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The first openly transgender athlete in Division 1, Kye Allums, shares his story at Charles J. Ping Student Recreation Center Tuesday, March 18, 2014. Allums also acts as the founder and creative director of the project "I Am Enough". 

Pride Week to only include one event this year

Pride Week will consist of one event this year.

The LGBTQA Affairs commission of Student Senate was tasked with events for the week, with Ryant Taylor, LGBTQA senate commissioner and presidential candidate on the BARE ticket, leading the charge.

The week featured seven events last year with Taylor Hufford, a junior studying athletic training, as commissioner. The week looked at bridging the gap between the athletic and LGBT spaces and the commission brought Kye Allums, the first openly-transgender Division I basketball player.

This year, Pride Week will consist of an event called “Be Proud,” on April 22, as a place where individuals are invited to the Scripps Amphitheater to share stories about being LGBTQA-identified. Taylor said he plans on contacting the LGBT Center and various student organizations to see if individuals want to formally present, but said it will be a pretty open and free-flowing event.

But members of Taylor’s commission quit early in the year and made it difficult to plan a week of events, he said.

He said he has been planning the event with friend Kim Oswald, a sophomore studying strategic communication, who started getting involved after individuals began quitting.

“Part of the difficulty was that it was only me planning it when other people were elected for positions and they decided not to do their part,” Taylor said, who is a previous Post columnist.

There was no information regarding Pride Week prior to March 31, which just included that the week would be occurring before finals week, Taylor said initially.

Paige Klatt, a junior studying specialized studies, and Abby Fairbanks, a junior studying communication sciences and disorders, planned Pride Week last year and resigned from the commission part way through this year. On April 9, they had a letter published online for The Post, criticizing Taylor’s lack of planning and communication this year in regard to his position and Pride Week.

Hufford said when she was in the LGBTQA commissioner spot, her sole responsibility and goal was planning Pride Week, besides contacting individuals.

Delfin Bautista, director of the LGBT Center, worked with Hufford and Klatt last year to put on Pride Week.

But when Bautista contacted Taylor in the fall and spring, Bautista received no details about when or how the week was happening.

Hufford said she gave Taylor a guide for how to plan Pride Week, and he contacted her to ask for help planning in late March. She said she was not contacted again after she offered her assistance.

Both in the position as vice commissioners Klatt and Fairbanks said planning for Pride Week needed to begin at the start of the year and Taylor would not accept that or their ideas.

“There could have been a lot more given back to the community and people outside of the community who could have become more aware of it and had a much more educational and eye-opening experience,” Klatt said.

Taylor said Fairbanks and Klatt “lied,” and said he has worked on projects such as bringing speakers to campus.

“They were lying blatantly in that letter, they stopped showing up to meetings, they stopped being responsive,” Taylor said. “They gave me no reason whatsoever as to why they dropped so if they are so committed to the LGBTQA community, they should have done a better job of actually fulfilling their positions and not throwing the blame on other people through lies.”

Fairbanks and Klatt said if schedules allow, they would like to attend the event.  

Daniel Warner, a senior studying psychology and the project coordinator of the LGBT Center, said he talked with Taylor earlier in the year and heard ideas about a street party for Pride Week.

After that has fallen through, Warner said he doesn’t hold it against him but just wants him to have done better, particularly with communicating with the LGBT Center.

Warner said the event overlaps with the Coming Out Monologues and the center’s participation in National Day of Silence.

“I’m frustrated. I’m disappointed,” Warner said. “This would be the least involved Pride Week I’d be involved in. While I do enjoy the opportunity to share, the timing of this event, it seems unaware of other events that (are) happening.”

When asked how he would respond to those who could be displeased with the plans for Pride Week, Taylor said he had no comment.

@reb_barnes

rb605712@ohio.edu

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