Hall of Shame

Transgender People Gain Equality in Louisiana

This past Saturday, U.S. Rep. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) was elected as Louisiana's next Governor. He will take office in January. If the Governor -elect Jindal carries through on his campaign promises, transgender people in Louisiana have the same rights as gays and lesbians.

Governor-elect Jindal has stated that will not renew current Gov. Blanco's 2004 executive order barring state agencies and contractors from discriminating in their hiring practices on the basis is sexual orientation. During Gov. Blanco's campaign in 2003, in meetings with the GLBT leadership she indicated that she would execute an executive order that would include protections for sexual orientation and gender identity. However, in a situation that is all too similar to the promise to have an inclusive ENDA bill, the transgender community was left out of the executive order at the last moment. The majority of the gay leadership in Louisiana voted in favor of leaving protections out of the executive order. In Louisiana, a half a loaf was acceptable and the gender identity provision was used simply as a bargaining chip. It was extremely important for the gay leadership to obtain the executive order and the language in the executive order was a model for the subsequent bills that were filed in the legislature. That's right. After they sacrificed the transgender community, they justified excluding gender identity from the state bill by using the executive order as the model.

For many years, the Forum for Equality, a member of the federation of statewide equality organizations, has been a thorn in the side of those who have advocated for transgender inclusion.

In 2001, one GLBT organization filed inclusive employment non-discrimination bills in the Louisiana legislature. The Forum for Equality responded by filing a competing bill that only provided protections for sexual orientation. A battle similar to the current battle over the federal ENDA fiasco followed but those who supported gender inclusion lost the battle. The leader of Forum For Equality stated that it was important to get the head of he camel inside the tent before they could get the camel's ass in the tent.

The gay community in Louisiana sure has made progress on the back of the transgender community!
In January, they will find that they have the same rights as their transgender brothers and sisters.

I'll bet the gay and lesbian community's Forum for Equality (Louisiana's State wide organization which fights for protections for Gay and lesbian people) and the Human Rights Campaign will be upset because they are once again equal.

That must really burn their asses!

Here is Forum for Equality's website, you won't find the word Transgender written anywhere. http://www.forumforequality.com/
Oh…they also never joined the other 300 plus organizations who opposes the Federal legislation that does not include gender identity. http://www.unitedenda.org

You can read more about Jindal's position, right here:

http://www.nola.com/timespic/stories/index.ssf?/base/news5/1192691199231370.xml&coll=1

Discrimination order
Jindal is the only candidate who said he would not renew a 2004 executive order by Blanco barring state agencies and outside contractors from discriminating in their hiring practices on the basis of race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, political affiliation or disabilities.

The order, which is similar to one issued by former Gov. Edwin Edwards, sparked a brief outcry from conservatives who complained that it could be construed in a way that excludes religious groups from getting government contracts by forcing them to change their hiring practices.
Gene Mills, director of the Family Forum, said the term "sexual orientation" could be broadly construed to include pedophiles as a protected class of worker in state government.
"If one describes his propensity for minors as a sexual orientation and it says there should not be grounds for firing, then you arguably have a legal dilemma there," Mills said.

Supporters of the executive order said it does not override any existing laws, such as those against pedophilia, and that it sends an important message to the outside world that Louisiana is a tolerant state. Doing so will help the state's efforts to attract outside investment and stem the out migration of educated people to other states, they say.

"It's no big surprise that we've lost thousands and thousands of jobs and millions and millions in investment because of our reputation of being an extremely intolerant state toward people who are nonstandard," said Joe Traigle, a former state Revenue secretary and a longtime activist for gay causes.

Jindal said that although he does not believe in discrimination, he fears the executive order's potential effect on nonprofit groups that contract with the government. Jindal said such groups should be allowed to discriminate in their hiring practices while still receiving tax dollars.
"I'd want to make sure we weren't driving out faith-based providers from state government, from providing state services," Jindal said.

Georges, a New Orleans area businessman, said he agrees with Blanco's executive order and would sign a similar order if elected.

"I don't discriminate in my own business, so why would I want the government to discriminate?" Georges said.

Boasso and Campbell made similar vows, saying they oppose discrimination and would renew the executive order if elected governor.

Jindal, meanwhile, is the only candidate to call for the repeal of hate-crimes laws, which provide added penalties for crimes motivated by animosity toward a particular person or group based on race, age, gender, religion or sexual orientation.

