West Palm Beach Housing Authority amends Equal Employment Policy to include gender identity and gender expression

January 27, 2012

At the request of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, the West Palm Beach Housing Authority has amended its Equal Employment Policy to include both gender identity and gender expression.

The new policy now reads: The Authority maintains a policy of non-discrimination with employees and applicants for employment. Open positions will be filled by the best qualified applicant without regard to race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, veteran status, marital status, sexual orientation, political belief, gender identity, gender expression or mental or physical disability (if such disability does not unreasonably interfere with the abilities of the employee to perform the work required).

Palm Beach County broadens commercial non-discrimination policy to include "gender identity or expression"

January 25, 2011

(West Palm Beach Beach) By a 6-1 vote, the Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioners amended its Nondiscrimination in Contracting Policy on Tuesday, prohibiting the County from doing business with, or appropriating funds to, public and private organizations which practice discrimination based on "gender identity or expression."

The policy now covers race, color, national origin, religion, ancestry, sex, age, marital status, familial status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression or disability.

Commissioner Steven Abrams of Boca Raton cast the only "no" vote, stating that the new standards could have a negative impact on the number of businesses bidding on county projects.

Abrams, a Republican, expressed concern that the new policy could lead to less competition and higher prices for taxpayers.

"Commissioner Abrams' concern is unfounded," said Rand Hoch, a retired judge who serves as President of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council. The Council is a local nonprofit organization is dedicated to ending discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression.

"The Palm Beach County School District's Commercial Non-Discrimination Policy includes sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression," said Hoch. "Commissioner Abrams cannot point to one company that has stopped bidding for work on our schools because of that policy."

In response to Abrams' concern that the policy could lead to additional litigation, Hoch replied, "Palm Beach County law already prohibits employment discrimination based on gender identity or expression. The new policy will not give rise to any new cause of action."

The Council commended the County Commissioners for taking a proactive stand against discrimination.

City of Delray Beach Expands Domestic Partnership Benefits

(Delray Beach, Florida) The Delray Beach City Commission voted unanimously on Tuesday to amend the City's Family and Medical Leave Policy to allow city employees to use family and medical leave to care for their domestic partners in the same manner married employees may use it to care for their spouses.

The action was taken at the request of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, which has been working with the city on domestic partnership issues since 2006.

The Palm Beach County Human Rights Council has been the leading advocate for domestic partner benefits in Florida since 1992, when theCity of West Palm Beach became Florida's first public employer to provide domestic partnership benefits.

"With this action, the City of Delray Beach now offers employees with domestic partners virtually all of the same family benefits it provides to married employees," said Human Rights Council President Rand Hoch, "The pro-family domestic partnership policies in Delray Beach are among the most progressive in the State of Florida."

More public employers in Palm Beach County provide domestic partnership benefits than in any of Florida's other sixty-six counties.

In Palm Beach County, public employers that provide domestic partnership health insurance and other benefits include Palm Beach County, the School District of Palm Beach County, Palm Beach State College, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, the Office of the Clerk and Comptroller, the Office of the Tax Collector, the Office of the Property Appraiser, the Office of the Supervisor of Elections, the Port of Palm Beach, the Solid Waste Authority, Palm Tran, Palm Beach County Children's Services Council, the Palm Beach County Health Care District, Seacoast Utility Authority, as well as the cities of Delray Beach, Lake Worth, and West Palm Beach, the Town of Jupiter and the Village of Wellington.

PBCHRC President's Message - January 2012

January 2012

While Florida has the third largest LGBT population of any state in the union (following California and New York), our state lacks any statewide laws offering protections to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender residents regarding employment, housing and public accommodations. Florida also lacks any statewide law protecting LGBT students from bullying and harassment. Moreover, Florida’s constitution and statutes prohibit lesbians and gay men from marrying their partners.

However, thanks to the efforts of the all-volunteer Board of Directors of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council over the past twenty-four years, more than sixty local laws and policies now provide Palm Beach County’s LGBT residents (and visitors) with both equal protection and equal family benefits.

Both Palm Beach County’s Equal Employment Ordinance and Fair Housing Ordinance prohibit discrimination based on both “sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression.” The Cities of West Palm Beach and Lake Worth have also enacted citywide ordinances prohibiting discrimination based on both “sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression”.

