We Demand Actions!

protest image

Photo by Pax Ahimsa Gethen, provided under Creative Commons license.

The actions detailed here extend those developed in our #Justice4Estrella campaign. The specific actions we are requiring may be modified as we learn more about specific mechanisms of systemic violence as perpetrated by those entities identified in this section, particularly through the incident reporting and data collection component of this campaign. We will be looking for reported incidents that present opportunities to take actions such as submitting federal complaints when we have the capacity to do so.

We at Trans Pride Initiative and all the trans community and trans community accomplices signing this petition demand, at a minimum, the following:

  1. We demand of the Dallas Police Department and Police Chief U. Reneé Hall
    2. Note: we have withdrawn our specific recommendations due to further consideration that what we initially thought would be an improvement could lead to further police interaction and increase police violence agaisnt trans and queer persons. We will re-post this section when we have further refined our action items.

  2. We demand of the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department, Dallas County Sheriff Marian Brown
    3. Note: we have withdrawn our specific recommendations due to further consideration that what we initially thought would be an improvement could lead to further sheriff staff interaction and increase sheriff staff violence agaisnt trans and queer persons. We will re-post this section when we have further refined our action items.

  3. We demand of Dallas Area Rapid Transit, DART President/Executive Director Gary C. Thomas
    1. DART must publish on their web site and in all documentation mentioning passenger rights and nondiscrimination policy — or that should be reasonably expected to mention these issues — the full nondiscrimination coverage as per the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Master Agreement (see Section 12, which specifies that each recipient of FTA funds will “[p]rohibit discrimination based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex (including gender identity), disability, or age”), and that documentation will expressly identify as prohibited ALL discrimination due to sexual orientation and gender identity. Failing to make this statement that passengers will not be discriminated against due to their sexual orientation or gender identity is participation in violence against transgender persons by DART and DART administration.
    2. DART must create a public awareness campaign addressing anti-transgender bias and stigma, with campaign approval by a trans community evaluation committee. At least one transgender staff person will be hired by DART in a position of significant decision-making authority on this project for the duration of the project.
    3. DART must display at least one print media item related to the public awareness campaign on each bus and on each rail car at all times during the public awareness campaign.
    4. DART must continue the public displays of the public awareness campaign for at least 24 months.
    5. DART must bring its complaint form, currently limited to “race, color, or national origin” into compliance with the full nondiscrimination requirements by the FTA, and must include sexual orientation nondiscrimination. Allowing discrimination actively promotes violence.
    6. DART must make unedited complaints (redacted only for protected personal identifying information) by persons claiming discrimination accessing DART services available to civil rights organizations such as Trans Pride Initiative.
    7. Aggregate complaints data must be provided to the public documenting, at a minimum, the type of discrimination being reported, the findings of the investigation, and any disciplinary or other steps taken as a result of the complaint.
  4. We demand of DART Police, DART Police Chief J. D. Spiller
    1. DART police general orders or other operational policy MUST include the full nondiscrimination coverage as per the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Master Agreement (see Section 12, which specifies that each recipient of FTA funds will “[p]rohibit discrimination based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex (including gender identity), disability, or age”), and that documentation will expressly identify as prohibited ALL discrimination due to sexual orientation and gender identity. Failing to make this statement that passengers will not be discriminated against due to their sexual orientation or gender identity is participation in violence against transgender persons by DART and DART administration.
    2. DART police MUST include in general orders or other operational policy that DART officers are required to address DART patrons who may be transgender by affirming names and using affirming pronouns. The statement will confirm that failure to do so is considered harassment and subject to disciplinary action.
    3. DART police must provide a public statement — including publication on the DART police pages of the DART web site — that the DART police will not harass or otherwise discriminate against transgender persons in DART restrooms and accessing other DART services. The statement MUST confirm that the gender identity of transgender persons is considered by DART police on equal par to the gender identity of cisgender persons.
      4. Note: we have withdrawn some of our specific recommendations due to further consideration that what we initially thought would be an improvement could lead to further DART police interaction and increase DART police violence agaisnt trans and queer persons. We will re-post this section when we have further refined our action items.

