Community members presented the findings of the inaugural LGBTQIA2S+ Community Health Needs Assessment on Tuesday to the Long Beach City Council, with top priorities including housing, affirming health resources and addressing safety in regards to hate crimes and violent incidents.
Over the year plus of distributing surveys and holding listening sessions, the City found its best practices for collecting data specific to sex, sexual orientation and gender identity, which it will use going forward.
Fifth District Councilmember Megan Kerr said the assessment has the power to “do some real restorative and reparative work for people who have lost faith in the City’s ability to see them, to find services for them and to support and uplift them.”
Community partners that helped compile data and engage with the community for these findings included KUBO Organizing Project, Earthlodge Center, the LGBTQ Center, APLA Health, Young People to the Front and Long Beach Forward.
The goals of the LGBTQIA2S+ Health Needs Assessment include:
- To assess the factors most impacting quality of life for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual and two-spirit individuals in Long Beach
- To identify current resources and assets available to the community that promote health and well-being.
- To understand best practices in collecting demographic data related to sex, sexual orientation and gender identity.
- To facilitate a community-driven proposal that leverages the strengths of the community in order to address health disparities and advance health equity for the LGBTQIA2S+ community.
Several listening sessions were held over the past year to gather multiple perspectives, as well as outreach at community events. Participants in surveys and listening sessions were currently living in Long Beach, 18 years and older and identified as part of the LBGTQIA2S+ community.
One-hour listening sessions were conducted with multiple subgroups such as Latinx, Black, Filipinx, Cambodian, transgender, gender expansive and intersex (TGI), youth, older adults, and folks with disabilities. The survey completed by 447 people included 61 questions and was available in English, Spanish, Khmer and Tagalog.
Almost 70% of the survey participants were people of color, 60% were between the ages of 25 and 44, 47% were part of the TGI community, 31% had an annual income of $20,000 or less, and 17% said their highest level of education was a GED. The 90802 zip code had the highest level of survey participants.
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Safety and Community
Safety, violence and community support emerged as a central theme in surveys and discussions, said Ellie Perez, interim director of the LGBTQ Center of Long Beach. Participants said in the last 12 months, 34% had experienced verbal abuse, 25% were threatened or harassed, 13% experienced physical abuse and 10% encountered cyberbullying. Over 80% of individuals said they had a safe place to go and socialize, and had friendships or relationships that were supportive.
However, nearly 60% of participants said they did not feel “confident” to go to the police for help. This number was higher (77%) among those who were transgender, gender expansive and intersex. Only 21% of people in Long Beach’s LBGTQIA2S+ community said they reported a hate crime or violence committed towards them to the police, “suggesting a reluctance to engage with law enforcement,” Perez said.
Housing
Housing was another prevalent issue brought up during the LGBTQIA2S+ Health Needs Assessment. About 6% of participants said they spend most nights in a shelter, while 64% reported couch-surfing with someone they knew. When asked about their emergency shelter experiences, 50% of TGI participants said they felt the shelter was affirming their gender.
A quarter of those surveyed or who participated in listening sessions said they had experienced homelessness in the last year, with 74% of them being people of color. Nearly a quarter of participants said they spend most of their income on rent alone. Of those who spend most of their income on rent, the rate was higher among the TGI community (31%) than the cisgender community (14%).
Mental Health
Sixty-four percent of participants reported being diagnosed with a mental health condition in their lifetime, with 80% of those being in the TGI community and 51% being cisgender. Barriers to mental health care included difficulty finding an affirming provider, getting an appointment due to long waitlists or being able to afford treatment. A quarter of respondents said they were able to access mental health services within the last year.
Needs Identified
Participants identified housing and homelessness as the top priority (64%), followed by mental health (38%), access to affirming care (36%) and safety (32%). TGI individuals saw the greatest need for housing support, though rent burden among all participants was prevalent. A high priority was also being able to access support services after experiencing a violent or hate crime.
For SOGI data collection, the group had multiple suggestions for best practices:
- Allow multiple response options for sexual orientation and gender identity.
- Include all response choices to show diversity of experiences.
- Protect all sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity data that is collected.
- Remind individuals that responding to sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity related questions is optional.
- Provide resources for term definitions.
- Ensure a diversity of categories when reporting data.
Additional cultural considerations were to include culturally-specific identities and understanding that not all terms can be translated exactly.
Next Steps
Long Beach Forward, KUBO Organizing Project and Long Beach City College will soon be hosting an LGBTQIA2S+ health summit to report these findings to the community and dive deeper into the data.
