On August 25, nearly 200 LGBTQ activists and advocates joined the National LGBTQ Task Force at the kickoff for the 38th Creating Change in downtown Louisville, Kentucky, January 27-31, 2027. At the event, the upcoming theme “Radical Imagination: Building Our Destiny” was announced.
“It is going to take radical imagination to rebuild, or as some may argue, build a new democracy in this country,” Kierra Johnson, president of the Task Force said. “It’s audacious to dream and resist right now, to claim our destiny and our agency to build this ourselves. This is our home, and it’s up to us to do it. We refuse to let anybody else take that agency from us.”
Kentucky LGBTQ activists, organizations, and lawmakers gathered for the kickoff, including state senator Kenturah Herron, the first openly LGBTQ+ person elected to the Kentucky General Assembly and the first openly LGBTQ+ person of color elected to the Kentucky State Senate
Reverend Debra J. Mumford came to understand Creating Change’s role in teaching movement skills through a faith lens for her students at Louisville Seminary.
“They can get out and meet the Louisville community and make some connections, especially since some of them come from different parts of Kentucky,” said Mumford, who serves as the Seminary’s Dean and Vice President of Academics. “These types of events by the Task Force truly make a difference….if … our students know these things exist and that they can work and volunteer in these spaces. They can envision their work.”
Alicia Hurle, co-executive director of Common Ground Kentucky and Chris Hartman, longtime executive director of Kentucky Fairness, gave a warm local welcome to attendees, thanking the Task Force for their commitment to the state’s fight in the movement. “For the Creating Change folks in the room, we want to demystify who we are about here in Kentucky,” Hurle said. “We are the front porch of the South and we’ve been ground zero for a lot of racial justice, queer liberation and the racial, working-class families. We’re excited to share that lineage with y’all.”
Sayre Reece, vice president of the Task Force, is a Louisville native and welcomed folks on behalf of the Task Force. Reece highlighted the Task Force’s vision statement, emphasizing intersectional advocacy and a commitment to work in principled struggle, as well as continuing the legacy of their founding mission in 1973.
“Our vision is of a democratic, economically-just society where all people thrive with a sense of belonging, self-determination, and bodily autonomy. We believe that durable progress depends on our ability to understand and strategically engage the roles of gender, race, and faith as structuring forces in society,” Reece said. “We are focused on a responsive, people-centered democracy.”
“Kentucky’s Worth Fighting For,”
Fernando Lopez, director of Creating Change, thanked Kentuckians and their commitment to the movement, sharing their current victories against anti-LGBTQ initiatives throughout the state. With the Task Force hosting its kickoff mixer 68 days away from the midterm elections, Lopez spoke to the critical need for Creating Change leading up to the ballot and in the aftermath of the results.
“The fact that, in this climate, moment, and time, you all defeated every single anti-LGBT, every anti-trans piece of legislation this cycle…y’all have organizing in your blood, and we want the rest of the country to learn from these successes,” Lopez said. They continued: “You are winning. You are constructing durable organizing infrastructure from the ground up.”
During the presentation, Lopez touted Creating Change’s offerings of nearly 150 skill-building workshops, 45 identity and sector-based caucuses, and almost 30 day-long institutes that center education on marginalized communities.
“At my first Creating Change 21 years ago, it changed my life. I didn’t know that there could be this many queer nerds in one place who [cared enough] to do…the deep gritty, hard, messy work of the movement. And I hope you get to experience that with us.”
Johnson closed the speaking program, calling on Kentucky’s organizations to bring their regional and local power and experience to Creating Change. A native Georgian, Johnson shared her commitment to bringing the movement to the South through Kentucky. The Task Force last hosted Creating Change in the South in New Orleans in 2024. “People think they know who we are and project onto us all kinds of falsities about our communities, our states and our people,” Johnson said. “In this room, this is what queer looks like. This room is not how people often talk about the race, class or gender of our LGBTQ people in our community.”
After recent attempts to overshadow the LGBTQ movement’s progress, Johnson described the “seeds of mistrust” that have led to a movement weary of joy, hope and creativity. Creating Change, Johnson says, looks to reclaim the movement’s progress through hard conversations such as pulling religious leaders into pro-LGBTQ faith work.
“We can’t shy away from hard conversations about race, gender, about sexual violence, about our parents who don’t have positive things to say about immigrants because they’re absorbing all their news from Fox,” Johnson said. “We have to relearn how to be in community, how to be in disagreement and still keep our people in it with us.”
Registration and hotel booking for the 38th Creating Change is open and closes January 5. For more information about Creating Change details, please visit the Task Force’s website to learn more.
About The National LGBTQ Task Force:
The National LGBTQ Task Force builds power, takes action, and creates change to achieve freedom, justice, and equity for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer people. As the progressive voice of the LGBTQ movement and the LGBTQ voice of the progressive movement, the National LGBTQ Task Force organizes people and money in pursuit of liberation for all