"I . . . absolutely think we ought to strongly prosecute these laws," Jindal said. "But I don't think it makes sense to treat different victims differently."

A Brief History
http://www.ambushmag.com/is901/
editorial
Volume 19/Issue 9/2001
by Toni Pizanie
NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA

Louisiana Senate Nightmare
A battle has begun in the Louisiana Senate between the state-wide, proven, successful LAGPAC [Louisiana Lesbian & Gay Political Action Caucus] and the New Orleans local Forum for Equality. Senators Cravins of Lafayette and Irons of New Orleans are the sponsors of Senate bill 862. This bill deals with discrimination in the workplace and reads as follows: EMPLOYMENT: Provides prohibitions against discrimination because of actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.

The Forum's bill has deleted the words "gender identity." That means no protection for Transgender people. I feel as though I am back in 1998 fighting for the inclusion of Transgenders against HRC. Today HRC is leading that fight. Has the Forum learned nothing in the last four years?

I spoke with the articulate and pleasant Jimmy Fahrenholtz who is the Executive Director of Forum. My question was why eliminate one group of our community? His answer was that after research, he had learned that the bill could not pass with the inclusion of gender identify. He said that it was for realistic and practical reasons that the Forum chose to register a second bill.

When I called Baton Rouge to speak with an acquaintance in the capital, I was told that Senator Cravins made it clear that if two bills were filed, they are both dead. Since LAGPAC had previously filed a bill, it seems that the Forum has set us back another two years. The aide that I spoke with said the filing of two bills makes the state-wide GLBT community look weak, confused and unprofessional. The only way to correct this enormous insult to the our community would be for Forum to withdraw their bill.

I also spoke with LAGPAC co-chair, Chris Daigle, who is presently in Baton Rouge as a lobbyist for GLBT issues with this session of the legislature. Chris pointed to three groups that will be protected by the inclusion of the term "gender identity." First, there is the overly masculine woman or effeminate male who could be fired not because they are Lesbian or Gay but because their actions are contrary to their gender. Second, there are the Transgenders who have been identified medically as such and been instructed to live as the gender with which they identity. Third, there are heterosexual men who cross dress on their own time, not at work, but are fired because someone accidentally saw them out on a Saturday night. Shades of the Winn-Dixie suit. SB 862 is stopping up the loopholes. We would be deficient as the Forum's bill is deficient if we did not include "gender identity" said Daigle.

I suggested that it is an arrogant attitude that a local organization would take it upon itself to undo the work of a state-wide organization. I asked about the LAGPAC Board and was told that Board members are residents in Lake Charles, Baton Rouge, Shreveport, Zachary and New Orleans.

Chris also said that the case law is proving the actual or perceived sexual orientation is inadequate due to the existing loophole. There are nineteen similar bills across the United States, Chris said, eleven include gender identity. People are getting the message that we cannot go backwards.

How do you plan to pass this bill? "LAGPAC has a state-wide tour to continue doing grassroots work. There is a post card campaign and street outreach campaign. To show the legislature the visibility of the GLBT community in Louisiana, we are having visibility day at the capital on May 10. Here is where LAGPAC needs the assistance of every GLBT person in the state to help us help them."
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http://www.ambushmag.com/is1001/
Transgenders - "The Ass" of the Camel
Many Transgenders and members of the Gay Lesbian and Bisexual Community were outraged at the crude remarks attributed to Forum For Equality Executive Director Jimmy Farenholtz. Farenholtz reportedly said in Southern Voice, " I'm calling this the 'nose-of-the-camel bill. You have to get the nose of the camel into the tent, and you can worry about pulling the rest of the ass in later." Farenholtz is referring to a bill introduced by the Forum For Equality in the Louisiana Senate protecting Lesbians and Gays through sexual orientation from employment discrimination, but excludes "gender identity". Ambush urges its readers to contact their Senators and let them know that "gender identity" should be a protected class in any employment discrimination act. LAGPAC has introduced a bill inclusive of protection based on sexual orientation and gender identity as reported in last issue's Ambush Editorial by Toni Pizanie.
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MAC Attack
The governor's race is over. But for local gay politicos, questions remain about the lingering effect of Mayor Ray Nagin's decision to endorse Bobby Jindal.
By Lili LeGardeur

