If you’re gay and living in Colorado, One Colorado wants to hear from you.
The new nonprofit organization launched an online survey meant to capture the pulse of Colorado’s gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community last weekend. It has already had thousands of responses.
“So far, it’s been pretty impressive,” said interim executive director Lea Ann Purvis.
The confidential survey, directed toward GLBT people across the state, asks about various topics, including discrimination and church affiliation.
“The questions generally are trying to get at what are people’s issues and how passionate are they about them,” Purvis said.
She said the issues, in many instances, run parallel to what most Coloradans worry about — unemployment, transportation and education all make the list.
The survey will run throughout the month.
Results, available in mid-March, will be shared with the public and state lawmakers and should give people outside the GLBT community a picture of what it’s like to be among them and living in Colorado.
Made up of two nonprofits and a political action group, One Colorado also will provide educational outreach, advocate for increased equality and support candidates friendly to GLBT equality in Colorado.
One Colorado eventually will have a budget of $350,000 to $500,000 and employ three or four people.
Hundreds of groups, organizations and individuals advocate for GLBT issues across the state, but none has sought to unify the movement statewide as One Colorado hopes to do, said One Colorado board chairman Bobby Clark.
“We need an organization that can really galvanize us and bring us together as a community” to move equality forward, Clark said.
Statewide gay-rights advocacy groups have been established in nearby states, but this will be Colorado’s first, he said.
The organization sprang from a survey of leaders and organizations in the gay and lesbian community as well as lawmakers. The study was funded in part by the Gill Foundation. The results indicated a hunger for a statewide organization encouraging education and advocacy, Clark said.
According to Harris Poll estimates, there are about 170,000 gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people living in Colorado.
In recent years, Colorado has passed several laws to protect gays and lesbians from discrimination, including those that allow second-parent adoption for children of gay couples and provide health benefits for same-sex partners of state employees.
But many people don’t know the laws exist or how to use them, Clark said.
Likewise, many in Colorado don’t realize that gays and lesbians face discrimination and can’t achieve the same protection for their partners that marriage provides heterosexual couples, and educational outreach through One Colorado could improve that, Clark said.
“One thing that certainly seems true (is that) the more people know someone who is gay, or about someone who is gay, the less they discriminate,” Clark said.
Heather McWilliams: 303-954-1698 or hmcwilliams@denverpost.com
