Every year at OutFest, organizers bestow awards for community leadership. The Oct. 7 festivities will honor a new group of leaders, as well as mark the inauguration of a new award.
Franny Price, president of Philly Pride Presents, which stages OutFest, said the organization seeks to highlight those who have been positive, influential figures in the LGBT and ally community.
“We look for people who help educate or make the community more aware,” Price said.
This year, OutFest will present a new award, OutProud Family, to Mia and Tracy Levesque and their daughter Josephine.
The Levesques run YIKES, Inc., a web-design firm on East Girard Avenue.
“In the last five years, more and more gay people are having families,” Price said. “Mia and Tracy are out and proud. They have been visible and active in the community even before they had a child.”
Tracy Levesque called it “an honor” to be the inaugural recipients of the award.
“This acknowledgement shows us that we must be doing at least somewhat of a good job supporting the Philly queer community,” she said.
The family has made it a priority to be out in any circle in which they travel, including at their daughter’s school.
Levesque said one of the family’s biggest accomplishments is owning and renovating two buildings in the Fishtown neighborhood, home to their business, which in July were certified Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Platinum — the first mixed-use rehab buildings in the state to earn that distinction.
However, it is the couple’s daughter who takes first place in their lives.
“We are lucky to have such an awesome, healthy kid and live on a block where she can play in the street with neighbor kids,” Levesque said.
Other honors this year include the OutProud award, which will go to Helen “Nellie” Fitzpatrick, an assistant district attorney who was named the DA’s Office’s first LGBT liaison earlier this year.
“She is new to Philly but she came out of the closet and stayed out,” Price said. “She goes to [police] sensitivity trainings with us, she rode in the Pride parade this year. She got involved in the gay community.”
The Philadelphia Gay Tourism Caucus will also be recognized.
The group, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary, will receive the Gilbert Baker National OutProud Award.
“They’ve been bringing tourism back to Philadelphia,” Price said.
Outgoing Pennsylvania Rep. Babette Josephs will be honored with the OutProud Friend award for her decades of supporting LGBT rights, as well as gender equality and reproductive rights.
“I’ve been a champion for LGBT rights,” Josephs said. “Throughout the last 30 years, I have been fighting for people who need their voices heard.”
Josephs, who said she has long supported HIV/AIDS causes, most recently sponsored legislation to legalize marriage equality.
“I’m not afraid of anyone or anything,” she said. “I will always advocate for LGBT rights.”
Josephs said OutFest is always “a fun night.”
“I like the noise, the people. I love to see the city streets used,” she said. “That is what a city should be: a place where people can be outdoors, where they can talk about their passions, aspirations and achievemnts.”
OutFest organizers will also honor an LGBT young adult who has been making headway in Philadelphia.
Maro Beauchamp will be presented with the OutStanding Youth award.
Beauchamp, 19, is an active member of The Attic Youth Center and works the agency’s arts program, Attic Graffix.
“Maro is truly an inspiration and an incredibly thoughtful, giving and responsible young person,” said Carrie Jacobs, executive director of The Attic.
A graphic-design student at The Art Institute, Beauchamp helped plan a workshop on art and mythology that the agency presented at this year’s True Colors Conference.
“Maro has also been a support with designing and printing posters, fliers and a huge number of big things that needed to get done for Pride,” said Tara Rubinstein, life-skills coordinator at The Attic. “Maro has done so much but is more of a behind-the-scenes player who goes above and beyond to pitch in. They care a lot about the center.”
Community pride is an important quality that Price looks for in honorees.
“We always make sure [the recipients] are out and proud, not just in their jobs,” Price said. “We look for people and groups who have been more than just out, but also very visible.”