Our Accomplishments

Conferences and Workshops

Pride in Aging RI has sponsored the following educational opportunities:

  • Visible Lives: LGBT Welcoming Agencies, a 2014 educational series of workshops and presentations in health care, social service, and academic settings.

  • Improving the Quality of Supports and Services Offered to LGBT Older Adults, presented with Tim Johnston of the SAGE National Resource Center on LGBT Aging (2014).

  • Life at the Intersections – Working with Older LGBT Adults (2016)

  • Necessary Conversations: LGBT Older Adults and End of Life Concerns (2016)

  • LGBT Elders: Vulnerabilities, Resilience, and Resources in partnership with NASW-RI, the RI Health Care Association, and Westview Nursing and Rehabilitation Center (2017)

  • Gen Silent: Understanding LGBT Elders and Practice Implications (2018)

  • Promoting Quality of Care for LGBT Older Adults: A Resource Model for Cultural Competence – a workshop series for healthcare and senior service providers (2019-2020)

  • Creating a Culture of Inclusion for LGBT Residents in Long-Term Care and Assisted Living Facilities – a series of workshops to introduce the development of staff training curriculum modules (2021)

  • Partnering with the Rhode Island Assisted Living Association (RIALA) to promote LGBTQ+ inclusion and visibility for welcoming assisted living residences in Rhode Island 2022-2023

Research and Reports

Pride in Aging RI conducts research on key issues for LGBTQ+ older adults to identify priorities and guide public policies, including:

  • The Meet the Older Neighbors Survey of 2005, the first survey to explore the needs and concerns of Rhode Island’s older adults, a project supported by the RI Foundation Equity Action Fund.

  • The Lesbian Health Survey of 2012 and Healthcare for Lesbian Elders: An Assessment of Lesbian Elders and Health Care Professionals Final Report 2013

  • The Health and Healthcare Needs of Older Gay Men in Rhode Island Survey Report of 2014

  • The LGBTQ+ Housing Summit and Survey of 2014

  • The 2020 THPF Momentum Fund Focus Group Project, a series of state-wide focus groups to assess the needs and priorities of LGBTQ+ older adults.

Over our almost 30-year history, Pride in Aging RI has led and supported many efforts to create a more welcoming and inclusive Rhode Island for our LGBTQ+ older adults. Below is just a snapshot of the impact we have made.

Events and Activities

Pride in Aging members have advocated for LGBTQ+ civil rights and LGBTQ+ inclusive public policy by:

  • Marching in the earliest Providence Pride Parades, volunteering at annual Pride Festivals, and contributing to LGBTQ+ oral histories and library collections.

  • Organizing campaigns to pass LGBTQ+ civil rights legislation beginning with the Providence Anti-Discrimination Ordinance of 1977, and to this day as individuals and in liaison with other LGBT organizations.

  • Participating in the first RI Foundation Equity Action 2008 LGBT Elder Care Summit bringing service providers, state agencies, and LGBTQ+ representatives together to begin the process of developing an action plan to better meet the needs of RI’s older adults.

  • Creating, with Lt. Governor Elizabeth Roberts and the Long Term Care Coordinating Council’s LGBT subcommittee, the first-in-the-nation RI State Plan for LGBT Elder Care in 2014.

  • Planning and implementing the 2013 and 2014 LGBTQ+ Health Fairs held at the RI State House in partnership with the RI Executive Office of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) Region 1.

  • Launch of LGBT Café in 2015 – a program supported by the Division of Elderly Affairs (now the Office of Healthy Aging) and co-sponsored by Meals on Wheels RI. The program operated with support from volunteers by SAGE-RI and AARP volunteers and was the first and only program of its kind for LGBTQ+ seniors in RI. It continuously ran for five years until interrupted by the COVID pandemic.

  • Holding community meetings, such as Moving Forward: Looking Toward our Future Community Meeting, held in April of 2018, to review the history of activism in Rhode Island and to introduce future legislative goals.

  • Launched SAGE Zoom Café April 2020 – a weekly meeting to relay important information about community resources and to reduce social isolation during the COVID shutdown.

  • Working with the Senior Agenda Coalition of RI, volunteering with AARP of Rhode Island’s advocacy initiatives, and participating on the Long-Term Care Coordinating Council’s LGBTQ+ Subcommittee, the RI Elder Justice Coalition, and the RI LGBT Public Policy Convening to make sure that LGBTQ+ voices are heard.

  • Participating in opportunities offered in partnership with SAGE-USA’s national network, SAGECollab, and the Aging with Pride National Health, Aging and Sexuality/Gender Study Advisory Committee 2023