A Letter From The President

PFLAG’s Coming Out Event to Have Transgender Focus

 Bob Dorr, PFLAG Omaha

 Posted on September 24, 2007

Omaha PFLAG’s Oct. 11 meeting, which falls on National Coming Out Day, will have a transgender focus. Our speaker is Ryan Sallans of Lincoln, who along with several other transgender people appeared on CNN’s Larry King Live in August.

Cheri Marti of Cornhusker PFLAG in Lincoln gave this description of Ryan: “He has spoken on many panels with me and does an amazing job of explaining his life story, how it’s impacted him personally, in his relationships, from a physiological perspective etc. He is very articulate and has a great ‘vibe’ generally.”

Ryan works for Planned Parenthood, providing educational services to schools, community organizations and clubs. He also is a Lincoln realtor.

We will devote the meeting to our National Coming Out Day program. The 7 p.m. meeting in Mead Hall at the west end of First United Methodist Church will not include support time.

AFTER SIX YEARS on Omaha PFLAG’s board, Carrie Spencer is stepping aside. As vice-president, Carrie arranged for our monthly meeting programs. She uses her computer skills as our Web administrator, prepares PFLAG’s ads for event programs, is a panelist at our Safe Schools appearances and serves on the Tom Mahony Pride Prom Committee. Carrie and Deb Kobler will represent Omaha PFLAG at the National PFLAG Convention in October.

As president, I have often relied on Carrie’s good judgment and range of skills. She is a joy to work with.

Carrie is not leaving. She will remain active in Omaha PFLAG and will keep doing much of what she now does. At our Oct. 28 board meeting, the directors will elect a new vice-president.

At Omaha PFLAG’s Sept. 13 General Membership Meeting, members elected three directors to additional two-year terms: Barbara Johnson, Gay Biga and Lauren Jansen. We elected two new directors: Patrick Heese and Rob Race.

Patrick and Rob were married in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, on July 4. An account of their marriage ceremony in the September PFLAG newsletter included this paragraph: “Although their marriage is purely symbolic and will bring them no legal benefits, it means everything to the happy couple as any legal marriage would. The real purpose of any marriage is to stand up and show your love to one another in the presence of family and friends.”

At the General Meeting, Omaha PFLAG members voted to eliminate the bylaw provision that a majority of the board must be parents. The change will permit greater flexibility in choosing directors. Six of the current 10 members are parents. I don’t expect that ratio to change very much anytime soon.

OUR SEPT. 8 TRAINING produced 11 new panelists for our Safe Schools appearances. Of the 11, three also will become presenters—two right away and the third a little later. Under the leadership of Joe Price, Suzy Adams and Betty Dorr, our Speakers Bureau is off and running on our fall schedule of appearances in Omaha-area college classrooms.

HAP ROHWER will move to Kansas City, Mo., in October to join Black & Veatch, a large engineering, consulting and construction company. In taking that job, Hap will be returning to his former field of nuclear power plant design.

Hap is among seven volunteers who staff PFLAG’s telephone help line and he is co-editor of our monthly newsletter. He formerly served as an Omaha PFLAG board member. He is a long-time Omaha PFLAGer who moved from Omaha, returned to our city after several years, became active in PFLAG a second time and now is leaving again.

Coordinator Kathy England needs a volunteer to replace Hap on the Help Line, which involves picking up and responding to recorded phone messages one day a week. Our help line receives an average of about one call a day. Anyone interested should contact Kathy at 292-1312 or england@radiks.net

Mary Gardner received two hours of training and has filled a Help Line vacancy, but we still need one person to replace Hap.

The newsletter’s other co-editor, Vicki Wiese, will assume Hap’s duties and become editor.

COMPARED WITH OTHER BENEFITS, our annual Pride Players benefit is relatively small and simple. And, even better, we help a group of talented Omaha high schoolers stage a show of short skits and monologues involving the life experiences of gay-lesbian-bisexual-transgender young people and their allies.

The next Pride Players run of shows will be Jan. 31-Feb. 3, 2008. The benefit that we share with GLSEN and Proud Horizons will be at 7 p.m., Friday, Feb. 1. The performances, as usual, will be in the upstairs Hitchcock Theater at the Rose Performing Arts Center downtown.

If you would like to consider joining a small planning group, let me know by calling 333-7064 or e-mailing bobcdorr@cox.net

We will do all our planning in a single meeting.

Bob Dorr, Omaha PFLAG president