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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 2, 1996)
just ou t ▼ February 2 , 1 9 0 6 ▼ 7 GASLIGHT INN national news Shouldn't A Seattle Tradition Private Baths Continental Breakfast Sundeck Mowetf Wonh JfceideA NAPWA summit sets AIDS strategy for ’96 Activists have hammered out an AIDS con tract with America. It’s called the 1996 AIDS Emergency Plan and will focus on voter educa tion, registration and mobilization. It sets the ambitious goal of turning out a million people to vote on AIDS issues on Nov. 5, 1996. The National Association of People with AIDS called a two-day strategic “leadership and mobi lization summit” over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend. The group will continue to coordinate coalition activities. Executive director Bill Freeman said the 50 attendees, gathered on only a month’s notice, had “reached consensus on 17 strategic issues across five issue areas.” Those positions were crafted into final language at the end of January, Bill Freeman and circulated to other organizations for their quoted the final 1993 report o f support. “We are not afraid the National of putting our contract against their contract Commission on AIDS: and saying, ‘These are the values we hold,’ ” “What needs to said NAPWA’s Cor he done is not nelius Baker. “In 40 complicated. It days we will see who has responded.” requires leader “It’s not rocket ship, a plan, and scien ce,” Freem an the national com m ented. He resolve to quoted the final 1993 report of the National implement it. ” C o m m ission on AIDS: “What needs to be done is not complicated. It requires leader ship, a plan, and the national resolve to imple ment it.” Jane Silver is a public policy analyst with the American Foundation for AIDS Research and heads up the working group on treatment issues in the coalition. “There needs to be a commitment and a de mand for a cure,” she said. “That means a battle plan. It needs to be public and private. It means that someone is in charge and accountable. And it means the dollars to fulfill that battle plan and build the infrastructure and access to delivery for a cure.” The prevention and testing working group is chaired by Rob McMurrough of the Florida HIV Planning Group. Its priorities are enhanced coun seling and testing, and “confidentiality so that testing stays anonymous.” Prevention efforts should be culturally sensi tive and funding should not be block-granted to the states. McMurrough said the goal is auda cious: “by the year 2000 [to] get the new infection rate to zero, or as close as humanly possible.” The three priorities in services include main taining Medicaid as an entitlement program with adequate levels of funding, and if managed care cannot be avoided then ensure that strict proce dures make it work for people with AIDS. Ryan White must be reauthorized and funded for the remainder of the fiscal year. Housing assistance must be maintained at current levels in future years, reported John Voyles with the Sonoma County (California) AIDS Foundation. Eileen Hansen, of the Women’s AIDS Net work in San Francisco, said the group “oppose[d] congressional or other attempts to mandate pub lic testing of pregnant women or newborns...or to impose treatment.” It also strongly challenged “religious stigmatization of people with HIV and A ID S.. .and efforts of the religious right and the pope [to do so]...specifically in education and prevention efforts.” Anne Donnelly, policy analyst with Project Inform, characterized the meeting as “crucial.” She noted that the AIDS community has “tried and failed [at this type of effort] in the past but that doesn’t mean it isn’t important to try again.” Wayne Turner, of ACT UP Washington, re minded the group that the gay and lesbian com munity emerged as a national voting block in the 1992 election. He predicted that the AIDS con stituency would emerge in a similar light during the 1996 campaign cycle. Freeman “holds out that this country can bring an end to the epidemic in four years. We could have a cure.” He quoted a letter that Abigail Adams wrote to Thomas Jefferson in 1789: “Great necessities call forth great leaders.” Bob Roe hr Skating on thin ice Figure skating glided back into the national consciousness Jan. 18-20 with the U.S. Figure Skating Association national championships in San Jose. The championships were partnered by the specter of AIDS, which has devastated the world of skaters, coaches, judges and choreogra phers. “The world of male singles figure skating is populated— if not dominated—by gay men, a half-secret that the sport’s sponsors have yet to accept, and which carries the potential to make anyone involved with the sport uncomfortable,” reports a new book. The revelations came in Inside Edge: A Re vealing Journey into the Secret World o f Figure Skating, written by Washington Post sports re porter Christine Brennan. The book was ex cerpted in the Jan. 7 issue of that newspaper. Perhaps the best known of skaters lost to AIDS is John Curry, the British 1976 Olympic gold medalist who died in 1994. That same year a benefit in New York’s Madison Square Garden memorialized more than 100 people in the field who had been lost to the disease. Than you jbo? Seasonal Heated Pool You work hard for your money. Floreid Walker can help your money work hard for you. As a Waddell <£ Reed account representative, she can offer a broad range of financial programs to meet your needs. Everyone should plan for their financial future, regardless of income. The sooner, the better. Call Floreid today and schedule a free one-hour, no obligation consultation. 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