The Fight To Keep HERO - October 8

There was interesting HERO news that happened yesterday.  

First the bad news.  The HERO haters got together at Second Baptist with 100 predominately white people on stage to have a press conference trying to convince Houstonians to vote against Prop 1.

And as usual they peddled the predator lie and tired to attack Mayor Annise Parker .

How ironic that this event happened at a anti-trans megachurch who had a youth minister sent to jail for 5 years  for actually being a child predator. 

Can you say 'hypocrites' people?

They need to stop projecting and look for the predators in their own GOP dominated ministerial ranks.  These out of town GOP activists and their kneegrow sellouts also need to stop meddling in Houston human rights business.

Now for the good news. A recent Houston Area Realtors poll revealed that a majority of Houstonians favor keeping the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance and it's not even close. 

Houstonians in that HAR poll favored HERO by a 51%-36% margin with 13% undecided.  While that's good news, we can't relax until November 4.

What's November 4?  The day after Election Day.. 

The other good news from that poll is that two of the 2015 mayoral candidates vying to succeed Mayor Annise Parker and who support HERO in Sylvester Turner and Adrian Garcia are tied for the lead in it. 

The poll reflects the general perception of the race in that the front runners are Turner and Garcia with three other candidates close behind.   The HERO haters like Ben Hall are at the bottom.   .

African-Americans for Prop 1 just put out another meme aimed at the Black community pointing out why the HERO is needed and necessary in our city.

There was also an event held at the Houston Area Urban League headquarters October 6 which was a conversation about racial discrimination.    56% of the HERO complaints received by the OIG office between May 28, 2014 and September 2 were for once again, RACIAL discrimination, with 17% being gender discrimination.

Tomorrow (October 9) starting at 5:30 PM on the UH campus will be a panel discussion on the topic of HERO and the Future of the LGBTQ Movement.  

It is presented by Texas Rising (of the Texas Freedom Network) and the Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies Student Group and will take place in the Bayou Room of the UH Student Center

The discussion will focus on why local non-discrimination policies like HERO are so important and how we must include trans* people and people of color in post-marriage campaigns to win comprehensive non-discrimination policies and to honor LGBT history that is often overlooked.

Additional discussion will center on how we go about ensuring that the most vulnerable communities not only be at the table, but be leading the tables moving forward as a movement.

Scheduled panelists for this discussion are: --Mike Webb (Legacy Community Health)
--Jaimie Bockmon (UH Student and activist)
--Melanie Pang, LMSW (Social worker and social justice activist)
--Dee Dee Waters (Houston activist)
.
Hope people can attend because it should be an interesting discussion.