The Civil Rights Agenda (TCRA) has hired LGBT community activist and blogger Nico Lang as associate director.
Lang will help oversee TCRA's Workplace, Families United and Faith Projects; the latter of which Lang worked on previously as the change coordinator.
Lang, a well-known Chicago blogger who helped create and currently co-edits In Our Words, brings to TCRA a new perspective on community organizing. A seven-year resident of Chicago, Lang also is a frequent contributor to The Huffington Post and Thought Catalog and hopes to continue to use those platforms and the new associate directorship to promote change both on the statewide and national levels.
"We are very excited to have Nico join our team," said Anthony Martinez, executive director of TCRA. "I have worked with Nico for a few years now organizing throughout Chicago and I know firsthand the ability he brings to the table. He is able to bring together many different types of people, and as any LGBTQ organizer knows that is the main challenge with organizing in the LGBTQ community. As we continue to focus on initiatives throughout Illinois, I am confident he is the right person to help us bring our message to every part of the state."
"I've been working with Anthony Martinez and The Civil Rights Agenda in some capacity since 2010, after working together to promote a vigil for Tyler Clementi on the DePaul University campus," Lang said. "After that event, I started working with their faith project, an Illinois interfaith initiative that seeks to bridge the divides between the LGBTQ community and communities of faith. That work was based on a need in our communities for intersectional engagement, which is something I strive to do with In Our Words, an initiative I founded through The Civil Rights Agenda's programs. Through sharing the stories of queer and allied persons, we hope to tackle issues that affect our community every day, to provide both solace for those who need it and call for lasting change for the disenfranchised and marginalized.
"In my role as TCRA's associate director, I hope to continue looking at our community's problems intersectionally, while also working with populations of the community that often get left behind or ignored in LGBTQ non-profit work. I hope to use my position to be an ally to the growing Trans, Genderqueer and Intersex Movement. I feel like it's time for LGBTQ non-profits to start thinking about the community differently, and I hope to be a part of that progression."
