A Space of Our Own: LGBTQ Organizations Move to Ownership

When Ceyenne Doroshow first began raising money to buy a building that would provide safe housing for transgender women in New York City, she recalls, “people were coming out of the woodwork trying to offer us the equivalent of crack buildings, in bad neighborhoods, with horrible policing,” just because those buildings were cheaper. But Doroshow found this unacceptable. Her organization, GLITS Inc. (Gays and Lesbians Living in Transgender Society), primarily serves Black trans women. Doroshow says after facing so much harassment and discrimination in the rest of their lives, they deserve a chance to live in stable housing in a peaceful neighborhood.

Like many of the women she works with, Doroshow has spent time homeless. “Our families just may not be that nice behind the velvet rope,” she observes. This can lead to so much housing insecurity that even when they’re housed, program participants’ anxiety stays high: “As soon as they got into [an] apartment, they were already mentally processing for the next round of . . . moving on again,” she says. That’s one of the reasons GLITS emphasizes supports and leadership development along with housing.

Doroshow held on to her dream. With money raised during Pride Month 2020, GLITS bought a 12-unit apartment building in a quiet Queens neighborhood, now known as GLITS 1 South. The residents are all part of the GLITS Leadership Academy, a program that helps each participant with their health, education, and leadership development goals. The building includes its own classroom and study space.

Janetta Johnson is CEO of the TGIJP, or Transgender, Gender Variant, Intersex Justice Project. For 20 years, TGIJP has been working for justice for transgender and gender nonconforming people inside and outside of incarceration, through leadership development, reentry services, name change clinics, advocacy, and recently a wellness program.

TGIJP purchased a building in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood in 2023, creating a hub for organizing and supportive services in the Bay. The neighborhood is the location of the 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria uprising, led by young TGNC (transgender and gender non-conforming) people and drag queens against raids and overpolicing of LGBTQ+ communities. “Black trans people deserve ownership, and I’m not talking about being capitalistic,” Johnson says in the report Duranti-Martínez co-authored for LISC, “We Take Care of Each Other”: The Power and Promise of TLGBQIA+-owned spaces. “It’s important for people to have safe cultural spaces. It’s important for people to have ownership so that they can believe in themselves and their abilities.”

While TGIJP doesn’t manage housing directly, it does help its clients access housing using city resources. It’s a struggle. “Our community is the last to be housed,” says Johnson. The organization has considered owning its own housing in the future, but under the current administration, it is not currently looking to take on new projects.