About Us
The Kalamazoo Alliance for Equality (KAFE) was formed in 2006 to work towards obtaining equal rights for the LGBT community in the Kalamazoo Metro area and beyond. The group is compromised of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, allies, and questioning individuals interested in promoting/obtaining equal rights for all persons.
The core purpose or mission of KAFE is to influence political change that improves equality for the LGBT community.
The group works to obtain equal rights through:
We accomplish these tasks through our members, ad-hoc committees and the steering committee, for more information on current committees click here.
Previous Actions
May to October 2007 – Engineering Social
Justice Training Series
KAFE created this series to train activists on the
basics of social justice activism. Visit
www.socialjusticemi.info to read more or to order a
DVD from the series. This training series may be
duplicated in the coming year around the state of
Michigan with the assistance of Michigan Equality.
Visit the website for updates.
June 2007 – City of Kalamazoo Effort to retain
benefits for partners of GLBT City Employees
A coalition of GLBT organizations from in and
around Kalamazoo worked with the ACLU to have
the City of Kalamazoo maintain the benefits for
partners of GLBT city employees. An effort that
lead to the City of Kalamazoo adopting a pilot
program that would allow for these benefits to be
maintained.
November 2007 - Kalamazoo City Commission
Voters Guide
With the assistance of The League of Women
Voters, KAFE’s Political Action Committee (under
the leadership of Terry Kuseske) put together this
extensive 16 page document that posed a series of
four questions about; affordable housing, public
safety, human rights, and the worth of diversity
training programs. Available online at
www.kalamazooalliance.org.
February 2008 – Seven Passages – A Community
Conversation on Homosexuality and Faith
Developed programming along with other Kalamazoo
GLBT & progressive organizations to coincide with
WMU Theatre Department’s production of Seven
Passages, The Story of Gay Christians.
Previous Actions
February 2008 – Stop Hate in Kalamazoo
Coalition
Along with many GLBT & progressive
organizations from in and around Kalamazoo,
KAFE helped form the Stop Hate In
Kalamazoo Coalition to offer support to the
students, faculty and administration of
Kalamazoo Central High School and their
production of The Laramie Project.
2008 & Beyond – Insert Your Concern
Here
Come and be a part of KAFE. We welcome all
of our gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender
and straight allies to come and help us work
towards achieving social justice in
Kalamazoo. “Change” starts with you |
