Building The Safe Place: A haven for the OKC LGBTQ+ community
- by Robin Dorner
Editor in Chief
In 2020, Christian Council was attacked by two people, and he was left bloody and bruised, with a gash below his right eye and swelling on his head and body. During the attack, the two were yelling homophobic slurs at Council. However, that fact is not mentioned in the Edmond Police report.
From the mass of media attention this attack drew, Council received many messages from people young and old. These people were not just Oklahomans, but people from around the world reached out to this young man in support.
“My situation resulted in the arrests of my attackers and worldwide media attention, but others had the opposite experience,” said Council. “No justice, no media coverage, no GoFundMe for their medical bills, etc. This weighed on me heavily.”
It was during this time that Council also learned that the Oklahoma LGBTQ+ community is not protected under Oklahoma hate crime laws.
“I felt in my heart and soul that I needed to find a way to use all of this media attention and support to somehow make a difference for my fellow community, especially queer & trans youth,” Council said.
This is how the idea for The Safe Place Community Center was born. The Safe Place is created as Oklahoma’s first dedicated housing, support, and community center for LGBTQ+ youth, because survival should not be the standard, and no queer or trans young person should be left without a safe place to call home.
“The Safe Place is laying the foundation for the first LGBTQ+ housing facility in Oklahoma and, though small, is ready to scale, with a clear plan, a passionate team, and proven community demand,” he said.
And they have already secured funding. In fact, they received $50K from the Melinda Gates Foundation to help build the center.
Council said his hands were shaking once he opened the envelope and saw the large check!
“The money came from Melinda Gates’ foundation originally, but was passed to us from The MATTIE Fund hosted by the National Philanthropic Trust, a philanthropic initiative launched in 2024 with a $20 million contribution from Melinda French Gates and Pivotal Ventures.”
Council said he was overwhelmed with happy emotions when he opened the check.
“My mind started racing to all of the different ways we can help queer and trans youth in Oklahoma with this money,” Council exclaimed. “Two of my board members happened to be with me at that exact moment, so I FaceTimed another one of them and had my camera facing away from me, zoomed in on the $50,000 amount!
“It was such an amazing moment, full of adrenaline and emotion! They started cheering, and I turned the camera back to myself and immediately started crying happy tears. I remember saying: “We are going to help so many people with this money. And this proves to me that people really believe in what we are doing.”
The vision for this community center is to build a haven for queer and trans Oklahomans to gather and know that they are accepted and wanted, no matter their sexuality or gender identity. Plans include a community center that provides housing to queer or trans Oklahomans experiencing homelessness or abuse/neglect in their home environment, outreach programs to Oklahoma Schools, and putting The Safe Place’s information in the office of every school guidance counselor so they may give our information to any students they think are at risk of homelessness or abuse because of their queer or trans identity.
“We also want The Safe Place to have trained, therapist-led programs for Oklahoma parents to come and be properly informed and educated on how to handle their queer or trans child’s identity in a healthy, nurturing way,” Council said. “Of course, we have many other dreams and goals for The Safe Place. However, it all starts with raising money.”
The group has also raised money by hosting a fundraiser called “The Safe Place Drag Race,” where local queens performed and competed against each other in different Drag Race-style categories and challenges. There is also “The Safe Place Society,” a title given to the ever-growing group of people who have signed up on our website to pledge a recurring monthly donation to The Safe Place.
“The community has also reached out to us for other fundraising efforts, such as being the recipient of drag bingo hosted by the wonderful Sisters Of The Sacred Heartland,” Council included. “We have some Oklahoma families who have made a couple of larger donations, and even a family in Arkansas made a large $3,000 donation last December!”
Taking on a project of this size is quite a task, and The Safe Place is working toward its goals.
“Our financial projections for Phase I (Leasing a small community center to host our events, social support groups, clothing closet, etc.) are a little over $49,000 in up-front costs to get it open and an estimated $6,813 in ongoing monthly costs to keep it staffed and running.
“For Phase I, the plan is only the community center part; we will raise much more funding before we open a building with the ability to provide temporary housing. We are currently providing temporary housing with micro-grants for extended-stay hotels, sober living houses, etc.”
In addition to the aforementioned fundraising, they also recently received $5,000 from PayPal and another $25,000 from the National Philanthropic Trust’s MATTIE Fund (in totally unrestricted funds). And there is no deadline for using the first $50k from the MATTIE Fund that Melinda Gates’ grant gave us.
As of the time of this writing, they do not have a location for building a center.
“We plan on starting with a small community center space and open that before the end of 2026,” he said. “We will open that community center while still raising funds for a larger facility to provide housing and more.”
The Safe Place has formed partnerships with SISU and Diversity Family Health, and continues to host events for queer and trans youth.
Their board members include: Christian Council - Board President; Jeff Wilson - Vice President; Lexie Garrison – Treasurer; Jeremy Rudder – Secretary; Laine Soto – Director; Danielle Tipton – Director; and Houston Payne – Director.
In terms of community support beyond donations, our biggest supporters include Dr. Melinda Chen at OU, Dr. Lindsay Churchill at UCO, the Executive Director and case workers at SISU, The Sacred Sisters Of The Heartland, and many more. In terms of donations, we are constantly getting small donations on our website from people all over Oklahoma!
“The Safe Place even has a supporter several states away who donates a piece of each paycheck and has it automatically mailed to us on his paydays. We have also received support in the way of large donations from a few families in OKC and Tulsa, but they wish to remain anonymous.”
For more information or to get involved, visit www.thesafeplaceokc.org.
The Gayly online. 9/1/26 @ 4:48 p.m. CST.