Black Policy Day returned to the West Virginia Legislature Wednesday for its second year to highlight the policy issues facing Black West Virginians.
Wednesday was Black Policy Day at the West Virginia Legislature. The event is in its second year and is an opportunity for advocates to highlight the policy issues facing Black West Virginians.
Katonya Hart, one of the day’s organizers, said she wants the legislative process to be open so that all can participate. This year, the day’s focus expanded to not only look at policy, but also to help community members learn about and engage with the process directly.
“It’s that diversity when everyone’s at the table,” Hart said. “Having an opportunity to put in that we become strong, that there is a ‘we’ and there’s no longer that separation, that we’re able to keep our identity while supporting and standing in solidarity with each other.”
She said the day’s focus is broad, bringing attention and action to issues facing all West Virginians. Hart is tracking more than 200 bills this session. However one bill, the CROWN Act, is of particular interest. Hart and many other activists around the rotunda wore crowns during the day as a symbol of support for the legislation.
“CROWN stands for, ‘creating a respectable and open world for natural hair and culturally relevant hairstyles,’” Hart said.
“If I wake up in the morning and I wash my hair and I go to work and not straighten it, perm it, it’s okay,” she continued. “Nobody’s gonna say ‘That looks wild and unruly and unprofessional,’ and send me home and try to have me press it like another culture’s hair in order to file papers, to type a letter. What is the necessity of that? What is the reason for that? But so many people have found themselves in that situation, showing up for work and someone saying ‘Your Afro, your curly hair is just not professional.’”
Several municipalities, including Morgantown, Charleston and Beckley, have created their own ordinances to codify the CROWN Act’s protection locally, but advocates have been waiting to see it become state law for four years.
Hart listed issues of funding for education, the regulating of women’s bodies and legislation targeted at the LGBTQ+ community as other areas of focus.
Kasha Snyder-McDonald, the president of the West Virginia Black Pride Foundation, echoed the importance of passing the CROWN Act.
“People of color, we do have distinct hair, hair quality, something that Caucasian people have no understanding of,” she said. “Therefore it is no other body’s place to tell a person of color, what to do with their hair, how we wear our hair. Our hair is a sign of our glory.”
As an LGBTQ+ advocate, Snyder-McDonald also had her eye on several bills aimed at banning drag shows in the state, which she said is often a crucial source of income for people in the community.
“People are scared of what they do not understand or what they do not know. When it comes to the drag community, they do not know that some people that do drag, the majority of people that do drag, is because it is their livelihood, it is their way of employment,” Snyder-McDonald said. “There are so many doors that are close to the LGBTQ+ community, especially the LGBTQ+ community of color.”
“Here in West Virginia, we don’t have a lot of representation for the LGBTQ+ community, including within our own community,” she continued. “It’s very hard for us to get people to understand our vision and to see that we’re here and we’re just like everyone else. Each and every day is a struggle. We’re fighting just to be seen and just to be heard.”
Snyder-McDonald and Hart both expressed their excitement for the opportunity that Black Policy Day provides for Black West Virginians to organize and stand together for a better future.
The shooting at Club Q in Colorado Springs this past weekend was an all too familiar story for many in the LGBTQ community, and one that highlights local safety concerns.
The shooting at Club Q in Colorado Springs this past weekend was an all too familiar story for many in the LGBTQ community, and one that highlights local safety concerns.
Rev. Zac Morton of the First Presbyterian Church in Morgantown said the news out of Colorado this weekend was devastating — and exhausting.
“It has a certain level of familiarity to it, that we’ve been, not only through mass shootings before, but experiencing the fact that it’s targeted at an LGBTQ group,” he said.
Morton, who counts many local LGBTQ community members as part of his congregation, sees the shooting, even two time zones away, as a harsh reminder that security is a constant concern.
“I worry that our local communities here, events from Pride, our local LGBTQ clubs and even our church could potentially be targeted,” Morton said. “Heaven forbid, in an act of gun violence, but there’s a lot of other ways in which we can be targeted, too.”
BD Voss is a master’s student in geology at West Virginia University and the social media manager for the LGBTQ+ club on campus. This year, they chose to carpool with relatives to a family Thanksgiving gathering in Virginia because traveling in the same area was already uncomfortable for them.