"Do you seriously think," asks Randal Beach (pictured), "that had Ray Nagin said, 'Bobby, I'm for you, but you need to meet with these representatives from my constituency first,' that he would have refused?"
Photo by Donn Young
Last Wednesday night at 7:20 was a bad time to call Randal Beach on his cell phone. "I'm watching Kathleen and Jindal debate gay rights!" Beach answered gruffly, sounding incredulous that anyone should call at such a moment.
It takes a lot to ruffle Beach, a lawyer whose passion for political and legal debate is matched only by his love of LSU football. On Nov. 5, however, news of Mayor Ray Nagin's endorsement of Bobby Jindal for governor went beyond ruffling. As soon as he learned of the endorsement, Beach decided to resign as chair of the Mayor's Advisory Committee (MAC) on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Issues. When he called the six other members of the committee, they told him that they had made the same decision. The entire committee resigned en masse the following day, an event that prompted mention in national media, including The New York Times. Emails flew. A few suggested starting a gay travel boycott of New Orleans -- something that none of those resigning from the mayor's committee would assent to.
"After enduring eight years of a Governor who refused to meet with our community leaders, it is now apparent that his protégé and hand-picked successor would, if elected, follow his policies of exclusion," wrote Beach in the group's letter of resignation. "It is unconscionable and incomprehensible to us that the Mayor of Louisiana's most richly diverse city would not only condone candidate Jindal's actions, but would support his exclusionary campaign with an endorsement."
The reason for the resignation was not Jindal's politics, Beach insists. "Our problem was that this man refused to meet with us. Had he met with us, we could not have faulted the mayor."
During the campaign, Jindal declined to meet with members of the Louisiana League for Equality, an umbrella group of GLBT political organizations from around the state that coordinates efforts to pass legislation and also reviews candidates for office. The league structure makes the process easier for candidates, says Christopher Daigle, a political adviser to the Lesbian and Gay Political Action Committee (LAGPAC).
As a mayoral committee, the MAC was not member of the league. Several of the committee's members, however, were also active in LAGPAC, Louisiana PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays), or LEGAL (Louisiana Electorate of Gays and Lesbians), all of which are part of the umbrella organization and were active in vetting candidates.
The League kept a painstaking account of efforts to contact Jindal. Two invitations to meet with the League, faxed to Jindal's campaign headquarters on Aug. 26 and Sept. 9, went unanswered, as did more than eight phone calls to campaign manager Phillip Stutts and scheduling manager Jamie Tanner. On Sept. 25, League chairman Joe Traigle confronted Jindal face-to-face at a debate at Tulane University and asked if the candidate would meet with the League. "I would be glad to meet with you after the election," Jindal replied, according to Traigle.
Trey Williams, who served as press secretary for Jindal's campaign, said before the election last week that Jindal would be a governor for "all Louisianians," but that the campaign didn't have time to meet with the Louisiana League for Equality. "We've had requests for hundreds of special-interest groups to meet with them in the last few months," he said. "Unfortunately, we have a limited amount of time and it simply isn't possible to meet with everyone. It's just impossible."
Asked whether the mayor's advisors weren't giving up power by resigning, Rev. Nicholas Romans, the lone Nagin appointee to the now-resigned MAC, laughed. "Clearly we're not," said Romans. Beach agrees. "Do you seriously think," Beach asks, "that had Ray Nagin said, 'Bobby, I'm for you, but you need to meet with these representatives from my constituency first,' that he would have refused?"
That the mayor of New Orleans even has a advisory committee on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues came as a surprise to many New Orleanians. The Sidney Barthelemy administration first set up a committee to address gay issues -- but it had pretty well ceased activity by the time Barthelemy left office. In return for broad support from New Orleans' GLBT voters, then-mayoral candidate Marc Morial pledged to set up a new committee to advise him on matters of concern to the community. The committee that he instituted in 1995, early in his first administration, focused primarily on civil rights. When Nagin was elected, he agreed to keep the existing committee in place for six months. In fact, the committee persisted into Nagin's second year with the addition of only one member, prompting some criticism that he was neglecting it.
For Beach, who was part of the first committee appointed by Morial, being counted as a gay man was at the heart of his political involvement in New Orleans. A native of Shreveport, Beach was always what his father called "a joiner." He participated in student government, then went on to run as a delegate for the Democratic National Convention when he was 22. (He made it when he was 26.) As both a lobbyist and as a law student, he hid the fact that he was gay.
"I wasn't out, but I didn't lie," Beach recalls. He stayed that way during a seven-year stint with the East Baton Rouge Parish Attorney's office, then as a member of Baton Rouge mayor Pat Screen's staff, where he ultimately became the mayor's chief administrative officer. When Screen left office in 1988, Beach made the decision to enter private practice in New Orleans -- and to come out of the closet. Three years later, when Insurance Commissioner Jim Brown asked Beach to join his staff, Beach said that he wouldn't hide the fact that he was gay to take a government position. "He said, 'You shouldn't have to,'" Beach says. He eventually rose to the position of deputy commissioner, becoming one of the most powerful gay men in Louisiana state government before leaving Brown's office in 1994.
"In January of 1995, I made the decision that my life was completely in my own hands and I made a decision to devote a great deal of my time to fighting for what I believe," says Beach. "That summer, the mayor appointed me to the Mayor's Advisory Committee."
Beach looks back with pride at the committee's accomplishments under Morial. So does Toni Pizanie, a longtime political activist and columnist for Ambush magazine, who joined the MAC shortly after Beach. It was that early MAC that asked Morial to extend health benefits to same-sex domestic partners, a measure that the city council approved in 1997. The city's human rights ordinance was also amended to include discrimination on the basis of "gender identity" -- which refers to people outside conventional gender norms, such as being in the middle of a transition from one sex to another. The MAC urged the mayor to support hate-crime legislation at the state level, making Louisiana the second state in the South with a hate-crime law. At the prompting of MAC members, Morial also supported efforts to repeal the state sodomy law. LEGAL brought the 1994 case to repeal the sodomy law; the law was upheld by the state's Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal in November 2002 but was vacated by the U.S. Supreme Court decision last spring in Lawrence vs. Texas, which made consensual homosexual activity in private legal.
