'A true community': DAP Health commemorates 40th anniversary, looks back on its origins

Tuesday marks DAP Health's 40th anniversary in the Coachella Valley. Many who were there during the local nonprofit's early days likely didn't expect it to reach that milestone.

That's because DAP Health, then called Desert AIDS Project, was born out of a crisis. In 1981, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on the first five cases of what would be known as AIDS. Human immunodeficiency virus, more commonly referred to as HIV, is a virus that attacks cells that help the body fight infections. If left untreated, it can lead to AIDS, or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.

Rare lung infections and an aggressive cancer called Kaposi’s sarcoma first began to show among men who have sex with men in 1981, and by the end of the year, there were 270 reported cases of severe immune deficiency among MSM. The following year, more cases appeared among MSM in Southern California.

Palm Springs resident Kevin Bass remembers that "unimaginable time" very clearly. Living in Los Angeles in his 20s, he and his friends wanted to live their lives however they wanted, despite the crisis around them. But as the years went by, "I spent more time at memorial services and celebrations of life than I did at clubs and parties," Bass said.

"It was a weekly occurrence, (when) somebody died," he said, now the co-vice chair of the DAP Health Board of Directors. "It was not uncommon to go into work and have a coworker in the middle of summer wear a long-sleeve shirt. You're like, 'Why aren't you wearing something more comfortable?' And then under those sleeves you could see purple lesions."

But what emerged during that time was a sense of community, especially among gay men. Bass moved to Palm Springs in 1993 and shortly after began volunteering for DAP, which had nearly 10 years under its belt of providing compassionate and holistic care to those who couldn't find it in many other places. Over its 40 years, that type of care would be at the forefront of DAP's work, and it continues as it moves into its next chapter with expanded services for thousands of people.

"We formed a true community because nobody else was helping," Bass said.

Early beginnings

Palm Springs is synonymous with the LGBTQ community today. But back in the 1980s, when HIV/AIDS was ravaging the nation, compassion was lacking for those who needed it the most — even here.

Sheri Saenz????, DAP's chief people and places officer, was born and raised in Palm Springs. When AIDS began to spread, mainly among MSM (cases also surfaced among those who inject drugs, those with hemophilia and Haitians), many in the desert put their walls up to others.

"It was pretty divided. I think everybody just figured that was the 'gay disease,' and if you're helping them or working there, you are going to get AIDS and die too," Saenz said. "They didn't really have compassion. There was a lot of fear."

Businesses and community leaders were also worried about Palm Springs' image being tarnished, or tourists being sacred away if "Palm Springs" and "AIDS" were mentioned in the same breath.

But during the summer of 1984, eight locals — Donald Beck, Ron Christenson, Dr. Bruce Lloyd, David Mackie, Kathy McCauley, Trace Percy, George Sonsel and Bonnie Wade — decided to establish an AIDS support and educational organization. The Community Counseling & Consultation Center Inc. was launched as an off-shoot of the already established Desert Community Health & Welfare Council, according to previous Desert Sun reporting.

"They have been abandoned by their friends and family," Sonsel, then-Project Chairman, said in a 1984 Desert Sun article. "They desperately need our help and we want to help."

There wasn't much in the beginning — Desert AIDS Project was located in a small space on Belardo Road — but the emotional support people could find was bigger and more impactful than what they had prior.

Discrimination and lack of compassion toward those who were sick was rampant, Bass said, and many who were HIV-positive were disowned by their families. He remembers visiting a friend, who had come to Palm Springs with hopes that the sun would help ease the cough he developed, at a local hospital. His friend was diagnosed with Pneumocystis pneumonia, a fungal lung infection that was common among people with HIV. They weren't allowed to go in his room at first, but when they were, "we were basically in hazmat suits."

"His family never came down, his family wanted no part of it. We would go back and forth over a 10-day period, and he was progressively getting worse and worse," Bass said. "When he died, they burned his journals, they burned his art, they burned the mattress he'd been sleeping in and all of his clothes. He was zipped up naked in a bag and sent back to his family in LA."

With Desert AIDS Project, people had a space where they could speak with others about their diagnosis, and find some type of care. Bass said it was "the one place that people could go and be treated with respect and dignity if they were sick."

In the early days, medications weren't available. More often than not, doctors were "stabbing in the dark, doing whatever they could" to help patients, Bass said, and sometimes that included unintentionally prescribing medications that were very harsh or toxic. At Desert AIDS Project, people were focused on a more holistic approach in caring for patients.

