The LGBT housing crisis is addressed in a documentary by three UW-Eau Claire students called Housing First.

As part of the Frameline38 San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival, a documentary short film created by three UW-Eau Claire students was screened June 22 at the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco. Housing First was chosen from a large compilation of short films last summer to be viewed at this year’s festival.

The 22-minute short film delves into the current housing crisis in San Francisco and how it’s affecting the LGBT community while also taking a closer look at how LGBT friendly the city currently is. This is the third film done by Eau Claire students to be chosen for a later screening. Housing First premiered at the Eau Queer Film Festival in October 2013 as well.

Seniors Nate Cooper, Neil Robmann, and JR Smathers all contributed to the making of the film through their LGBTQA Studies: San Francisco Travel Seminar at UW-Eau Claire. Taught by Ellen Mahaffy and Dr. Pam Forman, the class was able to attend the festival and make their film using a Blugold Commitment grant.

“We really started the process back in April of last year when we got our teams assigned in class,” Smathers said. “Then we were assigned subjects for the project that we would go to San Francisco to make a movie about. We had a couple months of a research period and then in June of last year, we flew out to San Francisco for two weeks.”

Among other featured sources, these students were able to get in touch with Tommi Mecca of the Housing Rights Committee of San Francisco and Brian Basinger of the AIDS Housing Alliance.

Along with creating the short film in little time, students got to attend multiple pride events and meet with other filmmakers during the seminar. Smathers said the whole experience was really a great time, especially going back to watch his film being screened.

“It was pretty cool especially for our film because our subject is so related to San Francisco that when we showed it in Eau Claire, it really didn’t have any impact,” Smathers said. “But when we showed it in San Francisco, there was a lot of people who really understood what was going on.  … To me, it was very significant that it was finally able to be shown to the audience it was intended for.”

Mahaffy and Forman will be bringing another class back to San Francisco in summer 2015, after a one-year hiatus due to funding allocation.