Local
Early win could be only pro-LGBT victory this year in Va.
A bill to reinstate sexual orientation in Virginia’s public employment non-discrimination policy passed the state Senate last week — marking what some LGBT activists fear could be their only success this year.
Virginia Partisans President Terry Mansberger said a near total shut-out by the minority Republican senators on Senate Bill 66 means it’s unlikely to see a vote in the Republican-controlled House. And he noted that any other LGBT-inclusive bill could meet the same fate.
“When you put forward things like this that protect people from discrimination, most people agree that’s wrong,” he said. “But the teabaggers who’ve taken over the Republican Party think any legislation that helps gays and lesbians is bad.”
Sen. Frederick Quayle (R-Suffolk) was the sole GOP member to back the bill that appeared to square with Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell’s stance that expanding the policy was a matter for the legislature.
Newly elected Sen. Dave Marsden (D-Burke), who defeated anti-gay Republican Steve Hunt by 327 votes in the Fairfax special election, was among the 7-6 majority who earlier endorsed the bill in subcommittee.
Mansberger said the narrow victory in subcommittee showed the importance of supporting pro-gay candidates like Marsden, even if the bill itself doesn’t become law this year.
Aside from the public employment non-discrimination push, several bills advancing LGBT rights have been introduced at the Virginia General Assembly, which gave community activists a tangible goal to focus on at Equality Virginia’s lobby day earlier this month.
Dels. Tom Rust (R-Hendon) and Adam Ebbin (D-Arlington) introduced House Bill 352 to allow employers to extend life insurance benefits to workers’ domestic partners. Ebbin also introduced a House version of the inclusive public employment non-discrimination policy.
House Bill 1142 from Del. Jim Scott (D-Merrifield) would add sexual orientation to the state’s hate crimes law. It also would add the right for hate crime victims to bring civil action for damages and allow Internet providers to restrict access to anti-gay hate material.
But several bills introduced this session would cut same-sex partners out of typical next-of-kin roles, such as House Bill 650 introduced by Del. Ward Armstrong (D-Martinsville), which excludes domestic partners in disputes over funeral arrangements. And Del. Chris Peace (R-Mechanicsville) introduced House Bill 719, which allows spouses and dependents to petition for power of attorney, but not domestic partners.
Despite this year’s robust legislative agenda, state LGBT activists and supporters are tackling an additional task: working toward a vote to overturn the state’s ban on same-sex marriage.
A proposal to repeal the 2005 constitutional amendment has been introduced into the state’s House by Del. David Englin (D-Alexandria). It does not replace the amendment text with language enacting same-sex marriage; it simply removes the current restrictions that preclude the legislature from recognizing same-sex relationships.
Claire Guthrie Gastañaga, Equality Virginia’s chief counsel and legislative lobbyist, said laying the groundwork for repealing the amendment through hearts-and-minds campaigning is already underway and will continue until a majority of lawmakers back the measure.
If enough legislators vote for the measure before the next election, the earliest the proposed change could go before voters would be 2012, as it has to pass two consecutive sessions. However, Guthrie Gastañaga said she’d be surprised to see the issue on the ballot again before 2016.
Nonetheless, Freedom to Marry Executive Director Evan Wolfson said Virginia’s pro-LGBT forces could work toward victory by following the path activists are blazing in Oregon.
“Once that constitutional amendment passed in 2004, Basic Rights Oregon, the Equality Virginia counterpart, moved to begin laying the foundation to undo that discrimination,” Wolfson said. “At first, they secured a statewide non-discrimination law as well as a partnership law, so even with the passage of the anti-gay amendment, Oregon moved on to win more protections than we had there before the amendment.
“It’s now embarking on the vigorous public education and outreach effort, asking people in Oregon to have conversations with their neighbors and to get involved in raising their voices and creating the climate to overturning the amendment, possibly in 2012.”
Wolfson said there’s no substitute in this process for local engagement, with conversations beginning among neighbors and leading toward a reshaped national dialogue.
“None of us can rely on the courts,” he said. “We have to get out there. Even though it may not immediately topple the amendment, and though it may not immediately lead to marriage in Virginia, it helps create the climate nationwide.”
But Isaac Wood, assistant communications director at the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, said it could be too soon for LGBT Virginians to expect change.
“With a heavily Republican and very conservative House of Delegates and a conservative governor, it is unlikely that the LGBT lobby will make much headway in Richmond this year or in the near future,” he said.
