Freedom Oklahoma gears up for 2016

by Robin Dorner
Editor in Chief

The Freedom Oklahoma board met this week to discuss the upcoming year and work on their strategic planning. Mark Henricksen, current Board Chair welcomed new members of the board. These members include Dr. Marlo Miller, Mark Van Dorn, Allyson Coffee and Dr. Megan Gandy.

Jenn Arlen, Bill James and Steve Funck recently joined the board and Lamont Lindstrom, Aiden Waidner-Smith, Brett Baldwin, Fredrick Redwine Paula Sophia, Randy Tate, Mark Henricksen are standing members.

Henricksen proposed bylaw amendment for a chair-elect. The person nominated and elected was Brett Baldwin. The current executive committee is vice chair, Allyson Coffee; Steve Funck, Treasurer; Frederick Redwine, Secretary and Paula Sophia was Chair of the political arm of the organization.

There are currently 21 bills in the capitol that Freedom Oklahoma has to research, monitor and fight. They plan to have a press conference at 11 am at the Oklahoma State Capitol on Tuesday, January 26th and encourage everyone to be there (press room, 4th floor on north side of building).

Tahlequah is the next city Freedom Oklahoma plans to work with to for inclusion of LGBT non-discrimination in city policies.

Marlo Miller race director committee for the Equality Run said her committee already has an outline for the vision for the run.

“We’re going from the botanical gardens and making it more of an event this year,” said Miller. “I think we have a better understanding of what we want this year as far as marking the path, road safety and getting a package together for the runners. It’s going to be really nice.”

Miller said their goal is to get 500 registrants. “The more registrants, the bigger the medals!”

The run is set for Saturday, June 25 (Pride weekend). The start time of the run is pending.

Brett Baldwin spoke about the Freedom Oklahoma Gala, 2016. “It’s time to get ‘the asks’ out so we have an opportunity to get some funds started for the gala,” he said. “If we are going to get more funding we need to get more from foundations or corporate asks.”

The group is leaning towards the Hall of Mirrors at OKC’s Civic Center. “It’s less expensive than the last venue and we can bring in our own food and beverage,” adds Baldwin. “We could possibly do the event for half of what we did it last year and it be just as spectacular.”

They are leaning towards a Roaring 20’s theme and the date is tentatively set for Thursday, October 20th.

Paula Sophia spoke, sharing that since the launch of the “I am Cait” E-TV show, many transgender individuals have had increasing acts of discrimination on them.

“One so blatant I haven’t experienced such since 2004. I was concerned that trans people won’t speak out for themselves,” said Sophia.

Sophia set up a Facebook group and had a meeting to see who might be interested in a trans advocacy group to see who might be interested.

“We had 30 people show up,” exclaimed Sophia! “It was encouraging to see that there were that many people that were willing to stand up for themselves.”

“Visabili T” is the name decided at the meeting for the group. According to Sophia, long and short-term goals were set and they will not be a separate group from Freedom Oklahoma, but to develop a group who can be cohesive with the work of Freedom Oklahoma.

Discussion of better organization of DBA (Diversity Business Association) was held. A follow-up meeting of a committee will be held on February 4th. Any active member of DBA are invited to join.

For information, visit www.freedomoklahoma.org.

Freedom Oklahoma is Oklahoma's statewide LGBT advocacy organization, and a proud member of the Equality Federation. Freedom Oklahoma is the unified organization resulting from the merger of The Equality Network, a 501 (c) (4) organization that lobbies for pro-equality legislation and public policies; and the Cimarron Alliance Foundation, a 501 (c) (3) organization that engaged in public education in support of the LGBT community.

The Gayly – 1/24/2016 @ 4:23pm CST