Press Release: Funds Raised to Free Meagan Taylor, a Transgender Woman Jailed in Iowa

Individuals interested in donating to free Meagan Taylor can do so here: http://sfwelcomeministry.blogspot.com/2015/07/arrested-for-being-transgender-meagan.html

 

Meagan Nicole Taylor, is a transgender woman who lives in St. Louis.  While on a trip with a friend, a hotel manager called the police (possibly twice), because Taylor's identification did not match the name and gender identity that Taylor has used with family and friends for years.  

"What happened to me, was definitely based on my gender.  Transgender people are being gender and racially profiled and it has to stop," Taylor said.

Woken up by a knock at the hotel door around 9 am, Taylor was taken into custody because she did not have the prescription for her hormone treatments with her and for how she spoke to the officers, whom she felt were unjustly arresting her.

Thinking back on her arrest, Taylor says: "To the woman at the hotel and police officers who arrested me, I have no ill will towards you.  I think God will take care of it and help you gain more education about transgender individuals.  LGBTQ individuals are very happy and peaceful people."

Taylor was told that she would be held without release until trial, scheduled for August 10, 2015 and was feeling frustrated that she would not be able to prove that she had a prescription for her medications for nearly a month.  On top of the $2,000 bond for Taylor's release, $500 fine from a 2010 offense had tripled due to fees and penalties and a warrant from Illinois could not be dropped until the $1,713.20 fine was paid in full.

The Welcome Ministry, led by the transgender Lutheran pastor Megan Rohrer, has raised $3,601 as of 9:12 am on July 19th and will be working with Taylor's aunt to pay both the fines in Iowa and Illinois.  Updated information on the funds to free Taylor can be found at: http://sfwelcomeministry.blogspot.com/2015/07/arrested-for-being-transgender-meagan.html

"Raised in the Midwest and a frequent traveler," Rohrer said, "I often fear that what happened to Meagan will happen to me.  I hope Meagan's story raises awareness, so that this never happens in Iowa or anywhere else in the country again."

"Think about if one of your kids was transgender.  What would you do?  And, how would you want society to treat them?" said Taylor.

Welcome's goal is to pay the fines and hopefully get Taylor release on Monday morning.  When she is released, supporters plan to have some of Taylor's favorite foods on hand (hot pickle, fried chicken and shrimp).

"I am thankful for all the support," said Taylor, who was moved to tears by the outpouring of support from over 80 donors and the transgender artists who had been forwarding information about the cause along on twitter.

Any additional funds, above the amount needed to pay for the fees for Taylor's release will be used to support LGBTQ homeless individuals in San Francisco and projects to uplift the voices of transgender individuals living in poverty.

"Meagan has a family that loves and supports her and a strong desire to support other LGBTQ individuals who are vulnerable, facing discrimination and in need of support.  After we get Meagan out of jail and she gets some rest, Welcome will continue to help her tell her story," said Pastor Rohrer.



The comments from Taylor in this press release are statements Meagan Taylor approved for sharing with the press and supporters.  They were transcribed in a web conference on July 19, 2015 from her isolation cell, by Pastor Megan Rohrer.



About Welcome:
Welcome seeks to provide a faithful response to poverty and to improve the quality of life for individuals in our community through hospitality; the arts; education; food; and referrals.  www.sfwelcome.org

Individuals interested in donating to free Meagan Taylor can do so here: http://sfwelcomeministry.blogspot.com/2015/07/arrested-for-being-transgender-meagan.html

Media Information:

• Contact information for Pastor Megan Rohrer: 415-827-2587  pastor@gracesf.com   @mmrohrer 
• Pastor Megan Rohrer's PGPs for news stories are: They/Their
• Despite some of the stories published, Meagan does not want information about her private parts included in stories about her.  You can find the GLAAD guidelines on reporting about transgender individuals here.
• Meagan would like the press to use her preferred name, pronouns and photos in stories.  Her family has been honoring this request for years.  Name: Meagan Nichole Taylor  PGP: She/Her
• Approved photos:
  
  

  

  Approved screen shot from a video chat between Pastor Megan Rohrer and Meagan Taylor on 7/19/2015

  
  
  

Links to Media Reports about This Story:

• Group Raises Money to Help Transgender Inmate, Des Moines Register, July 18, 2015.
• Black Woman Who Claims Police Arrested Her For Being Trans, Now in Isolation, The Advocate, July 17, 2015.

Arrested for Being Transgender: Meagan Taylor: Fundraiser for Bail: Advocating for Change

 Thank you to everyone who has supported the effort to help pay the fees and bond needed to get Meagan out of jail.  If you would like to donate to Welcome to support our other work with LGBTQ homeless individuals you are welcome to use the donate button above. 

 Now that Meagan is Free if you would like to provide her with additional funds or support, please contact her directly. 

Funds raised and designated to Welcome to "Free Meagan": $4,719

$955 in additional undesignated donations to Welcome between 6/21 and 7/23 were approved by the Welcome Board to cover additional fees (if needed) and to ensure that Meagan is able to legally change her name and get a new ID.  We apologize for not being clearer about this earlier, but our priority was Meagan's privacy, getting Meagan out of jail and ensuring that she was able to make her own decisions without pressure.  Donations will not be deposited in to Welcome's bank account until 8/13/2015.

