About ACON

ACON's History

Mardi Gras

In 2010, ACON marks 25 years of service to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) community and people affected by HIV/AIDS. As such, it’s appropriate to reflect on the impact HIV/AIDS has had on our community over the last quarter of a century, how ACON has developed as an organisation in response to the health needs of our community and what lessons we can learn from the past that can help us to continue our mission in the future.

A brief history of ACON
ACON and HIV/AIDS
The evolution of ACON
ACON's Presidents
Download Resources

A brief history of ACON

For 25 years, ACON has been delivering important outcomes for the health and wellbeing of our community. Looking back, our work can be characterised in four very distinct phases.

1985 - 1991: HIV prevention was as important but much more basic than today and we cared for people as they became sick, helping them to die with dignity while supporting family and friends.
1992 - 1999: Our programs began to change to take a more holistic approach and medical advances meant a change in emphasis to ‘living with HIV’.
2000 - 2007: We expanded further to become a health promotion agency for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.
2008 - now: Our expansion has continued to the point where we're now Australia's largest community-based GLBT health and HIV/AIDS organisation.

Throughout this evolutionary process, our HIV work has stayed at the heart of what we do but we have been building new programs around it.

ACON and HIV/AIDS

ACON began in 1985 as a major part of the GLBT community’s response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in NSW. At that time, HIV in Australia was restricted almost entirely to gay men and there was no treatment in sight. ACON gave a voice to people living with HIV/AIDS, worked alongside successive state and federal governments to develop HIV strategies and played an integral role in the Australian response to the crisis.

The gay liberation movement of the 1970’s provided a strong foundation for the community to pull together for a political response to HIV and to fight for the community. In fact, the linkages between gay rights, human rights and HIV were identified at the very beginning of Australia’s response to HIV/AIDS, with a strong belief that any work in HIV prevention, care and support necessitated the fostering of an ‘enabling environment’. This involved, and continues to involve, advocating for public attitudes, laws and regulations that impact on the whole person and focuses on their health in context rather than just upon the disease. Partnerships, a community focus, the right of people living with HIV/AIDS to self-determination and a sense of shared responsibility set the enormously successful foundations for the response at both a policy and service delivery level.

As we mark our 25th anniversary, ACON not only pays respect to this history but we are proud to continue to uphold these core values, a pride which is evidenced in all the work undertaken by our staff, our volunteers and our community. As such, the determination, intelligence and thoughtfulness of those activists, most of whom were very personally involved in the epidemic, cannot be over-estimated or over-acknowledged Alongside these activists, it is also vital to acknowledge the critical role played by the research and medical establishments, particularly general practitioners, in working with us over the last 25 years. We thank them for their vision and their hard work.

The evolution of ACON

In the context of this broad social history, how has ACON changed as an organisation over the last 25 years? In the early days, ACON’s programs were focussed mainly on HIV prevention in a more limited way than we understand it today. We focussed on caring for people as they became sick, helping them to die with dignity while supporting family and friends. Over time, especially after the advent of anti-retroviral treatments in 1996, our programs began to change to take a more holistic approach. Our methodology evolved from a focus on caring for people dying from AIDS to supporting people living with HIV. The demand for our services grew and we set up offices outside Sydney.

Gay men continued to be the most at risk but HIV became less central in the lives of negative gay men. Consequently, our programs changed so that HIV prevention was in the context of sex, relationships and the full, complex lives of members of our community. This approach was formalised in 2000 when ACON began describing itself as a health promotion organisation based in the GLBT community with a central focus on HIV/AIDS. By taking a broader health focus, we improved our work in HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and care, and improved the general health of our community by encompassing a broader range of health issues such as sexual health, lesbian health, drug and alcohol issues, homophobic violence, same-sex domestic violence and mental health.

However, HIV/AIDS remains the greatest threat to the health of the GLBT community and as such, ACON continues to constantly renew and reinvigorate our focus on HIV/AIDS. Nevertheless a range of other health issues are emerging with increasing urgency. Some of these, such as sexually transmitted infections, are clearly and directly related to HIV prevention. But tackling issues such as suicide, violence and the use of alcohol and other drugs – all of which are disproportionally experienced by our community – will also help reduce HIV infections by reducing vulnerability overall.

For this reason, ACON’s new strategic plan for the next three years redefines our mission to better reflect the work that we do. We are now recognised as a Australia's largest community-based GLBT health and HIV/AIDS organisation. Our mission is to improve the health and wellbeing of the GLBT community and people wioth HIV, and reduce HIV transmission. We continue our HIV/AIDS work because that remains the most important health issue for our community and not because we are a single-focus AIDS organisation, as ACON was when it began.

So as we commemorate 25 years of service in 2010, there is much that we have learned, many people that we acknowledge, many friends that we remember and many accomplishments that we celebrate. We thank all the staff, volunteers, stakeholders and members of our community who have supported our work for the last 25 years and we look forward to believing in and working for the future of our families, our friends and our community.

ACON's Presidents

Mark Orr
President from 2007 to present
13th President
Adrian Lovney President from 2000 to 2007 12th President
David Stone President from 1998 to 2000
11th President
Chris Gration President 1996/97 10th President
Bruce Meagher President 1994/95
9th President
Peter Grogan President 1992/93 8th President
Levinia Crooks
President 1991/92
5th and 7th President
Rolf Petherbridge President 1990/91 6th President
Levinia Crooks
President 1988/89 5th and 7th President
Gray Sattler President 1988
4th President
Don Baxter President 1987/1988 3rd President
Greg Tillett
President 1986/1987 2nd President
Lex Watson
President 1985/1986 1st President

Download Resources

Download: Strenghthening the Community - ACON and the HIV Epidemic in NSW (PDF)

This resource was produced to mark ACON's 10 year anniversary in 1995 and is a chronology of the community and government response to HIV/AIDS and GLBT rights in NSW from the 1960's to the mid-1990s.

Download: An Historical Timeline of HIV/AIDS Events (PDF)

This resource was produced by the Albion St Centre in 2006 and is a chronology of events related to HIV/AIDS with an emphasis on NSW and Australia.