Living
Maryland Senate kills trans rights bill
More disappointment for activists; Miller blamed for failures
Sen. Brian Frosh (D-Montgomery County), a supporter of the trans rights bill, disagreed with those who accuse Senate President Mike Miller of orchestrating the measure's defeat. (Blade photo by Michael Key)
A gay member of the Maryland State Senate issued a strongly worded statement criticizing his colleagues for voting 27-20 on Monday to send a transgender non-discrimination bill back to committee, an action that killed the bill for the year.
Sen. Richard Madaleno (D-Montgomery County), one of the lead sponsors and longtime supporters of the Gender Identity Non-Discrimination Act, known as HB 235, joined LGBT activists in expressing outrage over the Senate’s action.
“Every homeless transgender person that dies on the street will do so because of the Senate’s failure to pass HB 235,” Madaleno said in a statement released late Monday.
“Every transgender individual who cannot provide for themselves or their family because they are denied employment based on their gender identity will do so because of the Senate’s failure to pass HB 235,” he said.
The bill, which calls for banning discrimination against transgender people in the areas of employment, housing and credit, including bank loans, had been approved last month in the state’s House of Delegates by a vote of 86 to 52.
Initial head counts of senators led supporters to believe they had the votes to pass the measure in the Senate. But activists working with the statewide LGBT group Equality Maryland said that, to their great disappointment and surprise, as many as seven Democrats backed off from earlier commitments to vote for the bill.
Of the 27 senators voting to send the bill back to committee, 16 were Democrats and 11 were Republicans. Democrats hold a 35 to 12 majority in the Senate.
Of the 20 voting against the motion to send the bill to committee, 19 were Democrats. Just one Republican, LGBT rights supporter Allan Kittleman of Howard and Carroll Counties, voted against the motion to send the bill back to committee.
“Of the ones that voted to recommit, there were at least seven that we felt had committed to us that they were going to support this and then they backed out,” said Dana Beyer, a Montgomery County transgender activist and former House of Delegates candidate who worked closely with Equality Maryland to lobby for the bill.
“It’s always a guess,” said Beyer, when asked why supporters turned against the bill. “It’s shocking because we didn’t expect this. There are a thousand ways to kill a bill. This is one way to do it and I have to lay it at the hands of the Senate leadership.”
Beyer and others familiar with the bill said they believe Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller (D-Prince George’s and Calvert Counties), orchestrated the bill’s demise.
Miller was among the senators who voted for the motion to recommit the bill to the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, which voted 7-4 one day earlier to approve the bill and send it to the Senate floor.
Miller did not return a call seeking comment as of press time on Wednesday.
Sen. Brian Frosh (D-Montgomery County), chair of the Judicial Proceedings Committee and a supporter of the bill who voted against sending it back to committee, disagreed with those who blame Miller for killing the bill.
“I’m sorry that it lost,” Frosh told the Blade in an interview Tuesday. “But I think the president said a week ago publicly, and he had been saying all session, that there aren’t the votes on the Senate floor to pass it. And he was right.”
Added Frosh: “There were 20 votes for the bill. You need 24. And it’s a shame, but it’s a fact of life.”
According to Frosh, Equality Maryland has repeatedly miscalculated the vote count on the Gender Identity Non-Discrimination Act this year and in previous years, when the bill died in committee.
Frosh said he is doubtful that supporters would be able to line up the four votes they need to pass the bill next year.
Beyer disputes Frosh’s assessment, saying that Equality Maryland and others obtained clear commitments from senators who voted to send the transgender bill back to committee on Monday.
“It wasn’t just Equality Maryland that was doing the vote count,” she said. “There was a coalition of people that had personal relationships with various senators who got commitments from those senators.”
Miller, for reasons not fully understood by the bill’s supporters, “twisted arms” to get Democratic senators supportive of the bill to vote for the motion to recommit to committee, Beyer said. She said she and others associated with Equality Maryland confirmed this from reliable sources close to the Senate that she declined to identify due to promises of confidentiality.
Miller became the target of an aggressive campaign by Equality Maryland and a coalition of transgender activists and allies organized by Beyer after he diverted the bill to the Senate Rules Committee following its approval by the House of Delegates.
