June 22nd, 2004, 11:16 pm

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:Gentlemen! Fill me with barbeque sauce, because I am dumb as hell!: Adult Swim, Poynter VJ Lab

March 19th, 2004, 5:15 pm

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“Another week goes by, kicking and screaming, with a plastic bag around its neck.” -Hank Harrison (when told that these quotes are posted on the blog, he further commented: “There you go. That way nobody will ever see it.”)

March 10th, 2004, 7:44 am

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“It’s as quiet as a mouse, peeing on cotton.” - Hank Harrison

February 1st, 2004, 9:18 pm

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…”One of the things that is wrong with American newspapers today is their sameness. If we don’t put our personal stamp on the papers we edit, why have an editor at all? A computer program, or a corporate committee, could do the job as well if we don’t want our papers to reflect the quirks of the editor’s experience and interests. Some of us do it through the writing styles we reward with front page play. Some of us do it through the topics we are most interested in. Some of us do it through the people we know and our connections in the community –- connections in the good sense, in the sense of really knowing what people care about. In many newsrooms, editors have the closest connection to the communities they are serving. The reporting staff may be so young and so transient that they lack the history to understand why certain stories resonate with the community. Editors, who may be older and more connected to the worries of homeowners and taxpayers, can play an important reporting role in bringing those concerns to the news meeting.”Janet S. Weaver, Dean of Faculty, The Poynter Institute

January 21st, 2004, 5:36 pm

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Following is an excerpt of an interview conducted with the new Board members of the Gay and Lesbian Community Center, San Antonio. Excerpts of an interview with Gay and Lesbian Community Center, San Antonio Board Members, January 21, 2004 Michael Weaver, Chairman of the Board as of Jan 3, 2003 Nathan Javine, Secretary of the Board

After some preliminaries… LF: What are some of the issues that are facing the GLBT community? MW: The domestic partnership benefits that are being provided, or not being provided…gay marriage is a hot issue right now, services for the GLBT communiity, specifically those with HIV, breast cancer… NJ: Health care issues, domestic or intimate violence… GLBT are afraid to seek counseling, because it tends to label them… I guess those would be the most pressing issues that I’m aware of.

LF: So how does the center plan on dealing with these issues; you’ve sort of outlined four of them… MW: Starting with domestic and intimate violence, we have counseling. We have four counselors, and four interns that donate their time. The center itself, the counseling services are directed by Dr. Jordana Pazin, PhD, and programs and services, which are directed by Dr. Bibiana Gutierrez, PhD.

LF: She’s on the Board as well. MW: Yes. So we have a good knowledge base there to deal with those issues, I know that Jordana has spent many years [working] with family violence planning, uh, prevention, and currently we provide those services. Hopefully, we’ll be getting some grants that will help us to provide more of those services, and more outreach to people that are involved. Perhaps open some support groups to deal with those issues.

LF: Why don’t we talk about the grant [brought up earlier by a sales rep]… it seems like it is a huge issue that is impacting you right now. MW: Yeah. NJ: It is a big issue, because finanicially, we can’t survive without money coming in. At this point, we are running on the CDC grant, and funneling the operations of pretty much everything through the grant. MW: It limits us, because it’s just one grant; it’s a pretty specific grant.

LF: Do you remember the name of it? MW: YMSMOC. And basically what that means is “Young Men having Sex with Men of Color.” It was a grant that targets young men, 15-24, of color, and doing peer education, meeting with the gay/straight alliances within the schools, and things like that. Safe sex education, HIV prevention, testing.

LF: Is it an annual grant, or a biannual …? MW: It’s an annual reimbursement going on… NJ: It’s a reimbursement, which means money that we spend, that falls under the aspects of the grant, than the [CDC?] will reimburse us.

