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JUNE 3. 2011
pridefiles
WWW.JUSTOUT.COM
Acting Up & Out
“KC” Hanson, more than
politics
portland 5 0 3 . 2 2 7 . 1 2 1 2
vancouver
JO E L HAM LEY
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Carla “KC” Hanson says her first act of
activism was insisting to play basketball
with the boys on the playground. She was
in the fifth grade.
Then, the following year, all the girls
wanted to play basketball.
“It was very organic,” Hanson, 52, jokes,
“a very grassroots movement.”
Hanson, who has a loud personality and
a laugh to match, is one of the leading po
litical activists in Portland. She is also a
lesbian. She is chair of the Multnomah
County Democratic Party. She fought anti
gay ballot measures in Oregon in the early
‘90s and in 2004. She also campaigned for
John Kerry for president.
“I’ve been gay for as long as I’ve been a
Democrat,” she says, though she didn’t
make a connection between the two identi
ties at first. When she initially got serious
about politics during her time as a feminist
at the University of Kansas, she was mostly
about gay politics.
“It began to dawn on me that it would be
quite helpful to get involved in wider
Democratic politics,” she says, “both for
altruism and also for GLBT justice.”
Hanson helped bring gay issues to light
to the Democratic Party in Oregon. She
didn’t do it alone, of course, and she repeat
edly points to others’ contributions. But in
any case, she says the work by activists in
the state had a big effect.
“The Portland community has been re
markable in what it’s done through the
I told you
not to mention
in the paper!
we’ve made. Oregon Democrats
had a role in increasing the role
of the GLBT community in the
broader Democratic community for
activists nationwide.”
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years. Portland is really to be lauded on a
national basis for the strides we’ve made,”
she says. “Oregon Democrats had a role in
increasing the role of the GLBT commu
nity in the broader Democratic community
for activists nationwide.”
Hanson encourages everyone in the com
munity to get involved. In what? It doesn’t
matter. Everyone can find an issue to care
about, she says. It could be something as
simple as a school levy or as broad as a na
tional movement for marriage equality.
“All that matters is that you not only care
about something but that you activate
yourself on it,” she says.
— A aron S pencer
Over the Edge
Electro rocker Carmine
Evillé returns
Meeting up with someone like Carmine
Eville in the arborous, family-friendly con
fines of Mt. Tabor Park seems at first a bit
odd. The vampiric, gloomy undertones of
his thrumming electro-pop palette not
withstanding, Eville’s persona alone lends
itself toward a darker locale. But as the
35-year-old musician explains, he’s a coun
try boy at heart.
“I grew up riding horses and four-wheel
ers,” says Eville, whose second solo album,
not yet titled, is scheduled for release at the
end of the summer. “I was the kid who came
home with mud caked all over him. I do love
the city, but I love getting away from it, too.”
From his home studio in Happy Valley,
Ore., Eville has composed hundreds of
songs since his first release, 2007’s Edge of
the World. Having built a reputation as a
meticulous songwriter, Eville has honed his
latest batch of songs from a broader per
spective than his previous efforts.
“[With] my first solo album, I was trying
to get a lot out there,” Eville says. “There
was a lot of raw emotion that went behind
that. This second one is geared more toward
life experiences, not just a particular time. I