Total Funds expended to date: $5,381

Final Expense Accounting:

• $88 in web conferencing fees with Meagan in jail
• $2,276 wired funds to pay Meagan's bond at the Polk County Jail ($2,100 of this will be returned after Meagan appears in court or the charges are dropped)
• $1,825 wired funds to Meagan's family that paid her fees in Illinois 
• $646 funds wired to Meagan in Iowa
• $546 Instead of actual expenses for name change and ID fees, Meagan has opted to receive $500 to get the money in advance.

Meagan Taylor was the only individual making decisions about how funds were expended.  Welcome did not reimburse or accept requests for unsolicited reimbursement. We were saddened that so many strangers, expected funds raised to pay for Meagan Taylor's legal, would be distributed to them.  

* Notice that has been on this donation page, since start of the campaign: Welcome is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization.  Your donation will be acknowledged with a letter for your tax records.  We are committed to paying Meagan's fees.  Any remaining donations raised above the actual cost of fees will be used to support LGBTQ homeless youth and transgender individuals living in poverty.  Meagan has requested that we pay it forward to other people in need. 

Meagan Taylor was arrested in Des Moines because she was transgender and it upset hotel staff.  She is currently being held in Polk County Jail with a $2,000 bail amount. You can learn more about the case here: http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/rekha-basu/2015/07/16/arrested-transgender-sex-inmate-tests-jailers/30269945/

We don't know all the information about Meagan's story, nor do we wait to help people until we learn all the details of their past.  Poverty is complicated and no one is perfect.  Deeply rooted in faith, we believe that all people deserve another chance.  If you agree, we hope you will help raise attention to this issue.

While not homeless, Meagan's story is familiar to us.  At Welcome, we have traveled the country to document the stories of LGBTQ homeless youth.  And the affects of laws targeting homeless youth and LGBT individuals of color.

Here is a video from New York to learn more about some of the issues that Meagan is experiencing.

Work Featured by HRC

Profile in Ministry: Expanding the Definition of an LGBT Advocate

Photograph by Gabriela Hasbun.

Rev. Megan Rohrer was recently featured in the exhibit, Polk Street: Lives in Transition, that explores San Francisco’s Polk Gulch neighborhood from the 1960s to the present. Examining the historic changes that have occurred in this famous community, the exhibit asks tough questions about the ways gentrification challenges lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender hospitality. It asks us to think about what it means to welcome LGBT people? Does economic disparity narrow our sense of welcome? When we advocate for the LGBT community can our vision incorporate a spectrum that includes sex workers, homeless seniors and runaway youth? What are the intersections with our work for LGBT justice and the work of building and sustaining healthy communities where all can prosper?

One of the participants in this project, Rev. Megan Rohrer, challenges us to think about our communities in just such ways. Megan first came out as a lesbian (later she would identify as gender queer) at 18 in South Dakota and discovered at the same time that she wanted to be a pastor. While leaving the overt homophobia of South Dakota for seminary at the Pacific School of Religion and the progressive community of Berkeley, Calif., she still felt a sense of alienation—this time because of class--among the affluent neighborhoods in the Berkeley hills. She eventually found her way to what would become her true calling, ministering to the homeless through the Welcome Ministry program at Old First Presbyterian Church in San Francisco.

The people Megan ministers to range in age from teenagers to senior citizens and are largely sex workers, transgender people, gays and lesbians –many of them from small towns across the country--who came to San Francisco to escape persecution and judgment. Although they may not identify on paper as LGBT, Megan recognizes many commonalities. Like her, many came from across the country to San Francisco--the Mecca for LGBT folks--only to discover that hundreds of thousands of other people had made that same choice. As Megan describes:

They didn’t have any family connections to help them out, and everybody knows rent is so expensive in this town that, the only thing that was left for them was sex work. As the gay community--as the richer gay community--moved towards the Castro, the less wealthy gay community stayed here, and a lot of the sex workers who worked along Polk Street continued to stay here because they always would have people who would bring them food, here. . . . and they knew, as long as they stayed in this neighborhood, even if they weren’t pretty enough anymore to be sex workers, people would take care of them.

In the spirit of Jesus who also spent much of his time among sex workers, Megan’s ministry has sought to build community among the most marginalized and in the process to expand our vision of what community and LGBT advocacy can mean. As we work to build support in Congress for hate crimes legislation and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act during an economic crisis when job discrimination and violence is escalating, we are reminded that it is the most marginalized in our communities that suffer first and are hit the worst. Megan’s ministry models for us what it means to build truly inclusive community that can sustain all of us.

To follow Megan’s ministry, read her blog: http://mystreetretreat.blogspot.com/. Also, check out her contribution as a writer for HRC’s Out In Season, a seasonal preaching and devotional resources written from a transgender perspective.

To learn about the other stories from Polk Street, check out the exhibit Polk Street: Lives in Transition. If you live in the Bay area or are traveling to San Francisco any time before May 31, 2009 you can view the exhibit at the GLBT Historical Society, 657 Mission Street, #300. Visit their website to learn about more community events and future developments of this important project.

See: http://www.hrc.org/issues/religion/12189.htm