Charting Our Path Forward | | |
As Texas Pride Community Foundation enters its second decade, we’re stepping into a new chapter with a newly adopted strategic plan. Shaped by conversations with dozens of community stakeholders across Texas, the plan reflects both pride in how far we’ve come and a clear call for transformational change as LGBTQ+ communities face growing challenges across the state. We have seen time and again that gains and setbacks are a constant in the fight for LGBTQ+ equity, and that progress rarely moves in a straight line.
The plan also centers our continued commitment to community impact. We will sustain and strengthen our grant making, deepen relationships with nonprofit partners across the state, and explore how Texas Pride can play a stronger role in connecting leaders, sharing knowledge, and supporting collaboration across the LGBTQ+ nonprofit ecosystem. We have funded over 120 organizations over the last decade. Our statewide knowledge and experience make us not only uniquely but solely qualified to fill these roles. Thus, our vision is not only to fund important work, but to help strengthen the broader community infrastructure that makes progress possible.
As a community foundation, Texas Pride exists to stand with those on the ground navigating those societal swings, investing in the people, organizations, and long-term resources that help communities respond, endure, and build forward. This plan is about strengthening that role and building the foundation our communities need for the future ahead. We invite you to read more about the vision guiding our work in 2026 and beyond.
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Grantee Spotlight:
The Mahogany Project
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At Texas Pride Community Foundation, our commitment to LGBTQ+ communities across Texas goes beyond grant making. Being in community with our grantees through site visits and conversation helps us better understand the challenges and opportunities facing organizations across our large and diverse state.
During a recent visit to The Mahogany Project community center in Houston, our Community Impact Officer, Robert Salcido, spent time with founder and advocate Verniss McFarland learning more about the organization’s work and the realities they are navigating. From slower fundraising cycles to ensuring the safety of vulnerable clients amid growing uncertainty around immigration enforcement.
Despite these challenges, The Mahogany Project continues to build powerful pathways of support for their community.
Founded in 2017 by McFarland, the organization works to reduce the social isolation, stigma, and violence that transgender and queer communities of color often face. Today, it operates the only Black trans-led, peer-led community center in the state of Texas.
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Through services such as emergency housing navigation, a food pantry, clothing closet, and case management, The Mahogany Project helps meet immediate needs while creating spaces where community members can connect, create, and heal. From their media center and recording studio to art classes and community celebrations, the center provides opportunities for empowerment, belonging, and joy.
Pictured is McFarland in the organization’s clothing closet just one of the many resources available to community members who turn to The Mahogany Project for support.
Your support makes moments like this possible. By investing in Texas Pride Community Foundation, you help ensure that organizations like The Mahogany Project have the resources they need to serve LGBTQ+ Texans with dignity, care, and community. Together, we are strengthening a network of leaders across Texas who are creating safer, more resilient futures for our LGBTQ+ communities.
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Donor Spotlight:
Naomi Green (Icon Nay Nay)
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Generosity shows up in many forms. Sometimes it’s a check. Sometimes it’s a conversation that opens a door. And sometimes, it’s an entire community gathering created with intention, culture, and purpose.
This month, we are proud to spotlight Naomi Green also known in the ballroom community as Icon Nay Nay Juicy— whose vision and leadership brought her 7th Annual Birthday Ball to life.
For Naomi, this event was more than a celebration. It was an opportunity to uplift culture, create space, and give back.
Ballroom has long been more than performance. It is history, resilience, creativity, and chosen family. The Big D Ball welcomed participants to compete, celebrate, and connect. “Kiki Balls are powerful celebrations of visibility and resilience for Black and Brown LGBTQ+ young people, many of whom face stigma, discrimination, and economic hardship,” Naomi shared. “These events provide more than artistry and competition they create safe spaces.”
This year’s ball also continued a powerful tradition of weaving public health into culture by spotlighting HIV prevention, treatment awareness, and broader health equity initiatives.
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Most meaningfully, Naomi intentionally directed a portion of the event’s proceeds to support community impact. Funds raised benefited multiple organizations, including a trans housing fund in Dallas–Fort Worth through Texas Pride Community Foundation.
We are incredibly grateful for Naomi’s commitment to culture, community, and impact. Her leadership reminds us that philanthropy can be creative, joyful, and deeply rooted in the communities we serve.
Inspired by Naomi’s example? There are many ways to support Texas Pride Community Foundation. Host an event. Dedicate a celebration. Bring your community together around a cause you care about. When creativity meets generosity, the impact grows.
We are proud to stand alongside leaders like Naomi who are building stronger, more vibrant LGBTQ+ communities across Texas.
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We're proud to announce we earned our Platinum Seal of Transparency from Candid! The Platinum Seal is the highest level of recognition offered by Candid and is only provided to the best nonprofits that have shown an ongoing organizational commitment to transparency, accountability, and best practices.
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Questions? Ideas? Comments? We are all ears.
Write to us at info@TexasPrideCF.org.
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