“Now with the surge of hate crimes, and as someone who is very visibly not gender conforming, it’s very scary to think of going and pumping gas by myself on the way to go visit relatives,” Voss said.
They said since the relaxing of COVID-19 restrictions, there has been a concerted effort on campus to build a community. There are talks to hold a vigil when students return to campus next week, but Voss acknowledges that things are going to be difficult moving forward.
“Treat your fellow students and fellow staff members and fellow faculty and people you interact with on a daily basis with compassion as much as you possibly can,” they said.
Brad Grimes is the program coordinator of the WVU LGBTQ+ Center. He said the security of staff and students has been a primary concern for his office for years, in no small part because of increased anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.
“If you think that like last year alone in 2021, there were over 300 anti-LGBTQ bills and pieces of legislation passed,” Grimes said. “Then you see a headline, like the recent one this past weekend, it’s beyond political attacks and generalized attacks. People are dying just for who they are.”
Rev. Jenny Williams is the faith organizer at the ACLU of West Virginia. She said no place is immune to this type of violence.
“It’s just yet another assault on the daily freedoms of people because of how they identify, who they love, trying to feel comfortable in their own skin,” she said.
Williams said a lot of work needs to be done, both in the short and long-term, to create infrastructure to keep LGBTQ people safe.
“In West Virginia, we’re tied for last in the country and acceptance of queer people,” she said. “There’s long term work that needs to be done in terms of legislation, in terms of changing the conversation and faith communities.“
The shooting occurred at midnight on Nov. 20, just as the National Transgender Day of Remembrance began. Morton said the day is meant to be about confronting and remembering the devaluation of human life through rhetoric and actions that left 36 trans people dead in 2021.
After Club Q, the number is now 38.
“Different groups of people are made to kind of live with this lingering anxiety and grief. They have to ask, ‘Am I in a safe space?’ We need to move towards a society where people have to do as little of that as possible. And that’s the only way it can get done is together.”
Students at Morgantown High School staged a walkout Wednesday afternoon to protest the removal of Pride flags from classrooms. Monongalia County Superintendent Eddie Campbell asked all school principals to remove Pride flags just after the start of the school year. He cited a county policy that bans political activity in classrooms.
Updated on Thursday, Sept. 29, 2022 at 11:25 a.m.
Students at Morgantown High School staged a walkout Wednesday afternoon to protest the removal of Pride flags from classrooms.
Monongalia County Superintendent Eddie Campbell asked all school principals to remove Pride flags just after the start of the school year. He cited a county policy that bans political activity in classrooms.
Morgantown High School senior and student leader Lonnie Medley, who uses he/they pronouns, said the Pride flags made school safer for LGBTQ students.
“Today, we unfortunately have to have a walkout to fight for our rights because yesterday at the board meeting, it didn’t seem to go very well,” they said. “There are so many people that don’t have accepting homes and school is the only place where they feel safe.”
Medley said that despite best intentions, even school is not a perfectly safe place.
“So a lot of people think that we are safe in school without the flags, but that’s not how it is,” they said. “We are unsafe, we get bullied, we get harassed every day. And the only places we are safe are the places that have pride flags, and accepting symbols.”
Fellow Morgantown High senior Will McGahey is hopeful that the walkout opens some eyes, but is ready to keep taking action to ensure the return of Pride flags to classrooms.
“Hopefully we helped the boards understand that, you know, people like us are here,” he said.
McGahey said community activists plan to organize more actions until the Pride flags are allowed back in schools.
Chris Schulz
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West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Seniors Will McGahey and Lonnie Medley stand outside Morgantown High School Sept. 28 as students stage a walkout to protest the removal of Pride flags by the county superintendent.
Original Post:
Students, teachers, parents and community members gathered outside of the Monongalia County Board of Education meeting Tuesday night, to protest the removal of Pride flags from classrooms at Morgantown High School (MHS).
Earlier this month, the county superintendent sent a letter to the county’s principals asking that Pride flags be removed from classrooms. The justification for the action was county policy 3231.01, which bans political activities in the county’s classrooms.
“The policy specifically bans literature being printed or distributed that deals with candidates, issues or points of view,” said Rev. Jenny Williams. “It’s clear from the content of the policy that it’s aimed at keeping election politics out of the classroom. I’m not really sure why the Pride flag is coming under that and the board will have to be able to state that tonight.”
