In Memoriam: Wanda Alston, Prominent Leader in LGBT Community and Former NOW Staff Member

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In Memoriam: Wanda Alston, Prominent Leader in LGBT Community and Former NOW Staff Member

March 17, 2005

Those who knew and worked with Wanda Alston commend her devout commitment to feminist activism and LGBT advocacy.

Prominent leader in the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender community and former NOW staff member Wanda Alston of Washington D.C., 45, was a victim of an apparent homicide in her home March 16. Alston, a lesbian woman of color, was appointed to direct the newly-established D.C. Mayor's Office of LGBT Affairs last September after serving two years as special assistant to the mayor on LGBT affairs.

Alston served as the executive assistant to former NOW president Patricia Ireland and as special projects director at NOW from 1992 to 1996.

"When I met Wanda, she seemed as if she was at loose ends looking for something that would be satisfying and capture her imagination," said Ireland, who remained a friend of Alston until her death. "When she plugged into feminist activism, I think she found a whole new world overall—whether it was LGBT, civil rights, D.C. statehood or electoral politics. She was an organizer like the rest of us and did it to keep her balance in an unjust world."

Friends said Wanda Alston, shown here at the 1996 Fight the Right March in San Francisco, played a key role in bridging the diversity gap in queer political culture that some said had not always been broadly representative."

Along with Ireland, she helped to organize four national marches on Washington and a Fight the Right March in San Francisco and traveled to Beijing, China to participate in the Fourth World Conference on Women. While on staff, she also served as the staff liaison to the National Rainbow Coalition. From 1998 to 2000, she served on the NOW National Board and the Racial and Ethnic Diversity Committee that planned the 1998 Women of Color and Allies Summit.

NOW President Kim Gandy remembers Alston as someone who "always kept things interesting with her energy for life."

Those who knew and worked with Alston commend her devout commitment to feminist activism and LGBT advocacy. NOW Action Vice President Olga Vives, who remembers Alston's warm smile, called her an "in-your-face type of grrl whose energy and enthusiasm for activism was contagious."

Friends said she played a key role in bridging the diversity gap in queer political culture that some said had not always been broadly representative.

Alston, herself, said the goal of her post in the mayor's office was "to ensure that the district's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender residents are fully integrated into the city's civil and economic life."

She recently organized the first city-wide LGBT summit to be held April 30. She planned the summit to gather and organize input from LGBT citizens about the priorities of DC Government in governing the city and its resources.

Alston, a former co-chair of the D.C. Coalition of Black Lesbians, Gay Men and Bisexuals, received several community service awards: the 1994 Welmore Cook Award from Black Pride, Inc. given as the highest community service award by the Black LGBT community; the 1995 National Welfare Rights Union community award; and the DC Coalition of Black Lesbians, Gay Men and Bisexuals community service award, also in 1995. In 2004, she received the Trust Servant Award from the Transgender Health Empowerment organization.

Before serving in the D.C. Mayor's office, Alston worked at the Human Rights Campaign as events manager and later established a political consulting firm, Alston Consulting Services, Inc.

Alston is survived by her long-time partner, Stacey Long. A memorial service will be held Saturday at noon at Luther Place, 1226 Vermont Ave, in Washington, D.C.