than just hud that is involved. the comfort level in the bureaucracy is not as great as it used to be. when i pushed, for example, about defining families as broadly as possible in public housing or defining the ability of same-sex couples to buy an fha-secured home, i was actually a disciplined and suspended for some time. it had to be overruled. those things are not part of our policy. but i would recommend that the committee consider asking for a document to be developed of rights and resources for lgbt seniors, because it is not just in hud but also in hhs and other agencies, and there needs to be a coordinated function from the local level to push the federal level. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you. next speaker. >> hello, my name is betty, and

i am a board member at senior action network. thank you very much for having this hearing, which is very important. as supervisor olague mentioned, prior to being called to duty by the mayor, she was a staff person that senior action network. in fact, she was our program manager for housing advocacy. and i know, i pretty clear for seniors and persons with disabilities, i know how frustrated she was, as well as the rest of us, when people would come in and call and ask about low-income housing, and all we could do was show them a list so that they could be put on a waiting list. the key word being waiting. it is not easy when you are a senior and you really need housing, particularly as people that we spoke to prior and as this film show, the vulnerability of lgbt seniors in looking for housing. the other issue we have recently been taking up, and again, when supervisor olague was with

senior action network, she lit our program for seniors and persons with disabilities at sro hotels, a senior residence the occupancy hotels. many of those are in very poor condition. i do not know if you are aware that many of them do not have elevators. so seniors who, maybe when they were young, it was good exercise going up six or seven floors, but not so good when you're 70 and 80. and lgbt seniors are vulnerable in those situations, concerned about safety and being alone and isolated in an sro hotel. we have a working group that we started, because we had a hearing on this very subject, seniors at sro's in november. so we have a working group. i think it would be great to take up what she mentioned, combining our working groups. maybe one will come out of this hearing. so that we can work together on

this, an issue. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you very much. next speaker. >> good afternoon. my name is gustavo, vice president of the san francisco commission on aging and adult services. i was previously president and believe i am the first openly gay man to serve on it. thank you for allowing me to speak regarding this very important issue. the only alternatives to growing old are dying young or prematurely. those alternatives are no longer an option for me. many issues that lgbt seniors now face or will be dealing with are similar to what heterosexual seniors face. declining help, loss of independence, growing isolation. for many lgbt seniors who came of age before the gay liberation movement, those issues are compounded by a fear of revealing their sexual orientation, estrangement from their biological families,

having outlived their friends, and medical and psychological issues that resulted in living in a huff of mixed society. it is likely that a number of seniors fitting that description has been undercounted. this may be a great issue among racial and ethnic minorities who face other discriminations from society. for lgbt folks, those of us that are in the avant-garde baby boomers to these issues may not be as great. for more of us have lived openly. far more of us have loving, accepting, and supportive families. far more of us have a broad social network, which includes families of choice. i am among the lucky ones, but this is not true for all of my contemporaries. i am not a statistician. but i feel that our numbers have been undercounted. we cannot plan effectively for the issues our community is facing and those we will be facing without knowing how many of us there are. once we know, we can plan accordingly and provide a range

of options so we can have a dignified old age as possible. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you. next. >> hello, thank you for having me. i always open up wherever i go to let you know i am 8 screaming queen. i am is a pioneer. i am a legend could i am an icon. and i am a diva. [laughter] [applause] i am -- i came to san francisco when i was 15 years old. i was gay, fairy, queen, transgender, a female impersonator, a prostitute. and i was in the cafeteria rights it would get lost for 40 years until susan striker came and saw the documentary, and she won an emmy for it.

i have been fighting ever since. i was fighting in the 1960's. and i am fighting now for the seniors. i might not see this housing in my lifetime, but i am fighting for the future of lgbt, like i did in the 1966 riot. my family does not accept me, which is ok. i have two dogs. they are very accepting of me. [laughter] and i love them to death. i could sugar coated, what it is to be a transsexual, because i can pass. nobody knows who i am in the straight world. but in the lgbt community, there's a lot of discrimination to transgendered people. because they assume what they do not want to assume, who we are. and one more thing, supervisor chiu, this is directly to you.

