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Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel
340 North 3rd Street
Phoenix, AZ 85004

Doors open at 5:30pm

Join us in celebrating the The Heartbeat of Equality!

The 2013 Gala is an annual celebration that brings entertainment, dignitaries, business leaders and members of the community together, with a pledge of achieving fundamental fairness and equality for all.

The annual gala is the largest fundraiser of the year for HRC Arizona. Attendees will enjoy a memorable evening complete with fine dining, a silent auction, awards and honorary guests. The festivities begin at 5:30 p.m. at the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown.

Purchase tickets HERE

HRC President Chad Griffin
Featured Speaker

Chad Griffin is the president of the Human Rights Campaign. Griffin has spent his career taking on entrenched, well-financed interests like big tobacco, big oil and the far right, and shaped national policy debates around equal rights, clean energy, universal health care, stem cell research, and early childhood education.

Griffin is a founding board member of the American Foundation for Equal Rights (AFER), the sole sponsor of the Prop. 8 lawsuit. He is personally responsible for recruiting the legal dream team of Theodore Olson and David Boies to successfully argue the case. The case is now headed to the Supreme Court.

A veteran of the Clinton White House communications team and a native of Arkansas, Griffin was highly motivated by young people in taking this new endeavor.

Congresswoman Kyrsten Sinema
Featured Speaker

Kyrsten Sinema has worked in Arizona to pass tough immigration laws, secure funding for our vets, provide business incentives for job creation and fight back against attempts to cut basic health care for kids, cuts to services for the elderly and dramatic drops to school funding. As an openly bisexual member of congress, Kyrsten has worked hard to defeat two referendums that would ban same-sex marriage in Arizona.

In 2011, Kyrsten was lauded by the Arizona Republic for her “remarkable” ability to “partner with Republicans in both the House and Senate” to pass legislation while remaining “a staunch defender of key Democratic priorities.”

Sinema is committed to helping our country return to the values that make America great—the same values that have guided her life so far: hard work, access to public education, fairness and opportunity. Sinema takes her passion and talent into the 113th Congress, serving Arizona’s Ninth Congressional District. She has been to appointed to House Committee on Financial Services.

LZ Granderson
Visibility Award

Award-winning columnist and tv pundit LZ Granderson lives by the mantra “Boxes are for shoes.” African-American, openly-gay, Christian, and a father, the diversity of Granderson’s work – from sports, education and race, to politics, parenting and dating – has made him one of the most popular online columnists for both CNN and ESPN.

A journalist for nearly 20 years, Granderson has worked for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The South Bend Tribune and The Grand Rapids Press. In addition to his weekly online columns, he is a regular TV commentator for CNN and ESPN.

Individual Equality Awardee

Brandi Sokolosky has been Executive Director of Phoenix Pride since 2007 and worked to develop the Phoenix Pride Community Foundation. Since 2008, the Foundation has awarded 32 scholarships to LGBTQ identified individuals and funded 11 community grants to non-profits such as, Hospice of the Valley, Alzheimer’s Association of Arizona, GLSEN, One Voice Community Center and onenten.

Echo Magazine
Corporate Equality Award

Founded in 1989 by Dave Stewart and Bill Orovan, Echo has grown with continuous publication over almost 24 years, producing more than 600 editions dedicated to covering the Arizona LGBT community with news, features, entertainment and opinion.

Tiffany
Special Performance

Tiffany began her career at the age of 13 when she signed her first recording contract with MCA. The self-titled debut album was released in 1987 and eventually went quadruple platinum. The innovative “Mall Tour” that followed proved to be the signature for Tiffany’s early career and was very effective in targeting her core audience of young teens making Tiffany the youngest female artist to debut at number one on the Billboard charts.