EDITORIAL Tough decisions

Recently, the Lesbian-Gay Community Services Center announced to our community a very tough decision.

According to the announcement, the Center will now be looking for a full-time executive director while Director of Services Aubrey Wertheim will go on halftime status.

It would seem that Aubrey's half-time status is a matter of money and not lack of confidence. There is no evidence that Aubrey's work was not appreciated or even loved by the Board of Trustees. Their decision was one based on need and what was best for the community.

They can't afford two full time employees. But, can they afford to lose Aubrey? Even Aubrey agrees that some one else who has more administration skills is needed for the Center. The phenomenal growth the Center had experienced needs to be handled. We do not want to lose the Center. And we do not think losing Aubrey Wertheim's skills, talents and presence is a good idea either.

Change is hard and many tough

decisions need to be made. The Center,

like life, must move forward. There is no standing still. As a community, although we have come so far in the last few years, there is still a long way to go. There are so many lesbian and gay Clevelanders who aren't getting the services they need.

The Center did not make a wrong decision; they didn't even make a bad decision. They made a tough decision. They were honest and open about the process and most likely were as disappointed in the choices they had as anyone else who knows Aubrey.

The Chronicle would like to encourage the Center to do what they can to keep Aubrey as Director of Services. If this means massive fund raising, then so be it. If it means a slowdown in growth until money for two full-time employees can be found, then so be it. A full-time Director of Services and Executive Director is what this community could really use.

An organization of volunteers is very different from an organization of paid

GUEST EDITORIAL

We 'R' We

by Michele Smeller

Have you ever noticed how tall the Detroit-Superior Bridge is? The other day, as I was standing at the bridge's crest, I noticed. Of course, the fact that the guard rail is only waist-high and compels the casual walker to break the boundaries of safety by leaning over the edge probably had something to do with my perception.

At any rate, it was a beautiful day-a rare occasion during March here in Cleveland. So, I decided to take a walk. What possessed me to walk across the Detroit-Superior Bridge, I don't know. But while I walked, I began thinking about this east/west hang-up Clevelanders have.

Not being indigenous to Northeast Ohio, I feel qualified to comment on this subject objectively. When I moved here a few months ago, one of the first questions I heard was, "Where are you going to live?"

This leading question was asked, I feel, because choosing to reside on one side of the Cuyahoga or the other would, in some way, indicate what kind of person I am. If I lived on the East Side, then

LETTERS

Dry dance night

To the Editor:

As referred to as "Our Most Precious Resource" in your editorial (March 1989), I find it difficult to comprehend that gay youths are deprived of a social life, because they are under 21.

The times are changing and gay youths are out there. There's not much out there, and no one has made any accommodations for them. The youth today believe and feel strongly about relationships and abhor casual sex, and they have the need to meet people.

My friends and I under 21, we would like to go to the bars to dance and meet other gay men, but we are turned away. We are forced to wait until we are of age and by then we feel so old.

What is needed is a Dry Dance Night

I'd be politically involved/aware, cultural, vegetarian, etc. If I inhabited the West, I'd go bowling, wear tennis shoes everywhere and eat Big Macs three times a week.

Despite my awareness of the West Side stereotype and partly because of the East Side one, I chose to live at the very southwest edge of Cleveland. Actually, the rent is cheaper than any other place I looked, and I'm as close to my job as I can be and still be in a safe neighborhood. But, as I've come to find out, by making that decision, I started a chain reaction of conclusions drawn about my personality.

In talking with other women (and men) in this community, I've come to the conclusion that this east/west phenomenon is just the scum on the surface of the river. The real problem is that people are being judged not by what they are but what they are not. Or should I say what they appear not to be. And what they are is not dependent upon where they live.

I settled on the West Side, as did some of my friends from college. We all are politically and socially aware, concerned and active. We don't bowl or play

at one of the bars for 18 and over, so we can dance, and even more important, meet sober gay men, to get to know the real person.

