SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH – October 6, 2015 (Gephardt Daily) — A proposal to rename Salt Lake City’s 900 South ‘Harvey Milk Boulevard’ after the prominent LGBT activist has been announced.
The proposal was announced by city and LGBT community leaders during the Allies Dinner for Equality Utah Saturday. Equality Utah has been working with Salt Lake City councilman Stan Penfold and Mayor Ralph Becker to rename the street since 2014.
Executive director of Equality Utah Troy Williams said in a statement: “Harvey Milk is an icon for LGBTQ Americans. He challenged our community to bravely come out of the closet and change the world. Harvey foreshadowed his own death at the hands of a gunman when he said, ‘If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door.’ Harvey’s sacrifice shattered closets across the nation.
“Equality Utah approached the mayor’s office in 2014 requesting that Harvey join the other civil rights icons Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez on prominent Salt Lake City streets. Harvey’s message of hope will inspire a new generation of LGBTQ Utahns to believe they too can change the world for good.”
Penfold added: “I am excited and honored to be the sponsor of this proposal at the City Council.”
Harvey Bernard Milk, born in 1930, was an American politician who became the first openly gay person to be elected to public office in California when he won a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.
Milk moved from New York City to settle in San Francisco in 1972 amid a migration of gay men to the Castro District, according to Wikipedia. He took advantage of the growing political and economic power of the neighborhood to promote his interests, and ran unsuccessfully for political office three times. His theatrical campaigns earned him increasing popularity, and Milk won a seat as a city supervisor in 1977.
Milk served almost 11 months in office and was responsible for passing a stringent gay rights ordinance for the city. On November 27, 1978, Milk and Mayor George Moscone were assassinated by Dan White, another city supervisor who had recently resigned but wanted his job back. Despite his short career in politics, Milk became an icon in San Francisco and a martyr in the gay community.