  5. We demand of Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot
    1. The Dallas County District Attorney MUST collect data for ALL cases — misdemeanor and felony — filed with the District Attorney concerning persons who:
      1. identify as transgender, intersex, or gender diverse at any time during the arrest or after;
      2. are reported by any law enforcement person, attorney, or other entity to be transgender, intersex, or gender diverse; or
      3. for whom there is any reasonable indication that they may be or may be perceived to be transgender, intersex, or gender diverse by anyone involved in the case associated with arresting agency or the district attorney’s office.
    2. Data collected in compliance with item 5.a. must include, at a minimum, the date of filing, the department or agency filing, initial charges, rejection or acceptance by intake staff, Grand Jury action, recommendation for changes in the charge or diversion, name of defense attorney(s), sentencing recommendation, recommendation for dismissal, plea by accused, jury decision, and sentencing. Also to be included at initial filing and when any changes are made to the documented gender of someone not initially identified as meeting ite 5.a. are the gender as identified on legal documentation, the gender as stated by the subject, and whether the subject was perceived as possibly being transgender or intersex or gender diverse. Also to be recorded are the gender of placement in any gender segregated programs (such as diversion programs), assignments, or housing (such as shelter, transitional housing, or diversion housing placement).
    3. Anonymized individual data must be made available to independent governmental and non-governmental researchers and individuals on request.
    4. Aggregate data must be provided to the public documenting, at a minimum, the department or agency filing charges, initial charges, legal gender, self-identified gender, actions taken by the district attorney’s office in processing the case (including any referral or placement in gender segregated programs or services), Grand Jury action, charge changes, and outcome of prosecution including sentencing.
    5. The department must establish a clear contact telephone number, email, and physical contact information for reporting discrimination. This MUST NOT be an onerous Internal Affairs process or other difficult process that will discourage reporting discrimination, but MUST be a simple process that encourages reporting.
    6. The District Attorney must make unedited complaints (redacted only for protected personal identifying information) by persons claiming discrimination due to gender identity available to civil rights organizations such as Trans Pride Initiative.
    7. Aggregate complaints data must be provided to the public documenting, at a minimum, the type of discrimination being reported, the findings of the investigation, and any disciplinary or other steps taken as a result of the complaint.
    8. Due to multiple factors of marginalization in the trans community that results in extremely reduced access to satisfactory employment for a living wage, the District Attorney must seek diversion for all trans persons charged with sex work. The District Attorney must seek comprehensive sex work decriminalization.
  6. We demand of Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance, MDHA President and CEO Carl Falconer
    1. MDHA must immediately require all recipients of any funds and all members, partners, and other agencies with which the agency cooperates at any level to fully comply with the Equal Access to Housing Final Rule and the Equal Access in Accordance With Gender Identity Final Rule, along with any applicable standards under Chapter 46 of the Dallas City Code or other more affirming policy. These policies MUST BE CLEARLY LINKED AND ADHERENCE NOTED AS REQUIRED on the MDHA web site.
      NOTE: If the current administration modifies these regulations or takes any measures to weaken or alter them such that protections for trans persons are reduced in any way, MDHA must require compliance with these rules as published in 2012 and 2016, respectively.
    2. MDHA must immediately require all recipients of funding to accept trans persons by their affirmed gender. Shelters receiving funds in recent years that are known or strongly suspected to continue to discriminate include (list will change as we learn more):
      • Austin Street Centre (ESG funding)
      • SafeHaven Tarrant County (ESG funding)
      • St. Jude, operated by Catholic Charities
    3. MDHA must immediately require Continuum of Care member organizations to accept trans persons by their affirmed gender. Allowing agencies with discriminatory practices to engage at any level with MDHC condones and encourages violence, and incorporates violence in MDHA decision-making processes. A number of member organizations not only fail to provide shelter and support services to trans persons by affirmed gender, but some actively incite violence against trans persons. Current member organizations known or suspected to discriminate against trans persons include the following (list will change as we learn more):
      • Austin Street Centre
      • The Bridge (especially for discriminatory and harassing security practices)
      • Catholic Charities Dallas
      • City of Plano (has policy specifically encouraging discrimination against trans persons)
    4. MDHA must eliminate from all positions of decision-making authority all persons employed by agencies engaging in anti-trans discrimination (list will change as we learn more):
      1. Adult Shelter Committee Vice Chair Sharmeene Hayes, employed by Austin Street Centre
    5. MDHA must immediately add information to their web site about how homelessness and refusal of services by housing services providers disproportionately impacts persons who belong to LGBTQ+ communitiess. The complete absense of all information from the MDHA web site constitutes erasure of this important aspect of homeless services. Failure to include such necessary information is an act of violence in itself, and it encourages discrimination and violence by others. This willful and intentional erasure by MDHA is unacceptable.
    6. MDHA MUST hire transgender staff in positions of significant decision-making authority.
    7. MDHA MUST address the fact that since 2015 the agency has allowed there to be NOT ONE SHELTER IN DALLAS that will accepat trans persons by gender identity who have a sex offense conviction.
  7. We demand of Parkland Hospital, Parkland CEO Frederick P. Cerise
    1. Trans Pride Initiative filed a federal discrimination complaint against Parkland Hospital in 2016. We have published an overview of the issue, and a detailed timeline of events is also available. Parkland has refused to address the situation.
    2. Parkland Hospital MUST STOP allowing its physicians to discriminate against transgender persons and commit to treat transgender-affirming health care issues as medically necessary, as per professional standards of care, at all clinics.
