The San Diego GLBT Historic Task Force has announced that they will lead a campaign to create an AIDS Memorial for San Diego.
“More than 7,600 men, women and children have died of AIDS in San Diego County,” stated City Commissioner Nicole Murray Ramirez. “It is long overdue that we commemorate and remember their lives as so many other cities have done across this great nation of ours.”
Commissioner Ramirez has been involved with the issue since the HIV-AIDS epidemic first hit the U.S. in the early 1980s when he founded the first non-profit HIV-AIDS client services agency in San Diego County (The AIDS Assistance Fund).
San Diego County has registered 7,638 deaths due to AIDS according to the last report from the San Diego County Health statistics (June 2012).
The GLBT Historic Task Force, which last year led the successful “Harvey Milk Street” naming campaign in San Diego (the first in the nation), stated that the AIDS Memorial will be the Task Force’s main focus in 2013.
“HIV-AIDS continues to have a major impact on the lives of countless San Diegans for now more than three decades,” stated Susan Jester, founder of AIDS Walk San Diego.
“We will be establishing an AIDS Memorial Coalition to work on this campaign. We have informed Mayor Bob Filner and Council President Todd Gloria of our resolve and commitment to make a San Diego AIDS Memorial become a reality,” said Commissioner Ramirez.
The memorial coalition’s membership will be made up of representations from the County’s diverse communities and citizens.
The Task Force stated that it was too early to discuss the location and what the memorial will look like but said that it could end up being anything from a flower garden with benches and a special marker in Balboa Park to a memorial wall with names along the downtown Embarcadero.
The GLBT Historic Task Force will seek wide community input and private funding and contributions for the memorial.
This is a wonderful idea. If there is anything I can do to help, please let me know.
Luke Terpstra