The Rules Committee has long been viewed as a “graveyard” for bills out of favor with the Senate leadership. Activists backing the bill viewed Miller’s decision to single out the transgender bill for diversion to the Rules Committee while clearing dozens of other bills for the normal route to standing committees as an attempt to kill the bill.
But in a development that Annapolis political observers viewed as rare, Miller backed down amid a barrage of e-mails and phone calls to his office and to the offices of other senators demanding that the bill be released to the Judicial Proceedings Committee for a vote.
The Judicial Proceedings panel voted April 8, following a 90-minute debate, to approve the bill and send it to the Senate floor. The committee’s action led supporters to believe they had a fighting chance to see it through a full Senate vote.
Morgan Meneses-Sheets, Equality Maryland’s executive director, said she was especially disappointed that several senators that voted to recommit the bill to committee on Monday had assured the group of their support for the measure.
“I wish I had a why,” she said. “This means that we really need to examine our steps moving forward. But I must emphasize that we got so far this year,” she added, noting that the bill was killed in committee for the past four years without ever reaching the floor of the Senate or House.
“We are thankful to every legislator who did do the right thing,” she said. “We are so thankful to every constituent who wrote a letter and made a phone call, and especially to the transgender people of Maryland who came out and told their stories, who shared their very personal need for job and housing protections.”
“We will continue to fight every day. We will continue to analyze how we can get these important protections in place. But we are shocked and frankly appalled by this action today,” she added.
The vote by the Senate came on the last day of the Maryland Legislature’s 2011 session and followed less than 15 minutes of debate.
Sen. C. Anthony Muse (D-Prince George’s County) asked whether the bill would have an impact on private citizens seeking to choose a roommate in a private home. Muse also asked whether the bill’s proposed ban on employment discrimination would force the Boy Scouts organization to hire a transgender person or prevent any employer from establishing a dress code.
Sen. Jamie Raskin (D-Montgomery County), one of the lead sponsors and supporters of the bill served as floor manager for what was expected to be a lengthy Senate floor debate. Raskin told Muse the bill would not cover people in private homes looking for roommates.
Sen. Jamie Raskin (D-Montgomery County) (Blade photo by Michael Key)
“If you’re looking for a roommate, you can discriminate on any basis you want,” he said.
Raskin said the bill would cover the Boy Scouts organization for employment purposes, but said a transgender person seeking a job with the Boy Scouts would have to meet all other requirements for the job, including appropriate dress codes. He said the Boy Scouts, like any other employer, could not refuse to hire someone solely because of their status as a transgender person under the bill’s provisions.
Immediately after Muse and Raskin completed their exchange, Sen. James DeGrange (D-Anne Arundel County) offered a motion to recommit the bill to committee.
“I respect the work the committee’s done on this bill,” he said. “I know there’s a huge concern in this body toward this. To that I’d like to move that the bill be re-referred back to committee.”
Raskin and Sen. Catherine Pugh (D-Baltimore City) rose to oppose the motion, urging their colleagues to give supporters a chance to vote on the bill.
“It’s been way whittled down,” said Raskin in describing how the bill’s public accommodations provision was removed by House supporters to ease concerns by lawmakers hesitant to vote for the bill.
“This is just about giving people the right to live someplace and the right to earn a living,” he said.
Miller, presiding over the Senate, then called for a recorded roll-call vote on the motion. When the Senate chamber’s electronic board showed the motion had passed by a 27-20 vote, expressions of shock could be heard in the chamber, especially by supporters seated in the visitors gallery.
The bill’s defeat represented a victory for an odd coalition of opponents.
A faction of transgender activists, led by the group Trans Maryland, called on the Senate to kill the bill because it did not go far enough. The group said a decision to take out a provision protecting transgender persons from public accommodations discrimination – which includes stores, hotels and public bathrooms, among other places – made the bill unacceptable.
The bill’s supporters said they reluctantly agreed to a decision by the bill’s chief sponsor in the House, Del. Joseline Pena-Melnyk (D-Prince George’s and Anne Arundel Counties), to remove a public accommodations provision from the previous year’s version of the bill. Pena-Melnyk said doing so was the only way the measure could have cleared a House committee and have any chance of passing either body.
