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www.GayPeoplesChronicle.com August 28, 2009

GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE 3

Franklin grants benefits to county workers' partners

by Anthony Glassman

WITH WIRE REPORTS

Columbus The Franklin County Commissioners on August 18 unanimously approved domestic partner benefits for county employees.

The benefits, similar to those given to married workers' spouses, will be open to unmarried same-sex and opposite-sex couples, and will take effect January 1, 2010. They will not be open to employees of other elected county

officials, like auditor, judges or the sheriff, although the commissioners are urging other offices to make domestic partner benefits available to their employees as well.

Franklin County joins Cleveland Heights, the Columbus Public School District and seven state universities in offering the benefits, which have been unsuccessfully challenged in court as a violation of the state's ban on same-sex marriage.

"It's about integrity," Commissioner Marilyn

Brown said, according to the Columbus Dispatch's Barbara Carmen. "I am so proud we are enacting this among our benefits. It enhances our ability to attract and retain the best employ-

ees."

The move to add the benefits simply follows the trends among large employers, said Commissioner John O'Grady.

"In 1991, not a single Fortune 500 company offered domestic partner benefits. In 2008, 57 percent did," he said.

The benefits are expected to add less than one percent to the county's benefits costs, since some qualifying employees would already be covered under a partner's insurance, and others might want to protect their privacy by not enrolling.

Unions have been asking for the benefits for over a year, said leader Marianne Steger. She also pointed to both fairness and recruiting as driving forces behind adding them.

First gay Ohio history plaque may honor Dayton native

by Anthony Glassman

Dayton The state's first historical marker noting that someone is gay or lesbian may appear in the Miami Valley, honoring lesbian author Natalie Barney.

Barney was born in Dayton in 1876 and died 96 years later. Her novels extensively covered lesbian and feminist themes.

The Dayton LGBT Center and the Gay Ohio History Initiative worked together to raise $2,300 to create the iron marker, similar to others scattered around the state. It is now up to the Dayton

commissioners to decide whether to allow it to be installed in Cooper Park.

They were expected to vote on it during their August 26 meeting.

"Barney's sexual orientation was part of her life's work," John Zimmerman of the Dayton LGBT Center told the Dayton Daily News.

She began holding literary salons in Paris in 1900, the same year the first book of her poems was released. She kept up the salons for six decades.

"If you wanted to meet people who

published, you would wrangle in invitation to Natalie Barney's salon," Zimmerman noted.

"She was an important author," said city commissioner Matt Joseph. "She has an acknowledged place in history and I support this. I think if a Daytonian made an important contribution to the world, we should recognize it."

Dignity Dayton and the Living Beatitudes Community also worked with GOHI and the LGBT center to raise the funds.

If they are successful in getting this marker installed, there are already a few other queer

notables who markers are in the offing, like photographer Berenice Abbott, born in Springfield; composer-pianist Billy Strayhorn, and attorney and former HRC director Elizabeth Birch, both from Dayton.

The last hurdle, however, is still the vote. The Dayton Metro Library supports the proposed marker, and Dayton City Commissioner Nan Whaley believes it is a good idea.

"She had a significant life. She contributed to the world," she said. "When groups in our community want to recognize someone like that, I think we should support them."

Equality bill will be first when Ohio House returns

by Eric Resnick

Columbus The Equal Housing and Employment Non-Discrimination Act will be the first bill considered when the Ohio House returns from recess on September 15, its proponents say.

The measure, also known as EHEA or H.R. 176, prohibits discrimination by sexual orientation or gender identity in public and private employment, housing and public accommodations. Twenty-one other states have similar

measures.

Equality Ohio, which has been advocating for the bill, sent an e-mail to supporters August 19 announcing that House Speaker Armond Budish of Beachwood had said that the bill would be the first voted on that day.

If that holds, Budish will have kept his promise to the LGBT community despite pressure from more conservative elements of the Democratic Party, including Majority Leader Jennifer Garrison of Marietta, who has announced a bid for secretary of state.

Conservative Democrats have agreed to vote for the bill, some more reluctantly than others. But, fearing that the vote could threaten the House's Democratic majority, they would prefer

to delay the vote until after the November 2010 election.