    3. Parkland Hospital MUST STOP it's practice of hidden “separate but equal” clinics that are limited and not listed publicly in Parkland service directories.
    4. Parkland Hospital (and every other healthcare provider) MUST follow Affordable Care Act Section 1557 implementing regulations “Nondiscrimination in Health Programs and Activities.” Using actions by the aggressively anti-transgender judge Reed O’Connor to undermine the regulations does not remove the ethical professional requirements that health care providers follow these regulations in order to provide ethical care in health program settings. Failure to fully follow the provisions in the Section 1557 implementing regulations constitutes harm.
  8. We note concerning all services providers in the Dallas region and elsewhere
    1. Social services providers that fail to hold their own staff, as well as other entities to which they refer clients, accountable to violence against trans persons through refusal to serve those clients according to their affirmed gender are complicit in promoting harm against transgender persons.
    2. Any service provider who only seeks “affirming” agencies and providers that will “accept” trans persons based on their affirmed gender rather than holding all those providers accountable to the harm and violence — and the blatant disregard for social worker code of ethics and ethical standards that failure to fully accept the affirmed gender of transgender and gender diverse persons entails — are COMPLICIT IN THAT HARM AND VIOLENCE.
    3. We demand that every service provider hold all those to which they need to refer transgender or gender diverse clients accountable to the harm they cause for refusing to properly accept those clients into their services.
  9. We demand of the City of Dallas, Dallas City Council, and Mayor Eric Johnson
    1. The City of Dallas has done far too little to address employment and hiring discrimination, harassment of trans persons in public spaces, and housing and shelter discrimination, as well as other types of discrimination, harm, and violence against transgender and gender diverse persons. We demand that the City be more proactive in addressing pervasive and systemic harm against transgender persons that it often ignores, giving tacit approval to the violence.
      • We note prior work by TPI on Dallas City Code Chapter 46 improvements, which was intentionally undermined by persons with personal agendas, resulting in simplistic and largely meanintless changes during the most recent update to the chapter (2015).
      • We note the obvious, hurtful, and abusive hosting of Brazil’s President Bolsonaro by former Mayor Mike Rawlings, which should have been halted by the Dallas City Council and others at City Hall. Not only is Bolsonaro a fascist, but he fervently advocates for violence against LGBTQ+ persons in a country that experiences one of the highest rates of homicide against trans persons in the world. This support for violence against trans and gender diverse persons by City officials is unacceptable and is an example of how the City fosters and encourages harm against transgender persons such as we have seen during the first half of 2019.
      • We note a history of violence against Black and brown persons — in many cases promoted and carried out by city police and other municipal government staff — in Dallas that the City Council and municipal leaders have too long ignored or acted with a dispicable lack of interest or effectiveness.
    2. The City of Dallas must adopt changes to the City Code Chapter 46 as were proposed in 2014 and 2015, including:
      1. Lower the number of employees that exempt a business from compliance with the nondiscrimination policy from 15 to 1. There was previously no reason for the delays and intentional interference by the parties mentioned above (and others complicit in the interference) that meant a perfect opportunity for this change was lost in 2015.
      2. Eliminate the religious exemption or provide a requirement that each time a complaint is filed against an organization wishing to use the religious exemption, the organization must specifically state in a public request that they are applying for an exemption so they may be allowed to discriminate, and the target group of their discrimination.
      3. Require all housing services providers operating in the city to accept and house trans and gender diverse persons according to their affirmed gender, respecting the gender identity of trans persons equal to the gender identity of cisgender persons.
      4. Eliminate questionable coverage of restrooms in managed office buildings so that these and other like spaces are considered public accommodations without question and clearly covered under the City of Dallas nondiscrimination policy. There is absolutely no reason this should not have been taken care of in 2015.
      5. City of Dallas must identify and resolve discriminatory hiring practices though active investigation of employers disadvantaging transgender persons by withholding employment opportunities due to transgender status or perceived transgender status. TPI is aware of serious infringement on the employment rights of transgender persons by municipal departments as well.
    3. We also demand a clear statement of intent to work toward demilitarization, disarming, and dismantling of police operations.
    4. We demand support for aggressive reductions in police funding, and that funding be shifted to social support. The current system criminalizes survival work that disproportionately harms marginalized groups, and the only way to address it is by shifting our priorities away from police and incarceration, which support the structures of white supremacy, property, and other privilige at the expense of all marginalized persons.
  10. We demand of the City of Plano and Mayor Harry LaRosiliere
    1. Immediately revise the trans-exclusionary “nondiscrimination” policy passed in December 2015 by anti-transgender members of so-called advocacy organizations (particularly and especially the Human Rights Campaign, Gay and Lesbian Alliance of North Texas, and the Dallas Gay and Lesbian Alliance, all of which worked to hide the harmful impacts of what may be one of the worst “nondiscrimination” policies in the state, if not the nation). Their support then, and the continued existence of such harmful anti-trans policy, encourages the exclusion of transgender persons from services and promotes harm and violence against transgender persons here and elsewhere.

Contact Us

If you would like to contact Trans Pride Initiative either about our programs or about getting involved, please contact us to see how you can become involved!

TPI’s main web site is located at tpride.org.

TPI has a sexual health and awareness web site at tpower.tpride.org.

TPI has also teamed with two attorneys to challenge the constitutionality of Texas Family Code 45.103, which we believe is unconstitutional due to its disproportionate impact trans persons needing name changes. For more information, see 103.tpride.org.