The anti-LGBT group Maryland Citizens for A Responsible Government led efforts among conservative religious and political groups to oppose the bill on grounds that no transgender civil rights protections should be enacted. The group’s leader, physician Ruth Jacobs, organized telephone and e-mail campaigns targeting lawmakers that vowed to bring the issue up in the next election.
The transgender bill’s defeat followed by a little more than a month the defeat in the Maryland Legislature of a same-sex marriage bill that drew national media coverage. In what some in the LGBT community have viewed as an ironic twist, the marriage bill died after the Senate approved it and the House of Delegates sent it back to committee rather than take a full up or down vote on the measure.
In the case of the marriage bill, a coalition of LGBT groups, including Equality Maryland, favored sending it back to committee after determining they did not have the votes in the House to pass it and it would be better to avoid a losing vote.
Some in the LGBT community disagreed with that decision. But in the case of the transgender bill, nearly all of its supporters, including Equality Maryland, wanted the Senate to vote on the measure.
Beyer said her sources close to the Senate believe it would have passed had Miller and the Senate leadership agreed to allow it to come up for a full vote.
“He twisted enough arms to send it back to committee but he couldn’t get enough people to vote no on the bill itself,” she said. “That’s what we’re being told by people in the know.”
Madeleno could not be immediately reached to determine if he agrees with Beyer’s assessment of Miller’s role in the bill’s defeat.
But Annapolis observers believe Madaleno made it clear in the strongly worded statement he released on Monday that he was angry at Miller, even though he did not mention the Senate president by name.
“I am extremely disappointed by the Senate’s action today to send HB 235 back to the Judicial Proceedings Committee,” Madaleno said in the statement.
“The twisted and unfair process HB 235 had to go through to even make it to the Senate floor mars the Senate’s otherwise outstanding work this year,” he said. “The Senate’s treatment of this legislation will be remembered for a long time by the LGBT community and Marylanders who believe in equal rights for all.”
Madaleno said he plans to introduce a new version of the bill next year that will include a public accommodations provision.
Real Estate
‘Culture eats strategy for breakfast’
Real estate agents must adapt, learn how to manage from within
“Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast” was a phrase often repeated in many of my management courses from the University of Illinois. The concept was discussed at length – how the best laid plans can sometimes be supported or derailed by the culture of the people involved in whichever project to be implemented. Whether it be a project to implement new software, roll out a new product or service, or just reaching a sales target, the way the team involved works together can indeed affect the outcome.
Perhaps this is just another way to say, “teamwork makes the dream work!” Most teams usually have someone who is designated as a leader. The leader can try to lead through authority and control or can alternatively try to lead through influence and encouraging a more collective framework for solving problems.
Why does this matter when picking the right real estate agent or team to work with? Besides having a job as a salesperson for the brokerage, the real estate agent is contractually bound to act on their client’s behalf. The buyer broker agreement is in place so that the agent and the client can work together as a team in communications regarding offer strategy, during negotiations, implementing marketing plans, as well as selecting which renovations or upgrades to choose before selling a property. After the property goes under contract, the job isn’t “done”. There is still work to do.
At this point, the agents then turn into a project manager of sorts – coordinating communications between the lending team, the title attorneys, the other client’s agents, any governmental agencies that could be involved in down payment assistance or helping to clear a property for a sale, and often times groups like a condo board, a home inspector, or contractors when arranging repairs and estimates before a final walk through.
In short, the agent takes on somewhat of a “leadership role” in the transaction and ensures that all the ducks stay in a row until the project is complete. That agent will hopefully be very fluid and forthcoming with their information, copying the required parties on all communications and creating a “paper trail” of who said what or didn’t offer to fix A, B, or C, so that all the minutiae of the contract can be addressed and fulfilled before the settlement date. The agent often must wear many hats and quickly learn the communication styles of an entire new set of people in a short period. One person may not return calls for a week after being contacted. Another person may go on vacation at the beginning of the process and not return emails for two weeks. Another person may wish to have daily updates of the progress of the process.
In this way – an agent quickly learns in each transaction that “culture can eat strategy for breakfast.” Because the agent must adapt to a wide variety of communication styles, learn how to “manage from within”, build support for closing the project by the due date, and somehow keep all the interested parties invested, engaged, and responsive.