i gave you a document of the 1966 cafeteria riot in august of last year, because we were celebrating our 40th anniversary. and i never heard anything about that. no confirmation of that or anything that you received it or anything like that. i gave one to mark leno, tom amiano, and devon duffy, and i heard from all of them, except for from the board. i gave it to the board because there is a lot of gay supervisors, but i gave it to the president, because i wanted to make sure that our lgbt history is never forgotten and that the transgender, the hair fairy, the queens, the hustlers are the ones in 1966 that began the san francisco gay movement.

thank you. [applause] supervisor chiu: ma'am, i just want to say, i loved -- i will love to get another copy. i do not remember ever receiving that, but i would love to take a look at it. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you. ms. moran. >> hello. i am camille. i was born a permanent trend sexual child, and i am going to die feminine transsexual. but i do not want to die the way i was -- i do not want my life to end the way it began. excuse me. i think that that kinship, what

has been talked about, is really important, and i hope you make it along. the way lgbt people were treated before aids, before condoms, before anything, it could have put -- and makes it look like kindergarten. electric shock, insulin shock, thursday niehaus -- every torture they could event, they give to lgbt people, from children to seniors. i am worried about lgbt seniors been part of what is happening to seniors in general. hundreds of thousands of seniors have parkinson's and other diseases from having thorazine and other drugs forced down their throats.

90% of people who get electroshock treatments are seniors, mostly women. [bell rings] that is not independent living. that is not human dignity. i am sorry, that video made me not very steady today. i hope we get housing and health care that does not discriminate. i hope we get health care that is not a disguise for torturing us again. so thank you. [applause] supervisor wiener: thank you. next speaker. >> good afternoon. my name is sneaky. i came up here from southern california. it was supposed to be my

partner, and his name was in it. but we live in a community with that was a very conservative area, and we faced discrimination. he was sick. when he got worse, i cannot visit him in the hospital. when i said he was my partner, they had no idea what that meant. before he passed away, he made me promise to go to san francisco, because we were going to retire up here together. we wanted to hold hands appeared in together. we never got to do that, because he passed away. he passed away. i sold my house. i came up here. i started crying because i saw the outline of the city. i said, oh, my god, there is the emerald city. it has been good to me, the city. but i see some of my peers adjusting to the living situation here are being pushed out of their apartment, and we discuss it at coffee time.

it is amazing to see that, then nothing is being done for them. but the house was discovered. we go to meetings. we have groups. i would like to see publicity on the city part when they do tourist commercials kucinich san francisco is lgbt friendly. come to san francisco. i did volunteer for the training program with open house, and the main thing i noticed, they know -- they had no idea they had lgbt clients in their facility. when i spoke in told him why we went into the closet, they understood. i told them, go to the store and get a pin in the castro, where it, and i imagine that is working out. but it is needed, the training. it is needed. thank you. [applause] supervisor wiener: thank you very much. and we do have the board rule in terms of not having clapping or

booing, because it does disrupt the flow. i know we're all very enthusiastic about a lot of the speakers, but if you can refrain from clapping, we appreciate it. next speaker. >> my name is lynn. i have been in san francisco m0a metropolitan community church in 1970. working with open house and their caring connection friendly visitor program. what supervisor wiener said about concerns about aids is germane to our church, even though we have an increasing number of lgbt seniors, even though over 500 members of our church died of aids. one of the topics of discussion around this was the concerns expressed about the cartel's -- cocktails and the presence of the virus that might be accelerating the aging process of some of our church members.