Sam Hunley and Paige Corob are both seniors at MHS. They both arrived early to the meeting to take part in the demonstration against the flags’ removal, mingling with the crowd of more than 100 demonstrators.
“It’s really affected the LGBTQ youth in our system, and this is us coming together and standing against it because it means more to us than I think anybody understands,” Hunley said.
Corob called the decision heartbreaking, and disagreed with the characterization of the flag as political.
“It represents respect, and it shows the protection that we have, and that at the end of the day, we’re always going to have people that are supportive of us and supportive of loving who anybody loves, regardless of who that might be,” she said.
Chris Schulz
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West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Community members demonstrate outside of the Sept. 27 Monongalia County Board of Education meeting in support of Pride flags in county classrooms.
The decision had already garnered public discussion at the board’s Sept. 13 meeting where 13 community members spoke. At Tuesday’s meeting, 37 people were signed up to speak.
All public comment at Monongalia’s Board of Education meetings is limited to one hour, so each speaker was given just one minute and 37 seconds to speak. Most of the speakers were in favor of the Pride flags, or against their removal.
Staff from all three of the county’s high schools presented the board with letters outlining their concerns over the removal of the flag, and representatives from the faculty senates of University High School and MHS spoke in person.
Former Monongalia County teacher Rose Bell spoke about the experience of her nonbinary grandchild who used Pride flags to identify safe havens in their school.
“In those classrooms, there will be no bullying or harassment, and it won’t be tolerated,” Bell said. “The pride flag is an indicator that the teacher in that classroom is a trusted adult who will help them when there is an anxiety inducing situation, in or out of the classroom. Continuing to display the pride flag will ultimately provide a safer school environment.”
Speakers drew cheers from the crowd that had remained outside of the building, audible even from within the meeting chambers.
Some who spoke were in favor of the flags’ removal, such as Republican candidate for House of Delegates in district 78, Gino Chiarelli.
“Don’t let the crowd fool you. The overwhelming majority of people, parents and taxpayers in my district … believe you made the right decisions,” Chiarelli said. “Many of them fear backlash that they might incur because they dare stand against the political mob that is outside. So I want to say that I stand in solidarity with your decision. You made an excellent choice and the people of my district, the people of Morgantown at large, support you 100 percent.”
Chris Schulz
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West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Former Monongalia County teacher Rose Bell speaks at the Sept. 27 meeting of the Monongalia County Board of Education.
Later in the meeting, superintendent Eddie Campbell outlined the course of events that led to the removal of the flags. He said that after receiving concerned comments from community members that the Pride flags violated county policy, he consulted with outside legal counsel and took action.
“The guidance that I was provided with was ‘This does fall under your policy related to political activity in the classroom,’” Campbell said.
Campbell did not reveal what lawyer or firm he had consulted, and comments later in the meeting implied that not all board members had seen the legal analysis.
“I contacted our building principals, not the board, not these five people, I contacted our building principals,” Campbell said. “I said, ‘Please address the issue in your buildings. I want absolutely no consequences on the teachers that are displaying the flags.’”
Board member Daniel Berry said he interpreted the policy as applying to candidates running for political office and political parties. He expressed concern at the precedent the decision might set.
“I used to teach at Morgantown High and we had in the cafeteria, every flag of every country,” he said. “I think we’re going down a slippery slope, and that we might just have sterile white walls. I’m just really worried, and I think this probably needs to go on a future agenda.”
Board member Jennifer Hagerty reiterated that the Board of Education had taken no action on the issue of Pride flags, and questioned the legality of the decision.
“The ACLU, I think somebody brought this up in their speech, is pending litigation on this exact matter, overturning the board’s ruling on this exact conversation,” she said. “So I think we’re stepping into some legal territory that I personally think we need more information on because we aren’t quite prepared to make any decisions on Pride flags.”
Board member Ron Lytle focused on student comments about feeling unsafe, and said that safety should be the community’s priority. He questioned the necessity of the flag in that process.
“Be careful what you put up around you to protect you, because it sooner or later becomes a jail.” he said. “I can say, without a doubt, that if we would put the flags back up this week, we’d be right back where we’re at 10 years from now, this would be a wasted opportunity, absolutely wasted.”
Even after a protracted discussion that lasted almost an hour, the board took no action, although many members expressed interest in studying the matter further and taking the issue up again at a later date.