The MAC was also able to enlist Morial's support in keeping the HIV Outpatient Clinic in New Orleans running smoothly after a missed deadline threatened Medicaid reimbursements to the clinic. The HIV Outpatient Clinic, or "HOP," is the largest outpatient facility for AIDS and HIV-positive patients in the state.
Morial's ease with the GLBT community made him a tough act to follow, say activists. "He was very open-minded," Pizanie says, "very educated, very clear about what he thought about discrimination." Beach agrees: "With Morial, we created our own role. Marc wanted us to tell him what we wanted."
Rather than consulting with the MAC, Beach and other former MAC members say, the Nagin administration has presented the group with tasks, like preparing for Southern Decadence. The now-resigned members say they've only had one face-to-face meeting with Nagin. The administration counters by saying that Larry Bagneris, the mayor's liaison, attends practically every meeting and conveys the committee's concerns to the mayor. Nagin spokesman Patrick Evans also says the mayor has made a point of appearing at GLBT community events: at this year's Gay Pride celebration in Armstrong Park, Nagin walked from booth to booth and visited with festival-goers. Both the mayor and his wife -- along with key staff members and their families -- attended Christmas celebrations at well-known gay bars Oz and the Bourbon Pub.
"I challenge anyone to prove that this mayor and this administration is intolerant," says Evans. "To use a quote from Mike Tyson, 'That's ludiquous.'"
It's a hot time politically for GLBT issues. A "safe schools" act requiring schools to have a policy for dealing with bullying was withdrawn by state Rep. Cedric Richmond in June, after state legislators removed language specifying protection for students or groups based on sexual orientation and gender identity. A lawsuit filed against the city in July alleges that the city's domestic-partnership benefits policy violates state laws upholding traditional marriage. Funding for the HIV Outpatient Clinic is due to be reviewed as part of the Charity system overhaul next year. Rev. Grant Storms' success at gaining passage of a statewide law prohibiting public sex "for the purpose of drawing a crowd" in advance of Southern Decadence this year dismayed many in the community.
Bagneris, who was appointed by Morial but who has come to the fore as Nagin's point man on GLBT issues, says nobody is to blame in the flak over Nagin's endorsement of Jindal. "I thought the gay folks spoke quite eloquently in saying, 'If you won't listen to us, we quit,' but I thought the mayor also spoke eloquently," says Bagneris. "I applaud both groups, and that's coming from my heart."
The day the resignations hit the news, Bagneris says, he received 15 inquiries from people interested in replacing the advisors who had left. Among the letters was a note from a group of Log Cabin Republicans saying that the former MAC had never represented their concerns. Resumes and phone calls have continued to come in since, Bagneris says. The mayor expects to present final appointments to the city council within two weeks.
The new Mayor's Advisory Committee will consist of representatives from nine groups, says Evans: one each from the business and religious communities, one representative of gay entertainment businesses, one representative each from the Democratic and Republican parties, one organizer apiece from the Southern Decadence and Gay Pride celebrations, one woman, and one representative from the transgendered community. The committee that resigned included black and white members, one transgendered female, a mix of lesbians and gay men, a Protestant minister and an Anglican priest. The administration thinks the revised structure will bring a broader range of community members to the table -- but Beach doesn't see much difference. "Everything in that formula was represented in our group except for a gay Republican," he says.
The new group will take up where the previous group left off, says Bagneris, with the mission of developing the GLBT contribution to the city's economic growth. Two priorities will be to develop Gay Pride into a regional celebration and to continue to develop Southern Decadence into a major tourism event. The third effort is the gathering of the International Network of Lesbian and Gay Officials (INGLO), scheduled to be held in the city next November. The recent resignations have not jeopardized the event, Bagneris says.
Several studies have suggested that the more gay-tolerant a community is, the more likely it is to attract the types who drive high-tech corporations. The cover story of the October 2003 Governing magazine drives home the point that corporations favor gay-tolerant locations. The fact that 335 of the Fortune 500 companies ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and 202 offer domestic-partner benefits, suggests that GLBT issues matter to successful corporations.
By resigning, Beach says, he hopes that the MAC sent the message that the city's GLBT community can't be taken for granted. Bagneris, for his part, calls the city an oasis -- largely due to the former members of the MAC. "The protections are on the books in the city of New Orleans," says Bagneris. "These people are leaving a legacy." As for the economic benefits of being a gay-friendly city, he's seen it firsthand. "I've dealt with groups at the convention center who say, 'We won't deal with the city unless you prove you don't discriminate,'" Bagneris says. "I've had four calls this week about conventions. They want assurance. They won't come to town unless we can show them we have these policies."
Members of the now-departed MAC applaud Nagin for his economic initiatives, which have included focus groups on gay and lesbian tourism and a concerted effort to reach out to gay and lesbian travelers though advertising and special promotions. If there's one legacy they value more than any other, though, it's the sensitivity training on GLBT issues that they introduced into the police academy's training. Since 1994, members of the Mayor's MAC have served as volunteer instructors at the academy, giving cadets a two-hour crash course in everything from offensive language to AIDS transmission. In 2001, instructors even took the department's sergeants and lieutenants through a remedial session.
Beach is still a member of LAGPAC and plans to remain active in gay politics. He wishes the mayor's new advisers well and says he hopes the new committee will be an effective one. But he doesn't regret his decision to resign. "I don't think there's a homophobic bone in Ray Nagin's body," Beach says. "I just don't think he understands the implications of tacit assent to discrimination."

