Community Stories

The Pride Center is a wonderful place to be involved with. Everyone is friendly and helpful and its an extremely positive and welcoming environment. It’s always a blessing to be able to be in the atmosphere that the Pride Center exhibits.

I have worked with the center on organizing a trans clothing donation drive, as well as San Mateo’s first queer prom. The people at the center are more than willing to help and educate the community. Event coordinators have been speakers at my high school’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance. The club members have always been grateful and appreciative of the center for organizing fun events they can attend. The center serves as a safe space for those in the community and does a fantastic job of providing youth with resources.

The Pride Center is a great place where me and my family can just be. I love the atmosphere, the support, the intersectionality, and all the rainbows!! I first came to the Center before it opened to work on Pride and have found myself drawn to the place for many events including Queer Prom, movie nights, and my own creation, LGBT(ea). Its a lovely place to get to know the community around you.

Hello family, friends, and the community! I’ve been a member of San Mateo County most of my life; we moved to California from Texas when I was eleven. I’m Mexican American, part of the LBGTQ community, and I hold my head up high. To be open and honest, I havent always been proud of my sexual orientation, but the more I realized how important it is to stand with the community for the greater good to making positive changes for the LBGTQ community, and San Mateo county, the more I changed my way of thinking. Now at age 48—college student— I see how important it is to stand together, which will increase the strength of the LBGTQ community. I’m proud to be a part of San Mateo County and LBGTQ family.

The San Mateo Pride Center is a great place to do just that to be proud of who we are, no matter where we are on our journey, but also for any type of support to guide us down that path. Everyone at the center is very welcoming and friendly, always displaying positive attitudes. They’re all very accepting of anyone looking for support of any kind and would gladly point in the right direction if they didn’t have the answers. I feel at home in San Mateo County; additionally, I feel at home at the San Mateo Pride Center. I’m grateful this center opened up in my community. Finally a safer place for the people who just want to feel supported and accepted, more importantly, for people to be proud of who they are as individuals, and feel welcomed in their community.

As a queer femme therapist who works in San Mateo, I am so grateful the Pride Center exists! I provide therapy and services to LGBTQ survivors of partner abuse at CORA, San Mateo domestic violence and partner abuse prevention and services organization. What a blessing and support it has been to have a one-stop LGBTQ resource and community-building organization just down the street from our office! The Pride Center has already supported my work and CORA in so many ways, through consultation, providing meeting space and community education, mutual service referrals, and supporting in the training of our CORA volunteers. In my role, I’ve been lucky enough to get to know and work alongside the advocates, organizers, and community-builders at the Pride Center. Everyone I have met there speaks to an inspiring vision of how to nurture LGBTQ community in San Mateo county. They also create such a warm and welcoming environment, a place that feels like a true home where everyone is welcome and celebrated. They create this space not in spite of the differences in race, gender, sexuality, class, age, ability, and language that create the rainbow of our county; they create this space in honor of all the unique strengths, beliefs, cultures, and personalities of the people who live and work in San Mateo. For that the Pride Center and the people who make it happen have my deep gratitude and support as we all work to make San Mateo County an even more just and welcoming place for LGBTQ communities.

I moved from the South Bay to San Mateo County a while back, and though I love living here, I missed having access to the DeFrank Center in San Jose, where I had attended many events and made a lot of friends. One day this past spring I happened to drive past 1021 S. El Camino Real in San Mateo, and there was a rainbow sign on the building! I checked online and saw that, sure enough, a new pride center was being readied to open in June. I attended the grand opening on June 1st, and was quite moved to see the rainbow flag flying high over a wonderful crowd of people. Since then I’ve been done volunteer activities and attended support group meetings and other events at the San Mateo County Pride Center, and I’ve made some friends. And the best part its right near home!

Living in a very strict Filipino family growing up, being raised Catholic, and also being a lesbian is hard to digest sometimes. I feel like I get a sense of confidence when I’m in here. I can be my absolute true self. This place is honestly like a security blanket that I can wrap myself in every time I walk through the doors. If I have any problems in my life, I can block it out for a while and focus on the amazing work I get to do HERE! What’s comforting for me is how many folks I’m impacting in a positive way every day. The support that I get when I come into work exceeds all my expectations on how work should be. This center gives me a sense of hope and it inspires me to embrace being a proud Filipino lesbian, and I’m so grateful WE finally have the San Mateo County Pride Center!

Go north about 20 miles or south about 30 miles and you will hit a metropolis which provides the LGBTQ community with numerous social outlets – an LGBTQ Center, community meeting places, theaters, bars, restaurants, etc. However, San Mateo County has been an LGBTQ desert for all of the 14 years that I have lived here. My husband and I have done most of our socializing in San Francisco since that is where we lived before and we knew places to go to meet our needs. I know that San Jose has also been an outlet for many LGBTQ folks in San Mateo since that is the community they know best. However, San Mateo had nothing until an LGBTQ Senior Peer Counselor group was established at Peninsula Family Service about 10 years ago.

 

Ever since then, a small group of us from PFS have talked about the need for a center in our community. Finally in June of 2017, an LGBTQ Center was opened on El Camino Real in San Mateo, a first for our community brought about through the collaborative efforts of various non-profit groups in the county: Peninsula Family Service, the County of San Mateo Health and Recovery Services, Star Vista, Outlet of Adolescent Counseling Services, and Daly City Partnership and Pyramid Alternatives. The center provides a variety of services for clients of all ages – support groups and workshops for transgender members of our community, workshops on real estate in the county, Friday movie night, and a myriad of other activities. Check out the facebook page at: San Mateo County Pride Center for a listing of all activities coming up at the center.

 

Needless to say, the center has been a boon to our community as LGBTQ folks no longer have to drive north or south to find resources, they’re right here in our backyard. Check out the calendar and come to the center to participate, enjoy and offer any services or skills you have.