Hey y’all,
We hope you’re doing well and taking good care of yourselves. This is a challenging time for many of us, and we hope you know you’re not alone. We’re here with you, and we can’t wait to be in community again on Tuesday.
Our next meeting is scheduled for next week, Tuesday, June 24th, at Cache Valley Unitarian Universalists Church (596 E 900 N, Logan, UT 84321). Our social hour and dinner will start at 6pm, with the meeting starting at 7pm. We offer the meeting in person and online via zoom.
What we hope to cover at the meeting:
Last month’s meeting highlights
Updates from each of the Stewards
Community updates and announcements
Planning for June’s Pride art event
Planning for future events and important initiatives
To prepare for Tuesday’s meeting, we’ve written up a summary of May’s meeting highlights. Read on or use the table of contents to jump to a particular section.
Table of Contents
If you are able, please share our Facebook Event post! It really helps us spread the word and find people who might be interested in attending.
May Meeting Recap
Intro to May Meeting
To prepare for June’s meeting, it can be helpful to get a recap of what we talked about last month. If you just want to read the notes, click here. If you want to see the slides, click here. Otherwise, keep reading for a summary!
We had a spectacular showing for tacos at our social hour! We had over 20 people join us to connect and enjoy delicious food made by Bobbi. Then we transitioned to the meeting, and opened with our typical welcome, invitation to connect with us online through our linktr.ee, and a review of our mission and vision.
Image of slide from May’s meeting, with the quote, “It all matters. Showing up, being present, caring about yourself and your neighbors. Community is everything. Intersectional solidarity forever.”
We reviewed April’s meeting, which you can read more about here. We also shared information about our first Steward meeting and the key takeaways from it, such as setting measurable goals and distributing important tasks. We highlighted two big areas of impact:
Increasing access to LGBTQ+ affirming resources, particularly for queer youth.
Increasing access to safe third spaces for LGBTQ+ folks in the valley.
Steward Updates
Then we got to the main event- each Steward shared updates in their relevant areas with us as a Collective, and we gave our feedback.
Jax the Resource Steward shared information about donations and how the Collective wants to distribute those resources.
Ronda the Memory Steward talked to us about how notes and information from meetings get distributed.
Sara the Advocacy Steward discussed some ideas for increasing access to resources for LGBTQ+ youth in K-12 schools, and invited Collective folks to try to have a member at every school board meeting we can during the school year.
Cache County meets the 1st and 3rd Thursdays @ 5:30pm
Logan District meets the 2nd and 4th Tuesdays @ 5:00pm
Jeremy shared about his goals for increasing Collective members’ connection, and shared an Onboarding Survey for folks to take so we can better understand our members and their priorities. Please take it if you have a moment!
Community Announcements
We then spent time learning about and highlighting various community events to support and attend. Here are some you can still get involved with!
Mystik Hair Collective is hosting a Pride Open House event on Sunday, June 29th
Indigenous Pride Festival happening on Saturday, June 21st in SLC
More info about Mystik Hair Collective’s Pride Open House event on Sunday, June 29th.
SLC Pride festival happening June 28th and 29th at the Gateway in SLC
We Outside LLC with Black Lives Matter Utah is hosting a summer camp for kids July 24th-27th.
Collective Initiatives
At the end of the evening we split up into 3 groups, each tackling a different focus.
Group One: Discussing safe third spaces in Cache Valley
What defines a third space is that it’s a space beyond work or home, that is accessible to all, without needing to pay to participate. A good example of one is the Logan Pride house.
Woodsy was recommended as a third space the community could take greater advantage of, and our Discord channel has potential to be a safe third space online.
We want to build up existing third spaces and help them be more accessible!
Group Two: Discussing K-12 access to LGBTQ+ affirming resources
Discussed surveying previous students about their experiences in Cache Valley schools. We could also reach out to parents.
There’s a desire to do a training for the staff development days prior to the return to school for school staff. There’s potential to partner with the Bear River Region LGBTQ+ Coalition for this as well.
Group Three: Planning Pride art and music celebration the Collective is hosting at the end of June
Jax and Shane have been working on an event for June 28th aimed at celebrating Pride, highlighting local queer artists, and providing connection to resources and fundraising opportunities to local organizations.
Details were solidified to host artist Blythe Harmon as the main event with her Western themed queer art exhibit. We’re hoping to have more artists and musicians attend to promote their work.
Proud & Queer: We’ve Always Been Here celebration!
Group 3’s discussion culminated in an official event happening on Saturday, June 28th from 2pm to 6pm. Thanks to Shane and some amazing folks at Elements and the Riverwoods Conference Center, we’ll be able to host this at the Riverwoods for free, provide treats, and sell drinks!
Here’s what we need from the Collective to make this happen:
Please spread the word!
Share our FB event on social media:
Download and print these flyers and share around town!
Send this flyer and FB event page digitally to folks you know
Know any queer artists and/or musicians?
Please send them our way! Have them email us at [email protected], or share their contact information with us and we’ll reach out!
We want to have as many folks as we can manage!
Want to provide support?
Join our event organizing team! Reach out at [email protected]
Provide additional treats and non-alcoholic drinks for the event!
Reach out to businesses and organizations you think would like to have a table and attend this exciting event!
Thanks so much for reading! Please reach out to us if you have any questions. We’re excited and relieved to be in community with you all next Tuesday!
With pride and gratitude,
The Cache LGBTQ+ Collective team
