On November 2, 2019, Don Maison received the Kuchling Humanitarian Award from the Black Tie Dinner, the largest annual fundraising event in the City of Dallas, with an audience of 3,000 guests. The following is the written text of his acceptance speech. [See note at end]
Good evening. I’m truly humbled by this recognition and thank the board of Black Tie Dinner for this honor. But I am here because I stand on the shoulders of giants in our community. Bill Nelson, Terry Tebedo, Louise Young, Vivienne Armstrong, Bruce Monroe and so many others, many of whom are no longer with us today.
I must begin on the shoulders of a diverse and amazing staff over the course of 32 years: Judith Powell, Mike Anderson, and so many others. You keep your mission alive today. You know who you are. Many of you are here tonight.
First, some ancient history:
Back in the early 1980s, before my HIV/AIDS work, I had a role to play in helping to end police raids in Dallas gay bars. Yes, that was going on in Dallas. Finally, a dozen brave gay men had had enough and demanded trials. And we won those trials. We proved that those vice cops were liars. Thanks to Mike Anglin, a previous recipient of this award, a handful of gay lawyers infiltrated the Goals for Dallas Campaign – challenging Dallas Police and holding their feet to the fire. We caught them in lies both inside and outside the courtroom. We were successful. I represented a number of defendants arrested in the infamous Village Station busts – won those cases either at the trial level or on appeal. Thank you, Mike Anglin for being so creatively sneaky! D Magazine included these events in a special feature entitled “The 35 Biggest Moments of Modern Dallas History.” You can learn more about these events by visiting The Dallas Way website.
And at about the same time, one of those lawyers called and told me he had a guy in his office that had applied to be both a ticket agent and flight attendant at Southwest Airlines. The guy had been denied an interview because of his sex. The lawyer asked: “Isn’t that illegal?” I said “Send him over.” And on my Mag II typewriter (I know many of you probably don’t know what a typewriter or a Mag II is – you can see them in the Smithsonian) I filed a class action suit against Southwest Airlines. And we won (after 15 years of litigation – back and forth from the 5th Circuit). I guess you could say I helped launched a bunch of gay men into the sky! LOVE includes us, too.
So, salute the gay lawyers who continue to protect your rights.
But back to why I proudly stand here this evening:
In May of 1987 I received a call from a staff person in the office of then-State Senator Eddie Bernice Johnson’s office asking if I would please represent the PWA Coalition of Dallas – now known as ASD or AIDS Services of Dallas – whose mission was housing for indigent and homeless individuals and families living with AIDS. Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson and I have known each other since 1971 when Dallas recognized single member districts. Initially, I declined the phone request, as I was already representing a number of People Living With AIDS pro bono. I had bills to pay. Somehow the founders of PWA Coalition, Darryl Moore and Mike Merdian, ended up in my law office waiting room. I had no escape route and listened to their dilemma. I couldn’t say “no”. So I filed a general denial, which in lawyer-speak means I joined the issue and stopped the plaintiff from obtaining a default judgment. The following day it was a front page news story in The New York Times. I was in up to my eyebrows. With the help of our allies and my friends Betsy Julian and Ed Cloutman, that matter was finally resolved.
I have to admit, I didn’t want to know more people with AIDS. I didn’t think I could manage more pain and loss. That turned out to be a pipe dream.
In October of the following year, Mike Merdian, an earlier recipient of this award, invited me to lunch to inform me that PWA Coalition of Dallas had received a grant to enable them to hire an executive director. I congratulated him. Then he announced that he wanted me to apply for the position. I told him he was crazy. I had no nonprofit experience as I was a trial lawyer. He threw my words in my face: “You said you’d like to do more for persons living with AIDS but couldn’t afford it. Now you can.” Of course, he never mentioned the salary, which turned out to be close to laughable. Then he told me that there were 90 applicants for the position. I figured the odds were certainly against my selection, so I gave him a resumé. And so it happened. I nearly declined when I was told they had also hired Mike Anderson as my Program Manager. I agreed to meet Mike. And it was a wonderful encounter. This guy had nonprofit experience and taught me many things – for 23 years until he retired. Among the first things he said to me: “can you please take me to meet the leaders of your community” and so I did. He retired and moved to Rockport with his wife and has grown a great pottery business. I used to tease him: we both went to community college. He studied pottery; I studied Spanish. I used to kid him: “You’re doing it for money, I’m doing it to make friends!” I think we both achieved our goals.
Back then we inherited two, shall we say, “slums”. Mike Anderson and I shared a common goal: to create housing we would be proud to call our home. I believe we achieved that goal. Today there are five apartment communities for low-income and formerly homeless individuals living with HIV/AIDS. In our spare time, we co-developed four senior projects for low-income seniors (with or without HIV) and each year ASD receives developer fees that support ASD’s HIV/AIDS programs.
And as a result, ASD has touched the lives of thousands, of which I am most proud. ASD was the first AIDS housing program to receive the MetLife Award for Excellence in Affordable Housing and then went on to receive a second MetLife Award for Excellence in Affordable Housing in the national competition.
As I said, I stand here on the shoulders of giants. And that includes an amazing cadre of a dedicated staff, starting with four and ending with 73. Expanding an HIV/AIDS budget from $250,000 in 1989 to nearly $6,000,000 today, not including nearly one thousand senior housing units.
I’m proud to be here this evening with many people I love – and you know who you are – and I do appreciate the recognition. I am here only because I stand on the shoulders of so many others, and I thank you.
Our community is diverse. Celebrate that. Stamp out hate. Learn. Reach out and help us make this community a better place for all of us.
Have fun this evening. I could talk for hours, but they said they would cut me off after five minutes! I don’t want one of those hooks around my neck dragging me from the podium.
Good evening and thank you again for this recognition. Enjoy your evening at Black Tie Dinner.
Note: On November 2, 2019, the Dallas Black Tie Dinner presented its coveted Kuchling Humanitarian Award to Don Maison. Unfortunately, Don was unable to attend the event. On the big night, the award was accepted on Don’s behalf by long-time friend Ellen Sweet. See the entire presentation at https://vimeo.com/371210684. Sweet's acceptance speech was stirring in its own right, but The Dallas Way was delighted to obtain a copy of the speech “Don had intended to give,” if he had been able to attend. We publish it on this website to stand alongside a number of other such Kuchling Award recipient acceptance speeches in our collection over the years.