The board’s meeting carried on to issues of budget and expenditure, but most attendants and speakers left after the discussion of Pride flags.
Outside, now dark and with the demonstrators gone, a group of students congratulated each other for their bravery in speaking or for showing support by attending the meeting. Despite the outcome of the meeting not going their way, the atmosphere was positive.
“I’m incredibly disappointed with the outcome of tonight,” Corob said. “But at the end of the day, we all have each other’s back. We love like brothers and sisters and siblings, and no matter what we will continue to fight for what we believe in, and we will continue to stand up for people who deserve human rights.”
A walkout is planned at Morgantown High School at 1 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 28.
Education officials are asking a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit challenging West Virginia’s new law that bans transgender athletes from competing in female sports in middle schools, high schools and colleges.
Education and athletic officials said in court documents filed last week that they can’t be held liable for the law, which they didn’t request and largely won’t be responsible for enforcing, the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.
The American Civil Liberties Union and its West Virginia chapter filed the lawsuit in May on behalf of an 11-year-old transgender girl who had hoped to compete in cross country in middle school in Harrison County. The girl is seeking an injunction to prevent the law from being enforced.
The ban is set to take effect Thursday and will require the state Board of Education to establish rules to determine the means by which local athletic officials can enforce the law.
Attorneys for the West Virginia Board of Education and the West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission argued that they can’t be held responsible for the law because they aren’t responsible for enforcing it.
Attorneys for Harrison County Schools said the district “was not responsible for and did not pass” the transgender athlete ban and has not caused harm to the girl.
“(The law) was not created by the County Board, and it is not under the County Board’s control,” the response said.
A civil liberties and LGBTQ rights group are suing West Virginia and Harrison County officials, over a law targeting transgender athletes.
House Bill 3293 is slated to take effect July 8. It bars transgender girls and women from playing team sports with other girls and women, from middle school through college.The West Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit Wednesday with Lambda Legal, one of the largest national law firms for LGBTQ rights. They’re suing on behalf of an 11-year-old transgender girl who wanted to join her middle school’s cross-country team.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Charleston, names the state board of education and the Harrison County Board of Education.
The complaint said the law violates the U.S. Constitution and Title IX, a 1972 law that prohibits sex discrimination in school sports.
The national ACLU is challenging similar laws in other states.
Casey Johnson lives in Pittsburgh’s North Shore, a couple of blocks from one of the most colorful buildings in the nation, Randyland, a utopian-esque public art installation with walls, chairs, and trinkets in every possible shade and hue.
When apartment shopping in the Steel City, Johnson, who is pansexual, gender non-binary and uses non-gendered pronouns, searched to find a neighborhood that was the “most accepting.” North Shore, they said, fits the bill.
But if Johnson were ever to move back home to West Virginia, where they grew up, they know that acceptance isn’t certain and often a matter of where someone chooses to live.
Johnson was raised inside the city limits of Martinsburg, one of just over a dozen cities in the state to protect LGBTQ individuals from discrimination in housing and employment.
Their mother now lives outside city limits in Berkeley County, where no protections exist.
“If I were to move in next door to my mother, I can be evicted from an apartment because I’m queer,” said Johnson. “I could be fired from a job because I’m queer. And I’m not protected at the state level.”
Johnson wants to see lawmakers create statewide protections for LGBTQ West Virginians. A bill to do so has been introduced in the statehouse for the last two decades.
The most recent proposal — known as the Fairness Act — died in committee this year without a single vote. At the same time, state Republican lawmakers joined a half dozen other states and passed a transgender athletes ban.
“It hurts to come from a place where we preach how much we love people and how much we care about people, and then we don’t see that in practice,” Johnson said.
This story is part of our series, “Plugging the Brain Drain” about young West Virginians deciding whether or not to leave the state.
After graduating from West Virginia University last year, Johnson moved to Pittsburgh for an entry-level software development job and said they don’t see themselves moving back home with the current lack of protections.
“The thought of living somewhere that I could raise kids who one day would turn out to be queer, and the place wouldn’t accept them, you know, they wouldn’t be able to get health care, they will be turned away from even like schools and things like that, that alone is enough reason to move away from a place for me,” Johnson said.
Advocates started this year’s legislative session with the hope that this would be the year the Fairness Act passed.