Who you work with matters when picking the right person to represent you in your next transaction – so, just remember that “teamwork makes the dream work!”
Joseph Hudson is a referral agent with RLAH. Reach him at 703-587-0597 or [email protected].
Dear Michael,
I’ve been dating Mark for three years, living together for two, and I’m not sure he’s for me. We get along great but I’m questioning how attracted I am to him.
I was never crazy about him physically but he was such a sweet and smart guy that I wanted to date him.
Sex was never mind-blowing and the longer we’ve been together the more this is bothering me. I wonder if I could find someone who appeals to me more, physically.
On the plus side, I like him a lot. He has good values, shares my religious faith, which is hard to find in another gay guy, is responsible and has a good work ethic. Also, I just have fun with him and he’s always interested to hear what’s on my mind. He’s an all-around decent guy.
As I’m writing this, I’m thinking that he seems great and that I’m a fool for even questioning our relationship. But all my friends are always talking about the amazing sex they are having, and then I think I’m missing out on a key part of life because my sex life is comparatively lackluster.
I don’t want to settle. But how likely am I to find another guy who is as all-around a good catch as Mark, but with more sexual chemistry?
Michael replies:
I don’t think the right approach is to wonder about your chances for of finding someone better. Anyone you find will have things you aren’t crazy about.
For example, you might find someone whom you’re wildly attracted to sexually, but they’ll bore you or annoy you, or have values you don’t respect.
I understand that you aren’t wildly sexually attracted to Mark. The truth is that it’s extremely unlikely that you would remain wildly sexually attracted to anyone for that long. People tend to get used to each other over time. Sex can remain great, but more from closeness and love than heat and sizzle.
I work with people all the time who wonder if there is someone “better” out there. And I tell them, they’re never going to get through all the possibilities before they die. Instead, how about thinking if the guy you are with is someone you’d like to go with on this journey through life?
Mark’s attributes that you mention sound wonderful to me. After more than 30 years working with folks on relationships, and being in my own 30+ year relationship, I have learned a thing or two about what creates a relationship that is satisfying and good. A decent, kind guy with admirable values is an excellent start.
The question is, can you live with your sex life not being on an orgasmically hot mind-blowing level? I hope the answer is yes, because sex with anyone you pick is not likely to stay in that sort of realm for long.
Another point to consider: I don’t think you should get too caught up in what your friends are telling you. They may be having amazing sex, but are they all having it with the same long-term partner? As I mentioned, long-term sex can be great, but the excitement tends to be replaced by caring connection over time.
I’ll generalize here for a moment: Because so many gay men have many sexual partners, the kind of sex you have with someone new, whom you’re tremendously attracted to, tends to be glorified among gay men as the gold standard of sex. But it’s not realistic for sex with a long-term partner.
This glorification is a big problem: It leaves gay men who are not having torrid sex with lots of guys feeling like there is something wrong with the sex they are having, that they are missing out on something super fantastic. Just like you are feeling.
If you want a lifetime of ongoing hot sex, I don’t think you should be looking for a relationship. If you are willing to accept sex being a not-always fantastic, but perhaps consistently loving, often good, and occasionally great part of life with a kind decent guy, then Mark might just be the right partner for you after all.
(Michael Radkowsky, Psy.D. is a licensed psychologist who works with couples and individuals in D.C., Maryland, Virginia, New York, and all PSYPACT states. He can be found at michaelradkowsky.com. All identifying information has been changed for reasons of confidentiality. Have a question? Send it to [email protected].)
Real Estate
Does Pride decor resemble Trump’s design aesthetic?
Glitter, gold, and rejecting the idea that a home should be understated
Interior design is often a balancing act between taste, personality, and restraint. Sometimes, however, restraint leaves the building entirely. Such is the case when the colorful exuberance of gay Pride-inspired decorating collides with the famously excessive decorating style associated with the current occupant of the White House. The result can be a fascinating study in maximalism, spectacle, and unapologetic visual overload.
