World AIDS Day events will evoke the power of community

A local TV news anchor will headline the 37th annual World AIDS Day observance Monday, December 1, in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. The day, observed across the globe, is a way to draw attention to the epidemic, for which there is no cure.

In California, this year will be the first time that Governor Gavin Newsom will officially proclaim December 1 as World AIDS Day. It’s the result of a bill authored by gay state Senator John Laird (D-Santa Cruz) that was passed in 2024 and signed by Newsom. https://www.ebar.com/story/75856

At the AIDS grove, KGO-TV’s Dan Ashley will emcee the observance, which will start at 11:30 a.m. The grove is located at Nancy Pelosi and Bowling Green drives. According to John Cunningham, a gay man living with HIV/AIDS who is CEO of the grove, Ashley has “spotlighted stories of health and social justice in the Bay Area and beyond” for over 30 years.

People can reserve a seat at the event on Eventbrite, though RSVPs are not required. 

Ashley, a straight ally, has “used his platform to speak up for those silenced when few figures on the national stage supported those impacted by HIV/AIDS,” Cunningham added. 

Ashley didn’t return a request for comment for this report.

Cunningham said this year’s AIDS grove theme is the “Power of Community.”

“We gather to remember those lost to HIV/AIDS and educate younger generations about the leadership and activism associated with this disease,” he stated.

Founded by the World Health Organization and the joint United Nations Programme on AIDS (now UNAIDS) in 1988, World AIDS Day seeks to call attention to the global epidemic that has killed 44 million people since it was first discovered in 1981.

The San Francisco AIDS Foundation will host a Latine and Indigenous ceremony at the grove from 2:30 to 4:40 p.m. the same day. It will feature cultural music, Aztec dancing, shared food, an altar of offerings, and blessings. 

Jorge Zepeda, lead director of community programs at the foundation, stated that the event “is offered in honor of all the community members who have died of HIV and AIDS, not only in San Francisco but around the world. This event is a beautiful celebration of life and respect through dance, music, and food. It is a remembrance infused with love and passion to pay respect to those who fought invisibility and for those who continue fighting to end the HIV epidemic.”

Those events will come the day after the Light in the Grove annual benefit gala Sunday, November 30, at 6 p.m. The gala will celebrate the 35th anniversary of the grove, and tickets are available on Eventbrite starting at $300 .

“Fittingly, once again, we invite you to join us as a host of our iconic, annual Light in the Grove gala, a one-of-a-kind outdoor/indoor fundraising experience,” Cunningham stated. “Light in the Grove is a magical evening celebration of hope, community, and remembrance at the grove in Golden Gate Park. Join us on November 30, the eve of our annual World AIDS Day National Observance (also at the grove) for this truly unique and inspiring experience, recognized year-after-year as the Bay Area’s Best LGBTQ+ fundraising event.”

Light in the Grove will include a candlelight reflection, hors d’oeuvres, dinner, sweets, beverage stations, live music and DJs, and a “stunning nighttime display of the AIDS Memorial Quilt, curated to evoke touching moments of love, community, action, and resilience,” Cunningham stated.

The quilt is now overseen by the AIDS grove and several blocks will be on display.

Gay saxophonist Thomas Kurtz will be among the musical performers.

"This year’s Light in the Grove performance is my most immense undertaking yet,” Kurtz stated. “I’m collaborating with my students in my Music & Queer Community course at the University of San Francisco, with my students at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and with the intergenerational dance company, Dance Generators. Together, we’re bringing to life several works by composers whose music is inspired by HIV/AIDS or queer identity, weaving their voices into a shared performance.”

Ashley, who’s also a singer-songwriter, will be performing a song he wrote especially for the occasion of the grove’s 35th anniversary.

Other events
Other events observing World AIDS Day are also planned.

News Is Out, a national queer media collaborative of which the B.A.R. is a part, is one of the sponsors of a webinar at 3 p.m. Pacific Time featuring Gilead’s Choose U ambassadors. The Choose U ambassadors highlight how the outlook for living with HIV has changed, according to the San Mateo County-based biopharmaceutical company, and they will be sharing their stories of resilience, empowerment, and life with HIV. The webinar will be available on the News Is Out Facebook channel.   

The three panelists have each been living with HIV for over two decades and are named Andrew, Jahlove and Joyce, according to News Is Out. (Last names were not provided.)

All day in San Francisco’s Castro LGBTQ neighborhood, people are invited to inscribe the names of those who have died on the sidewalk for the 11th consecutive INSCRIBE event. Chalk will be available beginning at 9 a.m. on the 400 and 500 blocks of Castro Street, as usual. The event is the brainchild of Castro resident George Kelly, 65, a gay man and longtime HIV survivor. Kelly didn’t return a request for comment

Also in the Castro, the San Francisco AIDS Foundation will be holding a poetry book launch of “Holding HIV: Poems of Hope” at 6 p.m. at its Strut health center, 470 Castro Street.

Ebony Gordon, a HOPE for HIV Cure Community Partner and community engagement specialist with the Black health portfolio at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, stated to the B.A.R. that the foundation is excited to help launch the book.

“The collection draws on conversations with 27 Bay Area community members about what an HIV cure could mean: their hopes and their fears,” Gordon stated. “As part of our Community Arts Integrated Research program, dialogue was interpreted by authors Pauline Sameshima, Emily Turner, and Dazie Rustin Grego-Sykes, showing how art can bridge science and lived experience, opening new space for collective reflection and possibility in HIV cure research.”

World AIDS Day will also be commemorated in the South Bay and East Bay.
San Jose Vice Mayor Pam Foley will lead a display of the AIDS Memorial Quilt at San Jose City Hall, 200 East Santa Clara Street, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. December 1. There will be a flag raising ceremony at the same location at noon, a City Council proclamation in the chambers at 1:30 p.m., and a candlelight vigil at 5:30 p.m. outside the Janet Gray Hayes Rotunda.

In Oakland, gay-owned Fluid510 LGBTQ nightclub at 1544 Broadway will be the location of an Alameda County Division of Communicable Disease Control & Prevention event December 1 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., to honor the lost and recommit to ending the epidemic. Prospective attendees can sign up here . 

Sean Sullivan, a gay man who is a co-owner of Fluid510, stated, “Fluid510 is honored to host this most important event. It’s important to commemorate our history of struggle, accomplishment and the need to continue the fight until there’s a cure. We are super excited that our former congressperson and now Mayor [Barbara] Lee will be with us, as she has been so instrumental in advocating for HIV prevention across the globe.”

Lee’s office didn’t return a request for comment by press time.

Updated, 11/25/25: This article has been updated with an additional comment and an additional event.