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Contacting State Leaders for Progress

Thursday, 13 March 2008 00:00

The "Howdy Neighbors" project begins!

Will you Help?

The hustle and bustle of South Dakota’s 2008 legislative session is now behind us. For our state officials, this is a time conducive to neighborly visits at home -- and that’s exactly what EqSD has in mind. In the coming weeks and months, members of EqSD will be reaching out to their legislators to introduce the organization and its mission.

What’s our agenda?

To say “howdy neighbor” and to provide a human face to the organization and its mission. We hope to have a long and productive history advancing the cause of LGBT South Dakotans and we are eager to start building positive relationships for the long haul. We also plan to do some listening and learning in the process.

We’ve sent a letter of introduction to all of our state legislators and top tier executive branch officials as well as tribal leaders (see letter below) and are now making in-person visits.

As a supporter of EqSD, we hope you will participate. You don’t need to be an expert (after all, we are not pushing any legislation at this time) you just need to share from your heart why equality is important to you.

We think the “howdy neighbor” visits will help lay a strong and positive foundation for an organization like ours dedicated to positive change. We are sure that putting a human face to the LGBTA community will help dispel fears and open dialogue.

For more info on how to participate, contact us.

The letter we sent to state legislators and others

March 17, 2008

Dear _____

I’m writing to introduce Equality South Dakota, a new statewide advocacy organization dedicated to achieving fairness and equality for everyone in South Dakota. We know our goals are shared by fair-minded conservatives and liberals from both political parties. We’ll be calling soon to meet with you person to person. We want to tell you more about our organization, to answer any questions you may have, and to see if we can be helpful to you as you pursue your legislative duties.

Equality SD grew out of the 2006 ballot initiative to ban gay civil unions. Almost half of South Dakota’s voters weighed in against this amendment, including traditionally rock-ribbed conservative counties like Pennington (with 49% voting “no”), Lawrence (52%), Fall River (52%) and Custer (51%). The election was a wakeup call, proving that even South Dakotans who may not identify themselves as gay rights advocates do consider themselves advocates of fair treatment for all.

Now, Equality SD wants to find common ground with you and other South Dakota public servants, so that we can work together to build a better state. For example, we believe we can contribute to South Dakota’s economic development efforts by showing out-of-state companies that South Dakota is a friendly and welcoming place for their workforce. That’s why we’d like to see sexual orientation and gender identity added to existing nondiscrimination policies and laws in our state as our neighbors have done in Iowa and as 92% of Fortune 500 companies have done.

For another example, we want to help stem the tide of bullying and verbal abuse in our schools, not only because it is wrong, but also because it threatens the quality of education for all students; has been proven to contribute toward gang activity; and is a factor underlying the sad fact that suicide is the leading cause of death among youth who are gay or lesbian.

Of course we have other goals to share. We want to participate more directly in the political process. We seek to persuade a majority of faith-based institutions to become "open and affirming" of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. We want to secure rights associated with civil unions. Mostly, we want to put our collective energy into creating positive change, and we have big plans to do just that.

Please look for a call from Equality SD requesting a “get acquainted” meeting. The caller may be one of our board members or one of our supporters from your district. We want to meet you person to person, to give you a little more information about our group and to share a personal story or two about our hopes and dreams and why we’re taking the time out of our busy lives to engage in this work. Before the end of the year, we hope to have spoken with every elected official holding statewide office.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,