Apuzzo, Virginia

Virginia (Ginny) Apuzzo (b.1941) was raised in the Bronx, graduated with a B.A. from SUNY New Paltz and an M.A. from Fordham University, and entered a convent at the age of 26. After leaving the convent, Apuzzo came out publicly as a lesbian, taught at Brooklyn College, and dove head first into movement politics. Working with the then-named National Gay Task Force, Apuzzo worked to have a gay and lesbian plank included in the 1976 Democratic Party platform. Subsequently, she became the Director of the Task Force, directing much of her attention to the AIDS crisis. Apuzzo's impressive political accomplishments led to two decades of political appointments, first with the Cuomo New York state administration and then the Clinton administration, where she was appointed Assistant to the President for Administration and Management, making her the highest ranking out lesbian in national government office to date. Apuzzo left this post in 1999 when she rejoined the Task Force as the first holder of the Virginia Apuzzo Chair for Leadership in Public Policy. In 2005, she was one of the founders of the Hudson Valley LGBTQ Community Center which opened in 2007 in Kingston, New York. Also in 2007, then Govenor Eliot Spitzer appointed Apuzzo to the NYS Commission on Public Integrity where she served through 2011. She lived for many years in Kingston, New York before moving to Florida in 2013.