Four Corners Rainbow Youth Center has been a bastion for LGBTQ+ youth since it was founded in 2015. It’s grown to accommodate about 200 families annually through a variety of programs and events curated to support, educate and embolden queer youths.

Jennifer Stucka-Benally, co-founder and co-director of the organization in Durango, said the idea for the center came about during the 2014-15 school year when students at Durango High School approached them about the lack of services for the LGBTQ+ community.

At the time, Stucka-Benally was a behavioral health provider at DHS’ school-based health center. They noticed just as students had that Durango lacked resources for gay, lesbian, transgender and other gender nonconforming adolescents, who can be vulnerable targets of bullying, harassment and isolation without outside help.

They started holding focus groups after school on Mondays, where students could hang out with peers who had similar experiences, celebrate their identities and navigate the hard things about their identities, Stucka-Benally said.

What started as a small volunteer effort has since blossomed into a full-fledged nonprofit that opens its doors to children, young adults and families across the Four Corners.

But like the center itself, Stucka-Benally has come a long way since 2015. They are changing their life’s course and stepping down as director, entrusting a legacy of compassion and understanding to a new guard.

Co-Director Xander Hughes will become the sole directing officer of the Rainbow Youth Center, which is bringing on an assistant director to help keep things moving.

Stucka-Benally, whose last day was New Year’s Eve, accepted a job at Catacombs Fitness where they will continue to support people’s health and well-being, just in a different capacity.

The move is bittersweet, they said. It’s difficult to put into words.

Tirzah Camacho, a volunteer at the Rainbow Youth Center, said Stucka-Benally played a pivotal part in jump-starting conversations about social justice in Durango by addressing intersectionality at the center.

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary defines intersectionality as “the complex, cumulative way in which the effects of multiple forms of discrimination (such as racism, sexism and classism) combine, overlap or intersect especially in the experiences of marginalized individuals or groups.”

“We’re not seeing a lot here yet, like justice work on a scale that links people and marginalized entities together in a way that makes sense and that’s always made sense,” Camacho said. “It’s something that’s new for this area – to be thinking about justice work at all, let alone to be thinking about it as it relates to other forcibly marginalized groups.”

She said queerness doesn’t exist in a silo, and education about the LGBTQ+ community had always been at the forefront of Stucka-Benally’s work.

“It’s a hard time in the world,” Camacho said. “They’ve taken some hits. It’s a hard role to hold in a rural region on top of a small, tight-knit community. There’s all kinds of social care that’s required.”

During their tenure at the Rainbow Youth Center, Stucka-Benally held patience when faced with threats against the center, Camacho said.

“I know that we have saved lives because (youth) have told us,” Stucka-Benally said. “Time after time again, we’ve had youth come to us and say if it wasn’t for RYC, if it wasn’t for the healthy connections they were able to develop with friends and with healthy LGBT adults, that they might have followed through with completing suicide.”

Before the Rainbow Youth Center came along, many bullied youths weren’t socializing with friends or doing extracurricular activities after school. Instead, they were isolating themselves from others.

The Rainbow Youth Center is a place where children can “just let go, be themselves,” and have fun while “growing and learning as a person and making those really healthy connections,” Stucka-Benally said.

The center includes families in programs and events as well. Strong family bonds can “make or break” a young person’s fortitude, and the stronger families are in a community, the stronger a community becomes overall, they said.

The center’s impact has had a ripple effect across Durango, they said. They’ve seen more community support for the LGBTQ+ crowd than ever before.

“I think there’s a lot more visibility and awareness around the fact that LGBT people do live here and that they’re human and they have all the same needs we do,” they said. “I do feel like (there’s more awareness) even though we still have work to do.”

Camacho, whose daughter participated in programs at the Rainbow Youth Center, said the center also has programs for parents and caregivers.

“I’ve been part of those groups over many years. It changed my life, too, in a number of ways,” she said. “Especially (with) just having an organic, parent-driven crisis response. We’ve all shown up for each other and each other’s children many times over.”

Things have changed for the better in Durango for the LGBTQ+ community, but it still faces oppression nationwide, Stucka-Benally said. From corrosive politics to schoolyard bullying, adversity takes a heavy toll on the minds of queer youths, at times amounting to psychological stress, depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts.

Stucka-Benally said their message to LGBTQ+ youths is “You are not alone.”

In their 20 years of social work, they said they’ve learned most people believe in basic human rights, and opposition to LGBTQ+ rights comes from a “really, really, really loud” vocal minority.

“Yes, they have power. Yes, they’re loud. Yes, of course it’s going to have an impact on you,” they said. “It’s going to feel awful to have people try to take your rights away and say really negative things about you.

“Know that you’re not alone,” they said. “We’re going to be in (this) together.”

They said power lies in numbers, and homophobes, transphobes and bigots don’t have a majority.

“We’re going to continue to rise up,” they said. “We have not been in a race up to this point. Multiple times in history this has happened and we are still here.”

Camacho said one’s sense of self affects every other part of his, her or their life. Just having a safe place to visit or someone to call is “pivotal to just thriving,” she said.

“If it helps somebody eat that day, if it helps somebody sleep better that night, having a place to go, everybody needs that,” she said. “And these kids in particular need that because there aren’t places for them to go.”

Camacho said a get-together celebrating Stucka-Benally’s role will be held at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 20. The Rainbow Youth Center’s social media feeds will announce details and a community participation invite soon.

cburney@durangoherald.com