The LGBTQ Center of Long Beach will present its 4th Annual Black and White Ball on Saturday, April 22 at the Hyatt Regency in downtown Long Beach to celebrate the LGBTQ community’s accomplishments.
The event will include a Champagne greeting, red-carpet photo opportunity, live music, a silent auction, dinner, live auction, dancing, and three Center Icon Awards. In honor of the late Ellen Ward, The Center will be presenting the inaugural Ellen Ward Leadership Icon to longtime resident and activist Vanessa Romain. Ward served multiple times as mayor of Signal Hill and as a longtime councilmember. She was the original owner of the local bar Que Sera, a founding member of the Long Beach Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce and a longtime LGBTQ and HIV/AIDS advocate in Long Beach and Signal Hill. Romain is a decades-long resident of Long Beach who served more than 25 years on the board of directors at Long Beach Lesbian and Gay Pride and served multiple terms as the organization’s president. She currently serves as a field deputy to Congressmember Alan Lowenthal.
“We are presenting this award with great reverence in memory and in the spirit of Ellen Ward, who is one of the biggest champions the Long Beach LGBTQ community has ever known,” said The Center’s Executive Director Porter Gilberg. “Vanessa Romain has spent decades serving many communities through both her professional and volunteer endeavors, and there couldn’t be a more deserving recipient.”
The Center will also honor 70th District Assemblymember Patrick O’Donnell with the Political Icon Award. A former Long Beach city councilmember and public school teacher, O’Donnell has championed the LGBTQ community through legislative efforts to create safer and more inclusive schools, most recently by introducing and passing a law mandating that all schools have student suicide-prevention plans in place. The Community Icon Award will be presented to the International Imperial Court of Long Beach for their decades of support for LGBTQ and other nonprofit organizations in the City.
Proceeds from the Black and White Ball will support the programs and services of The Center, the largest publically supported LGBTQ direct services organization in greater Long Beach, which supports more than 25,000 clients per year, according to its staff.
Tickets to the event are $175, and tables of 10 are available for $1,750. For more information visit centerlb.org/gala or contact Porter Gilberg at (562) 434-4455.
Source: The Center
