Friday, November 5, 2010

Howard Brown Needs Lifeline

From Howard Brown

For more than 36 years, Howard Brown Health Center has been providing care, preventing illness, conducting cutting-edge research, and safeguarding the health of our community. It may be that you, a friend or loved one, or someone you know has benefited from Howard Brown's services and knows the friendly faces that provide kindhearted treatment and care to those who rely on us. When the Chicago LGBTQ community needs compassionate care, advocacy for their health, and life-saving medical services and support, Howard Brown is their lifeline.

Today, we need you to be a lifeline for Howard Brown. Without your support, we will most likely close our doors by the end of the year. Why? Our past leadership mismanaged Howard Brown's funds. Ultimately, their actions have led to a need to raise $500,000 by the end of this year, and an additional $500,000 next year. We are reaching out to all of our friends and supporters for gifts great and small to help us continue our lifesaving services.

Your gift today to the Lifeline Appeal will save lives and help secure the future of Howard Brown's desperately needed medical care and health services in our community. As Howard Brown begins a new day - steadying from extraordinary challenges to remain a vital lifeline for LGBTQ individuals and families - please act now and make a contribution to help keep our doors open.

This is a critical time. Quite simply: Without your lifeline of support in the next 50 days, Howard Brown may cease to exist, people will go without necessary health care, and countless lives will be at risk.

With your help, we won't allow that to happen. We refuse to allow youth like Will, who was turned out by his family and harassed and assaulted in his school just because he is gay. Will felt so isolated and alone that he thought about taking his life. Instead he found Howard Brown's Broadway Youth Center, a lifeline of services for LGBT youth. At the Broadway Youth Center, Will was welcomed by compassionate staff and caring professionals who provided more than our expert services; they helped him understand that he is not alone. The BYC nourished him physically with warm meals and nurtured his spirit with the support that every one of our youth deserves.

Will's own words best describe the lifeline of support you provide with your gift to Howard Brown: "There is no other place like the Broadway Youth Center or like Howard Brown Health Center in Chicago. I believe that they saved my life, and I will be forever grateful."

Today, Will is a nursing student at Loyola University, committed to giving back to his community in the way that he was supported at Howard Brown. Your support of the Lifeline Appeal helps us ensure that all our youth, adult, and elder clients have a place to go for vital care and support.

Our outstanding new leadership team and I firmly believe that Howard Brown Health Center will be here for many decades to come - yet only with your support and the support of our entire community.

Just as Howard Brown and the Lesbian Community Care Project (LCCP) were founded by the community when there was a void in services and support, we now turn to the community from which we came to support Howard Brown in our unwavering commitment to continue the important work this community started. Each day, we continue to serve our clients with the expert and compassionate care that everyone deserves. And, we will continue to serve our community as we work toward our new vision of a world where being LGBT is good for one's health - for every LGBTQA person!

Join us to help realize this future and be a lifeline for our community, just as Howard Brown has been for 36 years. Thank you for your support. We depend on you, as many depend on Howard Brown.
Please make a Lifeline Gift today to support life-saving care and services.

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