Other local public employers that have enacted ordinances, collective bargaining agreements, and policies prohibiting discrimination based on both “sexual orientation” and/or “gender identity or expression” for their employees include the City of Atlantis, the City of Belle Glade, the City of Boynton Beach, the City of Delray Beach, the City of Greenacres, the City of Pahokee, the City of Palm Beach Gardens, the City of South Bay, the Town of Haverhill, the Town of Hypoluxo, the Town of Juno Beach, the Town of Jupiter, the Town of Lake Park, the Town of Manalapan, the Town of Palm Beach, the Town of Palm Beach Shores, the Village of Royal Palm Beach, the Village of Tequesta, the Village of Wellington, the School District of Palm Beach County, Palm Beach State College, Florida Atlantic University, the Port of Palm Beach, the Health Care District of Palm Beach County, the Office of the Tax Collector, the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser, the Office of the Supervisor of Elections, the Office of the Public Defender, the Office of the State Attorney, the Palm Beach County Sheriffs' Office, the Office of the Clerk and Comptroller, Seacoast Utility Authority, the Solid Waste Authority, Palm Tran and the Palm Beach County Children's Services Council.

Both the City of West Palm Beach and Palm Beach County have domestic partnership registries that provide limited “spousal” benefits for lesbian and gay couples who have registered as domestic partners (or who have been married or entered into a civil union anywhere in the world).

In 1992, the City of West Palm Beach became the first public employer in Florida to offer domestic partnership benefits to its employees. Other public employers in Palm Beach County that now offer family health insurance coverage and other family benefits for employees with domestic partners include (in chronological order): the Palm Beach County Sheriffs' Office, the Office of the Clerk and Comptroller, the Port of Palm Beach, the City of Lake Worth, the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser, Palm Beach County, the School District of Palm Beach County, the Office of the Supervisor of Elections, the Office of the Tax Collector, the City of Delray Beach, the Solid Waste Authority, Palm Tran, the Town of Jupiter, the Health Care District of Palm Beach County, Palm Beach State College, the Palm Beach County Children's Services Council and Seacoast Utility Authority.

In recent years, the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council has focused on family issues, working with public employers to ensure that employees could use family medical leave to care for their domestic partners in the same manner as other employees could use it to care for their spouses. The following public employers enacted inclusive family medical leave policies in 2011: the School District of Palm Beach County, the Office of the State Attorney, the Office of the Public Defender, the City of West Palm Beach, the City of Lake Worth and the Village of Wellington.

While Palm Beach County, the City of Delray Beach, Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, and Clerk & Comptroller Sharon Bock informed the Council last Spring that they will update their family and medical leave policies to include domestic partners, to date they have not revised their policies. However, the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council expects these changes to be made in early 2012.

With virtually no hope of progress on the statewide (or federal level) for LGBT-inclusive nondiscrimination laws and equal benefit policies for LGBT families, much work remains to be done on the local level.

Since 1988, the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council has worked diligently on behalf of the LGBT community. Rest assured we will continue to do so in 2012 – and beyond.

Rand Hoch,

President and Founder

Village of Wellington Extends Domestic Partnership Benefits

The Wellington Village Council has completed a comprehensive policy revision to include registered domestic partners of Village employees as family members.

The action was taken at the request of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, which has been working with the Village on domestic partnership issues for the past year. The Palm Beach County Human Rights Council has been the leading advocate for domestic partner benefits in Florida since 1992, when the City of West Palm Beach became Florida's first public employer to provide domestic partnership benefits.

Domestic partners of Village employees and their children are now eligible for the same health, dental, vision and supplemental dependent life insurance coverage as employees' spouses and their children. In addition, Village employees may now take extended medical leave to care for their domestic partners and may utilize bereavement leave to grieve for an employee's domestic partner, as well as the partner's children, parents, siblings and grandparents.

"When we met with Wellington Mayor Darell Bowen at last year's gay polo tournament, the mayor emphasized the importance of developing a very inclusive domestic partnership policy," said Rand Hoch, President of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Human Rights Council. "As a result, Village Manager Paul Schofield and his staff developed a pro-family domestic partnership policy which is possibly the most inclusive in Florida."

Each year, the Village of Wellington plays host to the Gay Polo League's international tournament. This year's tournament will be held on Saturday, April 14 at Wellington's Grand Champions Polo Club.

"The Gay Polo League facilitated the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council's efforts to urge the Village to extend domestic partnership benefits," said Hoch. "Last year, the Gay Polo League was instrumental in having Wellington include both 'sexual orientation' and 'gender identity or expression' in the Village's nondiscrimination policies."

Wellington is recognized as the winter equestrian capital of the world and in 2010 was named one of the "Top 100 Best Places to Live" by Money Magazine.

More public employers in Palm Beach County provide domestic partnership benefits than in any of Florida's other sixty-six counties.

