ATHENS COUNTY, Ohio — Many people know the Southeastern Ohio Rainbow Alliance as the organization behind Athens Pride Fest, which happens every year during June, Pride Month. But pull back the rainbow flags and it’s clear that SEORA is a community organization that benefits far more people in the region than just the LGBTQ+ community.
“Obviously first and foremost we are an LGBTQ+ organization,” said Chris Nevil, board president of SEORA. “Something I’ve prioritized since taking over is making sure we are a community organization as well. Because there’s a lot of things that we need in this area, and they are not necessarily specific to the LGBTQ+ community.”
To that end, SEORA co-sponsors a blessing box outside of the uptown Passion Works Studio (The Side Bar and the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Athens are the other sponsors). This free box is stocked with personal hygiene items, food and lightly used clothing — all for the taking by anyone in need.
Additionally, SEORA organizes a back-to-school backpack and school supply drive, giving away up to 300 backpacks per year, full of notebooks, pens and headphones. SEORA gives away an academic scholarship every year and also has an emergency assistance fund — any community member in need can apply. The emergency assistance fund has existed since 2018, just one year after SEORA became a nonprofit organization.
“We’ve provided gas cards, hotel stays,” Nevil said. “We also donated to multiple gender-affirming surgery crowdfunding campaigns.”
A welcoming place
SEORA didn’t exist when Nevil, a 2011 graduate of Athens High School, was growing up.
“The need that I saw was to provide people in this area with things that I did not have that I knew would probably have helped make things better, or at least more supportive,” Nevil said, adding, “(SEORA is) just a place to be you. A place to feel accepted. There’s been many times when people have come up to me at events (and said), ‘This is the first time I’ve been out in public at an event in gender-affirming clothing.’ … Had I been able to do that, it might have made things easier.”
For some Ohio University students, Athens is the first place they’ve felt that kind of welcome.
For Silas Graser, it was a Welcome Week drag show sponsored by the University Programming Council.
“That was my first-ever drag show. It really made me feel safe at OU, like this is something that is normal,” Glaser said. “Even non-queer people are coming to this and having fun.”
One of the performers that night was Kazma Knights, Chris Nevil’s alter ego. “I do a lot of fundraising for SEORA as Kazma,” Nevil said.
SEORA drag shows are a major way the organization raises money for its community charities (the Welcome Week show was free for students). And at the shows, SEORA and sometimes other organizations have a table.
That is how Graser first learned of SEORA. So when Graser became president of Gamma Rho Lambda — OU’s first queer-interest, all-gender Greek chapter on campus — he reached out to SEORA. Philanthropically, GRL partners with national organization The Trevor Project, which provides suicide prevention and crisis intervention for LGBTQ+ youth.
But Graser wanted the group to be involved locally as well. “Athens already has so many great organizations like SEORA, (so) I wanted to reach out, explain that we are a queer sorority, that we would like to work with them through community service, (to) partner at events.”
(Historically used as a slur, “queer” has been reclaimed by the LGBTQ+ community. That was difficult for Nevil to accept — at first. “Now, I see that we are all proud queer people and we should scream it as loud as possible! It does feel empowering to take something back and we all should be proud of that!” he said.)
Stepping up after SB 1 closed OU Pride Center
In 2025 Ohio Gov. Mike Dewine signed into law Senate Bill 1, the Advance Ohio Higher Education Act. One of the main components of the act was a ban on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. So by that summer, OU closed all of its affinity centers — the Multicultural Center, the Women’s Center and the Pride Center, which opened in 1998.
The Pride Center existed when Graser arrived on campus for his first year in fall 2024, only to be closed by the time his second year began.
“It was a really surreal experience, having it and then watching it go away,” Graser said of the Pride Center. “It was just a really heartbreaking thing.”
SB 1 forced student and community organizers to step in. For example, Gamma Rho Lambda and SEORA co-host a monthly gathering on campus titled Rainbow Connections, where queer students and allies come together for programming, socializing and activism.
Graser appreciates the intergenerational aspect of the two groups.
“As a trans and queer person, it is really beautiful seeing older queer people,” Graser said. “That’s not what the world wants to show queer kids. They don’t want to show young queer people that they have a future.”
“Obviously it would be great to have the Pride Center, but we are showing that no matter what we have and what we don’t have, we can make a community,” Graser said, adding, “No matter how they want to restrict us queer students (and) multicultural students, minority students will always exist and will always have a voice. I think if people are feeling hopeless or feeling downtrodden, they just have to look at what the student and community organizations are doing. They will see resistance.”
The fight is not over
But lawmakers in Ohio didn’t stop at SB1. In March, the Ohio House of Representatives passed HB 249, the Indecent Exposure Modernization Act, which targets drag shows. SEORA’s Pride Week drag show at Eclipse Company Store patio is an all-ages show, but now Nevil is not sure if any adjustments will need to be made if HB 249 passes the Senate and is signed by the governor.
Nevil’s main concern over the legislation isn’t about drag shows.
“On the surface it’s a drag show ban for anyone under the age of 18 and it also restricts where drag shows can be held,” Nevil explained. “And then what people really don’t know is that the language in it specifically targets trans and nonbinary people because it actually gives people permission to profile people based on the way they look outside of performances. If you’re dressing too masculine, they could say you’re not dressing to match biological sex and they can target you.”
Critics, including the ACLU, point out that the bill is vague and potentially unconstitutional because it targets LGBTQ+ expression by infringing on First Amendment rights.
“I would just say to queer people specifically, now is the time to be louder and prouder than we ever have been before,” Nevil said.
And as for allies?
“We need your help. We’re such small numbers that we need the support and the other voices.”
Tap the images above to visit each webpage.
