Craft Lake City and Equality Utah invite the public to join in for a free virtual discussion on Thursday, June 29 from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m. to celebrate their newest street-side installation, Local Voices: Equality Utah’s Gorgeous Planet. This installation, emphasizing courage & curiosity over fear, is displayed to the public via 14 steel frames along Broadway (300 S), between 200 West and 200 East in downtown Salt Lake City through the end of June. Founded in 2001, Equality Utah is Utah’s premiere LGBTQ advocacy organization, leading efforts for LGBTQ civil rights at the state and local levels. They work tirelessly sponsoring LGBTQ legislation, lobbying elected officials, building coalitions and empowering individuals & organizations alike to engage in the legislative process. Craft Lake City is honored to partner with Equality Utah again in bringing awareness of this incredible work via large-scale street-side displays in downtown Salt Lake City.
About the Panelists
Troy Williams, Executive Director of Equality Utah
For the past two decades, Troy has been a community organizer for LGBTQ Utahns. In 2004 he became community affairs director of 90.9 FM KRCL. He was the executive producer and co-host of the talk show RadioActive. In 2010 the Salt Lake Tribune dubbed him “the gay mayor of Salt Lake City.”
Troy’s work has since been featured in the New York Times, Anderson Cooper 360, CBC Q, Democracy Now!, The Advocate, OUT Magazine and Interview Magazine. In 2010 he co-wrote the award-winning play, The Passion of Sister Dottie S. Dixon and in 2011 appeared in the Errol Morris film, Tabloid. In 2022, Troy also appears in the HBO original documentary, Mama’s Boy.
In 2022, The Advocate Magazine named Troy as one of the 50 LGBTQ Champions of Pride.
Troy became the executive director of Equality Utah in the fall of 2014. In 2015 he helped pass Utah’s historic LGBTQ non-discrimination protections in housing and employment. In 2016, he led efforts to rename 20 blocks of downtown Salt Lake City as “Harvey Milk Boulevard”. In 2017 he worked to successfully overturn the state’s ‘No Promo Homo’ law which prohibited discussion of LGBTQ issues in the classroom. In 2020 he led the campaign to successfully protect minors from the dangerous practice of conversion therapy.
Olivia Jaramillo, Diversity & Inclusion Trainer for Equality Utah
Olivia is a Strategic Leadership Consultant and a Diversity Equity and Inclusion Specialist. She is currently Director for Public Outreach at Equality Utah. She was born and raised in Mexico. She’s a retired United States Air Force Veteran, where she served on tours to Iraq, Europe, and humanitarian missions into Africa. In 2016 she was one of the first individuals nationwide to legally change her name and gender marker while still serving on Active Duty. She has worked in furthering DEI efforts for several companies and Organizations including the VIVINT, Qualtrics, Dominion Energy, Zions Bank, and Adobe.
She is a Commissioner on the Salt Lake City Human rights Commission, a member of the YWCA’s Public Policy Committee, and was a political candidate in 2020. She currently lives in Salt Lake City with her son Oliver.
Local Voices: Equality Utah’s Gorgeous Planet is open to the public 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, free of charge. To learn more about Equality Utah’s mission and programs, visitors will have the opportunity to scan a QR code while viewing the artwork series on the streets of downtown Salt Lake City. Local Voices: Equality Utah’s Gorgeous Planet will be on display in all 14 frames from May 1 to June 30, 2023.
With support from The Center for the Living City and The Temporary Museum of Permanent Change, Craft Lake City’s Local Voices installation series spotlights the inspiring work of Utah-based organizations in an effort to connect the community with ideas that matter. Craft Lake City curates this seasonal, rotating outdoor art exhibition for the Salt Lake community. The exhibits feature visually inspiring and interactive artwork meant to engage visitors and patrons. All Local Voices installations are displayed in fourteen metal frames along the sidewalks on the north and south sides of Broadway (300 South) between 200 West and 200 East in downtown Salt Lake City. For more information, please visit us at: https://craftlakecity.com/local-voices.
For more information about Equality Utah, please visit: https://www.equalityutah.org/.
About Craft Lake City:
Craft Lake City’s year-round programming is supported in part by the residents of Salt Lake County through the Zoo, Arts & Parks (ZAP) Program, the Salt Lake Arts Council, the George S. and Dolores Doré Eccles Foundation, and Utah Arts & Museums, with funding from the State of Utah and the National Endowment for the Arts.
About Equality Utah:
Equality Utah works to build a community where every Utahn is valued for being who they are regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. Equality Utah believes everyone in the state deserves to be treated with respect and understanding and to be afforded the same basic freedoms and opportunities as everyone else. Equality Utah’s vision is a fair and just Utah, and its mission is to to secure equal rights and protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer Utahns and their families. Equalityutah.org @equalityutah
About the Temporary Museum of Permanent Change:
The Temporary Museum of Permanent Change is a community based, participatory project that uses the ever-changing development processes underway in Salt Lake City as catalysts to animate city life. The Museum engages a variety of audiences using a collaborative, multidisciplinary approach that includes performance art and video production, visual art, urban archaeology, anthropology, local history, existing businesses and ongoing deconstruction and construction processes as spectacles for people of all ages. Together these elements provide teachable moments in our efforts to manage and celebrate change. This museum has no specific address. Rather it is a construction of ideas, installations and illuminations that comprise a new way of seeing our city. museumofchange.org
About the Center for Living City:
The Center for the Living City advocates for vibrant, adaptive, equitable communities created by and for everyone. We work to inspire civic engagement and leadership, invite creative urban solutions, and expand our understanding of the ecology of cities. Our purpose is to advance social, environmental and economic justice. centerforthelivingcity.org @_whatwesee_