At Christina Lloyd’s new home, she knows that “if I’m not seen for a few days, everyone wants to see how Chris is doing.”
“I’m epileptic, and I now have really cool people checking in on me and making sure I’m OK.”
It’s peace of mind for Lloyd, 59, knowing that she has a community of people surrounding her and keeping her mentally and physically healthy. She has found that welcoming space at Pride Place, a new and first-of-its-kind affordable housing project for older LGBTQ+ adults in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood.
The $54.4 million, 118-unit complex opened in September, in the former site of Eldridge Tire Company on Broadway, as a means to support older adults, particularly those in the LGBTQ+ community.
But for the residents, the project goes beyond just an affordable place to live: The building creates a physical space for people who may share backgrounds and identities to convene, over a meal or playing a board game, and build meaningful relationships. Through these connections, residents can protect themselves against social isolation and loneliness, which research shows can be prevalent among older LGBTQ+ adults.
“From a mental health perspective, queer people are challenged from the very beginning. Can I be myself or can I be safe?” said Judy Kinney, the executive director of GenPride, a nonprofit aimed at serving older LGBTQ+ adults. “Having a home where you can show up and be yourself and look around and see people like you with a similar history creates a foundation of growing older.”
Residents at Pride Place must be at least 55 years or older, or be housed with someone else who is. LGBTQ+ residents and “elder allies” are both welcome, the development’s website states.
Rent goes for $680 to $1,150 for studios and from $730 to $1,460 for one-bedroom apartments, adjusted based on income, said Kiley Dhatt, the executive director of Community Roots Housing Foundation. Community Roots Housing, the parent organization, is the owner, operator and developer of Pride Place.
“The community has been wanting a project like this for decades,” Dhatt said.
Located next to the gay bar Neighbours Nightclub and surrounded by rainbow crosswalks, the eight-story building is prominently positioned in a neighborhood that was once referred to as the “gayborhood” because it housed many of the city’s gay residents. But because of rising rents, many people who previously lived in the neighborhood have been priced out.
“It’s an effort to reclaim this as our stake in the ground,” Dhatt said. “This is our place again.”
It’s also close to multiple transit stops, a grocery store and medical offices, making it a convenient spot for residents.
On the ground floor of the building is GenPride, which dedicated space for health services including HIV testing, PrEP care, counseling and support groups — hoping to address a gap felt when Seattle Counseling Service, the largest and oldest provider of mental and behavioral health support and therapy for LGBTQ+ people in Seattle, closed last year.
GenPride, founded by Karen Fredriksen-Goldsen, a professor at the University of Washington, was born out of her landmark research. She began studying the mental and physical health of 2,450 midlife and older adults from across the country, including Seattle. Her research has found that older LGBTQ+ adults have higher rates of social isolation, depression and other mental health concerns, as compared to heterosexual people of a similar age.
The primary contributor to those higher rates is experiences of violence and discrimination, she said, which tend to be higher in the LGBTQ+ community.
“LGBTQ people historically had to be invisible,” Fredriksen-Goldsen said. “It wasn’t safe if they were visible.”
The HIV/AIDS crisis also devastated a generation of people, destroying social communities and engendering a need to rebuild.
In Fredriksen-Goldsen’s research, she also found high rates of poverty among older LGBTQ+ adults. She said many people experienced discrimination and lost jobs or had to go into certain careers to be safe. Because senior living can also be expensive, the findings of her study led her to support creating affordable housing as a solution.
Both the project’s formal health and support services, as well as the communal care, provide a network of people who can help people through aging. For the LGBTQ+ community, traditional concepts of aging and caregiving may look different.
“A lot of LGBTQ+ folks, especially older folks, may have lost the support of their families when they came out,” Dhatt said. “They may not even be in touch, so LGBTQ elders are less likely to have family support than their straight peers. That makes a place like this really appealing — they can build community in their chosen family.”
Relationships and community connections are an antidote to isolation, Fredriksen-Goldsen said, and is quick to mention that this group is a “highly resilient community.”
At Pride Place, “they’re setting up video games, they’re sitting around chatting, they’re putting together writing workshops, and they’re already making friends,” Dhatt said. “You can just see this joyous community that’s being developed here.”
The project operates under three principles, Kinney said: community, like “having a place to hang out and have fun together”; celebration, like talent shows and spoken word performances; and care, “like support and accessing resources and support groups.”
Gary David Lanzer, 63, said Pride Place has “saved my life,” after a traumatic relationship. “It’s so nice to make new friends and start a whole new life.”
He said people in the LGBTQ+ community can understand his experiences more deeply. “I can’t imagine moving out.”
This article was written with the support of a journalism fellowship from The Gerontological Society of America, The Journalists Network on Generations and the The Silver Century Foundation.