LF: And there’s a cap, obviously. NJ: 45-48,000 - Just say 40+

LF: What are your total expenses; how much does that cover? NJ: About half of our budget. Our budget for ‘03 was just over 80,000. Our budget for 2004 is 120,000

LF: [that's a big difference]. Where is that money coming from? MW: Wishes and prayers. From the community, companies donating funds, seeking more grants, specific to the programs and the services that we have. And we actually have a fundraising team that is targetted to raise a percentage of that. I don’t know what the percentage is… NJ: I’m not sure… We’ve become a lot more active than we have been in the past. So that’s kind of impacted the budget. The hopes are that the fundraising team will deliver more money. They’re doing more pleas for donations, and that has resulted in funds, and money coming in, and we really just kinda started that … Our [ad] relationship with the San Antonio Current should bring in some publicity, which could bring in the donations … Outside of that, we’re starting a grant committee, and their charge is to actively research grants, to do all the writing, to follow up on those.

LF: So, that committe hasn’t been formed yet? MW: It’s been formed … it formed late last year, and I think they already have met this month. The new team members.

LF: So, grants have a pretty high turnaround period … MW: Right, they have found some that are monthly, that they review applications monthly. Now, what their waiting list is, we’re not sure, because they don’t post that. But yes, some of these grants could take six months to be anything. So I think right now the focus will be more on hitting more of the smaller grants that don’t have a high turnaround time. So that we don’t have a slump. At the same time, working on those higher grants that do have the six-month waiting period, and things like that.

LF: Why weren’t you doing this in the past? NJ: [to michael] I’ll let you answer this one… MW: We, again, were limited on staff. We had an executive director, and an office manager. And the amount of work that needed to be done, didn’t allow for a whole lot of time for research. Also, we had - we still do - a poor computer system. The way our offices are set up, they would have to run downstairs to use the computer down there. If they get a call, they have to go out to the other area, it just made it difficult. It’s not really an excuse, but it’s certainly something that probably should have been done better. We learned from that. We did, I think, at one time employ a grant writer - this was before my time - but I think about two-years ago, they employed a grant writer. And that actually didn’t work out very well, from what I understand. So, it was decided that the staff would do it. And grant writing can definitely be kind of a full-time job. So it was too high of an expectation, I think, to expect that the grants would be written by one person doing it just a couple of hours a week.

LF: Were there personnel issues that were involved, or was it just a structural problem? NJ: I would think it’s probably more structural. MW: Because of the size of the organization we are, we don’t have a lot of staff. And some of this stuff could be done by volunteers. We’re at a growing period. I think we’ve been actively growing these past six months, and we’ll continue growing. We’re at a situation now where there is not enough staff to handle the work that’s there. So a lot of the Board members are actually doing the work of the staff. You know, Nathan doing all the marketing, with the Current, with OutWrite, which is our newsletter, the big screen movie night…

LF: So, how many people are on staff now? NJ: Three. MW: One full-time, two part-time. One, Dr. Jordana Pazin, all she does is direct the counseling department. So, she wouldn’t really be helping out with office work, she’s working with her interns, and the counselors.

LF: Was it a huge blow when Herrera left? MW: He’ll certainly be missed, he was an excellent PR man, very good with the media. I think we will feel it, I don’t think it’s something we can’t overcome. NJ: Tino [the interim director] has been part of the center for over four years, so the whole time Martin has been there, Tino was there … so Martin is leaving a good legacy.

(martin gave about a month’s notice)

MW: And we’re here to help Tino, with anything that he needs. The board that we have right now, we just put in four new members in January, is a much more active board than we’re used to seeing.

LF: Why is that? MW: Oh, just the types of people. It depends on who applies for the Board positions.

LF: You apply for them. Is there an approval process, or an election … ? MW: There is an interview process. This year, I think it occured December 15, we, as a Board, because we are still a Board at that time, until December 31, so all the current Board members interview all the applicants, and then there is a ballot process.

LF: Are there term-limits for your Board? MW: Yes. We have three tiers, we call them A, B, and C … let’s say someone is in for two years, and they resign from the Board, then we post that position open as an A tier. So when that person gets approved to go on the Board, they will have one-year. And all of the terms can renew for another three years. So, one person may come in because someone is actually over their timeframe, and they can come in, and at the same time, a person can come in and get six years, because they got a different tier than someone that’s replacing someone else…

LF: Why is it set up like that? NJ: Continuity. MW: Continuity, and there would always be people that knew what was going on. The learning curve, I guess.

