveys, and more.
• Learning Circuits - Learning Circuits is a free informational site from the ASTD. The goal of this site is to provide a large database of eLearning and training knowledge as well as efficient training technology.
• BusinessBalls.com - BusinessBalls.com provides free materials, exercises, tools, ideas, and templates that instructors and other eLearning professionals may find helpful.

Guest Blog Contributor By-line:

This post is from education writer Karen Schweitzer. Karen is with the About.com Guide to Business School. She also writes for OnlineCollege.org, an accredited online college resource.

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I know I haven't been around much... I was sick all of March and the top of April. But I'm back with a bunch of free resources. Today we can start with Podscribe, which my good buddy TL Pierce of How to Blog for Fun and Profit turned me on to. The place is called Podscribe. When you reach maximum absorption go to their links page - tons of great stuff.

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Bobby Maddex interviews David and Mangala Frost of the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies (IOCS) about a new IOCS Orthodox evangelism tool called The Way, now available in the United States exclusively through Conciliar Press.

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John Maddex interviews Fr. Evan Armatas about a great resource for families as they prepare for their journey through Great Lent. With the coupon code AFR2014, receive a 10% discount. Find out more HERE.

Bobby Maddex interviews Steven Christoforou, the Youth Protection and Parish Ministries Coordinator for the Department of Youth and Young Adult Ministries of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese (GOA) of America and the host of the Ancient Faith Radio video podcast Be the Bee, about the many resources for youth and young adult ministry that are available from the GOA.

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Bobby Maddex interviews Anne Van Fossen, the Chief Academic Officer of The Classical Learning Resource Center. Together they discuss some exciting new developments at the CLRC, including a new online academy!

by Bashar H. Malkawi Copyright is an engine for knowledge. Although copyright creates monopoly, it should not be considered as a good in itself, but as a tool which can be used to achieve desirable objectives in society. Against the

The utilisation of big data presents significant opportunities for businesses to create value and gain a competitive edge. This capability enables firms to anticipate and uncover information quickly and intelligently. The author introduces a human resource scheduling optimisation strategy using a parallel network fusion structure model. The author's approach involves designing a set of network structures based on parallel networks and streaming media, enabling the macro implementation of the enterprise parallel network fusion structure. Furthermore, the author proposes a human resource scheduling optimisation method based on a parallel deep learning network fusion structure. It combines convolutional neural networks and transformer networks to fuse streaming media features, thereby achieving comprehensive identification of the effectiveness of the current human resource scheduling in enterprises. The result shows that the macro and deep learning methods achieve a recognition rate of 87.53%, making it feasible to assess the current state of human resource scheduling in enterprises.

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Since the advent of the iPhone and rise of mobile technologies, educational apps represent one of the fastest growing markets, and both the mobile technology and educational app markets are predicted to continue experiencing growth into the foreseeable future. The irony, however, is that even with a booming market for educational apps, very little research regarding the quality of them has been conducted. Though some instruments have been developed to evaluate apps geared towards student learning, no such instrument has been created for teacher resource apps, which are designed to assist teachers in completing common tasks (e.g., taking attendance, communicating with parents, monitoring student learning and behavior, etc.). Moreover, when teachers visit the App Store or Google Play to learn about apps, the only ratings provided to them are generic, five-point evaluations, which do not provide qualifiers that explain why an app earned three, two, or five points. To address that gap, previously conducted research related to designing instructional technologies coupled with best practices for supporting teachers were first identified. That information was then used to construct a comprehensive rubric for assessing teacher re-source apps. In this article, a discussion that explains the need for such a rubric is offered before describing the process used to create it. The article then presents the rubric and discusses its different components and potential limitations and concludes with suggestions for future research based on the rubric.

With the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology, significant breakthroughs have been made in its application in many fields. Especially, in the field of enterprise human resource management and employee performance evaluation, AI has demonstrated its powerful ability to optimise and improve performance. This study explores the application of AI in enterprise human resource management and how to use AI to evaluate employee performance. The research includes analysing and comparing existing AI-driven human resource management models, evaluating how AI can help improve employee performance and leadership styles, and designing and developing human resource management computer systems for enterprise employees. Through empirical research and case analysis, this study proposes a new AI-optimised employee performance evaluation model and explores its application and effect in practice. In general, the application of AI can improve the efficiency and accuracy of enterprise human resource management, and provide new possibilities for employee performance evaluation. At present, artificial intelligence technology has been widely used in various fields of daily life, especially in corporate human resource management, providing better support for the development of enterprises.