The mood was high. After all, there was much to be excit­ed about.

After three long years, the Young Democ­rats of Wash­ing­ton were cel­e­brat­ing three firsts: their first in-per­son con­ven­tion since the begin­ning of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic; their first hybrid con­ven­tion; and their first con­ven­tion east of the Cas­cades in near­ly a decade, in my home­town of Spokane.

The con­ven­tion prop­er spanned three days and five sep­a­rate loca­tions, offer­ing par­tic­i­pants a chance to real­ly expe­ri­ence the city.

Sat­ur­day’s pro­ceed­ings, a series of pan­els and talks about issues fac­ing the region, were held at North Cen­tral High School.

I had the hon­or of attend­ing one such dis­cus­sion on Sat­ur­day morn­ing about the expe­ri­ence of being LGBTQ+ in East­ern Washington.

Though Wash­ing­ton has his­tor­i­cal­ly been one of the safer states to be queer, the LGBTQ+ expe­ri­ence east of the Cas­cades is a very dif­fer­ent one due to the Repub­li­can-lean­ing local gov­ern­ments. After all, it was­n’t that long ago that it was­n’t very safe to be out in Spokane, the biggest city in the region.

Sad­ly, even today, the fear of dis­crim­i­na­tion pre­vents many of us from out­ing our­selves, even for the pur­pos­es of data collection.

A recent esti­mate placed Spokane’s LGBTQ+ pop­u­la­tion at 3.8%, but it is like­ly that the true num­ber is even higher.

That said, Spokane is gain­ing a rep­u­ta­tion for being one of the friend­lier cities. Our Pride fes­ti­val is grow­ing every year, draw­ing more than 25,000 peo­ple to the streets of down­town Spokane to cel­e­brate queer joy.

We have an LGBTQ+ busi­ness cham­ber, queer-affirm­ing church­es, Odyssey Youth Move­ment (an orga­ni­za­tion geared towards LGBTQ+ youth), Spec­trum Cen­ter Spokane (an LGBTQ+ non­prof­it), and queer-friend­ly spaces such as Boots Bak­ery, nYne Bar, and Neato Bur­ri­to. Spokane Pride, the over­seer of all events Pride, served 27,000 peo­ple in 2019. Today? The num­ber is clos­er to 50,000.

And, in the last local elec­tion cycle, Zack Zap­pone made his­to­ry as the first open­ly bisex­u­al mem­ber elect­ed to the City Council.

One thing is cer­tain: Spokane is becom­ing more queer. How­ev­er, even with our progress, city lead­er­ship has yet to tru­ly reflect our grow­ing demographics.

Este­ban Here­via chose to run for City Coun­cil rep­re­sent­ing Dis­trict 3 pre­cise­ly because of this lack of rep­re­sen­ta­tion. He is the for­mer Pres­i­dent and CEO of Spokane Pride, and Strate­gist for Health Jus­tice and Belong­ing at Wash­ing­ton State Uni­ver­si­ty’s Elson S. Floyd Col­lege of Med­i­cine. If elect­ed, he would be the first Latine mem­ber of Spokane City Council.

Here­via led the ses­sion, titled LGBTQIA in East­ern Wash­ing­ton, by talk­ing about his expe­ri­ences as an out per­son run­ning for office.

He spoke of the per­ils of work­ing with those even with­in the par­ty who hold reser­va­tions against the queer community.

“Peo­ple hear ‘Pride’ and they hear two things,” he said. “ ‘Oh, that’s too pro­gres­sive.’ And on the oth­er side, folks say ‘oh, that’s too mild.’ ”

“But when we look at what a city coun­cil mem­ber is, it’s some­body who can trans­form change, make sense of pol­i­cy, [and] make sense of change.”

