For Houston’s Montrose Center, this year’s Texas legislative session was another bare-knuckle brawl in its 47-year history of LGBTQ advocacy. For Avery Belyeu, the first openly transgender woman in the United States to lead a center of its size, it was affirmation that she was exactly where she needed to be. 

“It’s not a state that respects LGBTQ Texans,” Belyeu said. “And that is made clear every time we go into legislative session where we have to literally fight for our lives.”

In January 2024, when Belyeu took the top job at the Montrose Center, a nonprofit whose services include housing, mental health care and support to members of the LGBTQ community, she knew what she was in for. The 89th session of the Legislature would kick off a year later — and with it, a series of bills aimed at rolling back rights for trans youth and access to gender affirming care…