Serena Worthington, senior director of public programs for Center on Halsted, has accepted a new position as a national advocate for LGBT seniors. She will serve as the director of community advocacy and capacity-building for Services and Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Elders (SAGE).
Worthington’s new position entails coordinating and working with the 16 SAGE affiliates across the country and improving advocacy training within those communities. She will also be a major player in helping shape federal policy agenda in Washington in terms of advocating for LGBT seniors.
Windy City Times: What are some of the exciting opportunities you’re looking forward to with this new job and what are your goals?
Serena Worthington: For me, building on the work of SAGE is an incredible opportunity. We’re at a very exciting point in history where we have an administration that’s paying attention to aging issues and LGBT issues and we have, in my opinion, a society that is very receptive to hearing about the specific needs of LGBT elders, so for me it’s a really great time to join the organization.
It’s a three-year grant and they’re working with three partners; the goal of that will be to provide technical assistance training and resources to LGBT seniors and providers across the country and that’s really incredible. It’s also very exciting in terms of the community-advocacy part because it’s a really good time to advance the work of policy reform around some of the inequities that exist and improve the quality of life.
WCT: What will you be sacrificing or missing most now that you’re moving on to this big national stage, as it were?
Serena Worthington: I will miss the Center. The Center is an amazing locus of activity and excitement. Just being here physically I will miss. There’s amazing leadership here for our senior services initiative and that support is incredible. I think on a personal level just seeing all these amazing people and all the amazing programs and activities and meetings that happen in this building on a daily basis I will miss that. The main thing I will miss I think are the seniors that I grew to know over the course of my time building the SAGE program. I will very much miss seeing them on a semi-regular basis. That will be a really hard goodbye.
WCT: Was working with the LGBT elderly something you thought might always be in the cards for you? What was it that called you to this very specific segment of LGBT advocacy?
Serena Worthington: It was really working in a long-term care environment where I got to know the gay and lesbian residents and seeing for myself what their experience was like. I worked at a place that provided excellent care but for a closeted individual the quality of life is different. You’re more isolated; there’s an increased risk for depression—and that’s the best-case scenario. The worst-case scenario is that you suffer neglect and abuse at the hands of people who would discriminate against you, so just seeing this isolation and putting myself in that place gave me this growing understanding of what that was like.
When my boss had us write 10 things it would take for us to move in where I worked, I realized I would want primarily a safe and affirming environment. I would want a place that celebrated who I was, and when I realized that there are all these people who are 80, 90, 95, 100 years old living in nursing homes right now who are the people who helped make [it] possible that I could work somewhere and be out and have domestic-partnership benefits.
WCT: In your career thus far, what are some of your biggest accomplishments? What do you hope to add to that list before you’re through?
Serena Worthington: Where SAGE is now is an amazing accomplishment. When I started it was a 10-year-old program that had four or five programs a month and about 20 people involved on a regular basis; now we’ve served almost 800 people individually and there are about 40 programs a month and our many services. Right now one of the last things that happened before I left is the launch of the nation’s first LGBT-homesharing program. The last piece that I think is incredible is the center got a $475,000 grant from the government. It’s a federal appropriation. I helped get that grant and the work that’s going to happen as a result of that is going to be incredible.
WCT: What are some of the most current endeavors as far as government policy that you expect to jump right into when you start?
Serena Worthington: “The Future is In Our Hands” is the constituent conference that I’d love everyone to know they’re welcome to. It’s in New York Nov. 11-13. Check the website [www.sageusa.org] to find out what that’s going to be about.
As for policy issues, I would say the Older American Act and including LGBT seniors as a vulnerable population, making sure federal funding is moving towards programs that specifically serve LGBT people and their allies and then including sexual orientation and gender identity when the government is asking questions. That’s one area that was so frustrating when I started; there was so little data about how many LGBT seniors are there and what are their needs are. When the government requires people to ask those questions we will know so much more.