Local
Police, military officials lead Kameny farewell
Mayor, Council members join friends, activists in memorial ceremony
(Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
A gay Air Force sergeant and four gay military veterans in full dress uniform joined gay D.C. Council members David Catania and Jim Graham as pallbearers at a memorial viewing on Thursday honoring the late gay rights pioneer Frank Kameny.
The contingent of pall-bearers, including gay former Army Lt. Dan Choi, carried an American flag draped coffin bearing Kameny’s remains into the main hall of the historic Carnegie Library in downtown Washington, where the viewing was held.
Friends and activists who knew Kameny during his 50 year tenure as one of the nation’s and D.C.’s leading LGBT rights advocates said the ceremony and memorial viewing of his closed coffin was a befitting sendoff for a man they said improved the lives of millions of LGBT Americans.
Members of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington opened the ceremony by singing the National Anthem as D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray, D.C. Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, four D.C. Council members and a contingent of friends and activists stood near the coffin.
Hundreds of activists, community allies, public officials, and D.C. residents who knew Kameny or knew of his work filed past the coffin between 3 p.m. and the start of the ceremony at 6:60 p.m. Among them was John Berry, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the highest ranking openly gay appointee in the Obama administration.
Kameny Memorial. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
The Rev. Elder Troy Perry, founder of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, which caters to mostly LGBT congregations throughout the country, traveled from his home base in Los Angeles to attend the event. Perry, an outspoken advocate for LGBT rights for more than 30, worked with Kameny on national LGBT related projects in the 1970s and 1980s.
Mayor Gray said Kameny’s civil rights work led to a “massive, positive change” in the way LGBT people live their lives both in D.C. and across the nation.
“Frank Kameny is one of the most significant figures in the history of the American gay rights movement,” Gray told the gathering. “It was a poignant coincident that Dr. Kameny passed away on National Coming Out Day because he came out as a proud gay man in an era in which there were virtually no social and legal supports for sexual minorities who chose to live their lives openly in this country.”
Organizers of the ceremony, led by local activists and Kameny friends Charles Francis and Bob Witeck, placed at one end of the coffin a picket sign that Kameny made for a 1962 gay rights protest he organized outside the White House. The sign, still attached to its original wood stick handle, states, “Homosexuals Ask for the Right to the Pursuit of Happiness.”
At the other end of coffin stood a portrait of Kameny painted by local gay artist Don Patron.
Norton, a leader of the black civil rights movement, said Kameny’s acts of “defiance” and “raw, pure undiluted courage” during the decades he fought oppression against LGBT people put him in a place similar to that of black civil rights legend Rosa Parks.
Norton noted that Kameny began his fight for equality and justice for LGBT people shortly after he was fired for being gay from his job as an astronomer with the U.S. government in the late 1950s.
“Frank Kameny no more set out to sacrifice his livelihood when he refused to deny his sexual orientation to federal authorities than Rosa Parks intended to give up her work as a seamstress when she refused to move to the back of the bus,” Norton said. “Rosa Parks got tired of suppressing her full identity and her full dignity. So did Frank Kameny,” said Norton, adding, “There is a special place in our country for people like Frank Kameny. The phrase he coined, ‘Gay is Good,’ is every bit as significant as Black is Beautiful.”
Kameny died in his home Oct. 11 at the age of 86. Organizers of his memorial said a larger community memorial celebration of his life will take place Nov. 15 at a location to be announced.
“He was a great man who made it possible for me to be who I am,” said Rick Wood, a D.C. gay activist who said Kameny helped him organize the city’s first gay youth group 25 years ago.
“When I heard of Frank’s passing I was heartbroken but also grateful for the fearless and brave life that he led,” said Catania. “We’re all better off for having had Frank walk this earth. He changed minds and opened hearts to acceptance and tolerance in Washington and all over the world.”
Graham, who said he got to know Kameny during Graham’s tenure as director of the Whitman-Walker Clinic, called Kameny an “extraordinary” figure on the Washington scene for half a century.
“It is not possible to overstate the contribution that has been made by Frank Kameny for human rights, for gay and lesbian people and for everybody because, in point of fact, he was concerned about everybody,” Graham said.
