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Tuesday, December 23, 2008


Words From Outgoing Excecutive Director, Dan Furmansky


The end of December marks the end of Dan Furmansky's tenure at Equality Maryland where he served as Executive Director for five years. Click here for his full bio.

I once heard that an executive director could measure his or her success based upon whether or not they left their organization in a place of strength when they moved on to new endeavors. On that note, I feel good about stepping down from my leadership role with EQMD at this point in time. I have spent the past two weeks helping our incoming executive director, the talented and very personable Kate Runyon (link to press release), get acclimated to the Maryland political landscape. Kate is a quick study and an impressive bridge-builder who will be a tremendous new voice for our movement.

Our current staff -- Policy Director Carrie Evans, Sr. Field Organizer Mary Zicari, and Development & Communications Associate Mike Klein -- deserve the lion's share of the credit for our great work. Each one of these individuals works long hours, week in and week out, with their entire hearts and souls immersed in our mission to make life better for LGBT Marylanders. They have experienced the legislative and judicial disappointments more deeply than most, yet quickly rallied us all to dust ourselves off and move forward. Every LGBT Marylander is lucky to have these three people as our advocates and leaders.

To support our "old-timer" staff members, we have hired Kim Miller as office manager and Kevin Walling as development director, and these two new faces, both longtime EQMD members, will bring an enormous amount of expertise and savvy to the Equality Maryland family. Our lobbyists -- Ann Ciekot, Robyn Elliott, and Michele Douglas -- are already working to promote our 2009 legislative agenda with legislators in Annapolis. EQMD remains committed to moving our community forward in every way possible. Lea Gilmore, a longtime consultant for Equality Maryland who guides our faith outreach, as well as our involvement with the Maryland Black Family Alliance, is already working on some exciting and innovative initiatives for 2009 that will continue to promote greater acceptance of LGBT people. All of these individuals are supported by a board of directors that truly understands governance and oversight, and has its eyes on the imperative of diversifying the organization in a number of ways, especially geographically and racially.

While EQMD is as nervous as any organization about the current economic climate, we have money in the bank account to take us comfortably through the first quarter of 2009, and we are counting on our committed members to renew their memberships early in 2009. Do you hear me? Renew early in 2009! Even better - become a sustainer to Equality Maryland TODAY.

Having worked with a number of non-profit organizations over the years -- as a staff person, a consultant and as a board member -- I say with confidence that Equality Maryland will not only continue to be a guiding force for the LGBT community statewide; we will actually build on our legacy and be a stronger, more determined, more professional organization in the crucial years to come. With our talented staff -- old and new -- and our focused, goal-oriented work plans, I will be enthusiastic about support Equality Maryland as a donor and volunteer.

No goodbyes from me, though, since my commitment to our movement is as strong as ever, as is yours. I anticipate seeing all of you on February 2nd in Annapolis for our annual lobby day and rally, if not sooner!

In partnership and equality,

Dan Furmansky
court.spark@gmail.com

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Wednesday, December 17, 2008


Commitment and Contribution


Kate Runyon is the new Executive Director of Equality Maryland. She comes to us from Michigan where she served as the interim Executive Director at the Triangle Foundation, Michigan's statewide LGBT advocacy organization. She now resides with her partner Monique Ellison who is an Episcopal priest, in Fells Point, Baltimore with her cats and West African village dog.

What are you committed to? Earlier this fall while at a workshop, the leader asked me how far I would go to prove my heart's most passionate purpose. This was at a time while I was coming to a close as the interim executive director of Triangle Foundation in Michigan, the statewide LGBT advocacy organization. My passionate purpose is living a life that leads to greater equality within society with integrity, openness and honesty. When I was presented with the opportunity to move to Maryland from Michigan to continue to do LGBT advocacy work, it was an easy choice because the work is in alignment with my core purpose. Moving to a new state, starting a new job and getting to know a whole new bunch of people - this is some of what I would do to live my most passionate purpose. What would you do differently in your life to live from your core purpose? To what new depths would you go to live your heart's most passionate purpose? What about for LGBT equality?

This is a good time to ask ourselves challenging and probing questions. It is the beginning of a New Year and time for New Year's resolutions. This is the darkest time of year and a good time for reflection. This is the time of year we gather and reconnect with family and friends and share our hopes and dreams. What are you sharing with your family and friends about your values? How are you reflecting your core values in your interactions in the world? As part of the LGBT equality movement, if you value freedom, choosing whom you love, and protections for your family, as examples, how does this connect with your overall choices and actions in life? There are questions to be answered, and your actions do the answering.

During this first week as the executive director of Equality Maryland, the importance of all of us contributing our best to the movement has been on my mind: board members, staff, and you. We are already diving into work together. I have met with the ACLU, Progressive Maryland, visited the Howard County PFLAG, set meetings with legislators, and have a long list of folks to contact. As I am getting to know the board and staff and some of you in the wider community, many of my questions relate to finding out how we all see our most valuable contribution to Equality Maryland. I want to ensure that the staff is contributing the skills and expertise that they value most. I want the board members to make the most of their contributions of time, skills and financial support to Equality Maryland. We are here together to serve Maryland by working in every way possible to secure equality for LGBT people and out families, to insure our safety and make this a state where we can thrive.