"Barney Frank has been hailed a 'hero' to our community but I just don't see it that way. Heroes aren't usually cowards."
~Ethan St.Pierre
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Baldwin, Frank disagreed on vote count
Ethan Jacobs
http://tinyurl.com/3cf9ph
The questions over ENDA strategy have exposed sharp divisions not only among LGBT advocacy organizations but also among congressional allies. On one side of the strategy debate, Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) who, like Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.), is openly gay, said that prior to House leadership's decision to split the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) into two bills two weeks ago, her own count of votes found that there were enough votes to narrowly pass H.R. 2015, the original ENDA bill that would provide employment protections on the basis of both sexual orientation and gender identity. Jerilyn Goodman, a spokesperson for Baldwin, confirmed that Baldwin told advocates about her own vote count during an off-the-record conference call last week with activists from United ENDA.
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Lisa Wade:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-wade/barney-frank-says-its-u_b_68640.html
Representative Barney Frank's comment in Friday's New York Times reveals something very disturbing about the state of our democracy. Regarding his decision to exclude transsexuals from a bill forbidding discrimination against gays and lesbians, he says:

Barney Frank - http://logo.blogs.com/hereandnow/
Alan Van Capelle - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwiQ6DsoK_U&eurl=
http://www.davidmixner.com/
Korn - Politics http://tinyurl.com/2rg8bh

Part of Joe Solmonese's speech at the Southern Comfort Conference.
SCC is the largest transgender conference in the country.

You can also view the video on youtube: http://youtube.com/watch?v=p-6ZoNJj-bU