Picking up on the national discontent with elected leaders, grassroots LGBT activists are just as restless and dissatisfied with the community's current leadership and are organizing to reshape the agenda.

Pride At Work, an LGBT labor organization, and One Struggle, One Fight, a queer grassroots group, recently held community forums to discuss forming a platform for an LGBT agenda.

"There is just no feeling of action, there is no feeling of edge, there's no feeling of pushing the boundaries around what we want [and what] we believe in," said Robert Haaland, co-chair of Pride At Work, lamenting that the edginess of the LGBT movement of yesteryear has disappeared into a more sterilized and packaged movement.

Organizers from both groups are queering the national discontent focusing their discussion on workers' rights, gentrification, and a national LGBT agenda, said Haaland. Like many people throughout the United States, Haaland is disillusioned by President Barack Obama's administration and a polarized Congress unable to pass health care reform and other legislative items.

"I was hoping for an FDR," said Haaland, referring to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Haaland believes that the first step toward changing the current national economic and political situation is to take a moment to question the "direction of where we are heading" and redefine the movement's focus on more "basic bread and butter economic issues."

Grassroots organizers aren't only disappointed by the Obama administration, but also with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and other members of Congress, said Carlos Wilson, a member of One Struggle, One Fight's leadership-steering committee, in an e-mail interview last month.

"The group spoke of [its] frustration with [Pelosi's] office and the sense that the gay community has been patronized by her office," Wilson said. "There was a sense that it is the right time to begin ratcheting up the pressure on our federal elected officials in new and increasingly radical ways."

Pelosi's spokesman Drew Hammill responded to the criticism in an e-mail Monday, March 1 stating, "Ending discrimination and ensuring fairness for LGBT Americans have always been a top priority for the speaker."

Hammill wrote Pelosi is working closely with out LGBT Representatives Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin), and Jared Polis (D-Colorado) to push the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and repeal the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy through Congress on the heels of the successful passage of the hate crimes legislation last year, in spite of Republican stalling on "nearly 300 pieces of legislation passed by the House."

Queeroots rising

Elected officials aren't the only focus of grassroots LGBT organizers' dissatisfaction, but also national LGBT leaders and organizations. The Bay Area Reporter estimated 60 people gathered at the Pride at Work discussion February 10. An estimated 45 individuals attended One Struggle, One Fight's town hall meeting in late January, Wilson said.

Criticism of gay issues being dismissed by the national leadership included LGBT individuals not being included in the census and in general not being counted and reflected in critical empirical data, such as unemployment; addressing affordable education and housing; and state and local budget cuts to services such as HIV/AIDS treatment, substance abuse, public transportation, and housing.

"All of these issues are real issues that impact real working people throughout the nation on a daily basis," said Wilson, who claimed that the national LGBT leadership doesn't reflect the "true rainbow" of the queer community, but is made up of "rich white male 'Old Guard,'" that keeps the "needs of the working class, communities of color and transgender people" from receiving "mainstream attention they deserve."

In terms of the upcoming census, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force has launched its "Queer the Census" campaign. Through Credo, the progressive mobile phone company, people can obtain a free sticker urging that gays be counted to affix to their census envelope. For more information, visit the Task Force's Web site at http://www.thetaskforce.org.

According to change.org, same-sex couples can fill out the census form together using "Person 1" and "Person 2" and can define their relationship as "husband or wife" or "unmarried partner." If there is no legal recognition for their relationship yet they consider themselves married, they can mark the "husband and wife" box.

Wilson, who is gay, believes that the grassroots LGBT movement has "taken a serious and thoughtful turn toward real inclusion." The national LGBT organizations have been "all too ready to cave into the demands of the Democratic Party," especially demands that dismiss segments of the community, such as transgender individuals, Wilson said.

The national organizations have been too "willing to wait for our rights to be handed over on a silver platter when we really should be in the streets and louder than ever," Wilson said.

National LGBT organizations "throw us a few bones every once in a while," agreed Haaland. "We need to build our own edge and reclaim our image. ..."

Groups respond

Most of the grassroots activists' criticism was focused at the Human Rights Campaign, the country's largest LGBT organization and Equality California, the statewide LGBT lobbying group.

Officials from HRC and EQCA disagreed with the activists' assessment.

Brad Luna, HRC's director of communication, pointed to the group's launch of "Degrees of Equality," a project specifically focused on examining and improving working conditions of LGBT employees and creating a "comprehensive suite of resources." He also mentioned "Ya Es Hora," a nonpartisan civic engagement campaign to help Latinos and other immigrants with citizenship, census enumeration and voter registration, as examples of HRC's work toward inclusion of working-queer rights and queers of color and lower economic status.

For its part, EQCA officials talked about the organization's "aggressive" stance in helping secure passage of state legislation.

"We've had an aggressive edge and as a result we've seen unprecedented results in the legislature and in candidates," said Geoff Kors, executive director, pointing out that the organization has passed more than 50 pieces of legislation over the past decade.

"We all need to be engaged because it is the people that win these elections that vote on not just our rights, but our budgets that literally impact whether some people live or die," said Kors, adding that he expects a more intense budget battle in Sacramento this year than last year. He hopes the "community will engage and take action on the budget to make sure that critical services aren't affected."

Kors also pointed out the extensive work EQCA engages in on a daily basis, including lobbying for legislation that supports employment, health care, and other services important to LGBTs.

Winning equality

While Haaland and Wilson were critical of mainstream LGBT organizations, they did not completely dismiss the goals and achievements made by these groups.

"The mainstream LGBT movement and leadership have given the community a political voice and are able to do serious fundraising for a lot of important causes," said Wilson. "I'm glad that they are out there doing the work that they do."

Local candidates for elected office agreed with grassroots organizers that now is the time for LGBT activists to capitalize on the progress that has been made, especially with the momentum built since the passage of Proposition 8. The ballot initiative amended the state constitution to ban same-sex marriage.

"It's really important that we get it right, right now as we recover, because it's so on the line for so many people, so many people are right on the edge of bankruptcy, insolvency, and just not being able to live here anymore," said District 6 supervisorial candidate Debra Walker, the only candidate for office to attend Pride At Work's discussion. Walker was also critical of the boom and bust economics that have driven some people out of San Francisco.

District 8 supervisorial candidate Rebecca Prozan agreed with Walker that, "We need to focus on the day-to-day issues of our community." She recently launched a survey to obtain District 8 residents' input on the city's budget priorities.

Wilson said that as "awful as [Prop. 8] was [it] ... galvanized the community and brought fresh new voices into the political discussion."

"These new voices are the future of the movement," said Wilson. "They come to the table ready to work, ready to learn and ready to solve the issues that face us."