WILTON MANORS, FL – Former Broward County Mayor Ken Keechl’s campaign will hold a fundraiser tonight between 6 and 8 p.m. at the Law Offices of George Castrataro in Fort Lauderdale.  Keechl, who was Broward County’s first openly-gay mayor, is a candidate for Broward County Commission District 7.

Keechl, 48, was elected to the commission in 2006, to represent District 4. He lost the seat in 2010 to Republican Chip LaMarca. His elevation by commission colleagues in 2009 to county mayor made him for a time  the nation’s highest-ranked elected LGBT official.

Term limits mean that the current commissioner, Broward Mayor John Rodstrom, is ineligible to run for re-election and redistricting based upon 2010 U.S. Census data places
the boundaries of District 7 to include Wilton Manors, among other  Broward communities.

“I will run a people-powered campaign–walking, knocking on doors and meeting residents and business owners of District 7,” Keechl, a native Floridian, said. “The people of District 7 will always be my main focus.”

After leaving the commission, Keechl, who has lived in Broward County for 25 years, became a partner at the Fort Lauderdale-based law firm of Kopelowitz, Ostrow, Ferguson, Weiselberg, Keechl, P.A.
Says Keechl of his current campaign: “We are in it to win it.”