Diverse & Resilient: Thirty Years of Unbreakable Resilience
December 11, 2025
By: Tou Fong Lee, M. Ed
In 1995, Diverse & Resilient began as a small yet visionary project inside Sinai Samaritan. At the time, LGBTQ+ health was rarely discussed in institutional settings, especially when it came to the needs of queer youth and Black and Brown gay men. Founder Dr. Gary Hollander (photo below) recognized this gap and launched D&R to build the capacity of LGBTQ+ groups across Wisconsin. What began as a seed of possibility quickly grew into a statewide movement.
Dr. Gary Hollander – Founder and President & CEO from 1995 – 2015
By 1996, D&R held its first one-day conference on LGBTQ youth needs, bringing visibility to experiences often ignored. The impact was immediate, and the following year the conference expanded into a two-day statewide gathering, sparking the momentum of youth leadership development across Wisconsin.
Over the next decade, D&R became a driving force in youth empowerment. The LGBT Youth Development Leadership Advisory Council took shape in 1999, followed by the Rainbow Alliance for Youth (RAY) in 2000, supporting youth groups statewide. Staff began training Youth Development Specialists in 2001, strengthening local leadership pipelines long before LGBTQ+ youth programming became common. By 2002, D&R had grown large enough to incorporate as its own nonprofit and moved into the Milwaukee LGBT Community Center, marking its arrival as a trusted force within Wisconsin’s LGBTQ+ landscape.
As the organization expanded, it continued stepping into critical public health leadership roles. In 2003, D&R established the LGBT Health Leadership Forum, followed by the Healthiest Wisconsin Grant in 2004 from the UW School of Medicine and Public Health, recognition that LGBTQ+ health equity was a statewide priority. In 2005, the Safe Schools, Safe Communities conference launched in partnership with GSAFE, reinforcing D&R’s commitment to protecting queer youth where they spend most of their days: in school.
Growth, Leadership, and the Fight for Health Justice
D&R moved to its current office on Holton Street in 2008, solidifying its physical home within the communities it served. Federal support began flowing in, including Congressional backing from Tammy Baldwin and Mark Pocan in 2009 and a $1.6 million CDC award in 2010 to address HIV among young African American men. This funding strengthened HIV prevention efforts that continue to save lives today.
D&R’s Acceptance Journeys campaign launched in 2011, telling powerful stories of love and support from straight family members and friends. By 2012 and 2013, D&R expanded HIV counseling, testing, and prevention programs, hosted its first Reviving the Dream celebration in honor of Bayard Rustin, and joined the United Way network. After 20 years of foundational leadership, founding CEO Dr. Gary Hollander prepared for his transition.
Dr. Gerry Coon – 2nd President & CEO from 2015 – 2022
In 2015, Dr. Gerry Coon became the second President & CEO and led the organization through continued growth: adding HIV/STI testing sites, launching Room to Be Safe for survivors of LGBTQ intimate partner violence, producing the Our Trans Family exhibit, and partnering with Holton Street Clinic in 2017 to provide free STI treatment and in-house PrEP navigation.
This partnership continues today as one of D&R’s most essential community health lifelines.
From 2018 through 2020, D&R expanded its programming into teen pregnancy prevention, youth self-love campaigns like Colors in Bloom, and statewide trans needs assessments.
The organization launched an Appleton office in 2019 and played an active role in the social justice uprisings of 2020. Despite the pandemic, the team maintained in-person HIV/STI testing and earned awards for youth activism and nonprofit leadership.
Chris Allen, MBA – 3rd President & CEO from 2022 – Current
In 2022, D&R received investments to support Black trans women and LGBTQ+ youth, and in December of that year, Christopher Allen (photo on the left) became the third, and first Black, President & CEO.
Under Chris’s leadership, the organization deepened its commitments to racial justice, expanded programs in both Milwaukee and Appleton, increased services for trans communities, and strengthened statewide anti-violence work.
Spaces of Survival, Healing, and Joy
Throughout its entire history, D&R has been defined by the communities who gather in our empowerment spaces. For decades, groups like:
- GROWN Ups: Support space for gay men living with HIV
- SHEBA: Sisters Helping Each Other Battle Adversity is a support space for trans women living with HIV
have provided life-saving support, sisterhood, and healing during times of intense stigma and violence.
More recently, as community needs evolved, D&R created new support groups like:
- Lovely Ladies: Support group for women of color living with HIV
- N2IT: A community group that is centered in body positivity for queer people of color.
- Youth Advisory Board: An anti-violence and leadership program for queer youths.
- LGBTQ+ Youth and Adult Group: Two support groups in Appleton for both youths and adults
- PACE: Pride and Celibacy Empowerment is the first online queer celibacy support group in Wisconsin for LGBTQ+ folks navigating celibacy
Each of these spaces reflects the changing lives, identities, and needs of LGBTQ+ people statewide. They are proof that community care is not a theory, it is a practice.
Investing in the Future
In 2022, D&R launched the Summer Youth Internship Program, funded through the City of Milwaukee Office of Community Wellness and Safety. This program provides queer youth of color with paid work experience, mentorship, and a healing-centered environment to grow into confident leaders.
D&R also expanded its Anti-Violence Program into Milwaukee, ensuring LGBTQ+ survivors throughout Wisconsin have access to safe, affirming advocacy services.
The Weight and Power of Resilience
Diverse & Resilient has spent nearly thirty years navigating social turmoil, political attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, statewide funding cuts, the HIV epidemic, and a global pandemic. It has fought for Black trans women ignored by mainstream systems. It has fought for the safety of queer youth in Milwaukee and the Fox Valley. It has fought for people living with HIV who deserve dignity, care, and connection.
Every milestone reflects resistance against forces that told LGBTQ+ people they did not deserve to live, thrive, or feel joy.
Yet here we are, still rising, still fighting, still building futures.
Why Your Support Matters Now More Than Ever
As the landscape becomes increasingly hostile, financially, politically, and socially, Diverse & Resilient remains a rare constant: a place where LGBTQ+ Wisconsinites can access healing, safety, leadership development, and affirmation.
Supporting D&R is not just an act of charity. It is an investment in:
- Black trans futures
- Queer youth leaderships
- HIV prevention and care
- Survivor safety
- Mental health
- Community power
Diverse & Resilient has survived three decades because people believed in us. Because community members showed up. Because resilience is not just a word in our name, it is the promise we keep.
As we look toward our next 30 years, we remain guided by the same truth that guided us in 1995:
The health and safety of LGBTQ+ people is not negotiable.
It is necessary. It is urgent.
And it is worth fighting for.