ANN ARBOR, MI — Kathy Kozachenko says when she was elected to the Ann Arbor City Council in 1974, she never thought she’d be back giving a speech over 50 years later.

She addressed a large crowd gathered outside city hall Thursday, Sept. 4, for the unveiling of a new historical marker celebrating her and Ann Arbor’s LGBTQ+ history.

“I came to Ann Arbor in 1970, I was 18 years old, ready to take part in the actions of the ’60s that were still very much alive on the campus,” she said.

Kozachenko, 73 and now living in Pittsburgh, made history with her 1974 win as the first openly LGBTQ+ candidate elected to public office in the United States. She was a 21-year-old University of Michigan student activist and member of Ann Arbor’s left-wing Human Rights Party.

“I was a lesbian on a campus t

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