George Moscone was a trailblazer. A new documentary reminds California just how much.
t is no small tragedy that George Moscone’s life was cut short 40 years ago this month and he was not allowed to fulfill his purpose of righting wrongs for Californians.
As a state senator, he championed bills that established California’s school lunch program, mandated bilingual education in public schools and overturned the state’s sodomy statute. He also worked on abortion rights, gun control, the death penalty and lessening of marijuana penalties. As mayor of San Francisco, Moscone included people who were traditionally left out -- women, African Americans, Asians, LGBTQ people and others -- more than ever before in government.
Jonathan Moscone, says in the documentary “Moscone: A Legacy of Change,” airing Nov. 5 on KVIE and later this month on other PBS stations throughout the country. “He pushed the doors open, and he kept them open and they never closed. I think the flow into and out of the halls of power changed dramatically because of my dad.”
Moscone met Willie Brown, the former state Assembly speaker and San Francisco mayor, at UC Hastings College of Law while both worked as custodians to pay tuition. “George Moscone was different than any white man I had ever met,” Brown says in the documentary. “The comfort level of your conversation with Moscone, your social interactions with Moscone, was absolutely no different than your comfort level of social interactions with any other black guy.”
https://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article220868945.html#storylink=cpy
