Hillcrest Town Council will host the Post-Pride Clean Up, a fundraiser for the Hillcrest Town Council beginning Monday, July 20, at 7 a.m.

The community is encouraged to come together to help clean Hillcrest on this special post-Pride clean up day.

Pitch in with other friends and neighbors to sweep the sidewalks and gutters of the community and help raise funds for the Hillcrest Town Council.

San Diego Pride will donate $10 per volunteer hour to the Hillcrest Town Council. Each volunteer hour will help the Hillcrest Town Council receive a larger check from San Diego LGBT Pride.

With just a few hours of support, Hillcrest will be shining once again after Pride.

Meet up at the corner of Park Boulevard and University Avenue and head out to clean the ’hood. There will be free T-shirts and giveaways. The Hillcrest Town Council will provide brooms, bags, trash cans, etc. Also feel free to bring your own favorite broom if you like. A dumpster will be available on the Normal Street median north of University Avenue for neighbors to discard large items.

Any amount of time is appreciated. For more information, call 619-260-1929 or visit www.hillcresttowncouncil.com.

The Gay Men’s Chorus of San Diego will show its true colors during the 40th Anniversary Celebration of GLBT Pride by undertaking a number of fun activities during the weekend of July 18-19.

GMCSD will once again partner with the San Diego Pride organization by selling tickets to the Pride Festival at a half dozen locations along the Pride Parade route beginning at 11 a.m. on Saturday, July 18. The mile-long Pride Parade will wind its way through Hillcrest – first heading west on University Avenue and then south on Sixth Avenue – until it reaches Balboa Park. Teams of Chorus members will be stationed at six tents positioned along the Parade route selling festival passes. This service is a major fundraiser for GMCSD and also allows the public to avoid any potential wait at the festival gates.

The Gay Men’s Chorus has been scheduled to perform on the Pride Stage on Sunday, July 19, at 2:15 p.m.

GMCSD will thrill the huge Pride audience by singing selections from its upcoming summer pops concert “Really Awesome 80s.” This fully-staged and fun-filled concert featuring special guests from the d’shire dance collective will take place on Saturday and Sunday, August 1-2, at La Jolla’s Garfield Theatre.

GMCSD will also participate in the Pride Parade with its wildly popular, colorful and musical contingent, then staff a booth on the Pride festival grounds to meet and greet all its fans and potential new members.

“Really Awesome 80s” will feature the Gay Men’s Chorus of San Diego performing some of your very best-loved songs from the decade that brought us big hair, shoulder pads, skinny ties, and parachute pants. Take a ride along with the Chorus down the freeway of love in their pink Cadillacs and little red Corvettes as they remember those video vixens, macho men, and one-hit wonders that helped define a generation. Celebrate good times with GMCSD on one thriller of a road trip you won’t want to miss!

Tickets for “Really Awesome 80s” range from $24-$35 with discounts available for students, seniors, military, and groups. All seats are reserved and are selling briskly, so everyone is encouraged to visit www.gmcsd.com at any time to view a seating chart, select their preferred seats, and make their purchases. For more information audience members can call 619-57-GMCSD or go to www.gmcsd.com.

Each year San Diego Pride pays tribute to “inspirational couples,” who are longtime partnered members of the GLBT community. The 2009 honorees, a female couple and a male couple, each became legally married last year during the short period of time when same-sex marriage was permitted in the state of California.

Pride’s inspirational couples reflect the many fulfilling partnerships that exist throughout the GLBT community and they cast a human light on achieving full equality for all people. The honor is an inspirational show of support for the scores of committed and dedicated couples within the GLBT community.

Kensington residents Linda Smith and Niki Morehead met 35 years ago as staff members for the Girl Scouts while on a camp in Wisconsin. They began dating a year later while living in Chicago, where in 1975 they took part in their first Pride parade together at a time when the social climate was far less accepting of the GLBT community than it is today.

“The parade was small and there was a lot of hostility in the crowd,” Smith recalls.

At the time, Smith worked in the admissions department for the School of the Art Institute in Chicago, while Morehead completed her undergraduate studies in recreation. The couple then moved to San Diego in 1977, when Smith began working as a realtor until retiring. Morehead became a teacher after earning her master’s degree in education from San Diego State University.

The women are members of Front Runners and San Diego Dignity, and say the secret to their longtime relationship is believing that “bad times always get better, and the good times get even better.”

When Vern Miller and Ray Wooding met at a San Diego house party 50 years ago, they recall that words like “gay” and “homosexual” were never used to describe same-sex relationships. “It was just kind of assumed that we were a couple,” says Miller, who was working for San Diego Office Supply at the time. He later enrolled in Southwestern Beauty College and went on to work for three different salons in La Jolla over a span of 35 years.

Wooding attended a mortuary college in Los Angeles during the first year of their relationship and worked locally as a mortician afterwards. Three decades later, when the AIDS epidemic struck, he became one of the first morticians in San Diego to handle funeral arrangements for AIDS victims when many other funeral directors avoided such cases.

The couple enjoy traveling and currently maintain two residences, in southeast San Diego and Downtown. Recalling their legal marriage last year in the San Diego Courthouse, Miller adds: “Never in our lifetimes did we dream we would experience that. It’s as remarkable to us as when man first walked on the moon.”

On GLBT Pride Sunday, July 19, The Metropolitan Community Church of San Diego will welcome as special guests the renowned Christian songwriters and recording artists Jason & deMarco. Already with musical careers of their own, they met in Hollywood in 2001, and soon formed a duo. Since launching their first album in 2002, they have recorded a total of eight CDs, been on the cover of The Advocate, entertained around the world, and won MTV Logo’s “Music Video of the Year” in 2006. They were also the subject of the Showtime award-winning documentary “We’re All Angels.” According to Inside Out Magazine, “Jason and deMarco’s music has a way of moving heart and healing spirits. Their music is uplifting and hopeful,” and the LA Times has recognized their “preaching through song that you can be a loving, happy couple finding comfort, rather than condemnation, in God.”

The church’s Pride Sunday Worship Celebrations at both 9 and 11 a.m. at The Center will include a message from Senior Pastor Rev. Dan Koeshall and several songs by Jason & deMarco. “The Met” welcomes all people to its worship services every Sunday. For more information about this open, affirming congregation and its services and ministries, go to www.themetchurch.org or call the church ministry offices at 619-521-2222.

Last week’s San Diego news story “Local organizations host vigil for murdered seaman,” stated that City Commissioner Nicole Murray-Ramirez said there is evidence to prove the murder is a hate crime. Murray-Ramirez maintains the murder of Seaman August Provost is a “possible hate crime” and said he has no evidence otherwise. We apologize for any inconvenience our error may have caused.