Norton To Celebrate D.C. Black Pride Festival, Monday
Norton to Celebrate D.C. Black Pride Festival, Monday May 27, 2011 WASHINGTON, DC - Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) will join members of the District's lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community on Monday, May 30 at Fort Dupont Park, noon - 4:00 p.m. for the 21st annual DC Black Pride Festival. A longtime advocate for LGBT rights, Norton will deliver remarks to the thousands of attendees from around the country who participate in the festival each Memorial Day Weekend. Norton also recognized DC Black Pride Week, held May 26-30, on the House floor yesterday. "The DC Black Pride Festival is a multi-day celebration featuring music, dance, films, a poetry slam, a church service, community town hall meetings, and a health and wellness expo, among other things," said Norton. "The DC Black Pride Festival is widely considered to be one of the world's preeminent Black Pride celebrations, drawing more than 30,000 people to the nation's capital from across the United States and beyond. This year's theme, ‘21 Years and Legal,' reflects the 21 years DC Black Pride has fulfilled its mission to increase awareness of and pride in the diversity of the LGBT African-American community, as well as support for organizations that focus on health disparities, education, youth and families." Earlier this week, Norton alerted residents to a provision in H.R. 1540, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, that could delay, or even kill, the repeal of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy, and indicated that D.C. needs to be ready for Republican attempts to overturn the city's marriage equality law. In December, when Norton still had a vote in the Committee of the Whole, she voted to repeal the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy in what she describes as the most significant national civil rights legislative action since the civil rights laws of the 1960's. |