Gary Schiff

Gary Schiff is an American politician and activist who represented Wardon the Minneapolis City Council. A member of the Minnesota DemocraticFarmerLabor Party , he was first elected in 2001 and reelected in 2005 and 2009. Prior to his political career, Schiff was involved with a variety of activist groups and causes ranging from human rights with the Human Rights Campaign, to historic preservation with Save Our Shubert.

Schiff was born Gary J. Schiffhauer on February 3, 1972, and grew up the youngest of six children in Western New York State. In 1990, the American Civil Liberties Union represented Schiff after he graduated from LewistonPorter High School in his hometown of Youngstown, New York. According to The Buffalo News, Schiff had painted a mural along the schools stairwell that referenced drugs, safe sex, AIDS and racism in the style of artist Keith Haring. In September of that year, the schools superintendent, Walter S. Polka, decided that parts of the murals text were objectionable. The American Civil Liberties Union became involved in an extended legal fight over the constitutionality of Polkas censorship, and a New York Supreme Court Justice sided with the LewistonPorter School Board. In 1991, the school board voted 51 to paint over the mural. The board cited Schiffs involvement in a recent ACTUP demonstration at the schoolwhere demonstrators gave condoms and safe sex literature to studentsa

Source: Wikipedia