During a 2020 gubernatorial debate, Republican Gov. Jim Justice said he supported the legislation. That moment was heralded in October by former Republican Senate President Mitch Carmichael as “a significant turning point in the political landscape of West Virginia as it relates to the LBGT community.”
When the state legislature convened in February, there was a noticeable lack of decisive change on the issue.
The Fairness Act didn’t make it onto the legislative calendar in the Republican-controlled statehouse.
However, the GOP lawmakers joined over 20 other states in considering a ban on transgender girls competing on sports teams consistent with their gender identity.
This proposal passed and became law.
Perry Bennett
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West Virginia Legislative Photography
“I’m going to sign it proudly because I really believe that that is the right thing to do,” Justice said just days before signing the ban into law.
This dichotomy of priorities rankled Democrats in the statehouse and sparked protests and outrage among some young West Virginians, a group more progressively-minded on social issues.
“I’m sure to have transgender students,” said David Laub, a WVU graduate student who is studying to be an English teacher. “And it’s really frustrating to me, that I would have to sit by and just watch them not be able to do the things that they care about potentially in school — one of them being sports.”
David Laub
He’s also a former high school athlete and said he doesn’t see the need to legislate whether or not transgender girls can play sports.
Laub acknowledged that he and his friends are all pretty liberal and among the minority in West Virginia, a state with Republican supermajorities in both the chambers of the legislature.
Political disagreements are a part of life but Laub said some of the legislation proposed this past year by Republican lawmakers went beyond politics.
“When it comes to matters of not being able to discuss systemic racism, and not being able to discuss sexism in the classroom, because they’re divisive concepts, or not being allowed to strike to get a fair wage, or transgender students in my classes not being able to just play sports,” said Laub. “That’s an eye-opener that is so far removed from my personal everyday reality.”
He went to WVU on a full-ride scholarship and said he owes everything in his professional life to the school and by extension the people of West Virginia.
Still, when he thinks about where he wants to live, it comes back to acceptance. David has close friends who are LGBTQ.
“I don’t want to put them in a situation where they feel kind of threatened just for existing or unable to exist in an authentic way without fear of like employment discrimination or other kinds of discrimination,” Laub said.
Almost every Republican — and a few Democrats — in the statehouse voted for the transgender sports ban. However, support is not unanimous.
“I think that anytime lawmakers do something that is a hindrance for young people or hindrance for minorities, it really does turn people away,” said Del. Joshua Higginbotham, R-Putnam, the lead sponsor of the Fairness Act this year and the only Republican delegate to vote against the transgender sports ban.
Perry Bennett
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WV Legislative Photography
Joshua Higginbotham, R-Putnam, speaks in the statehouse earlier this year.
In the state Senate, several GOP members voted against the measure. Those who spoke said they agreed with the idea but feared the NCAA’s threat to move revenue-producing regional and national championships to other states without transgender sports bans.
“I don’t think that my colleagues were motivated out of bigotry,” said Higginbotham. “I don’t think they were motivated out of hatred. I think it was a lack of understanding. Most people, especially in the Republican Party, have not met an LGBT person. And I find that to be very disappointing.”
A 2017 national study from The Williams Institute found that West Virginia has the highest percentage of transgender teens with 1.04 percent. The national average is .73 percent.
Higginbotham was first elected to the statehouse in 2016 at the age of 19 and is now just 24. He said many of the people he went to high school with are in college, in jail, or have left the state.
“When I talk to a lot of the people who have left, they remind me that it’s the culture,” Higginbotham said.
He said state lawmakers should do “everything we can” to deregulate and pass tax reforms that will attract businesses.
”But ultimately, if we don’t change the image of our state, if we don’t change the stereotypes…people aren’t going to want to move here,” Higginbotham said. “And more young people will try to leave.”
When Generation Z and millennials become the largest voting bloc, Higginbotham said he expects a cultural shift in West Virginia and the nation.
A study last year from the Center for American Progress found that the 2024 election will likely be the first where these two younger generations outnumber the Baby Boomers.
He points to a poll from the Public Religion Research Institute released earlier this year that found — for the first time — half of Republicans support gay marriage.
“Ten years ago, that would have been an impossibility,” Higginbotham said. “And I think that as we replace some of the Baby Boomers, some of the greatest generation, we’re gonna see these cultural changes.”
