BY AJ TRAGER
SAGE Metro Detroit
This year the LGBT community welcomed the transition of the LGBT Older Adult Coalition to form SAGE Metro Detroit, the area's newest organization focused on the needs of LGBT older adults.
The new Metro Detroit chapter is just one of 29 chapters serving 21 states across the country. SAGE — Services & Advocacy For Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender Elders — is the country's largest and longest serving organization dedicated to improving the lives of LGBT older adults and offers innovative services and programs to LGBT older adults nationwide.
For LGBT seniors living in Metro Detroit, SAGE Metro Detroit will provide premier LGBT cultural competency training, help create safe spaces and provide a framework for many programs and services that are lacking for LGBT older adults in the area.
"We have a lot more to do," said Kathleen LaTosch, chair of the board. "The reason we became the SAGE Metro Detroit affiliate was because we wanted to pull everything that was being done together under one umbrella and make it really clean, simple and pull all our resources together to make it more effective and more efficient."
The coalition partnered with the State of Michigan Offices of Services to the Aging to launch the first ever statewide needs assessment for LGBT older adults in the nation and captured the responses of over 750 individuals. The Michigan assessment remains the only survey conducted focusing entirely on the needs of LGBT older adults.
The coalition also launched a cultural competency project with all three of the area agencies on aging that, with the aid of two certified trainers from the National Resource on LGBT Aging, was able to train hundreds of service providers in the area over the past five years on LGBT cultural competency. The three area agencies on aging collectively serve seven counties in Metro Detroit and receive 350 calls a year from older adults seeking services.
Judy Lewis serves as volunteer manager of SAGE Metro Detroit. Kathleen LaTosch serves as chair of the board with Jay Kaplan as volunteer vice chair. Those looking to donate to the organization can do so by contacting Lewis at [email protected].
SAGE Metro Detroit will have two offices to better serve the community and meet people where they are: one north of 8 Mile at Affirmations Community Center in Ferndale and one south of 8 Mile at The Luella Hannan Memorial Foundation located near Warren on Woodward.
