Trans Lifeline
OVERVIEW: In addition to its crisis helpline for trangender people, Trans Lifeline provides microgrants to transgender people for gender-affirming needs. This funder also makes grants to transgender-serving organizations.
IP TAKE: Trans Lifeline provides vital services to the transgender community through its helpline and microgrants programs. Unfortunately, some of its grant programs have paused because of financial difficulties faced by the organization. Trans Lifeline is, however, accessible and appears open to collaborating with like-minded organizations and groups. When reaching out, please use the form on Trans Lifeline’s contact page, as the helpline is meant for trangender people in crisis. Stay up-to-date with this organization by signing up for updates at the bottom of the website.
PROFILE: The Oakland-based Trans Lifeline was established in 2014 as a suicide hotline for the transgender community in response to the ongoing “epidemic of suicide in our community.” In 2016, an affiliated organization, the Trans Assistance Project, began awarding microgrants to “provide access to low-barrier funds for legal name and identification document changes.” The two organizations merged the following year. Since then, Trans Lifeline has added grantmaking programs to meet other needs of trans people and extended its helpline to Spanish language speakers. Today the organization is “dedicated to improving the quality of trans lives by responding to the critical needs of our community with direct service, material support, advocacy, and education.” Trans Lifeline is a signatory of the GUTC.
Grants for LGBTQ Causes, Mental Health, Migrants and Refugees, Criminal Justice Reform
In addition to its English and Spanish suicide helplines for transgender people in crisis, Trans Lifeline runs micrograntmaking programs to support the trans community. The following programs provide support to individuals for specific needs relevant to gender affirmation and transition. The organization affirms that “[p]utting money directly into trans people’s hands is central to economic and racial justice and our overall well-being” and sees its support for individual members of the community as a “political act.”
- Name Change Microgrants “cover all the required fees pertaining to court-ordered name changes,” including “corrections and updates on passports, driver’s licenses, state IDs, birth certificates, and Tribal IDs.”
- Applications are accepted until the 14th of every month. A lottery system is used to select grantees, and approximately 32 grants are awarded each month, 75% of which are reserved for BIPOC trans people.
- Guidelines, eligibility and FAQs are linked to the program page.
- Gender-Affirming Hair Removal Microgrants provide “funding for electrolysis, laser hair removal, or other forms of permanent hair removal.” These grants prioritize people who experience transmisogyny, or “the specific oppression towards people perceived as trans feminine.” This program has temporarily paused its application program as Trans Lifeline faces “financial uncertainty.”
- The Inside Advocacy Microgrants program “provides financial aid and local resources to trans people currently incarcerated or recently released.”
- Commissary Microgrants provide funding for supplies that incarcerated people can purchase from commissaries in the facilities where they are being held.
- Post-Release Microgrants may be used for “rent or other re-entry needs.”
This program has also paused its application program until further notice.
- Trans Lifeline’s Trans Migrant Partnership Program is an ongoing partnership between the organization, the Trans Asylum Seekers Network and the Queer Detainee Empowerment Network. This program’s microgrants are given “directly to trans migrants to support immigration costs, including updating names and/or gender markers on identifying immigration documents and legal fees during immigration and asylum processes.” Trans Lifeline does not accept applications for these grants.
In addition to its grantmaking for individual members of the transgender community, this funder has supported transgender-serving organizations including the Transgender Law Center, the Translatin Coalition and Freedom Overground, which supports “transgender survivors of assault and incarceration.”
Important Grant Details:
The amounts of Trans Lifeline’s grants to individuals are unclear, but its grants to trans-serving organizations range from $20,000 to $60,000.
- This funder makes microgrants to meet gender-affirming needs of transgender individuals, as well as grants to transgender-serving organizations.
- Grantmaking appears to be limited to the U.S.
- Some of this funder’s microgrant programs have paused their application programs, but the Name Change Microgrant program accepts applications from the first through the 14th of every month and selects grantees by lottery.
- For information about past organizational grantees, see this funder’s past tax filings.
Submit inquiries to Trans Lifeline via the form on its contact page. Please do not use the hotline phone number for non-emergencies.
PEOPLE:
Search for staff contact info and bios in PeopleFinder (paid subscribers only).
LINKS:
