Our Delaware is a monthly series that will explore the history of communities and the institutions that serve them around the state. To suggest a potential topic for an upcoming feature, email Editor-In-Chief Jacob Owens.
Why Should Delaware Care?
CAMP Rehoboth has served as a pillar for the LGBTQ+ community for more than 30 years, offering one of the earliest open meeting spaces for those in the community. While some members felt a sense of calmness after marriage equality was legalized nationwide, many feel there is a renewed sense of purpose for the organization under the Trump administration.
For years, Fay Jacobs worked as a journalist in Washington, D.C., but was unable to express her real identity.
Jacobs, a member of CAMP Rehoboth, said she was part of an era where she couldn’t tell her boss that she was gay, she couldn’t write or publish stories under her own name.
She learned about CAMP Rehoboth just four years after it was established in 1991, and was soon asked by one of the organization’s cofounders, Steve Elkins, to write for their newsletter called Letters from CAMP Rehoboth.
“From that moment on, I had a career in writing essays for activism and humor,” she said.
The history of CAMP Rehoboth
There are several iterations of stories like Jacobs’ from people who found a strong sense of belonging within CAMP.
The organization was founded amid the AIDS epidemic, which led to some perpetuating myths about the LGBTQ+ community. Some called HIV/AIDS the “gay plague.”
Although Rehoboth had been a popular destination for the LGBTQ+ community for years before the organization was established, the beach-town community wasn’t immune to misconceptions among other residents.
Some residents attempted to limit the number of gay bars and restaurants, and a bumper sticker that read “Keep Rehoboth a Family Town” gained popularity as some viewed the community as outsiders.
But Elkins and co-founder Murray Archibald wanted CAMP to live up to its acronym — Create A More Positive Rehoboth.
The organization started local efforts like fundraisers to help people with AIDS and worked with local police on sensitivity training on how to address victims of hate crimes and verbal abuse.
Meeting the needs of the LGBTQ+ community
In the nearly 35 years since its establishment, CAMP Rehoboth has evolved to serve a growing community in Rehoboth and has continued to expand its services based on existing needs.
The organization has a long history of offering free and confidential HIV testing to anyone in need through its health suite. It also partnered with Beebe Healthcare’s mobile clinic this past year to reach people throughout Sussex County who may be interested in the testing.
CAMP also works with the Delaware Breast Cancer Coalition, an organization that CAMP’s Executive Director Kim Leisey said is LGBTQ+ affirming, to provide chest and breast exams.
Along with its health services and wellness services, the organization has also partnered with Delaware Hospice to hold an LGBTQ+ bereavement group at its downtown campus to provide people with safe spaces.
CAMP also has a strong connection to the arts through activities like its chorus and various art exhibitions.
Leisey said that her role as executive director is not to reinvent services that already exist, but to ensure the organization partners with existing services that “are affirming of LGBTQ people, and that they can provide the LGBTQ community with good services or care.”
Securing LGBTQ+ rights in Delaware
Although same-sex marriage was legalized in the United States in 2015, Delawareans’ first step toward that right was in January 2012 when civil unions were recognized.
Before then, some CAMP members like Chris Beagle participated in efforts to get civil unions recognized in the state.
Beagle, who previously served as board chair at CAMP, was one of 10 people to testify for the state’s civil union bill and also helped lead phone banking efforts to help build support for the bill.
Beagle said he played a “small” part in getting civil unions recognized, but calls it an honor.
“When I spoke [at Legislative Hall], I said, ‘I suspect my love story is similar to yours. I met and fell in love with the person I would eventually spend my life with while in college. I think the main difference is I happened to fall in love with a man,” he said.
Delaware’s first same-sex marriage license was issued one year later to then-state Senator Karen Peterson and her partner Victoria “Vikki” Bandy in 2013.
Jacobs said some members joked about whether CAMP Rehoboth was still needed after marriage equality was established nationwide, and the LGBTQ+ community didn’t need to be closeted.
She called that period “an era of good feelings.”
Continuing to evolve CAMP
Leisey took the helm as CAMP’s executive director in July 2023, just months before Salvatore Seeley, who served as the health and wellness director at CAMP Rehoboth, pleaded guilty to embezzling funds from the organization.
Last year, Seeley was sentenced to nine months in prison and to pay $176,000 in restitution.
At the time of Seeley’s indictment, CAMP Rehoboth released a statement saying the organization first discovered “financial irregularities” within the organization in September 2021, and “took immediate action and notified state authorities,” the Washington Blade reported.
Leisey’s second year at CAMP coincides with ongoing decisions from the U.S. Supreme Court and the Trump administration, which some believe repeal the rights that the LGBTQ+ community has fought for.
While Jacobs felt the community was previously living in an era of good feelings, she said the transgender community and LGBTQ+ community as a whole are now “under siege” and believes there’s a “huge role” for CAMP to help alleviate concerns within the community.
In June, Gov. Matt Meyer signed an executive order at CAMP Rehoboth to protect gender-affirming care for transgender minors in the state from attempts at the federal and state levels to criminalize patients and providers.
Although efforts have been made at the state level to protect the transgender community, some members like Graeme, who asked to only be identified by his first name, felt a lack of representation at CAMP. That’s led to the most recent evolution of the organization.
“I questioned CAMP about the letters [LGBTQ+], and asked, ‘Where’s the T?” Graeme said. “Where was the representation of [transgender people] in CAMP? And we began to have this dialogue about that.”
Graeme then told CAMP he wanted to start his own group for transgender men within the organization. His group, the H.I.M. society, had its first meeting in March.
When asked if CAMP has a similar group for transgender women, Leisey said they do not, but said some people have expressed interest in starting a group and added that the organization would welcome it.
Leisey also pointed toward the organization’s Women in Circle group, which is a gathering space for all LGBTQ+ women.
CAMP also has a written grant to get the funds to hire a therapist or social worker who would work with transgender kids and their families.
“Our role is to be present and to be offering services and support … and to affirm our trans siblings,” Leisey said.