Rick Rosendall, vice president of the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance and a friend and colleague of Kameny’s for more than 20 years, read from a chapter Kameny wrote for a book about the early “homophile movement” that was published during Kameny’s early years of activism. Kameny’s message in the book chapter was intended for a gay audience.
“It’s time to open the closet door and let in the fresh air and the sunshine,” Rosendall quoted Kameny as saying. “It is time to doff and discard the secrecy, the disguise and the camouflage. It is time to hold up your heads and to look the world squarely in the eye as the homosexuals that you are, confident of your equality, confident in the knowledge that as objects of prejudice and victims of discrimination, you are right and they are wrong, and confident of the rightness of what you are and the goodness of what you do. It is time to live your homosexuality fully, joyously, openly and proudly, assured that morally, socially, physically, psychologically, emotionally, and in every other way – gay is good.”
Joining the contingent of gay military pallbearers were four members of the D.C. Police Department’s Gay and Lesbian Liaison Unit, who served as pallbearers at the conclusion of the ceremony. With participants and well wishers lining the steps and plaza outside the Carnegie Library, the GLLU members and two of the gay military veterans carried Kameny’s coffin to a hearse on the street
Kameny’s friends and activist colleagues said they arranged for Kameny’s body to be cremated, based on Kameny’s expressed wishes, shortly after his death on Oct. 11. An urn bearing his ashes had been placed in the coffin for the ceremony.
Witeck said he and others close to Kameny had yet to decide on a burial site or other resting place for the Kameny’s ashes. One place under consideration, Witeck said, is D.C.’s Congressional Cemetery.
Rehoboth Beach
Former CAMP Rehoboth official sentenced to nine months in prison
Salvator Seeley pleaded guilty to felony theft charge for embezzlement
Salvator “Sal” Seeley, who served as an official with the Rehoboth Beach, Del., CAMP Rehoboth LGBTQ community center for 20 years, was sentenced on April 5 by a Sussex County Superior Court judge to nine months in prison and to pay $176,000 in restitution to the organization.
The sentencing took place about five weeks after Seeley pleaded guilty to a charge of Theft in Excess of $50,000 for allegedly embezzling funds from CAMP Rehoboth, a spokesperson for the Delaware Department of Justice told the Washington Blade.
Seeley’s guilty plea came shortly after a grand jury, at the request of prosecutors, indicted him on the felony theft charge following an investigation that found he had embezzled at least $176,000 from the nonprofit LGBTQ organization.
“Salvatore C. Seeley, between the 27th day of February 2019 and the 7th day of September 2021, in the County of Sussex, State of Delaware, did take property belonging to CAMP Rehoboth, Inc., consisting of United States currency and other miscellaneous property valued at more than $50,000, intending to appropriate the same,” the indictment states.
“The State recommended a sentence of two years of incarceration based on the large-scale theft and the impact to the non-profit organization,” Delaware Department of Justice spokesperson Caroline Harrison told the Blade in a statement.
“The defense cited Seeley’s lack of a record and gambling addiction in arguing for a probationary sentence,” the statement says. “Seeley was sentenced in Superior Court to a nine-month prison term and to pay a total of $176,000 in restitution for the stolen funds,” Harrison says in the statement.
Neither Seeley nor his attorney could immediately be reached for comment.
At the time of Seeley’s indictment in February, CAMP Rehoboth released a statement saying it first discovered “financial irregularities” within the organization on Sept. 7, 2021, “and took immediate action and notified state authorities.” The statement says this resulted in the investigation of Seeley by the state Department of Justice as well as an internal investigation by CAMP Rehoboth to review its “financial control policies” that led to an updating of those policies.
“As we have communicated from day one, CAMP Rehoboth has fully cooperated with law enforcement,” the statement continues. “At its request, we did not speak publicly about the investigation while it was ongoing for fear it would jeopardize its integrity,” according to the statement. “This was extremely difficult given our commitment to transparency with the community about day-to-day operations during the recent leadership transition.”
