Around the Region captures the latest LGBT news from Iowa, Wisconsin, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

Wisconsin

*The Green Bay Area School District became the first in Wisconsin to ban bullying based on gender identity when school started last week, according to the Green Bay Press Gazette. And the district continues to make strides toward a safer environment for LGBT students through trainings and supporting the formation of Gay-Straight Alliances.

*The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point just wrapped a training for school teachers aimed at creating safer schools, the Stevens Point Journal reports. The SafeZone trainings help educate teachers on how to make schools a safe place for LGBT students.

*Same-sex couples in Wisconsin are celebrating a series of favorable court decisions in favor of marriage equality, even though coupes still cannot marry. Those court decisions have also prompted courts to allow adoptions for same-sex couples. A Dane County judge approved one such adoption last week.

*Wisconsin officials have appealed marriage equality cases to the U.S. Supreme Court in the hopes that the high court will invalidate the lower court rulings in favor of same-sex marriage.

*A candidate for the Wisconsin Assembly is taking heat for a tweet he authored before announcing his candidacy.

22-year old Jacob Dorsey wrote “fags need 2 leave my favorite state alone” after a Utah court struck down a ban on same-sex marriage. Dorsey was attending Utah’s Brigham Young University at the time. He took a break from school to run for the seat which encompasses Janesville.

Iowa

*A Davenport couple who have been together for 72 years married last week. Vivian Boyack, 91, and Alice “Nonie” Dubes, 90, exchanged vows on the 7th.

*HIV Plus Magazine profiled Nick Rhoades, an HIV-positive gay man whose case against the state helped topple HIV criminalization laws. The magazine writes: “If there was a star of this summer’s HIV is Not a Crime conference earlier this year, it was Nick Rhoades, a 40-year-old former hotel administrator from Plainfield, Iowa. In 2008, the HIV-positive Rhoades had a one-time sexual encounter. He used a condom, had an undetectable viral load, and did not transmit HIV but was sentenced to 25 years by an Iowa court for failing to disclose his status. Rhoades was charged under Iowa’s HIV-specific criminal law, a class B felony along the same lines as manslaughter, kidnapping, or robbery.”

*Conservative Christian lawmakers are targeting a community college because the school is sponsoring Republican Gov. Terry Branstad’s Conference on LGBTQ Youth to the tune of $1,000. Lawmakers warned that they would pull funding for the Des Moines Area Community College if the school didn’t withdraw sponsorship from the anti-bullying conference.

North Dakota
*The final briefs have been filed in North Dakota’s lawsuit challenging a ban on same-sex marriage. Josh Newville, a Minneapolis attorney who is representing North Dakota same-sex couples told the Associated Press that he is optimistic that the court will “declare marriage equality to be the law of the land.”

South Dakota
*Outsports.com interview the South Dakota high school coach who came out as gay last month.