Since 2002, he has been chief consultant of the Democracy Project of the Gill Foundation. The nonpartisan project, now entering its sixth year, has helped nearly 400 state and national organizations update and target their databases to enable a louder, more unified voice for more than 14 million gay people and allies in the policy debate. Participating organizations include interfaith, civil-rights, and pro-privacy groups and vary widely in the sophistication of their fund-raising, advocacy, and get-out-the-vote capacities and strategies. In 2004, voluntary nonpartisan collaborations between national and state organizations in the Democracy Project helped allies of equality for gay people gain seats in 12 of the 15 states served by the Project. Among the antagonists of gay rights who lost were an incumbent governor and lead sponsors of antigay legislation in 8 states. In 2006, vote-by-mail projects involving Project organizations contributed to increased turnout in two states. Coalitions in two other states used their improved data to defeat anti-abortion ballot measures. In addition, Project organizations in 13 states used their improved data for nonpartisan get-out-the-vote efforts, most effectively targeting voters shown to have voted infrequently in prior elections. In Minnesota, for instance, compared with a similar election four years earlier, turnout among voters targeted by its nonpartisan program rose more than 300 percent.
Before taking on this challenge, Hans helped lead list-development and communications efforts for the nation's largest and fastest growing union, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). As a columnist, his work appears regularly in In These Times magazine, where he is a contributing editor. He is a regular guest on "The Young Turks." He serves on the board of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center.
Hans is a native of Kalamazoo, Michigan, and a graduate of the College of Wooster, in Ohio, where he organized and led a fund-raising campaign to secure the endowment of the John Plummer Memorial Scholarship. The annual prize will recognize significant contributions by any student to a more welcoming campus environment for gay people. His partner is Luis Lopez, and Hans spends significant time in both Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles.
