DAVID TAFFET | Senior Staff WriterTaffet@DallasVoice.com Later this month, “seven faith congregations in Tarrant County will be raising their voices in song in an interfaith concert benefitting NTTN, the North Texas TRANSportation Network, which grants funds to families who need to travel out of state or relocate to access needed gender-affirming medical care,” Cantor Sherri Allen said in a recent press release.Allen is among the organizers of the Feb.
20 concert. NTTN has already made more than 50 grants and expanded its mission since it was founded just a few years ago, according to its executive director, Cynthia Daniels.
The organization was created as a direct response to SB 14, which passed in the 2023 session of the Texas Legislature. The law prohibits physicians and other licensed medical professionals from providing gender-affirming medical care to minors.
The project was the idea of the Rev. Katie Hays of Galileo Church in Kennedale, a small enclave between Fort Worth and Mansfield. “We were on defense testifying in Austin,” Daniels said. “We needed to find a way to go on offense.” She said Hays asked if she’d like to be the new group’s executive director and find a way to help parents who were suddenly being investigated for child abuse for simply getting medical “Nothing about the bill said we couldn’t be good neighbors and get them the healthcare they needed out of state,” said Daniels, who has an adult daughter who is transgender. “We’ve been in this with her for the past five years,” Daniels said. “We didn’t have any trouble getting her the healthcare she needed that was recommended by doctors and psychologists.” She said she’s seen the difference getting that care made for her own child and has become passionate about helping others get that same kind of lifesaving healthcare for their kids.