In Palm Beach County, public employers that provide domestic partnership health insurance and other benefits include Palm Beach County, the School District of Palm Beach County, Palm Beach State College, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, the Office of the Clerk and Comptroller, the Office of the Tax Collector, the Office of the Property Appraiser, the Office of the Supervisor of Elections, the Port of Palm Beach, the Solid Waste Authority, Palm Tran, Palm Beach County Children's Services Council, the Palm Beach County Health Care District, Seacoast Utility Authority, as well as the cities of Delray Beach, Lake Worth, and West Palm Beach, and the Town of Jupiter.

"Hopefully other public employers in Florida will soon follow Wellington's lead," said Hoch.

Palm Beach County Human Rights Council: President's Message - July, 2011

As a presidential candidate, Barack Obama repeatedly said "everyone should get a seat at the table, but no one should be able to buy up all the seats."

Last week the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council got our seat at the table, through an invitation to participate the Florida Community Leaders Briefing at the White House. I must admit, it felt pretty good.

When the invitation to the White House was extended last month, I asked if we were being invited to the President’s annual Gay Pride Reception on June 29. I was told that while the reception is a social event, the Community Leaders Briefing was a working meeting.

The briefing was in keeping with a pledge made by the President in his Inaugural Address, when he told America that his “commitment to openness means more than simply informing the American people about how decisions are made. It means recognizing that government does not have all the answers, and that public officials need to draw on what citizens know."

At the President’s request, the White House Office of Public Engagement identified 150 activists representing a variety of local constituencies throughout Florida. We were being invited not only to be briefed by senior administration officials on a variety of national issues, but also to let administration officials know what we were doing on the local level.

The night before the Community Leaders Briefing, our favorite Congressman – Ted Deutch – co-hosted a reception for us at the U.S. Capital along with Congresswoman (and Democratic National Committee Chair) Debbie Wasserman Schultz. U.S. Senator Bill Nelson came by to say a few words.

Looking around the room, I saw Blacks, Whites, Hispanics, Latinos, Asians and Carribean Islanders. (If there was a Native American there, I missed her). I met people from South Florida, the Panhandle, Tampa Bay, Central Florida, Jacksonville, St. Augustine, Gainesville and Tallahassee. There were teachers, students, lawyers, union members and health care workers. Talking to people that night, I learned we were advocates for children, seniors, working people, the unemployed, retirees, people with disabilities, immigrants, the LGBT community, women and men. Our group was a virtual cross section of Floridians – and we were all working hard to improve life for our constituents.

At the reception I spent time catching up with other LGBT activists including Joe Falk, Chairman of SaveDade (www.savedade.org) and Alan Clendenin, a National Democratic Committeeman and the Hillsborough County State Democratic Committeeman.

The White House Office of Public Engagement easily filled our day for the Community Leaders Briefing. Throughout the day there were briefings from administration officials from the Department of Commerce, Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Council on Environmental Quality, the Small Business Administration and NASA.

I was particularly looking forward to hearing from Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor and Assistant to the President. The President had been spending day after day with Congressional leaders working on the debt ceiling negotiations, and I was curious to learn from an insider how things were going.

Unfortunately, she only spoke for a few minutes. Fortunately, she kept her comments very brief so she could introduce “a very special guest” – President Obama.

Needless to say, our group rose to our feet, applauded, and cheered. Frankly, I thought the President probably needed a break from the budget negotiations, and he started his talk by letting us know just how happy he was to take that break.

While he only spent five to ten minutes with us, he spent the bulk of the time thanking us for our activism and our dedication to the people we work for. He strongly encouraged us to keep engaged with the White House.

To see what the Obama Administration is working on for the LGBT community, please check out: www.whitehouse.gov/lgbt.

Back at home, there was a great decision from the Circuit Court which confirmed what the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council has been telling public employers in Palm Beach County for many years: the County’s Equal Employment Ordinance (which prohibits discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations based on sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression) has jurisdiction over all public employers in Palm Breach County with fifteen or more employees – except for the City of West Palm Beach. (West Palm Beach has its own Equal Employment Ordinance which includes sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression)

Over the years, the School District, Florida Atlantic University, some of our constitutional officers and some municipalities have claimed they were exempt from the County ordinance. With the Circuit Court ruling, they no longer can effectively claim this defense!

The Palm Beach County Human Rights Council continues our work on family issues, particularly our effrots to ensure that gay and lesbian employees in domestic partnerships have the same rights to use family and medical leave as non-gay married employees.

As reported previously, so far this year, the City of West Palm Beach, the Office of the State Attorney and the Office of the Public Defender have all updated their family and medical leave policies to include employees with domestic partners. (The County’s Supervisor of Elections, Tax Collector and Property Appraiser have provided this benefit to their lesbian and gay employees for several years).

