When the Bronx Community Pride Center in Longwood closed its doors earlier this year, the Bronx had no safe haven for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning community. Fortunately, a new LGBTQ center in the Bronx has risen from the ashes of the old center’s demise.

While the new organization is gaining momentum, the center is still looking for a permanent home.

“We’re trying to find one centralized place that’s convenient for everyone to get to,” said Fabio Cotza, a member of In the Life Ministries and the new LGBTQ center. “But hopefully if that’s successful, there will be several satellite programs spread all over the Bronx.”

The old Community Pride Center closed in June of 2012 in the wake of the Lisa Winters scandal. Winters, the former executive director of the Pride Center was indicted last year and convicted on April Fools Day of embezzling nearly $143,000 from the organization.

Though the new center does not affiliate itself with the old center in any way, it will be providing the same type of services for the LGBTQ community in the Bronx and upper Manhattan. These services include an area for members of the LGBTQ community to meet and socialize, receive support and services from other organizations, and to educate and advocate for issues important to the LGBTQ community.

Tym Moss co-founded the center last year and is its current president. Before becoming president of the center, he owned and operated a real estate company, Moss Realty, for more than 20 years. He left the company in 2004, and in 2008, went back to doing what he really loved: entertainment. Moss has been an actor, singer, an Internet radio show host, and a producer for a number of years. And even though he volunteers as the president of the LGBTQ center, he still has time to perform even at the center’s events.

Moss’ deep involvement isn’t something he envisioned even a year ago.

“Believe it or not, last year I had no idea I was going to be doing this,” Moss said.

After he learned about the Lisa Winters scandal, he and a group of friends, including Peter Frank, an LGBTQ activist, and Reverend Carmen Hernandez-De Armas, president and founder of the NYC LGBTQS (S stands for straight allies) Chamber of Commerce in Bedford Park, formed an ad hoc committee. From there they incorporated and filed for non-profit status. Moss was asked if he would be president of the new organization.

The ultimate goal is for the new center to provide a safe place for the Bronx LGBT community.

“The center [the Bronx Community Pride Center] was a physical site where LGBT people could go for support and when it closed, they had other places, but none which were explicitly LGBT,” said Dirk McCall, a former executive director of the Community Pride Center. “Supportive programs exist [elsewhere in the Bronx], but LGBT is not their main focus.”

The new center was formed not only because of the lack of a center in the Bronx but also because of the rise of reports of violence against the LGBTQ community within the borough. According to NYPD Detective Timothy Duffy, there have been a total of six hate crimes against members of the LGBTQ community in 2012 within the Bronx. Four of them were felonies, while two resulted in misdemeanors. In the past six months, there have been a total of six reported incidents, all of them have resulting in misdemeanors.

According to Sharon Stapel, the executive director of the Anti-Violence Project, the amount of violence hasn’t gone up. The reasons more people have been reporting more is because they are aware of organizations like AVP and the new center.

“Since we’ve been in the Bronx we’ve seen an increase of reports of violence in the borough,” said Stapel. “That doesn’t mean that the violence is increasing, it just means people are more aware of AVP services and the fact that they can make a report.”

The Bronx is no stranger to high-profile hate crimes. In October 2010, several members of the Latin Kings Goonies street gang kidnapped and tortured two teenagers in Morris Heights who both confessed to having sex with a 30-year-old man. The members then kidnapped, tortured, sodomized, and robbed the 30-year-old and forced the two teenagers to take part in the act. The story made national headlines for its brutality. On June 20, the Bronx District Attorney Robert T. Johnson announced the conviction of three men who were involved with the incident, all of whom pleaded guilty.

To promote the LGTBQ center, its members held a community outreach walk on June 21, to kick off the center’s opening. Politicians, members of the center, and other community activists gathered at the community center at Mullaly Park, off Jerome Avenue just north of Yankee Stadium.

Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. was also present at the outreach walk to voice his support for the LGBTQ center. He plans to make the center available to the community and to help the center grow.

“We will continue to give them space in Borough Hall free of charge, and we’re going to continue working with them and try to get them financiers.” said Diaz Jr.

Just recently, the center held the 2013 Bronx LGBTQ Pride & Health Fair last Saturday, July 20 at Crotona Park. The fair included performances from LGBTQ entertainers and political guest speakers including Speaker of the New York City Council Christine Quinn, who is lesbian, and former Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion Jr.

Moss has a bright outlook on the center’s future and is feeling the group’s momentum building.

“I’m learning as I’m going along, but I’m amazed at how positively we’ve been received in the community,” said Moss. “I think people have realized how much this borough needs an LGBTQ center.”

CAP: Members of the new Bronx LGBTQ Center pose during a community outreach event with Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr.
Photo by Hugh Thornhill