Arkansas trans community center vandalized for 5th time in past year, advocates say
The founder of InTRANSitive, the only trans community center in Arkansas, said the center has been vandalized five times in the past year.
An Arkansas transgender advocacy group’s community center was vandalized this week for at least the fifth time in the past year, the group’s executive director said.
InTRANSitive, the only trans community center in the state, has become increasingly visible in recent years due to its activism against a wave of state legislation targeting trans people, Rumba Yambú, the founder and executive director, said.
InTRANSitive’s Little Rock-based community center has seen repeated acts of vandalism since it opened in December 2021, said Yambú, who uses they/them pronouns. Starting last year, someone has damaged the pipes outside of the building at least four times, they said. Cameras have also disappeared and plants have been damaged. This past weekend, the same pipes that had been repeatedly damaged were completely removed from the ground and taken from the premises.
The first four times the pipes were damaged, the group spent an estimated $900-$1,200 to repair them each time, Yambú said. This most recent act of vandalism cost about $1,400 to fix the pipes and another $900 to install a protective cage over the them, they added. The group is fundraising to cover the cost since Yambú had to pay for it using a credit card. Yambú said they also expect the group’s water bill to be much higher due to flooding caused by the damage.
“We just can’t afford to be closed for too long,” Yambú said. “It just puts a pause on everything that we do and all the people that we serve.”
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