"OK, we can't treat this virus, but we can figure out a way to keep a person healthy with other means, whether it was nutrition, whether it was proper sleep, whether it was the proper environment. We knew that stress on the immune system was detrimental ... so (we tried) to alleviate the stress," Bass said. "We wanted to make sure that our community, if they did contract HIV, that whatever time they had left on this Earth was meaningful, was impactful and pain-free."

Growing support

In those beginning years, community support was hard to find: The Desert Sun reported that the organization often received angry phone calls and hateful letters. Bill Smith, who became executive director in 1987, realized outside support would be necessary for Desert AIDS Project's success.

Smith and a former board president sought support from religious leaders and politicians who would lend credibility to the nonprofit, but their requests were denied. It wasn't until then-Riverside County Supervisor Patricia "Corky" Larson agreed to let the Desert AIDS Project use her name on its stationery.

"After that, we were on a roll," Smith said in a previous Desert Sun interview.

However, the nonprofit struggled financially. In the late 1980s, leaders had to ask Coachella Valley cities for any grant dollars or donations. It also held its first major fundraising event, the Ace AIDS tennis benefit tournament at the Palm Springs Racquet Club, in May 1988, according to Desert Sun archives. Shortly after, DAP moved to new offices at 750 S. Vella Road, where it provided health education and prevention programs on AIDS, HIV testing, social services and counseling support.

It was during the late-'80s and early-'90s that DAP put its fundraising efforts into full gear. In May 1989, it held its first AIDS Walk, a 10-kilometer event in downtown Palm Springs. The event attracted many, including actor Kirk Douglas and his wife Anne, and former President Gerald Ford and former first lady Betty Ford attended a post-walk picnic.

In February 1992, renowned interior designer and DAP board member Steve Chase chaired the sold-out "An Event in 3 Acts." The three-stage celebrity fundraiser included a pre-theater dinner at Wally's Desert Turtle in Rancho Mirage and a performance of the musical extravaganza "Heart Strings." The event raise $360,000, more than twice the $160,000 raised at DAP's AIDS Walk in 1990. Singer Thelma Houston announced at the event it was DAP's largest fundraiser ever.

The following year, DAP held "A Valentine's Gala" honoring first lady Ford, McDonald's chain owner Joan Kroc and Chase. Hundreds of supporters attended the event, and more than $300,000 was raised for the nonprofit.

Chase died of AIDS in 1994 at the age of 52, but his mark on the organization would not be forgotten. The Steve Chase Humanitarian Awards, established in 1995, takes place annually and has raised millions of dollars for client services.

Expanding care

Funds raised from these events, including grant money and donations, helped expand medical offerings and services to patients. Between 1985 and August 1993, DAP had served nearly 1,800 clients.

In 1994, DAP opened a satellite office in Indio to serve east valley patients. Zayda Welden was hired as a case manager in 1996, and her job consisted of making referrals to a number of social services and testing new clients.

Even though support was growing for DAP, many patients were still worried about being seen going into a clinic, Welden said.

"I remember we were at a SunLine bus stop. We rented an office there because we wanted to make sure the clients had confidentiality," Welden said. "It was easier back then to enter a SunLine business than a Desert AIDS Project business." That stigma is a problem in the Hispanic community today too, she notes.

Another challenge was how open clients were about their diagnosis with their loved ones. Some were forthcoming with their spouses and children, while others did not want anyone to know. That was "nerve-racking," Welden said, because she needed to not only build trust with that client, but also make sure they wouldn't spread HIV to others and come in to get services.

"If a client committed to medical care, I was sure that they will be there no matter what," she said. "I remember having a client in Mecca who was pregnant and she ... used to come in to the clinic in a bus in the middle of the summer. She knew that she was saving her life and her kid's life."

Changing landscape

As the years progressed, the HIV/AIDS landscape was changing.

Early drugs that entered the market were harsh on patients and caused other significant health problems. But in June 1995, the FDA approved the first protease inhibitor, the start of highly active antiretroviral treatment, a medication regimen used to manage and treat HIV type 1. The treatment brought a 60% to 80% decline in rates of AIDS-related deaths and hospitalizations when it was used.

Today, there are a number of medications available to essentially prevent HIV infection or suppress the virus so that individuals can live healthy lives. Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, commonly referred to as PrEP, can be taken by someone who does not have HIV but is at high risk of infection.

