PERSON OF THE YEARAndy CohenThe Person of the Year is that individual who is continually involved in an important undertaking that makes a positive statement forthe LGBT community as a whole.Christopher Street West annually presents The Person ofthe Year Award to someone consistently making a posi-tive and lasting impact on the LGBT community. Changing opinion is never easy. Being in a position to affectopinion is often not easy either. But having a national stage fromwhich to influence an entire nation, or at least the portion thattunes into your programming, is a powerful and useful tool.Emmy and Peabody Award winner, executive for a top-tier cableoutlet and talk-show host, Andy Cohen is in a position to do just that.He is living openly and honestly, working to bring out and open LGBTpeople to millions and millions of homes across America. Andy Cohen is Bravo's Executive Vice President of Programmingand Development and host of "Watch What Happens: Live." He hasnot shied away from putting LGBT people in front of the camera, andsmack dab in the middle of America's living room. With shows like"Top Chef," "Tabatha's Salon Takeover," "Million Dollar Listing"and "Kathy Griffin - My Life on the D-List," there has been noshortage of open, out and proud members of our communityseen weekly on our televisions. "Watch What Happens: Live," is Bravo's late night, inter-active talk show featuring guests from some of Bravo'smost popular shows, as well as from the worlds of enter-tainment, politics and pop culture. As America's firstopenly gay late-night talk show host, in June, 2009,during the reunion special for "The RealHousewives of New Jersey," Andy Cohen said hewas offended by one of the housewives'(Teresa's) husbands' use of the word gay as aninsult. This rare and on-air editorializing andmention of his sexuality is especially impactfulgiven Cohen's steadily rising profile. In June, 2010, Andy Cohen was namedone of TV Guide's "25 Most InfluentialPeople in Television." Out Magazine puthim on their Out 100 List in 2008 and in2011, he has appeared on the cover ofThe Advocate while also being profiledin The Los Angeles Times, The NewYork Times, Entertainment Weekly, TVGuide and Businessweek.As the Bravo TV juggernaut con-tinues to take America by storm-Andy Cohen's star-both in frontof and behind the camera, andability to continue helping ourcommunity-is still on the rise.What comes next? We'll haveto Watch What Happens!47