SIR IVAN GIVES TEN THOUSAND TO LIGALY

Sir Ivan Wilzig Presents Check To LIGALY

Rock singer Sir Ivan went to Bayshore on Tuesday to present LIGALY’s CEO, David Kilmnick, with a check for $10,000 toward the organization’s successful Safe Schools Initiative, which, through its workshops in over 90 school districts in Nassau and Suffolk Counties, has created a safer environment for GLBT youth. LIGALY’s comprehensive program offers a broad base of services and programs to help students and staff develop a school culture that fosters support, understanding and respect for GLBT youth, families and educators. “Sir Ivan’s contribution is a tribute to his personal caring and sensitivity, and is evidence of a growing awareness and acceptance of GLBT rights as a human rights issue. We are honored by his generosity,” said Kilmnick. Sir Ivan, the banker turned singer/peace activist, has for some time dedicated the royalties from his recordings to The Peaceman Foundation, whose mission is to battle hate crimes and to treat victims of post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSS) all over the world. He is continually inspired by his late father, the legendary banker and Auschwitz survivor, Siggi B. Wilzig, who witnessed the murder of 59 of his family members by the Nazis and suffered with PTSS for many years afterwards. His father’s tragic experience motivated Sir Ivan to create The Peaceman Foundation and to select John Lennon’s Imagine for his first recording. Sir Ivan has been a notable supporter of Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation and the family-endowed Wilzig Hospital in his native New Jersey.Appropriately, the LIGALY check presentation took place in the same Bayshore hall where the GLBT Center is displaying the exhibition “Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals: 1933-1945." The exhibition, on loan to the Center from the U.S. Holocaust Museum, honors a persecuted population whose stories are largely unknown by the public. On hand for the ceremony were two distinguished New York State Assemblywomen, Ginny Fields and Patricia Eddington.Sir Ivan will be a guest of honor at LIGALY’s upcoming On the Bay Lawn Party & Auction, which will take place at the Diamond Ranch in Watermill on August 16.For more information about LIGALY, visit their Web site http://http://www.ligaly.org/. For further information on Sir Ivan, visit his Web site http://www.sirivanmusic.com/ and his MySpace page http://www.myspace.com/sirivanmusic.