Medical care was also expanding in the Coachella Valley. In 1995, a group of volunteers led by the late Guy Lawson transformed the third floor of then-Desert Hospital's (Desert Regional Medical Center) East Tower into a Special Care Unit dedicated to those with HIV and AIDS. Dr. Shubha Kerkar, an infectious disease specialist who worked at the hospital at the time, said patients had a dedicated group of doctors, nurses, nursing assistants, pharmacists and volunteers providing treatments and making them feel as comfortable as possible. The space was "very much an unprecedented thing," she said.

The unit had 18 rooms, and Kerkar said each one was decorated with a different theme and photos of friends and family on the walls. There was a wish list of what a patient might need during their time in the hospital, including in-room VCRs, headsets for music, books and more. Even pets were allowed to visit. A patient told The Desert Sun in 1996 that he felt "more like a guest in a hotel than a patient" in the unit.

"We had nursing volunteers and they were amazing," Kerkar said. "Their philosophy was, 'It's OK to laugh here, it's OK to cry here, we offer caring, acceptance, love and mandatory hugs.'"

Bass had a number of friends who went to the unit. He called it a "beautiful, warm environment," adding, "if you were going to die in a hospital, that was the way to do it."

Kerkar does not remember when the unit was closed, estimating it was around 1999 or 2000. But it came when patients no longer needed to be hospitalized and could manage their diagnosis through an out-patient setting.

Around that same time, Welden began to feel a sense of hope as well. As new medications became available, even though many were harsh, she said it "brought a positive light into treatment."

In May 1999, DAP moved to its Sunrise Way location, where its main campus is located today.

Changes in the 21st century

David Brinkman, DAP's current CEO, joined the organization in 2006. When he thinks back to that time, he remembers that people were moving to the Coachella Valley to "escape oppression" and "access excellent health care and all the wraparound services" that the organization had developed.

"When I arrived, DAP already had 400 people volunteering at the organization, had a strong social service program, case managers who were looking to build safety nets so people wouldn't fall through them, people in the community who were welcoming to people who had been ostracized and faced discrimination," Brinkman said.

But that was just the beginning.

In these past two decades, DAP has expanded to include a whole host of services to patients, like building a Food Depot in 2001 to provide food distribution and grocery vouchers to more than 30 clients a month, providing on-site affordable housing for HIV-positive patients and providing HIV-specialty dental care in 2008.

Adding dentistry is one of Brinkman's proudest moments, coming at a time when people still faced high amounts of discrimination and stigma from health care workers. Many patients chose to go to Mexico to get dental work, but the care they received was substandard. DAP then chose to partner with the philanthropic community to build the first HIV dental practice in the region.

"As I look back at the data of the health outcomes of that group that we built that dental clinic for, it dramatically improved their immune system," Brinkman said. "Good dental health impacts our mental health, it impacts our physical health."

Similarly, providing on-site affordable housing, first with Vista Sunrise and soon with Vista Sunrise II, gave people a sense of safety and security, easing worries about where they would sleep, whether on a friend's couch or on the streets, he added.

Though the work and times have changed greatly from when DAP first started, the lessons from those early days continue to serve the nonprofit to this day. In recent years, DAP sprang into action with the COVID-19 pandemic and mpox virus, setting up testing sites and vaccination clinics once supplies became available.

Last year, the nonprofit entered its next chapter by acquiring Borrego Health after the latter filed for bankruptcy. DAP Health now has 25 fixed locations and eight mobile units in Riverside and San Diego counties and more than 85,000 patients. Along with the various services that DAP Health provided, it added family medicine, women’s health (including OB-GYN), pediatrics, veterans’ health, geriatrics, urgent care and pharmacy services under its umbrella.

When many HIV-focused health care clinics have closed their doors, Bass said DAP has been able to "harness everything we've learned and now apply it to men, women, children, people not living with HIV."

"When I talk to our founders about where we are today, everybody in the room has tears in their eyes," Brinkman said. "The organization was found in the middle of an international health crisis, and as a part of the LGBTQ human rights movement in a very difficult time in history. To think that we have made so many advancements in achieving health equity and learning to develop our own best practices to do that is truly overwhelming when you think about where we started."

Ema Sasic covers entertainment and health in the Coachella Valley. Reach her at [email protected] or on Twitter @ema_sasic.

This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: Palm Springs nonprofit DAP Health honors its AIDS crisis origins