In early May, the Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioners voted unanimously to update the County's Family and Medical Leave Policy to include families based on domestic partnerships. Within days, both Sheriff Ric Bradshaw Clerk & Comptroller Sharon Bock informed the Council that they will do the same.

We continue to work with the Palm Beach County School Board and the Cities of Lake Worth and Delray Beach on family and medical leave and we are very optimistic that all three will update their policies in the near future.

Speaking of Lake Worth, congratulations go out to newly-elected Mayor Rachel Waterman, who was elected by a wide margin. Mayor Waterman was endorsed by the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council Voters Alliance.

The Council’s newest board member, Peter Cava, reports that Board of Trustees of Florida Atlantic University will vote in October on adding both ”sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression” to the school’s non-discrimination policies. Peter is working with a strong coalition of professors, administrators, staff and students who have been working on this issue for well over a decade. It appears that the amendment has the support of FAU President M.J. Saunders. If all goes well the coalition will move forward with their longstanding campaign for domestic partnership benefits for FAU employees.

On the subject of domestic partnership benefits, Board Member W. Trent Steele continues to lead the Council's efforts to urge the Town of Palm Beach to provide domestic partnership benefits to Town employees. To read Trent’s recent Op-Ed piece in the Palm Beach Daily News, go to: www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/town-of-palm-beach-should-recognize-domestic-partners-1533924.html.

The Council also continues to work with the City of Palm Beach Gardens on adding “gender identity or expression” to the city’s non-discrimination policies.

Greenacres City Council Member Paula Bousquet contacted the Council concerning updating that City’s non-discrimination policies to include both ”sexual orientation” and “gender identity or expression”. PBCHRC Board Member Hutch Floyd will be working with her on this project.

PBCHRC Board Member Jessica Blackman continues her work with the Village of North Palm Beach, urging Village Council Members to adopt pro-LGBT policies for Village employees.

Kudos go out to Fort Lauderdale attorney Miriam Richter for her success in getting the Fort Lauderdale City Commission to finally take steps to move forward on domestic partner benefits. The Council was happy to help out with some of the research.

Our expansion into the social media has been a great success. Throughout the day, local, state, national and international news of interest to the LGBT community is posted on the Council's Facebook page (PBCHRC). According to Facebook, our postings are viewed more than 235,000 times per month! In addition, PBCHRC maintains a blog which can be viewed at pbchrc.blogspot.com.

Please help us extend our reach -- and help your Facebook friends keep up with LGBT news, etc. -- by going to the PBCHRC Facebook page and hitting the "Invite Friends" button on the right. This will help us out greatly.

As you can tell, there is a lot of work being done by the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council – and there is even more that needs to be done.

As always, we will keep you informed of our progress.


Rand Hoch,
President and Founder

PALM BEACH COUNTY EXPANDS BENEFITS FOR NONTRADITIONAL FAMILIES

OUT IN AMERICA

(West Palm Beach, Florida) The Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioners directed county staff this morning to update the County's Merit System Rules and Regulations to allow County employees with domestic partners to take the same family and medical leave granted to married employees under federal law.

County Commissioner Paulette Burdick, a longtime proponent of equal rights for the county's gay and lesbian community, proposed the change in response to a request by the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, a local nonprofit organization dedicated to ending discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression.

The Council has been the leading advocate in Florida for domestic partnership since 1992, when the City of West Palm Beach became the state's first public employer to provide basic domestic partnership benefits.

The existing county regulations are based on the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which allows married employees to take up to 12 weeks unpaid, job-protected leave to care for spouses with medical issues.

"When it comes to so many aspects of the law, Congress refuses to enact laws recognizing that gay men and lesbians form families," said Palm Beach County Human Rights Council President Rand Hoch. "And that is not going to change any time soon."

Since the federal law does not recognize nontraditional families, employees in domestic partnerships – including gay and lesbian employees – are limited to no more than 13 days pursuant to the county's sick leave policy.

"That's not fair," Hoch told the county commissioners. "It's hypocritical. It's discriminatory."

County Commissioners agreed, and unanimously voted to equalize the family and medical leave benefits.

"Palm Beach County government employs many gay and lesbian employees in committed family relationships. Unfortunately, the State of Florida and the federal government do not recognize these relationships," said Burdick. "Under the new county policy, all county employees will have the same family leave benefits. In Palm Beach County we will not tolerate discrimination."

According to county staff, 53 Palm Beach County employees have registered domestic partners.

Across Florida, 58 public employers – 17 of which are located in Palm Beach County – have policies offering domestic partnership benefits to their employees.

"Perhaps one day, the state of Florida and the federal government will end their discrimination against non-traditional families," said Hoch. "Until that day comes, it is incumbent upon county and municipal officials to take action to protect all families." [5/3/11]

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