I believe that expanding the age group will influence a younger crowd to become regular customers as they become of age. This could be an endeavor, to interest people to come to a place where they have already become comfortable and feel appreciated. There are also those who refuse to go to the bars because of alcohol, and would like to meet someone sober.

We as the gay youth can't rely on someone to accommodate us. We need everyone to show support to get what we really need to become a reality. Please show your support of this concept, and call the Hotline at 781-6736 for Dry Night Support.

Dan Crews PRYSM

employees. Money does change motivations and commitments. Considering that most of the Center and its entire board consists of volunteers the work they have accomplished is staggering.

Let's not destroy what has gotten us to this place in the rush to grow even bigger. There wasn't a person in Cleveland that could have done for the Center what Aubrey has done. He was the new blood, that little spark that ignited this community to work together and produce what we have needed for so long. Before Aubrey's arrival the Center (formerly GEAR) was little more than a private club filled with big egos. The advent of Aubrey, along with Judy Rainbrook (now president of the Board) created an exciting metamorphosis which has infected the entire community. An infection that no one wants a cure for.

Aubrey, don't leave us. Keep your smiling face just where it is. Be patient, sometimes tough decisions have a way of working out.

softball. Some of us are vegetarian, but all of us watch the amount and type of meat we consume. And we usually wear what we like to call "functional and situationally appropriate clothing." We don't draw lines between us because one is a runner and one likes to lift weights. Or because one chooses to drive a foreign car and one an U.S.-made automobile. Or because one is German and one is Italian.

We don't bother with these distinctions because we're friends. We don't need them to make ourselves different. We are different and we accept those differences. Our differences are what empowers and sustains our friendships. Period.

In a community as small and oppressed as the gay and lesbian community, I wonder how sane and safe it is to alienate any part of it because of what someone is not.

I'm not an East Sider, though someday I may be.

I'm not thirty-something, though eventually I will be.

I'm not a gay man, and though it's technologically possible, I never will be. But not being those things doesn't

Sticks and stones

To the Editor:

The proposal of legislation to prevent homosexuals from adopting or fostering children is the engineering genius of an uninformed "public servant". State Senator Gary Suhadolnik's defended his bill with the strong and highly intellectual verbal retort "Sticks and stones..." This must be a reference to the ancient tradition of ❝stoning" one to death for breaking a social law. No doubt that he will soon attempt to introduce new legislation encouraging the return of stoning. Later legislation may include immediate retroactive action on the removal of children from their natural parent(s) that happen to be homosexual.

Mr. Suhadolnik apparently does not agree that "alternative lifestyles" offer

gay people's

HRONICLE

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The Gay People's Chronicle is dedicated to providing a space in Cleveland's lesbian-gay community for all women and men to communicate and be involved with each other. This means that every Chronicle, to the best of our ability, will be equally dedicated to both men's and women's issues,as well as issues that affect all of us. Striving for this balance will not only provide the community with a forum to air grievances and express joys, but will also help all of us achieve this balance in our lives.

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make me less important, less significant, less empowering than any other link that holds this community together. If we keep defining others by what they are not, eventually we'll end up with a “community” of one. Because I am certain of one thing I am most definitely not: I am not you.

any merit to society whatsoever. You're wrong, Mr. Suhadolnik; some of the greatest minds in history lived "alternative lifestyles". Like so many others he can only see the "sexuality" aspect of these people. That which consenting adults do behind closed doors is not to be overseen by legislation or by religious fanatics with their eyes to the peepholes. The other aspects most people do not associate with the word "homosexual" are the same as everyone else's.

Love affection, warmth, humility, compassion, ambition, hope, dreams, and values are part of them as well as the rest of humanity. Are these not the environmental elements that children deserve? As far as children developing homosexual tendencies in such circumstances, that is a matter they will decide for themselves when they are adults. Until then responsible parents,

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