PINK ESSENCE TRANSGENDER FRIENDLY HOMELESS SHELTERS link (Please leave a comment if you know of more shelters. This list includes only one in Southern California and it's for gay youth.)
We've met more than one person living in a van or in the park for years who are resistant to try getting into a shelter because they are transgender. We also know of some people, in all these cases these were or are MEN, who are in mental health programs that lead them to shelters on the basis that transgender people are crazy! We even know of someone whose case manager wants them to get SSI on the basis of sexual identity confusion. (Are you crazy if you're transgender?) But what then? A life of living on disability just to get housing? Sleeping behind a restaurant in West Hollywood can't last forever can it?
USUALLY IF A SHELTER TAKES A TRANSGENDERING PERSON IN, they will be put in with the people who have the same biological sex. So if you're a man and you're on hormones and growing breasts you will still be put in with men if you are pre-surgery (on your penis) and after surgery (without penis) you'll be put in with women.
Homeless transgender people have difficulty finding places they can wash. They find that the gym doesn't want them in the men's locker room or the local swimming pool doesn't want them in the ladies because there are kids around. A certain small percentage of people are born with sexual characteristics of both sexes and they have the same issue. OFFERS TO DRESS AND UNDRESS BEHIND CURTAINS DOESN'T SEEM TO WORK. There is also a concern that a transgender man pre-surgery may be a rapist in the ladies room.
At shelters transgender people are afraid of more than the usual problems with room mates. Men are afraid the other men in the room will beat them up.
We think this is a true concern.
3 comments:
I came to Los Angeles escape homelessness in Fort Lauderdale after and gentlemen beat me up. My mistake was not calling Broward County to have him arrested in his own home. He was drinking a fifth of vodka a day and threatening me because he was screwing up.I lived i my car and local blacks began threathtening me. LA LGBT has tried to help. I have a BS from UofH but just returning from Canada I need to find a job. I have 16 years writing experience with Fortune 500 in Houston and as a transgender person that makes me at risk. And I was threatened by this black gentleman today for riding the bus back to San Pedro and 7th with my groceries. I have serious issues and wish to move to Seattle in hopes of finding less violence. I have a social security disability claim pending and I just moved it to the Los Angeles office last week. I'm getting Assistance from the la LGBT Center and am a member of the seniors group. This has not stopped the threat of violence from people who have nothing and want to take just my groceries ans my purse and leave me dead to ensure that they have their male dominance to take home to bed with them on the street. I am desperate and my mother won't speak to me and I'm afraid my corpse will go unburied.
Katherine, do not go back to the area where you are being threatened with violence or anywhere in downtown LA. See if the LGBT can get you into a shelter in Hollywood/West Hollywood but if not, get yourself to the San Fernando Valley. We can't promise you won't experience violence, but an armory shelter has overnight security and social worker intakes and there are a few open in the area. There are homeless out there who are more protective and sharing rather than these brutes you've met. LA is huge and it's not easy for a newcomer to know where they are. We suggest that during the day you spend time at a library in a better community as well.
We're posting your plea so that maybe someone reading this can direct you towards work or a retraining program or other useful information.
We hope and pray that by the new year you will find yourself in better circumstance!
Hi there
My name is Summer. Im a mtf living in So. Cal too. I can fully relate to your crys for help having experienced a grest deal of violence myself, including 4 attempted murders. I wish I had better answers but really the trans community tends to communicate with each other as to where safe is snd isnt. Downtown isnt.
The fact that you hooked up with LA LGBT is a good thing. Stay in touch with them. Try an orangisation called Chirp. Theyre trans friendly and can usually help with housing and different income levels.
I havent had any luck with shelters.In fact just the opposite.
Stay away from Orange CountY and Riverside too.
Theres no help and its totally unaccepting of trans folks. Your probably on the right track making your way to Seattle but proceed with caution. There really is no place 100% safe. The best there is is better. ...not paradise.
One last thing. .Maui Hawaii is becoming a welcoming LGBT place. If you can afford alittle more. Now that be might be paradise lol
Try Long Beach LGBT too for all kinds of resources
Best
Summer
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