Chanting and carrying signs, a crowd of more than 700 people rallied at the LA Gay & Lesbian Center Sunday and then and marched more than a mile to the Social Security Administration office in Hollywood today to call for end to the discrimination that deprives older LGBT taxpayers of hundreds of millions in Social Security benefits every year, Associated Press reports.

According to a recently released report prepared by an LGBT advocacy group and endorsed by major aging groups, including AARP and the American Society on Aging, Gay senior citizens face a multitude of social and financial problems. However the group Services and Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Elders, or SAGE, says the the greatest hurdle may be the inequity of Social Security.

A second major report focusing on aging LGBT people was released today. Yesterday, the LGBT advocacy group SAGE released a report that addresses the needs of older populations in general, including members of the WWII generation who now face issues with care facilities. The second report released today focuses on a subset of the population—boomers born between 1946 and 1964. The study found that the LGBT boomers have a broader definition of “family” than do members of the general population and depend on their “chosen family” of friends and associates for a broad range of support.

LGBT senior citizens face unique social and financial problems, and lawmakers could help them by modifying Social Security and Medicaid rules, according to a national report released Wednesday in Chicago at a national conference on aging. Tom Nelson, chief operating officer of AARP, wrote the report’s foreword and said Tuesday that his organization wanted to see the needs of LGBT seniors discussed and met.

CHICAGO -- When federal officials studied housing discrimination based on race, the setup was simple: They sent in testers of different backgrounds and gauged how landlords and real estate agents treated people of color compared with whites. As the government prepares a first-ever study of housing discrimination against gays, however, the issue is more complex. How do you design a study to make an applicant's sexual orientation or gender identity as obvious as race and color?

The 2010-2011 California budget proposal released in January by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s office proposes deep cuts in community-based services available to low-income seniors and low-income Californians of all ages with disabilities.1 The cuts will make it much more difficult for many older adults to continue to live safely in their own homes, create hardships for their families, lead to a loss of jobs and health insurance by direct service providers, and close many adult day care centers. Increased use of emergency rooms, hospital in-patient care and nursing facilities by affected older adults are likely to erode the financial savings of the reductions.2 This policy note analyzes the likely consequences of the January 2010 proposals for seniors, their families and service providers.3 We find that the proposed reductions would reduce support for home care in the state to levels not seen for almost 30 years.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius today announced an award totaling $900,000 over three years to Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders (SAGE) to establish the nation’s first national resource center to assist communities that provide services for older lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals.

The Human Rights Campaign, the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender lobbying group and political action committee, recently released the findings from its 2010 Corporate Equality Index.

Retired Army Gen. Colin L. Powell, whose opposition to allowing gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military helped lead to adoption of the "don't ask, don't tell" legislation 17 years ago, said Wednesday that he now thinks the restrictive law should be repealed.

WASHINGTON — It's time to repeal the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy and allow gay troops to serve openly for the first time in history, the nation's top defense officials declared Tuesday, with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff proclaiming that service members should not be forced to "lie about who they are."