| PTS - Pink Triangle Services | |
|---|---|
| Motto | The Centre for the Celebration of Sexual and Gender Diversity. |
| Formation | 1984 |
| Type | community centre |
| Purpose/focus | LGBT community |
| Location | 251 Bank St. Suite 301 Ottawa, ON K2P 1X3 |
| Region served | National Capital Region (Canada) |
| Executive Director | Claudia Van Den Heuvel |
| Staff | 4 |
| Volunteers | 130 |
| Website | PinkTriangle.org |
PTS, formerly known as Pink Triangle Services, is an Queer Community Centre located in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. They are the oldest registered Queer or LGBT-specific charity in Canada, becoming registered in 1984.[1] The organization serves Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Trans, Two-Spirit and Queer people within the National Capital Region (Canada).[2] They provide a number of services including support groups, education, research, advocacy and community space for other community groups.
Contents |
One of the founding members of PTS, Barry Deeprose in 2002 wrote a history of the organization. The forwards starts off as:
Until the 2000s PTS was run by a working Board of Directors and was funded primarily by individual donations from those communities.[4] Starting in the 2000s the organizational structure changed to become a policy and governance Board of Directors while the first agency Executive Director was hired.
Another major change that occurred in the 2000s was more focus was attributed to less served members of the community including bisexuals, trans people and those who solely identify as queer. This was also influenced by the decrease of stigma towards gays and lesbians in the broader community that lead to a court ruling making same-sex marriage in Ontario legal in 2003.[5] A bisexual women's group started at PTS which evolved into BiAmore for bisexuals of all genders years later. And in 2004 Trans Youth Ottawa started a group for transgender and transsexual youth and young adults which ran until 2009 and Gender Quest a group for all trans adults started in 2005 and still operates today. In 2005 the Board of Directors added trans, two-spirit and queer[6] to the letters patent to state their official commitment to those communities.
The programs of PTS can be broken up into three prime categories support programs, education programs and resource programs.
Historically one of the flagship programs of PTS was based on peer support groups. Over the years PTS has seen many groups come and go based upon need. Over time the programs being more education and social focused including guest speakers and workshop topics. The first group to undergo this change was Pink Triangle Youth (PTY) in 2003.[7] Current support groups include:
PTS has done education and advocacy work since it's outset as an organization however, since 2009 a new focus upon educational outreach programs which provide workshops has become a new priority. The three programs include:
There are plans to expand the resource programs at PTS to include a community calendar and to make an updated user-friendly version of their resource directory which can be found on their website.[10] Currently however, the one prime resource is the Dr. Kelly McGinnis Library, which is the largest queer-specific library in Canada.[11]