We generally don’t chronicle every city council’s (sometimes successful) attempt to pass local anti-discrimination ordinances, but today I’d like to highlight what happened in Hatboro, Pennsylvania, just north of Philadelphia. The LGBT-inclusive Human Relations Ordinance was a go last month when it passed in a 4-3 vote, Democratic Mayor Norman Hawke vetoed it last Monday. And when the council tried busting the veto with a required 5-2 majority vote, it failed when the three Republican “no’s” remained opposed. So what does Hawke have to say for himself for blocking a measure that would expand the state’s anti-discrimination laws in housing, employment, education, and public accommodations? That the issue should be handled at the state and not the local level and, reports PhillyBurbs, “supported enacting a resolution to urge [lawmakers in] Harrisburg to act.” As for Republican councilmembers John Zygmont, Bill Tomkins and Vince LaSorsa, who voted against it? They were concerned “about costs and possible legal problems the borough could get into while looking into discrimination complaints.”
randy
Well, if the idiots have to look in to discrimination, then it happens and needs to be prevented! Good lord, the gyrations people go through to justify their hate.
Daez
We all know that forcing land lords to give gay tenants housing and forcing employers to employ gays is good for society. I mean, who could it hurt? Its not like that land lord isn’t going to then do everything in his legality to make that living situation an absolute shit hole for the tenant. Its not like that company isn’t going to banish that gay employee to the mail room for the next 30 years.
Forcing people to accept gays and lesbians is definitely in the best interest of everyone involved.
DR
The question I have is: instead of trying to do this piecemeal, where are the major organizations trying to get the state of PA to change its statewide human relations commission to be inclusive instead of relying on three counties and maybe 22 cities?
This is absolutely an issue which needs to be addressed by the folks in Harrisburg.
Daez
@DR: The very same organizations working with the cities are working with the states. Its not as if they aren’t. Its just easier for them to have people also working in their local neighborhoods where change is much easier to accomplish in many cases, and its pretty hard for a state that has 1/2 its counties and all of its major cities with ENDA like measures to sit there and say that the people don’t want them to pass a state wide ENDA.
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@Daez: okay lets get this right… You believe that hotels don’t have to serve gay couples, property owners don’t have to rent to gays, and that republicans are better for gays than the dems… Do hotel and apartment owners have to serve blacks, the milliary members, single women, or Jews???
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@Daez: I’m not trying to pick a fight with you… Actually like to see the thought process of people on the other side of the political fence. My question though, is when do you believe it is a government’s job to protect the minority for the majority? If a owner can stop me from moving somewhere (eventhough I have the money and credit), because I’m gay or black, doesn’t it violate my rights?
DR
@Daez:
Completely disagree.
That would work wonders in a state where a large majority of municipalities had full protection. However, in PA:
-only 17 or 18 cities provide protection to GLBT citizens.
-only 5 counties (maybe 6) have independent Human Relations Commissions, not all of which are GLBT-friendly. Lancaster County just eliminated its Human Relations Commission (which did not protect GLBT citizens, by the way) as a cost-cutting measure, and York County is looking into cutting its Human Relations Commission as well.
PA civil rights groups need to spend more time on the hill advocating for an inclusive Human Relations Commission/ENDA because outside of Philly and Pittsburgh, very few municipalities are willing to offer protection to GLBT citizens. When you move into central and northern PA, most of us have nothing, and we can’t keep waiting for Philly and Pittsburgh activists to get around to showing up in our area to do the work they are so eager to do.
They need to start working in Harrisburg on GLBT issues, and they need to work hard. This is a prime example of how the piecemeal approach isn’t working, just like it’s not working with civil unions and marriage.
Raspberry
@Daez: stop trolling!
Meowzer
Being from PA… and not far from Hatboro, I can tell you that it is backward homophobia disguised as “fiscal responsibility”. PA is one of the most bass-acward states in the country. Last to move forward. First to stay stuck in the stone age. State stores anyone?
Just me
Living in Hatboro, I can tell you there’s no need for these laws. We’re not a “gay” community. There’s only a few people who are gay in our town, and nobody’s ever had a problem with that. The reason that it got brought up was that this one lady in our town had a bug up her ass because her lesbian daughter got discharged from the military.
I should also note what else was in the new law:
*No making fun of source of income (that includes drug dealers and prostitutes)
*No discriminating against anyone left handed
*No discriminating against the blind (we have many small stores that can’t allow service animals for liability reasons
Can’t you see that this is insane?!
You can’t force compassion, because it will just make matters worse.
Blackmattachine
I’m not so sure the call for progress in matters of law are “insane”, but legal matters call for legal minds. Grown people “making fun” of anyone strikes me as a bit peculiar. I know that drug dealers and prostitutes might be fair game to some, but in many parts of the world–and even in our own nation–drug and flesh merchants are both legal and rational. (For you Christians, you know that Jesus had a grandmother who was a prostitute.) As a left-handed man, I can’t imagine why anyone would want to discriminate me because of that. If you were left-handed or blind, I think that you would appreciate knowing that the law backed up your claims for equal opportunity. But laws are also supposed to be reasonable–small stores already in business and ill-equipped for the handicapped can be ‘grandfathered’, which means that nothing would have to change until the business was sold.