Bea Arthur’s Golden Gift to LGBT Youth

“The Golden Girls” Bea Arthur
Photo Credit: Wayne Williams_Shooting Star™

Thanks to a serendipitous $300,000 gift of actress Bea Arthur in 2009, ground recently broke on a full-service, 18-bed residence in New York City for LGBT homeless youth. As part of the Ali Forney Center, the Bea Arthur Residence will serve New York City’s growing population of homeless youth, currently estimated to be around 20,000 with 40 percent said to be LGBT. According to Ali Forney Center executive director Carl Siciliano, the donation came right in the nick of time. The amazing story from Towelroad:

On one summer day, the landlord had called threatening to evict the center because it was late on rent.

“I pulled my car off to the side of the road and said my prayers. I didn’t know what else to do,” Siciliano said. “I’m an old Catholic boy, I was a monk, and I started praying to all of my saints,” he said. And to Bea Arthur.”

Arthur, who had passed three months earlier, must have heard Siciliano’s prayer as the center received word later that day that the late actresses estate had named the Ali Forney Center at the top of her list of charities in her will.

With the money rolling in, Siciliano was able to pay rent and pay Arthur back with the development of a center named after her.

Siciliano added that Arthur was aware of herself as an LGBT icon and was troubled to learn of the plight of LGBT teenagers being rejected by their families.

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