Friends,
Thanks to the entire Rochester Rainbow community for their continued support as we celebrated our first full year re-opened at the Prince Street location. Looking forward to a New Year of protecting and celebrating our identities, we would like to share some of our accomplishments in 2024, our vision for 2025, and a snapshot of our current financial situation.
A Year of Successes: 2024
We were proud to be recognized by President Biden with a proclamation for Pride month and were extremely honored to receive an invitation to World AIDS Day at the White House! We equally appreciated a commendation by Rochester’s City Council during Pride!
We’ve expanded our board with new members and are proud to say that we have diverse voices from many backgrounds and activities, including Indigenous, Black, Brown, Trans, gender expansive, and Latine representation.
We’ve also led the way in facilitating quarterly community council meetings of Rochester’s LGBTQ+ organizations and groups resulting in the formulation of 5 separate committees which are hard at work strengthening our response to current events.
This year, we have seen hundreds of guests come through the Rochester Union Community Center and have hosted or led dozens of events for a range of groups and organizations, some of which include:
A post-election community art therapy session for over 40 people
5 Artist Pop-Up events, including singer/songwriters, jewelry, authors, and illustrators
A free gender expansive clothing closet
Weekly meeting of Rochester’s Queer Comics Club
A 5-week workshop series for LGBTQ+ leaders on transforming conflict in conjunction with the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Non-violence
4 regular 12-step programs
A Pride Comedy Fundraiser with Cindy Arena, Caleb Goldberg, Kai Von Doom, Mike Gamms, and Steph Adams, organized by Tootsie!
Raising nearly $4,000 in direct mutual aid to the Trans community for Trans Day of Visibility
Lectures such as Madelein Murphy’s “The Importance of Queer Storytelling”
Hosting the Queer Stories Now teen program by Rathaus Press
Affirming, safe, joyful, free, Queer space at our community center!
We are equally proud that our award-winning Lilac Library — New York State’s oldest and largest circulating queer library — has been bustling with activity:
Expanded open hours to Sundays 2 - 4 and Wednesdays 6 - 8 (we hope to offer even more availability soon!)
Over 160 visitors through the year
Over 140 volunteers donating over 500 hours of time
Added over 400 new volumes (books, magazines, videos and audio recordings)
Circulated countless items
Welcomed delegations from the Landmark Society Preservation Conference (where our librarian Gerry presented) and The Late Night Copies Press
Dozens of tabling events in the community
We want to thank our volunteers and many partners who worked alongside the Union this year, including Luzco Technologies, Red Fern, Progressive Insurance, The Free Art Collective, WAVE Woman Inc, Genesee Valley Gender Variants, The M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence, Spotted Rabbit Studio, The Landmark Society, and everyone who has helped along the way. We especially want to thank Rainbow Seniors ROC who shared our space, and we wish them the BEST in their new location down the street by Village Gate!
Continuing our Growth in 2025
We also have exciting plans for 2025!
The first new copy of The Empty Closet since 2020 (official announcement soon!)
The launch of a art gallery for local Queer artists (with funding from Progressive)
Sober craft n’ sip events
Pop-up art therapy Sundays
Extended library hours
Community action committees
Community talking circles
A new Trans social group
New fundraisers
Potlucks for rent in the spirit of 1970s San Francisco
Financial Update
We are so grateful for the many supporters who donate their time, talent and treasure, and we are encouraged as we continue to work our way toward financial sustainability. In particular, we want to thank Dr. Bill Valenti for his significant support—without which we would not have kept the doors open till this point.
In 2022, the Rainbow Union replaced the old Out Alliance. A new group of volunteers and directors came together under the encouragement of giants like Evelyn Bailey and formed the Rochester Rainbow Union to salvage the abandoned library (an invaluable collection of over 10,000 items of Queer media) and decades of archival materials dating back to 1971 while forging a path ahead for the next generation. Our goal was to construct a mission, vision, board, location, and structure of a new organization. Our volunteers have labored to create a new community center and safe space available to all Rainbow groups for free use, and to expand access to the collections within the Lilac Library.
Since moving into the Prince Street location, we have resolved many of the remaining outstanding liabilities and have kept our operating expenses to the bare minimum, with the enormous help of our volunteers, at approximately $3,266 each month for rent, insurance, accounting and utilities. Our recurring income (monthly donors and quarterly contributions) is approximately $1,656.91. This means that we currently operate at a monthly deficit of $1,609.09. With events like ROC the Day, we supplemented this shortfall through single time donations, and the board has successfully applied for additional funding including micro-grants. We currently have enough non-restricted funds to last us 6 months. Thank you to all our donors!
We are also working to resolve an outstanding lawsuit against the Out Alliance, brought after it ceased operations and its insurance policy ended, and before the Rochester Rainbow Union was formed. While we will not discuss the specifics of this legal matter, our pro bono counsel has disputed the allegations and claims made, and we have diligently tried to settle the suit (as well as offered to participate in independent restorative and mediation programs) in the interest of moving our whole community forward. Any monetary settlement would come out of Rainbow Union operating funds (which are currently extremely limited).
This lawsuit deals with a time when the old Out Alliance was in operation, and is wholly unrelated to the Rochester Rainbow Union, our Board is sadly aware of the fracturing that still exists in our community. We remain hopeful that all parties can arrive at a resolution that allows the Union’s community space and Lilac Library to continue to exist as an asset to our entire Rainbow community, and to allow us to keep expanding our services as part of a strengthened Union.
With your help, we want to look forward to a year of protecting and celebrating our community, and to grow for another 50 years.
Our Excited Thanks to You!
Rochester, thank you for building this space with us! This safe, affirming, and joyful community center is yours; we are just temporary custodians protecting it and working to ensure financial solvency for years into the future. An organization is not its walls and paperwork, an organization is its people, and we are grateful for the new generation of volunteers and supporters eager to forge ahead as part of the Rochester Rainbow Union. We repeat our commitment to standing with you and all members of the Rochester Rainbow community through the coming months and years in protection and Pride.
Yours in joyful Pride,
Andrew Moran, President
Maureen Connell, Secretary
Mary Belcher, Treasurer
Brandon Brooks
Stephen DeVay
Luca Jutsum
Trent Marshall
Jimmy Paulino
Griffin Van Ostrand