Donald Trump’s personal decorating style has long been a subject of debate among designers and critics. Admirers see luxury and grandeur. Critics see something else: a dizzying display of gold leaf, marble, mirrors, crystal, and oversized furnishings that often crosses the line from elegant into what many designers would call tacky. More is rarely enough. If one chandelier sparkles, three are better. If a room has gold accents, why not make every available surface gold? (See Oval Office and ballroom rendition for details.)
In many ways, this excess shares common ground with certain Pride celebrations. Pride has never been about blending into the background. It celebrates visibility, self-expression, individuality, and joy. Rainbow colors, dramatic costumes, glitter, flamboyant artwork, and bold statements have long been part of Pride culture. Yet there is an important difference. Pride’s extravagance is often playful, self-aware, and rooted in personal expression, while Trump’s aesthetic has frequently been criticized for equating luxury with sheer quantity and visual intensity.
Combining these influences creates an interior that could best be described as “glamorous chaos.”
Imagine entering a living room in which gold-trimmed mirrors stretch from floor to ceiling. Crystal chandeliers hang above a bright rainbow velvet sectional. Marble floors gleam beneath metallic furniture that appears determined to reflect every available light source. Pride flags become framed artwork surrounded by ornate gold moldings. A room designed this way doesn’t whisper. It shouts.
Color is central to the concept. Pride-inspired interiors often embrace the full spectrum of colors. Trump’s style, meanwhile, traditionally favors cream, gold, black, and glossy finishes. Combining them means introducing vivid jewel tones against a backdrop of faux-palatial luxury. Emerald green chairs, ruby-red draperies, sapphire-blue accent walls, and gold-trimmed furniture can coexist in a way that feels deliberately theatrical.
The key word is theatrical.
Many professional designers spend years learning how to create visual balance. A Pride-meets-Trump interior intentionally ignores many of those rules. Pattern competes with pattern. Shine competes with shine. Artwork competes with furniture. The eye rarely gets a chance to rest. For some homeowners, that sounds exhausting. For others, it sounds like the perfect party.
Lighting offers another opportunity to embrace excess. Crystal chandeliers, mirrored lamps, illuminated shelves, and color-changing LED lighting can transform a room into something resembling a cross between a luxury hotel lobby and a Pride festival. The goal is not subtlety. The goal is spectacle.
A dining room inspired by this combination might feature a massive glass table, gold dining chairs, rainbow floral arrangements, mirrored walls, and enough crystal accessories to keep a polishing cloth busy year-round. Critics would call it gaudy. Fans would call it fabulous.
Artwork becomes particularly important. Pride-themed pieces featuring LGBTQ+ history, activism, and culture can provide meaning beneath the decorative excess. Without these personal and cultural elements, the room risks becoming little more than a collection of expensive looking, but not necessarily expensive, objects. Pride design can work best when it reflects identity and community rather than simply displaying color for color’s sake.
While normally a haven for restful sleep, bedrooms can take a similar approach. Plush velvet fabrics, oversized tufted headboards, metallic and mirrored finishes, colorful accent lighting, and dramatic artwork create a space that feels more like a boutique hotel suite than a traditional bedroom. Again, the challenge is avoiding the temptation to add one more decorative element to an already crowded visual landscape.
What makes this design combination interesting is that both aesthetics reject the idea that a home should be understated. Both embrace visibility. Both invite attention. Both encourage occupants to take up space unapologetically. Yet where Pride design often celebrates authenticity and self-expression, Trump’s decorating style is frequently criticized for prioritizing conspicuous luxury over cohesion and refinement.
The result is an interior style that many people would consider delightfully outrageous and others would consider a decorating nightmare. Either way, nobody is likely to forget it.
In the end, a Pride-inspired interpretation of Donald Trump’s famously over-the-top aesthetic would be colorful, glittering, excessive, and impossible to ignore. It would break nearly every rule of minimalist design while embracing the philosophy that if something is worth doing, it is worth overdoing. Whether one sees that as fabulous or tacky may depend entirely on how much gold leaf and rainbow velvet one can tolerate in a single room.
Valerie M. Blake is a licensed associate broker in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia with RLAH @properties. Call or text her at 202-246-8602, email her at [email protected] or follow her on Facebook at TheRealst8ofAffairs.
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