community
RICHARD GEYSER COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP AWARD GOES TO:
HUMAN DIGNITY FOUNDATION’S
“BILL” KELLY by lisa lipsey
WILLIAM About 14 years ago, I first met William “Bill”
Kelly: A friendly, talkative, artsy guy with a passion for making the world a better place, who radiated love for his hubbie Bob and their dog, Jack. We served on the Board of PAWS San Diego (Pets Are Wonderful Support) and our paths crossed again when Kelly started to write his “Think About It” column forThe Rage Monthly, taking on older, adult quality of life and affordable housing issues, as well as many other subjects. We atThe Rage Monthly offer congratulations
to Kelly for winning San Diego Human Dignity Foundation’s (SDHDF) 2017 Richard Geyser Community Leadership Award. But perhaps more importantly, from his perspective, it’s about congratulating the innumerable, community advocates who worked to achieve groundbreaking success with him: A 76-unit, LGBT-affirming, affordable senior housing complex, slated to open this December in North Park.
I remember when you first brought up the idea of an LGBT senior housing needs assessment. Was that really ten years ago? It has been a little over ten years now and it
started when I decided to make my 60th birthday a fundraiser. I wanted to start a fund at the San Diego Human Dignity Foundation, a fund for Senior Care and Senior Issues. We raised $12,000, then the recession hit and there were far more people who needed help. After giving the money out, I just started putting people together—we became an ad-hoc housing committee—I went to Dolores [Jacobs, CEO of the San Diego LGBTQ Center] and she provided a meeting space. We had as many as 33 people at one point, representing various organizations. This went on for the better part of the next seven years, in various forms. Some people dropped away, called to other issues including marriage equality and ending “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” All great
12 RAGE monthly | APRIL 2017
causes, but seniors were getting the short stick. It was a lot of heavy-lifting by The Center and Community Housing Works, but it took broad com- munity effort. What advice do you have for the next generation of advocates? All of us, including myself, think, “This is not going to happen to us,” or “I
have time to plan for when I get old.” Younger generations aren’t worrying about the aging crisis, or outlasting their money, or how the high volume of older adults is expected to impact society over the next ten years. But, they should get involved, anything they do to help the current generations of
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