With same-sex marriage legal in 19 states and the issue on track for a Supreme Court hearing, activists, advocacy organizations and leaders have been turning their attention to the multitude of other issues intersecting with and so affecting the LGBTQ community.

On Aug. 8, the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality at the University of Chicago was the setting for the second and final day of the Affinity and National Organization for Men Against Sexism ( NOMAS ) conference "At the Intersections: Gender, Sexual Orientation and Race in Public Policy."

Immigration reform, homelessness, employment, health and wellness, education, and inequities in the legal system were just a few of the topics forming the basis of impassioned and action-based discussions among people representing a broad spectrum of race, gender, sexual orientation and gender identity.

The idea for the conference was seeded during a December 2013 community forum "Beyond Marriage Equality" organized by Affinity and black LGBTQ leaders. "We talked about three public policy areas and the need to work across community and identities," Affinity Executive Director Kim L. Hunt told Windy City Times. "One of the outcomes of that half-day session was that people wanted to see a full day devoted to public policy."

Donald Bell is one of the founding members of NOMAS—an almost 40- year-old pro-feminist, gay-affirmative organization of men and women that has fought against racism, class distinctions and injustice. Bell said it was the synergy between NOMAS and Affinity's two-decade-long work that helped bring about the Intersections conference. "When Affinity was founded, I was on staff at a local university and I got a chance to play host to people addressing LGBT concerns for the Black community on the south-side," he recalled. "The women took the lead in those conversations. We have since been dealing with social issues not on separate levels of race, gender or sexual orientation but together."

That sense of unity began with an inspirational performance from poet and choreographer Avery R. Young, followed by a lively, standing-room-only public policy roundtable moderated Chicago Fair Housing Alliance Executive Director Morgan Davis. Panelists included activist and human-rights champion Gaylon Alcaraz, AIDS Foundation of Chicago Interim President and CEO John Peller, lobbyist and former Illinois Unites for Marriage campaign manager John Kohlhepp and Audra Wilson, who is the district chief of staff for U.S. Congesswoman Robin Kelly.

Issues raised included life after marriage equality. "Now that marriage equality is granted, issues with respect to surrogacy and adoption are now starting to rise to the surface," Wilson said before updating the audience of the status of federal bills introduced in the past year including Fairness in Lending and Veterans Issues.

She added that, despite Congressional gridlock, there have several Republican co-sponsors of those bills. "Interestingly, there is a probably more of a chance of some of these bills being passed when Congress gets back from recess this month," she said. "Some of the issues we are talking about today particularly health disparities and inequities among African American populations and the LGBT community, these are the issues we are going to be taking on." Kelly is a co-sponsor of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act ( ENDA ).

Peller discussed the continuing work of the AIDS Foundation of Chicago and the power of anti-retroviral medications such as PrEP that he said has "an upwards of 90-percent chance of preventing new HIV infections. We have an opportunity to harness the power of anti-retroviral medications to prevent HIV in a way that we have not known about before."

One audience member challenged Peller with her concerns that HIV advocacy has principally remained on the North Side of the city. "The disease has not left our community," she said. "We know what's happening to our young Black men and women yet we're not given a platform to help ourselves."

"Can we be doing more? Yes." Peller replied. "Can we be doing it better? Absolutely. I am deeply concerned about the lack of capacity among African American community-based organizations to serve the population."

There was agreement on the need to build strong coalitions to forge new ground on issues such as HIV advocacy, ENDA and immigration, and for those coalitions to build on successes that have been achieved through decades of hard work. "I worked on immigration issues in 2004," Kohlhepp said. "I learned so much about community organizing that the immigration movement taught me to bring to the marriage equality effort. I don't believe we would have had the success we did had we not had that history."

Yet—during the roundtable on Immigration Reform and Public Policy Impacts—both the panelists and the audience wrestled for over an hour with an overwhelming number of issues that stretch far beyond the fickle interest of cable and network news on the child immigrants entering the country.

Moderator and Association of Latinos as Motivating Action ( ALMA ) board member Luis Roman, alongside United African Organization Executive Director Alie Kabba and immigration attorney/LGBTQ Immigrant Rights Coalition member Roberto Romero-Perez discussed how that state of U.S. immigration law has torn apart families, left undocumented LGBTQ immigrants ( at best ) in legal limbo for years or at worse placed in detention facilities, some of which have turned a blind eye to gender identity and sexual assault. After detention, they are in danger of being summarily returned to countries where their sexual orientation has put their lives at risk.

