The Breast Cancer Alliance United to Support and Educate (BCAUSE) Fund at the San Diego Human Dignity Foundation is now accepting grant applications for innovative projects in the area of breast cancer education, support and outreach targeting the GLBT community in San Diego County.

Grant applications must be postmarked by Friday, Jan. 5. To download the BCAUSE Fund Request for Proposals, visit www.sdhdf.org/pdfs/bcause_grant_rfp.pdf. To download the San Diego Common Grant Application, visit www.sdhdf.org/pdfs-/san_diego_common_grant_application.doc.

The BCAUSE Fund was established by a group of women who were alarmed by research suggesting that lesbians may be at a greater risk of developing breast cancer than heterosexual women due to the prevalence of certain risk factors as well as reduced rates for self and clinical breast exams and mammograms.

Through its grants, BCAUSE Fund aims to fund vital breast cancer awareness, education and prevention programs that help the GLBT community in San Diego County.

For more information about the BCAUSE Fund and the Human Dignity Foundation, call (619) 291-3383 or visit www.mylgbtfoundation.org.

The Holiday Angels Celebration for seniors will take place on Tuesday, Dec. 19, from 11:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at ElderHelp of San Diego.

In partnership with Phones 4 Life and CVS/Pharmacy, ElderHelp is celebrating the holiday season for seniors by hosting a light lunch with festive music, as well as giving each senior a CVS/Pharmacy gift card and free emergency cell phones from Phones 4 Life. Attendees will also have the opportunity to meet the San Diego Chargers.

Space is limited, so those interested are encouraged to sign up early.

ElderHelp of San Diego is located at 7381 Jackson Dr.

For more information, contact Bonnie Lopez at (619) 284-9281 ext. 22, www.elderhelpofsandiego.org.

On Dec. 4, Assemblymember John Laird, D-Santa Cruz, introduced the Civil Rights Act of 2007.

The new legislation would expand nondiscrimination protections for all Californians, including the GLBT community. The bill, AB 14, strengthens and clarifies 51 provisions in state law by making them consistent with the strongest standards of nondiscrimination protection, which prohibit discrimination based on race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, ethnic group identification, age, disability, medical condition, marital status, sex (including gender identity) and sexual orientation.

The new bill increases nondiscrimination protections in a variety of situations, such as jury service, the issuance of credit cards, participation in the Cal Grant program, voter registration programs, delivery of emergency services, awarding of public contracts, food stamp eligibility and the use of public beaches.

“California continues to lead the country in protecting LGBT people from discrimination,” said Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California, which sponsored the bill. “This legislation ensures that California has the most comprehensive nondiscrimination policies in law.”

The Civil Rights Act of 2007 ensures that 51 nondiscrimination provisions are consistent with California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act and a government code provision that applies to state-funded programs and activities. Because the other provisions do not include all of the protected classes mentioned above, there is an existing deficiency in protection for Californians, in addition to confusion for those who implement and comply with these laws, Equality California said.

“Throughout California law there remain significant gaps in civil rights protections for Californians, leaving people vulnerable to discrimination in a wide variety of situations,” Assemblymember Laird said. “AB 14 strengthens dozens of codes so they are indexed to the strongest level of protection in state law.”

This is the fourth in a series of nondiscrimination bills authored by Assemblymember Laird: AB 2900, which amended more than 30 labor and employment-related nondiscrimination provisions; AB 1400, which prohibits discrimination by business establishments regardless of a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity or marital status; and AB 2800, which amended 17 housing-related nondiscrimination provisions. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed all three bills into law.

The new bill is expected to be heard in Assembly policy committees in February.

The mission of the Diversionary Theatre’s program “Queer Theatre – Taking Center Stage” is to champion the discovery, development and production of plays that explore, reveal and celebrate the lives of the GLBT community.

With 79 new plays submitted to Diversionary Theatre during the 2005-06 season and dozens more arriving since July 1, executive and artistic director Dan Kirsch needed to find a way to organize and review this volume of new work.

“We’re very excited that there are so many voices wanting to tell lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender stories – our stories,” said Kirsch. “We wanted to honor the ideas, the energy and commitment people had made to write their plays. We were lucky enough to find local playwright Patricia Loughrey to help us establish guidelines for new play submissions – published on our Web site – then organize and read the first 15 pages of each play submitted.”

Kirsch continued: “We were fortunate to receive a grant from the James Irvine Foundation’s New Connections Fund to support our work. We chose to organize our new play development efforts under the banner ‘Queer Theatre – Taking Center Stage.’ Reclaiming a word like ‘queer’ to describe ourselves is provocative and challenging to some. To others, it provides a sense of pride – they’ve put aside the negative connotation that society created around the word and are proudly defining the word to allow lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people to be true to themselves.

“This program also allows us to look at plays that are relevant to LGBT history that haven’t been seen in a long while, may have had limited productions because of a controversial subject, target one of our constituencies but may not have the audience base for a main stage run, or [is] a new play that we want to hear read aloud to gauge its viability for a future production,” Kirsch added.

Happy Endings Are Extra was one of 79 new plays submitted to Diversionary last year, by South African playwright Ashraf Johaardien, and the only new play to have a main stage production (January 19-February 11, 2007). Four other plays, both old and new, will have readings in January and February as part of this program, all at Diversionary.

For more information about the theater, call (619) 220-0097 or log on to www.diversionary.org.

The San Diego HIV Funding Collabora-tive (SDHFC), a program of the Alliance Healthcare Foundation, distributed $486,795 in grant awards to 34 HIV/AIDS service organizers, including Being Alive, Mama’s Kitchen and Stepping Stone, that provide direct services to those impacted by the disease in the San Diego region. The funds, raised through AIDS Walk San Diego and a number of local and national donors who contribute to SDHFC, were awarded at the annual Grants Awards Ceremony at The Center on Dec. 13.

The Center hosted “Pajama Movie Night” on Dec. 9 to benefit The Center and the Imperial Court de San Diego’s annual blanket drive.

Dressed in their favorite pajamas and bringing their warmest blanket, attendees joined hostess Lola for a campy double feature of the ’80s classics Heathers and Steal Magnolias. At the end of the night, blankets brought to the events were donated for community service organizations throughout San Diego County and Tijuana. The event was sponsored by HIM/Pix, Baja Betty’s, Bourbon Street and Urban Mo’s.