48- RAND HOCH — Activist and Palm Beach attorney
For Rand Hoch, anti-gay discrimination smacked him in the face when, as a new graduate from Stetson University College of Law, he found himself fired from his first job as an attorney for being a homosexual. As a result of his experience, Rand formed the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council in 1988 and served as the organization’s president until 1992. During that time, the Council was successful in having Palm Beach County extend protected status to gay men, lesbians and bisexuals in housing, public accommodation and county employment and in having the City of West Palm Beach extend basic domestic partnership benefits to City employees. Rand is a supporter of legalizing marijuana as a means of taking the burden off of the justice system that is clogged with victimless cases.