The task fac­ing Here­via is no small one. Here­vi­a’s Dis­trict 3 con­tains the West Cen­tral neigh­bor­hood, the poor­est neigh­bor­hood in Spokane. The medi­an income is $31,313. It has the most renters, there are no col­leges in the dis­trict, and it is one of the most diverse neigh­bor­hoods. LGBTQ+ adults are more like­ly to expe­ri­ence pover­ty than their het­ero­sex­u­al, cis­gen­der peers, so these indi­ca­tors are unfor­tu­nate­ly not sur­pris­ing. Giv­en the needs of the com­mu­ni­ty, Here­via wants peo­ple in office who are “rep­re­sent­ing the real­i­ties of our voters.”

Join­ing him in con­ver­sa­tion was Leiy­o­mi Pre­ci­a­do, a trans woman of col­or who ran for Kit­sap Coun­ty Com­mis­sion­er last year. Her mes­sage for allies was strong: “[It] does­n’t need to hap­pen for you in order for you to care.”

“What may hap­pen to trans peo­ple,” she said. “May then go onto gay peo­ple.” Indeed, there has been much fear with­in the com­mu­ni­ty about the onslaught of vio­lent, anti-trans leg­is­la­tion pour­ing out of states with right-wing gov­ern­ments, and what this could mean for the rights of LGBTQ+ peo­ple over­all.

Pre­ci­a­do spoke of the impor­tance of being rep­re­sen­ta­tion in gov­er­nance: “Being out, and vis­i­ble, and proud to show that any neg­a­tive con­no­ta­tion they have against trans peo­ple isn’t warranted.”

She expressed con­cern with those among the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty who are Demo­c­ra­t­ic “in name only;” who express ally­ship, but may not be ful­ly in line with mar­gin­al­ized com­mu­ni­ties. She asked Here­via how young Democ­rats can over­come these par­ty dynam­ics, espe­cial­ly from the old­er guard.

Here­via empha­sized the val­ue of com­mu­ni­ty build­ing: “The kitchen table is the most impor­tant table when you’re running!”

For LGBTQ+ can­di­dates run­ning for office, gath­er­ing the sup­port of oth­er can­di­dates and sym­pa­thet­ic busi­ness­es can be of utmost impor­tance. After all, there is a strong queer com­mu­ni­ty in Spokane, as mentioned.

How­ev­er, aggres­sive trans­pho­bic and homo­pho­bic pro­pa­gan­da has paint­ed our com­mu­ni­ty in a bad light, despite the fact that LGBTQ+ peo­ple are more like­ly to be vic­tims of vio­lence. Cir­cling back to Pre­ci­ado’s expe­ri­ence in her own dis­trict, con­nect­ing with oth­ers, help­ing them real­ize that queer and trans peo­ple are heir neigh­bors, their gro­cery store clerks, their doc­tors, and their friends, can go a long way in dis­man­tling deeply held bias­es. Here­via said there are “can­di­dates who have mon­ey from pow­er, but they don’t knock on doors.”

With that being said, LGBTQ+ aspi­rants can still suf­fer from undue scruti­ny. In an anti­quat­ed sys­tem that favors wealthy donors over grass­roots activism, peo­ple of col­or and mem­bers of oth­er mar­gin­al­ized com­mu­ni­ties have expressed frus­tra­tion with hav­ing to meet shift­ing goal­posts that their white, cis­gen­dered, het­ero­sex­u­al peers are not held to. Here­via him­self recount­ed instances where peo­ple expressed sur­prise at his qual­i­fi­ca­tions despite his lengthy resume!

Despite these chal­lenges, the tone of the ses­sion cen­tered on the pow­er of leg­is­la­tion to cement long-last­ing change. In a world where we are con­stant­ly under attack, it is impos­si­ble to under­es­ti­mate the rad­i­cal­iz­ing pow­er of joy.

“When I think of queer lib­er­a­tion, it’s tied to pol­i­cy,” Here­via said. “When we’re able to real­ize our own joy first… [we for­get] the sys­tem. We don’t need it.”