they are experiencing memory loss, fatigue, loss of mobility. they're only in their 50's at into their 60's. seniors are experiencing the challenges of negotiating a multi-tier insurance provider, reductions in home support services, eligibility for medications, medical follow ups, all of this because of medical facilities -- also do not have special assessments for seniors in these facilities. we now require the resources of the declining number of organizations, such as open house san francisco, to act as our advocate for housing, medical treatment, mental health issues, and support in social services. i have lost nearly all of my peer support group, and i am estranged from my family. the dilemma is also for what constitutes affordable housing. for all of us, there is no

model, especially for lgbt seniors, especially those living with hiv/aids and what the future holds for us. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you very much. next speaker. >> good morning, good afternoon peter i am pam. i am 55. and i love my city. that is why we are here. we love our city, and we want to stay. we want to be safe in our city. we have worked here, paid rent, you know, did all this that heterosexuals do, and you all know that already. i just want to say that all of us have been through a lot already, and we're just asking for help, so help us to live the rest of our lives more gentle, more loving. some of these people that i know have been through a lot. i have a friend in a hotel that has been raped and abused

because she was a lesbian, the mission hotel. and i lost a friend because she had to move away. she lost her support here. she lost open house, which was very great. and i want to say, open house is a very, very special to me and to my friends, because without them, i would be in my home, in my closet, and diving slowly, because arthritis is very painful, but now i do not feel like i have got it because i have got a place to go. open house will help us and give you less work. thank you. >> good afternoon, supervisors but i am with a senior action network. i am one of the baby boomers that supervisor campos was talking about earlier. i am the youngest one in the bunch. i want to speak on two issues.

we need to educate our paramedics. i am living with hiv/aids. i wrap myself a real tight to catch two buses to kaiser permanente 80 stand up in the cold and rain to deal with the repair and maintenance -- to deal with the paramedics that are not generous. as a transgender woman of color at 80, it is hard to work with people who cannot identify, nor tolerate, someone who is different than they are. another issue, and director, resource guide, that guides seniors to where senior services are. that needs to be upgraded to include the areas that serve the seniors and that they are lgbt senior-friendly. i have a resource guide and my desk at work. i use that regularly. but i noticed when my community

members, , they want to know, are they lgbt-friendly, and i cannot tell them if they are or if they are not. so i have questions staff at the human rights commission. the director. we need to teach our city workers as well. because our city workers are not educated on lgbt issues, so how are we going to move forward with lgbt issues? we do not have to wait until june to do it for pride month. we need to start living for today. and today is the day and not tomorrow. thank you. supervisor wiener: next. >> good afternoon, supervisors. my name is isaac, a 32-year resident and merchant in the castro and proud gay man. i want to thank you, first of all, for bringing this issue to the forefront and wanting to

create something such as this to deal with many of the aspects of the oppression of lgbt people as they age. we are the many splendor faces of an invisible minority who are coming forward so that you can see what we look like and what we need. hearing the terrible circumstances that many people have suffered as they grow older and are lgbt and seeing the film which made those issues even more emotional and deeply understood, i just want to commend you for taking on the issue. i hope that you will deal with some of these suggestions, one of which was to establish, if you will, a bill of rights for lgbt people, which clearly is sorely needed. again, i thank you for paying attention to this issue, and i

hope that you will advance it and bring it into a deeper reality. thank you. >> thank you, supervisors. i am a member of the lgbt advisory committee of the human rights commission. i wanted to thank all the supervisors for understanding how important this issue is. i wanted to thank sheila and adam from your steps further great work. i want to a knowledge the people who have worked so hard to bring these issues to the board, including cecilia, and gustavo, rick, michelle, steve, mark, larry, s daniel, herine, ray, amy, mark, and the staff and commission of human rights commission. supervisors, it was truly my honor to work here and city hall for susan when she was on the board. she was the first lgbt person of color to serve here, and i was extremely proud to represent her