LF: (so, what happened with the CDC grant that you are allegedly in danger of losing?) NJ: Uh, the CDC MW: The CDC changed the structure of how they give the grant, they compile them all - instead of having them broken up into different groups, they compile them all into [ ?], so that caused some lag time, and it also caused the CDC to refocus on what they actually wanted out of the grant … [?] … We are actually recieving our grant in kind of a subcontracted way. The CDC is actually providing the grant to HAC, Hope Action Care. And Hope Action Care’s agreement with the CDC is that some of the things that are required by the grant - the outreach, the counseling, the youth group, will be outsourced. So, basically, ‘We will do this part of this, but we will get another organization to do something else.’

LF: So then the CDC changed the structure of giving it to the HAC? MW: Yes. NJ: They’re the parent. MW: Yes, HAC is still the parent. NJ: They are the parent, but some of the structures have changed, and some of the things they’ve looked at - we’re still looking at - and that’s why we have to find out sort of soon if it’s going to continue or not. If HAC can better handle the outreach part of it, instead of giving it to the GLCC. MW: And I think CDC also wanted to see a few things change, they wanted to provide in different areas that before they weren’t asking for, and now they are. NJ: They just looked at the effectiveness of the grant, and so, you know, they want to get the best for their money. It’s just a natural process to review.

LF: And because it’s a reimbursement grant, the money is already spent. MW: Right. LF: Is there money in the bank, so to speak, to cover [your expenditures if you didn't get reimbursed?] What happens if it doesn’t go through? NJ: Well, our expenditures are reimbursed monthly. So we turn in reciepts to them, and report to them what we need reimbursed for. And so then the next month, we get the reimbursement. The lag time - before, we had already started to get reimbursed for the period of time that the program was being restructured. And we didn’t get the reimbursement. But we are starting to get the reimbursements back.

LF: When is your money secure until? NJ: Secure, I guess it’s never really secure.

LF: Ok, so when was the last month you were reimbursed for? MW: Oct-Nov, we are anticipating shortly getting Dec-Jan, and we are putting in for a February reimbursement, and then we don’t know if we still have it or not. We’re hoping to hear something by March, if it’s going to continue.

LF: So, it would be accurate to say that you anticipate getting the next two payments, but the future after March is kind of… NJ: For that grant? MW: Yeah.

LF: Who would be in charge of the grant writing committee? MW: At this point, it would be Tino Romero.

LF: [we've been talking a lot about the grant, is there another issue that you feel is more important?] NJ: Well, we can’t operate without money. MW: We need the donations, we need the grants. Any sources of funding, we need. NJ: The other issue that I personally feel which is of big urgency to us is - we continue to grow, our programs and services continue to grow, we’re getting ready to open a new program shortly, but we have no space. We are limited in what we can do at the Center. We’re limited by how many people we can get in a seminar; At movie night at the center (first Queer As Folk, and now the L-word) we’re lucky to be able to hold a bunch of people, because we have no room. So we’re getting ready to start a capital campaign. And looking for a building. You know, it’s down the road, s

{can hold about 30-50 people at movie night} NJ:It is very limited, we have social groups that are bigger than that. Our transgender social group has about 60-80 members. … {can’t hold events off site often, because they charge}

NJ: Without a building, we can’t grow much bigger. It’s very hard to find a night [where we can do events at the center] because it’s also a church, metropolitian community church … There are some nights that are reserved on a permanent basis for us, but it’s very hard.

{90% donations from individuals, 10% companies , around $100-500}

LF: [Do people know how much losing this grant could impact you?] NJ: It hasn’t become public knowledge.

{transcription in progress}

January 13th, 2004, 5:29 pm

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“No President has ever done more for human rights than I have.” George W. Bush

November 6th, 2003, 3:05 pm

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“Adulthood is the same is childhood — just look at the Flaming Lips!” Julian Coronado, supercool 17-year old Current intern