The statement was referring to Kim Leisey, who began her job as CAMP Rehoboth’s new executive director in July of 2023, while the Seeley investigation had yet to be completed, following the organization’s process of searching for a new director. It says Seeley left his job as Health and Wellness Director of CAMP Rehoboth in September of 2021 after working for the organization for more than 20 years.
“Mr. Seeley’s actions are a deep betrayal to not only CAMP Rehoboth but also the entire community we serve,” the statement says.
Maryland
Christian Siriano to serve as grand marshal of Annapolis Pride Parade
Fashion designer is an Annapolis native
BY JOHN-JOHN WILLIAMS IV | He’s conquered fashion week. His designs have slayed the red carpet during award season. And now Christian Siriano is coming home.
The Annapolis native will serve as grand marshal and keynote speaker June 1 for the annual Annapolis Pride Parade and Festival, which is a major coup as the event enters its fourth year.
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
District of Columbia
As You Are bar closes temporarily, citing problems with building
Shutdown comes two months after fundraising appeal brought in $170,000
As You Are, the LGBTQ café and bar located in the Barracks Row section of Capitol Hill near the Eastern Market Metro station, has announced on its Instagram page that problems associated with its building at 500 8th St., S.E., forced it to “temporarily” close on April 8.
“As you may be aware, As You Are’s location in Eastern Market has been closed since April 8, when we began to have concerns about the physical condition of the building,” the Instagram message states. “We worked quickly to alert our landlord, and they have assessed the building with their engineers,” the message says.
“We understand that certain repairs need to be made to ensure the safety of our staff, patrons, and community,” the message concludes.
In one of two more recent videos posted on Instagram on April 17 and 26, As You Are co-owners Jo McDaniel and Rachel Pike said they did not have any update on when they can reopen. “The engineers and contractors have all come into the space, and we’re just waiting on a plan and a timeline from our landlord,” McDaniel said in the video.
Pike mentioned in one of the videos that As You Are has a Venmo app set up, and said they appreciate the support they have been receiving from the community. McDaniel added, “We’re really interested in supporting our team through this, as this is an unexpected loss of income for all of us.”
McDaniel didn’t immediately respond to a request from the Washington Blade for a further update on where things stand with the building repair project and the specific nature of the problems with the building. An earlier message posted on the As You Are website said, “Heavy rain damaged the back wall of our building, and we are closed to assess and repair.”
The message added, “Regular updates and ways to support can be found on our Instagram page @asyouaredc.”
The April 8 shutdown came a little over two months after As You Are issued a GoFundMe appeal on Feb. 5 seeking emergency financial support to prevent it from closing in February due to a $150,000 debt. In a display of strong community support, its $150,000 fundraising goal was reached in less than a week. By the following week, the GoFundMe appeal had pulled in more than $170,000 from more than 3,000 individual donations.
Many of the donors left messages on the GoFundMe page for As You Are expressing their strong support for the bar and café, saying it served as a uniquely supportive space for all members of the LGBTQ community.
In the GoFundMe message, McDaniel and Pike said their goal in opening their business in March 2022 was to offer community center type programming beyond just a bar and café.
“AYA is a café, bar and dance floor that hosts diverse programming nearly every night of the week, including social sport leagues, Queer youth socials, weekly karaoke, book clubs, open mics, Queer author events, dance parties, and much more,” the two said in their message.
The building’s owner and the As You Are landlord, Rueben Bajaj, who is the principal operator of the Bethesda, Md., based real estate firm White Star Investments, couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. The Washington Post reported that he contributed $500 to the As You Are GoFundMe appeal, saying, “I personally want to see As You Are succeed.”
United Methodist Church removes 40-year ban on gay clergy
Republican state AGs challenge Biden administration’s revised Title IX policies
University students have a right to protest
Former CAMP Rehoboth official sentenced to nine months in prison
Christian Siriano to serve as grand marshal of Annapolis Pride Parade
Md. governor signs Freedom to Read Act
HHS reverses Trump-era anti-LGBTQ rule
PHOTOS: Capital Pride Pageant
4th Circuit rules gender identity is a protected characteristic