working with the lgbt community. nothing makes me more proud than to look around today and see our community coming together to do more for our seniors. this is san francisco at its best. we should be proud of this effort. more importantly, we should use this as an opportunity to not only take stock of what is, but to also imagine what can be. the hiv/aids pandemic devastated our community, but it also gave us the gift. we learned how to speak up and speak out. in the absence of adequate culturally appropriate services, we learned how to build a program to our community needs to survive and thrive. by taking the lead, san francisco greeted model programs that have been replicated all over the world. it is now time to take these lessons to turn our sustained attention to seniors. lgbt seniors are the people who made it possible for us to be standing here in these corridors of power discussing these issues. they created this community that we all value so highly. now it is our turn to take the

lead, making life better for them. seniors thrive on hope, too, just like the rest of us. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you. thank you for your work. i should have noted adam and sheila did an enormous amount of work. i will call another series of speakers. john wary, rick appleby, laurie geidis. stu maddow, larry brikennken, lauren meissner, rebecca, and david gonzales. just come on up.

>> that afternoon, supervisors. thank you so much for calling this hearing. i am the co-chair of the democratic club, lgbt. we fully support, we talked at our board meeting last monday, fully supports the purpose of this meeting. and any and all efforts we can make to create a model approach to serving the lgbt seniors in san francisco, the alice b. toklas club would live to handle that -- help with that. we fully support your recommendations. i had the unique opportunity of cochairing the hearing by the human rights commission and the commission on aging in 2002 and the report, everyone has reviewed. it had no less than 67

recommendations. to move forward and i think while we since 2003 have moved forward on a lot of those, there is plenty of those that need to be done. i hope that you'll start with that and continue to push those recommendations. i think since that time, we have had an increase in marriage rights which has made us feel a little more confident about legal protections for us. certainly we have community agencies that have improved in got more resources and we're hearing a lot about that this afternoon. keep supporting those. we remain in a situation where laws, prejudice, and poverty hit seniors the hardest. especially the poor women and people of color in our community. many of us do not know what we will do when we get old and not have family helping us. we're going to absolutely need the city and county of san

francisco to come up with a model that does not yet exist to help us through the end of our lives so they are dignified. that is it. >> i am executive director at disabled community -- disabledcommunity.org. i have to tell you that there are many of us that are excluded from programs in our city. which -- we're not included because we're younger than the age of most people getting social security. in 2006 i had a more feigned pain pump implanted in my side

which made it impossible for me to return to work. i pursued a master's degree in gerontology and tried to return to work at the places like onloc. friends of the elderly, and the jewish home. many of our nonprofits are not getting enough support from the city. even though they're getting grants. many people do not know what the left hand and the right-hander doing. many do not know if their clients are being served by their agency and five other agencies. there is no database that tracks. as far as what i would like to see, i am involved with the

lgbt community partnership and we focus on serving people with disabilities as well as aging and what i would like to see is a congregant meal program at the center. because i would feel welcome there. i will not feel welcome going to a religious oriented facility that is providing meals. as a lesbian, and raised catholic, i was never welcomed in that community. i wish you would address that for our community. supervisor elsbernd: thank you. i have been a queer activists for 40 years and counting. i was part of the liberation front in philadelphia. i am proud to say that we stopped aversion therapy on gay

men in philadelphia. i have been on the front lines of many battles in the clear community over many years but now face the toughest challenge of my life. growing old in a society and a queer cannady that provide little help for the elderly, especially those of us who are single. i'm going to address the area of housing. though some legal protections exist, far too many of us still are pushed out of our rent- controlled apartments by speculators eager to make scads of money by selling our homes as tic's. where do we go when we are displaced? where's the affordable housing for us? open house is great. even when it is built and i will fight like hell to make sure it is built in those units are open, the reality is they will not be enough. we need more than one open

house. waiting lists do not cut it. no one in the city has stats on how many queer seniors there in the city. my guess they are 10% of the population, but who sees the queer, seniors? what about the seniors who live in substandard housing? they are afraid to complain because their landlord might retaliate and evict them. i hope that any worker that comes out of this meeting will fight for these issues for more affordable housing for ways to enforce the housing codes and for protections for seniors from eviction. we need action now. our lives depend on it. thank you. >> i am a lifelong resident of san francisco. i want to speak in