Though Budish continues to deny any pressure to delay the vote, sources for a July Gay People's Chronicle report on the backstage maneuvering have continued to stand by it, and others have joined them since the story ap peared.

The maneuvering is part of a conflict within the Democratic Party in both Columbus and Washington, pitting those who want to use the party's majorities to pass a progressive agenda against conservatives who fear a backlash and loss of power.

Garrison, who is anti-gay, was recruited to run for secretary of state by conservatives who fear that the progressive Franklin County Commissioner Marilyn Brown is weak and will not be able to win the seat being vacated by Jennifer Brunner, who is running for U.S. Senate. Brunner recruited Brown.

Garrison, and by extension an LGBT equality agenda, will continue to swirl around this drama, which may also play out when EHEA hits the Senate.

The equality bill will most likely pass the 99member House. Democratic sponsor Dan Stewart

Lutherans remove barrier to gay clergy in relationships

by Patrick Condon

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Minneapolis-The nation's largest Lutheran denomination took openly gay clergy more fully into its fold on August 21, as leaders of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to lift a ban that prohibited sexually active gay and lesbian people from serving as ministers.

Under the new policy, individual ELCA congregations will be allowed to hire gay men and lesbians in committed relationships as clergy. Until now, gays and lesbians had to remain celibate to serve as clergy.

The change passed with the support of 68 percent of about 1,000 delegates at the ELCA's national assembly. It makes the group, with about 4.7 million members in the U.S., one of the largest U.S. Christian denominations yet to take a more gay-friendly stance.

"I have seen these same-gender relationships function in the same way as heterosexual relationships bringing joy and blessings as well as trials and hardships," the Rev. Leslie Williamson, associate pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Des Plaines, Illinois, said during the hours of debate. "The same-gender couples I know live in love and faithfulness and are called to proclaim the word of God as are all of us."

Conservative congregations will not be forced to hire gay clergy. Nevertheless, opponents of the shift decried what they saw as straying from scriptural direction, and warned that it could lead some congregations and individual churchgoers to split off from the ELCA.

ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson said after the vote he was committed to keeping

opponents of the new policy within the ELCA fold.

"I'm pleading with people to stay in there with us in this conversation," Hanson said.

In September, Lutheran Core the group that led the fight against the changes is holding a convention in Indianapolis to discuss the next steps. It also encouraged ELCA members and congregations to direct finances away from ELCA churchwide organizations and toward "faithful ministries within and outside of the ELCA."

Other mainstream Christian denominations in the United States have struggled to remain united in the face of such debates. In 2003, the 2-million-member Episcopal Church of the United States consecrated its first openly gay bishop, a move that alienated American Episcopalians from parts of their worldwide parent church, the Anglican Communion. The divide has led to the formation of the more conservative Anglican Church in North America, which claims 100,000 members.

Last month, the Episcopal General Convention approved a resolution saying "God has called and may call" gays and lesbians in committed relationships to any ordained ministry in the church, including bishop.

The United Church of Christ, with 1.1 million members, boasts a long track record of welcoming lesbian and gay clergy, which they officially accepted in 1980.

The Unitarian Universalist Association and Reform Judaism also allow gay clergy.

of Columbus predicts that at least 51 of 53 Democrats will vote for it. Republican sponsor Ross McGregor of Springfield believes that 12 to 20 Republicans will join them.

But that will not be without a floor fight as the Ohio Chamber of Commerce again tries to amend the bill to include sweeping "tort reform" provisions they have not otherwise been able to pass.

McGregor said the Chamber has been "very engaged" in the bill, to which they tried to attach seven amendments in committee.

Neither Stewart nor McGregor want the Chamber's entire amendment package to be put on the bill, as it is extraneous to the measure's purpose and could make it difficult for Democrats to support.

However, McGregor says that there are a

couple of pieces of the Chamber's agenda that, if passed, could make the bill a lot easier to get through the Republican-controlled Senate.

As an example, McGregor cited one proposed amendment that requires someone with a complaint to exhaust all administrative avenues before going to court.

"It has as good a shot as ever at passing both chambers," McGregor said, adding that some negotiation around the Chamber amendments will help him in two ways.

The first, he said, is to get as many Republicans as possible to vote for the bill in the House.

"That would make the bill a truly bipartisan bill and send the message to the Senate that we want it to pass and that the House has done its part," McGregor said.

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