Equality Pennsylvania and HRC partner for equality

With the gubernatorial election rapidly approaching, Equality Pennsylvania and the Human Rights Campaign have joined forces to secure equality in the Keystone State. The partnership will focus on improving relationships between LGBTs and people of faith in order to gain support for passing non-discrimination legislation on a local and national level.

EQPA recently celebrated the revision to the Department of Motor Vehicle's gender marker policy that now allows trans Pennsylvanians to update the gender on their state-issued identification cards without sex reassignment surgery.

The initiative marked the first success of an extensive agenda EQPA Executive Director Ted Martin hopes will allow his group to become the Commonwealth's quintessential LGBT civil rights organization. Martin is confident these partnerships will allow the non-profit to expand its bandwidth in lieu of a dwindling budget.

"I think it's important for non-profits to collaborate because it strengthens the fact that there's probably not great numbers in your budget to maybe throw at your efforts like for-profit institutions," he told EDGE. "We're trying to broaden the scope of what we do and I think partnerships are really the best way to do that. I think we're trying to look for like-minded organizations that are interested in our point of view and work with them as best we can. This is a long journey but I think these are all steps in the right direction."

Martin added EQPA will collaborate with the NAACP, America Votes and other non-profits on special projects in the coming months.

Allyson Diane Hamm, vice-chair of the Allentown Human Relations Commission, will serve as a statewide organizer for both EQPA and the HRC. She will educate LGBT Pennsylvanians on the upcoming election and conduct outreach to groups located throughout the state that may be helpful in the efforts to pass non-discrimination measures.

"[Hamm] will be working with churches, attending community meetings and speaking with our members to make sure that congress hears that LGBT people deserve to work free from the threat of discrimination," said Sultan Shakir, regional field director for the HRC. "Communities of faith have long been a strong voice in advocating for the equal treatment of all people. The struggle for equality is one that is strengthened by working with communities of faith, just as all struggles for equality have benefited from partnerships with other communities. With many LGBT people being a part of communities of faith, it's natural to look for ways to build stronger relationships."

Shakir added the upcoming election is especially important to LGBT Pennsylvanians, as it would most likely decide the fate of the federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

"With a vote on ENDA likely to happen after the upcoming elections, this partnership will allow us to increase the work in progress-to generate constituent contacts to Congress," Shakir told EDGE. "Much of that work involves talking to people face to face, in priority congressional districts, to make sure that members of Congress continue to hear that Pennsylvanian's support equality. This election year is key with the state house up for grabs and with senate races polling neck and neck. This partnership will increase the number of pro-equality voters who know why this election is so important."