5 THINGS TO KNOW

High Times, The Advocate & Out are now part of the same family.

Oreva Capital, the Los Angeles-based investment firm that recently bought marijuana enthusiast magazine “High Times,” has funded a management buyout of a handful of media brands catering to the gay community. Oreva has backed a management-led buyout of Here Publishing, which owns such titles as “The Advocate” and “Out,” with plans to grow its online and events business, Oreva CEO Adam Levin told Reuters in an interview this week.

5 THINGS TO KNOW

Rainbow lifeguard tower to become ‘monument of acceptance’.

A Venice Beach lifeguard tower gets to keep its gay pride rainbow stripes after the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to rescue it from getting repainted to the iconic blue. “We received 11,000 signatures on a petition from that area, saying no no, we love it, we’d really like to keep it,” said Supervisor Sheila Kuehl, who introduced the motion to let the stripes stand.

BUSINESS

BART reaches out to LGBT small businesses.

BART organizers are making moves toward updating the agency’s Small Business Program to include more local LGBT small businesses as BART works to rebuild its aging transportation system. On Sept. 14, the agency’s Board of Directors will vote on whether to add these contractors to the program which, as the official site writes, “provides bid preferences for qualified small businesses.”

5 THINGS TO KNOW

Amsterdam Pride corporate sponsorship right on track.

There is no other LGBT Pride celebration anywhere in the world like Amsterdam’s. The city famous for its canals, cannabis, and sexual freedom has long been an example to the world of how to treat its gay and lesbian citizens with dignity and respect, and of how to do full legal equality right. So it should come as no surprise that Amsterdam’s annual LGBT Pride celebration is one of the most unique in the world, with boats instead of floats that literally float around the city’s rings of picturesque canals as hundreds of thousands of Dutch revelers – most of whom are straight – and tens of thousands more international visitors come out along the waterways to celebrate Holland’s diversity […]

BUSINESS

LGBT friendly affordable housing coming to Long Island.

In the metropolis that helped give rise to the modern gay rights movement, a new housing project is building homes for its aging members. The LGBT Network showed off plans for a 75-unit affordable housing apartment complex that embraces lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) residents, the first development of its kind in Long Island, New York. The Islip Town Board is expected to vote on the development this fall.

5 THINGS TO KNOW

The German gay and bisexual pay gap.

Homo- and bisexual men on average earn 2 euros less per hour than their straight colleagues, according to an economic study. That’s despite being more likely to earn higher qualifications and work in white-collar jobs. In its first study on Germany’s “Sexuality Pay Gap,” the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) on Thursday reported that gay men earn on average markedly less than their straight male colleagues, despite generally boasting higher qualifications.

BUSINESS

LGBT senior housing coming to Washington, DC.

Despite having the nation’s highest percentage of LGBT-identifying residents, Washington, D.C., doesn’t have any senior housing developments dedicated to those in the LGBT community—yet. By 2020, there is interest to create the District’s first housing development for LGBT seniors. D.C. resident Imani Woody plans on redeveloping her childhood home, located at 401 Anacostia Road SE, into a 15-unit development with low-, moderate-, and market-rate prices, called Mary’s House for Older Adults.