We have so much work to do, and among us, we have the resources and skills to secure equality for the LGBT communities. What we need now, more than anything, is for us all to be dedicated to contributing our best to the movement. Some of the concrete things I know we can all do now to support Equality Maryland are: give financial donations, participate in the Equality Maryland Lobby Day on Feb. 2nd, thank legislators for their support, educate legislators that need to learn equality issues for LGBT people and drop us a line to see how you can volunteer!

I look forward to meeting you to take the opportunity to share our most passionate purposes and to share what our best contributions can be. Keep an eye out for a schedule of Equality Maryland gatherings throughout the state for us to meet. I'll see you then. In the meantime, be well, make the best of the holidays and keep your values radiating through everything you do.

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Tuesday, December 10, 2008


A Sense of Hope on World AIDS Day - 12/1/08


Carrie Evans is Equality Maryland's Policy Director. She spoke at last week's World AIDS Day in Baltimore.

For those of us who have been working on HIV and AIDS issues for the past decades we remember all too well the times we have lost hope that there would ever be an end to HIV and AIDS. For me some of these moments of hopelessness appeared when I was losing a client a week at the Wills and Powers of Attorney Clinic I ran in Toronto, and when one of my closest friends, Chris, evacuated New Orleans because of Hurricane Katrina with no refills left on his HIV meds and a T Cell count of less than 200 and returned home months later to a city with no services for its PWAs and when my 18 year old intern told me he was HIV+. But for all these times we have lost hope it somehow always comes back - because if we do not have hope we have nothing to build our dreams and plans on.

Our country has been pregnant with hope during this election season. And we must capitalize on this and have hope that our new President will discard the judgmental morality of the last decade and infuse common sense back into our international HIV/AIDS policies.

Hope that we can transcend the differences between the communities affected by HIV/AIDS to realize the common goal of saving lives.

Hope that we can continue holding our elected officials and other governmental actors accountable to do right by the individuals and families affected by this infection.

Hope that the state of Maryland does not take its budget cutting to the programs and services we need to prevent and manage HIV and AIDS.

Hope that once and for all we can move past characterizing this as a “gay disease” and wake up real quickly and realize people are dying because of homophobia.

Hope that Mayor Dixon who has lost her brother and sister-in-law to HIV will set a shining example of what a city can do when it gets serious about fighting back.

Hope that my friend Chris will see another Mardi Gras.

On this day of memory, healing and hope I affirm Equality Maryland’s commitment to continue fighting for legislative and policy changes aimed at making genuine and meaningful investments in helping people living with HIV and AIDS and to eradicating new infections.

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Wednesday, December 3, 2008


Coming Out


Samantha Master hails from Columbia, MD where she was apart of her high school’s student government association, Black Student Achievement Program, gay-straight alliance (GSA), and gospel choir. Currently, Samantha is a sophomore at Morgan State University majoring in political science with a minor in speech communication. In addition to being an active member of her church, she is the outreach and community service coordinator for Morgan’s GSA, Rainbow Soul and a member of the youth and college division of the NAACP. Her favorite quote is “…become the change you seek.”

My coming out experience had very little to do with an exclamation of my sexual orientation to anyone. For me, coming out was about living freely. It began with little acknowledgements about where I was going, such as D.C. Pride. Then, I became more vocal about social issues I wanted to fight for and began to speak out when I heard people use words like “dyke” and “fag”. With that, came the recognition of the personal offense I took when I saw anti-gay sentiment. Although it wasn’t until recently that I used the word “lesbian” to identify myself to my family, the small steps of openness that I had taken made understanding and accepting my lifestyle that much easier on the people I love.

The first time I remember being confronted about my sexuality was at the age of 16. It was a surprisingly warm fall evening and I was riding back from D.C. with my mother. We had just seen a Christian play called Satan’s Expose’ that openly stated God’s disdain with homosexuals, adulterers, and those who have had abortions. Usually, our rides were filled with music and conversation, but that day I wasn’t in the most talkative mood. In fact, I was frightened out of my mind. The play reaffirmed what I already knew. I was an abomination and God didn’t love me, I reasoned. And if God didn’t love me, then there was no way that anyone else could. I felt absolutely alone.

I was so enthralled in my thoughts that I didn’t hear the statement my mother made.

“What did you say?” I asked.

“I know.” She said.

In an effort not to incriminate myself for something that I did that I had probably said I didn’t do, I asked again, “What do you know?”

“I know, and I love you anyways.”

I didn’t respond, and quite frankly, I didn’t know how to. “I love you anyways.” That statement replayed in my head a million times. She didn’t say “I accept you” or “I agree with you”, but at that moment, I didn’t need her to. I was her daughter, I was a lesbian, and I was loved, and that’s all that mattered to me.

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