Miami Herald - June 21, 2004
Ashley Fantz, afantz@herald.com

The annual Stonewall Festival, a gay pride parade and street party, brought out the usual crowds -- men and women wearing pounds of Mardi Gras beads, holding hands and kissing, stepping to dance club thump down Wilton Manors Drive.

But this year, the party comes three weeks shy of a July U.S. Senate debate over President Bush's proposed ban on gay marriage, which will force Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry to state clearly where he stands on the issue.

"Everyone is watching him," said Mauro Montoya, 46, of Fort Lauderdale. Not so much a supporter of Kerry as an opponent of President Bush, Montoya describes himself as a "recovering attorney," having established and operated since the 1980s one of Washington, D.C.'s pioneering legal assistance programs for people living with HIV.

As a flatbed truck plastered with Kerry signs crawled past Montoya on Sunday, hands raised in cheers toward a green RV with the smiling face of Wilton Manors Mayor Jim Stork on the side.

A Democrat and owner of two Wilton Manors bakeries, Stork is challenging 12-term U.S. Rep. Clay Shaw, R-Fort Lauderdale.

Endorsing Kerry, Stork has been embraced by the Democratic Party with Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., helping to shape his campaign.

Stork was on an eight-city, two-week fundraising tour and couldn't make the parade. The Stonewall Festival, an annual event celebrated all over the country, is named after the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, where, on June 27, 1969, gays fought New York City police after what they called harassment and frequent police raids on gay bars. It is considered the start of the modern gay-rights movement.

For David Steffen, 37, a pharmaceutical scientist wearing a Stork sticker, Stonewall is a way to remind everyone, "We're here, we exist, that we're not all queens and leather guys. We're just regular folks."

Stork's campaign manager Dannielle Sylvester, 36, who is gay, said voters across Florida have been receptive to her candidate who has been careful not to pigeonhole himself as the "gay" choice.

"Jim isn't so much a gay activist as a guy who is running for office who happens to be gay," she said, noting Stork's opposition to Medicaid discount cards, criticized for being confusing and yielding too little savings. "There's a definite shift this year, I can feel it. People are starting to pay attention to this community."

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