Romero-Perez cited a recent study from the Williams Institute at UCLA that estimated the number of LGBTQ immigrants in the United States to be close to 1 million. "Out of that 1 million, approximately one-third are undocumented," he said. "There are close to 78 countries in the world where [same-sex] relationships are criminalized. Many people don't know that they can seek asylum in the U.S. based on persecution of their sexual orientation. By the time they discover that they can, it is usually too late and the one year deadline [to apply] has passed."

"It is not a one-dimensional fight," Kabba agreed. "If we talk about full equality, we have to be willing to stand with every community fighting for social justice. Africa has been historically underrepresented and deliberately excluded from immigration." He added that—during the last debate in the Senate—both Democrats and Republicans seemed quite willing to dispense with the diversity visa program that has served as a rare and legal form of entry for people from African nations. "We had to take on that battle," Kabba said. "It was our allies in the LGBT community who stood with us."

There was a similar level of raw emotion during a discussion on Crime and Justice in Institutions, Communities and the Home. Chairman and Commissioner of the Chicago Commission on Human Relations Mona Noriega joined National Coordinator of the Black Youth Project 100 ( BYP100 ) Charlene Carruthers, Rape Victim Advocates Executive Director Sharmili Madjmudar, Associate Executive Director of VCS Inc. Phyllis Frank, and moderator and Affinity Board Chair Ebonie Davis in order to face down topics such as hate crimes, intimate partner and sexual violence and inequities in the legal system particularly towards trans*people of color.

"When you look at how Black people are criminalized and you look at who is all the way at the bottom, we are talking about Black trans* women," Carruthers said preferring to use the term criminal legal rather than criminal justice system. "We have to be real about the liberation of Black people and not just from the perspective of Black people who are who we think they should be."

Noriega noted a massive lack of statistics that track the number of transgender people killed as the result of a hate crime. "Right now in Chicago, we only have 35 [total] reported hate crimes," she said. "But we know in this city that there have been a hell of a lot more. We know that there are multiple times in Chicago that there have been trans*people who are killed but it's not labeled a hate crime because we can't find the perpetrator. Hate crimes are occurring. They are being underreported. We know that sexual orientation and gender identity is one basis for assault. This is where the intersection sometimes falls out from the people who are on the margins."

Conference participants also tackled issues that included education; school environment and funding; economic issues for workers and families; health, wellness and reproductive justice; and housing and homelessness.

At the end of the day, Hunt admitted to having mixed emotions caused by the sheer number of barriers still facing the communities she has ceaselessly worked for. "Anybody doing human rights or social justice work is in it to solve problems," she said. "On the one hand, the litany of issues is absolutely overwhelming and no one organization can address those issues and no one community can do this work. But what has been encouraging about today has been seeing all of these folks from different walks of life and different focus areas looking for that common ground as they identify issues that are most significant to their communities."

Both Affinity and NOMAS acknowledged two allies in their struggles for full equality and justice in an evening post-conference reception held at the Washington Park Arts Incubator. The evening included a presentation by the Legacy Project-an organization dedicated to combating LGBT bullying through education and the celebration of LGBT contributions to history and an initiative that Hunt called "unique in the world."

Former Sidetrack General Manager Chuck Hyde was honored alongside the Illinois Legislative Black Caucus; Jason Hart, the special projects coordinator for state Rep. Rita Mayfield, accepted for the caucus.

"I've taken a step back and taken some time to figure out what I really want to do now," Hyde told Windy City Times. "I am so proud of the wave of change we have created. I am proud to have been a part of that. Working with organizations like Affinity, we have done something that mattered."

Windy City Times videos by Tracy Baim

Affinity confab 8-8-2014, 1 of 6, Keron Blair Link Here .

Affinity confab 8-8-2014, 2 of 6, Chris Smith panel ww.youtube.com/watch?v=d2iemchEDkU&list=UUzzNK0LkjNd_M06IILX7d8Q .

Affinity confab 8-8-2014, 3 of 6, Angelica Ross Link Here .

Affinity confab 8-8-2014, 4 of 6: John Kohlhepp Link Here .

Affinity confab 8-8-2014, 5 of 6, Art Bendixon Link Here .

Affinity confab 8-8-2014, 6 of 6, policy panel Link Here .