Hillsborough Chair Ione Townsend said uncertainty about the shape of the district, which could change substantially in the coming redistricting, makes it harder for any candidate to contemplate a challenge. “Anybody who does want to take it on is going to have to think about it for a while.” This week, the Democratic Party chairs of Hillsborough and Polk counties, which together make up most of the district, said they don’t see a strong challenger on the horizon Democrat Alan Cohn, who lost to Franklin by 11 points in 2020, said he’s not interested in another try.Ĭohn’s loss, which came despite heavy support from the national party, “was a hard election for us,” said Polk Chair Catherine Price. Scott Franklin, R-Lakeland, isn’t raising much money for his re-election next year, but then he may not need to. Franklin not raising much, but may not need to
Petersburg Mayor Bob Ulrich, and former South Pasadena mayor and now county Commissioner Kathleen Peters. Pete’s future.”īlackmon touts endorsement from five current or former local mayors – Greco, Redington Beach Mayor David Will, Treasure Island Mayor Tyler Payne, former St. Greco praised Blackmon’s youth as “a voice for St. He had served three and a half terms as mayor from 1967-2003.īlackmon, 32, who’s in his first council term and has defended his experience level, noted in a news release that Greco was Tampa’s youngest mayor ever when first elected at age 34. Petersburg condo, but then moved back in 2020. Greco, 87, grandson of a Tampa cigarmaker, left his ancestral home in 2015 and moved with his wife to a St. It's her efforts that helped gay activists lay the foundation for weeklong celebrations of gay pride leading up to the climactic Gay Pride Parade.Former Tampa Mayor Dick Greco has endorsed Robert Blackmon in the St. As Queerty notes, "Howard's voice remained one of the loudest, most exuberant and productive of the time.
FIRST GAY PRIDE PARADE IN THE COUNTRY POLK STREET SERIES
Grassroots activist and founder of the New York Area Bisexual Network Brenda Howard, who is sometimes known as the "Mother of Pride," coordinated a week-long series of events around Pride Day, including a dance. Sargeant recalls that it took “nearly a year of 1960s-style back-and-forth consciousness-raising” and “months of planning and internal controversy.” Over a dozen LGBTQ+ rights groups were involved in the planning, including lesbian feminist group the Lavender Menace, formed in response to mainstream feminism's exclusion of lesbians Gay Liberation Front, formed post-Stonewall lesbian civil rights organisation Daughters of Bilitis trans rights organization Queens Liberation Front and various student groups. Their first Annual Reminder was held in 1965, and was intended to "remind the American people that a substantial number of American citizens were denied the rights of 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,'" according to Philadelphia LGBTQ+ rights organization Philly Pride. Craig Rodwell (who happened Fred Sargeant's partner) was the Mattachine Society member who originally came up with the idea for The Annual Reminder. We were supposed to be unthreatening.” The event was put on by a gay men's rights group called the Mattachine Society, which was one of the earliest LGBTQ+ rights groups in the United States (it formed in 1950). Required dress on men was jackets and ties for women, only dresses. It was usually “a small, polite group of gays and lesbians outside Liberty Hall," Sargeant describes. This event was a somber, and tightly orchestrated affair. At the time, the largest LGBTQ+ rights rally was a yearly silent vigil called “The Annual Reminder” held in Philadelphia.