Griffin Nichol has been a beneficiary of Rainbow Wellington's grants Rainbow Wellington has helped out two community groups and a young vocalist who overcame the odds, in recent grants. The group donated $500 to help the Patchwerq hui for queer youth in the Wellington region, and $1,000 to School’s Out, to help it move to its own accommodation in Wellington. “Homophobic bullying in our schools almost certainly remains the largest remaining issue of discrimination against our LGBTI communities, and Rainbow Wellington considers that supporting those groups who really work ‘at the coal face’ in this area to be an important contribution which we can make,” the group says. “We mostly support other local community groups, but occasionally an individual request comes along which is special and clearly deserves support. Griffin Nichol is a young FTM trans person, who formerly sang soprano in the National Youth Choir. “After transitioning he has now been accepted back into the choir as a tenor, a real first in many ways. Griffin is now asking for financial support to be able to participate in the choir’s tour of the USA and Canada.” Rainbow Wellington has given the talented singer $500 to help his bid. “Although grants to individuals rarely meet our criteria, we felt that this is such an inspiring story, that this brave and resourceful member of our communities well deserved our support.” Virtually all Rainbow Wellington’s income is from membership fees, and a few fundraising events, such as a recent successful Unity Books review night. Grants and donations are its largest expenditure. It made a substantial contribution to the Asia-Pacific Games in Wellington a couple of years ago, and regularly supports events like Out in the Square and the Out Takes Reel Queer Film Festival. Rainbow Wellington has clear criteria for grants and donations, which is set out here To further simplify the process it is working on a form anyone requesting financial support can use.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Wednesday, 31st July 2013 - 9:52am