FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 19, 2019
San Antonio, Texas – Pride Center San Antonio is excited to announce the launch of our Gender Affirmation Project in partnership with St. Mary’s University School of Law Pro Bono Program and Texas Law: Richard and Ginni Mithoff Pro Bono Program. The partnership will begin offering gender marker and name change clinics in San Antonio for transgender and gender nonconforming individuals. The project aims to assist people align the gender presented on their government identifications, driver’s licenses, and other documents with how they identify.
“The clinic is a grass-roots effort of partnerships from across the state coming together to address a need in the San Antonio community. Transgender individuals face so many challenges each day that obtaining an identification credential that matches their identify should not be one of them,” said Benjamin Dunn and Molly Buchanan of OUTlaw. “It is our hope that transgender people find in their pursuits at least one burdened eased by this support.”
Benjamin Dunn and Molly Buchanan, both with St. Mary’s Law School, began having conversations about ways to help people file paperwork to change their names on legal documents. They reached out to Robert Salcido with Pride Center San Antonio, where the newly formed team conceptualized the details of the project.
“With constant barriers for LGBTQ+ communities under the Trump administration and no uniform processes in our justice system to correct a person’s identification in Texas, the Gender Affirmation Project is very important for transgender people,” said Robert Salcido, executive director at Pride Center San Antonio. “Changing one’s identification to align with who they know themselves to be is a major milestone and affirmation of their identity. These corrections have the potential to curb discrimination, violence, and having to be outed as transgender every time they have to present their ID.”
The first scheduled clinic will be held at The Center, 1303 McCullough Ave. Ste. 160 on Saturday, April 20 from 2:00 pm – 7:00 pm. To learn more about the project, community members are invited to an information session on Saturday, March 30 from 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm. The information session will go over the process, qualifications and documentation needed.
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Pride Center San Antonio (The Center) serves the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and HIV communities by connecting them and their families to community resources and organizations related to health, wellness, support, education, activities, and advocacy.
Contact:
Robert Salcido, Executive Director
Pride Center San Antonio
210-370-7743 (o) 210-857-6928 (c)
robert@pridecentersa.org
