Fall Intern of the Assistant to the Deputy Vice-Councilman of the Board of Parks and Recreation: “Yep. I’m Gay”
by Larry St. James, Our Town Staff
In a bombshell that rocked Borough Hall yesterday, Jared Young, the fall intern in the office of Assistant to the Deputy Vice-Councilman of the Board of Parks and Recreation Glenn Portsmouth, announced that he was a homosexual.
Young nonchalantly came out to Portsmouth and Assistant to the Municipal Liaison to the Federal Office of Homeland Security Don Horatio during a casual in-office lunch. After longtime friends Portsmouth and Horatio spent some time reminiscing about their college days, Horatio turned to Young and playfully suggested that Young, “must be very popular with the [ladies]” at his university. Joyfully finishing the last bites of his salami sandwich as he awaited an answer, Portsmouth’s jaw nearly dropped at Young’s response.
“No, not really. I’m actually gay.”
Despite Young’s insistence that he first came out four years ago, and that his parents and close friends were all accepting of the fact he was gay, within Borough Hall, Portsmouth and Horatio thought it best to keep the information between the three of them. It didn’t take long, however, for Horatio to accidentally slip the inform to his girlfriend Heather DeAngelo, who told her mother Cynthia the following evening, who told, apparently, a lot of people.
By the following morning, government officials and residents alike were crawling with suspicion of the accuracy of the information. Approached sporadically throughout the day, Young politely entertained one curious inquiry after another with the same three-word confirmation.
“Yep. I’m gay.”
At a press-conference held later the day, Mayor Allenbach expressed his full-fledged support for Young in this volatile period of potential discrimination. “One of the great things about public service is that people of every race, age, creed, and sex can come together in the house of state under the common goal of social improvement. My own house is another story. If my sole biological heir Jeremy ever chose to halt the Allenbach bloodline, so help me God, there wouldn’t be a flight of stairs high enough that I could throw him down…”
Others, including Councilwoman Beth Viscero, echoed Allenbach’s sentiments. “If the State of New Jersey is progressive enough to have a gay governor, by God, Chesterfield Ridge is progressive enough to have a gay intern in the office of the Assistant to the Deputy Vice-Councilman of the Board of Parks and Recreation.”
Residents of Chesterfield Ridge have responded quietly to the news thus far. While the information shocked many, like 78-year old Lynn Winters, who expressed confusion as to when homosexuals started working anywhere outside of Hollywood, many others saw the confession as a predictable sigh of relief. Said 15-year old Meghan Updike, “Of all the people in Borough Hall working for the Board of Council, other than the councilmen and councilwomen themselves, he’s definitely the gayest.”
Whatever his political future in Chesterfield Ridge may be, Young remains determined not to let his sexual orientation stop him from rising as far as his ambition will carry him. Said Young, “It was too late to apply for any other internship and my mom is good friends with the one of the clerks there.”