“Politics is cyclical and Virginia is a battleground state, so it is possible the ideological makeup of the legislature could change significantly over the next five years. While it is unlikely that Democrats could retake the House of Delegates in 2011, they can bolster their razor-thin majority in the state Senate and get within striking distance to retake the House in the 2013 elections. In politics, as in sports, there is always next year.”
Maryland
What Anne Arundel County school board candidates think about book bans
State lawmakers passed Freedom to Read Act in April
BY ROYALE BONDS | Parents’ efforts to restrict content available to students in school libraries has become a contentious issue in Maryland. Conservative parent groups, such as Moms for Liberty, have been working to get books they believe are inappropriate removed from libraries in Carroll and Howard counties, sparking protests, new policies, and even a state law.
The Freedom to Read Act, passed in April, sets standards that books cannot be removed from public and school libraries due to an author’s background. Library staff that uphold the standard are protected under this act. The law, however, does not prohibit removing books deemed “sexually explicit,” the stated reason local Moms for Liberty chapters challenged school library books.
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner website.
District of Columbia
D.C. Council member proposes change for Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs
Parker also seeks increased funding for LGBTQ programs in FY 2025 budget
D.C. Council member Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5), the Council’s only LGBTQ member, has asked his fellow Council members to support a proposal to change the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs to become a “stand-alone entity outside the Executive Office of the Mayor to allow for greater transparency and accountability that reflects its evolution over the years.”
In an April 30 letter to each of his 12 fellow Council members, Parker said he plans to introduce an amendment to the city’s Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Support Act to make this change for the LGBTQ Affairs Office.
His letter also calls for adding to the city’s FY 2025 budget two specific funding proposals that local LGBTQ activists submitted to D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser that the mayor did not include in her budget proposal submitted to the Council. One calls for $1.5 million to fund the completion of the build out and renovation for the D.C. Center for the LGBTQ Community’s new building in the city’s Shaw neighborhood and $300,000 in subsequent years to support the LGBTQ Center’s operations.
Parker’s second budget proposal calls for what he said was about $450,000 to fund 20 additional dedicated LGBTQ housing vouchers as part of the city’s existing program to provide emergency housing support for LGBTQ residents and other residents facing homelessness.
“The Office of LGBTQ+ Affairs currently manages about 90 vouchers across various programs and needs,” Parker said in his letter to fellow Council members. “Adding an additional 20 vouchers will cost roughly $450,000,” he wrote, adding that dedicated vouchers “play a crucial role in ensuring LGBTQ+ residents of the District can navigate the complex process of securing housing placements.”
In her proposed FY ’25 budget, Bowser calls for a 7.6 percent increase in funding for the Office of LGBTQ Affairs, which amounts to an increase of $132,000, bringing the office’s total funding to $1.7 million.
“To be clear, I support the strong work and current leadership of the Office of LGBTQ+ Affairs,” Parker says in his letter to fellow Council members. “This push for change is in recognition of the office’s notable achievements and the significant demands being placed on it, which require a greater level of accountability.”
Parker told the Blade in an April 30 telephone interview that he believes Japer Bowles, the current director of the Office of L|GBTQ Affairs is doing an excellent job in operating the office, but he believes the office would be able to do more for the LGBTQ community under the change he is proposing.
“Making it a stand-alone office versus it being clustered within the Community Affairs division of the mayor’s office, it will get more attention,” Parker told the Blade. “The leadership will have greater flexibility to advocate for the interest of LGBTQ residents, And we will be able to conduct greater oversight of the office,” he said, referring to the Council’s oversight process.
Parker noted that other community constituent offices in the mayor’s office, including the Office of Latino Affairs and the Office of Veterans Affairs are stand-alone offices that he hopes to bring about for the LGBTQ Affairs Office. He said Council member Brianne Nadeau, who chairs the Council committee that has oversight for the LGBTQ Affairs Office, has expressed support for his proposal.
Also expressing support for Parker’s proposal to make the LGBTQ Affairs Office a stand-alone office is the D.C. Advisory Neighborhood Commission Rainbow Caucus. Vincent Slatt, the caucus’s chairperson, submitted testimony last week before the D.C. Council Committee on Public Works and Operations, which is chaired by Nadeau, calling for making the LGBTQ Affairs Office a stand-alone office outside the Executive Office of the Mayor.
Slatt also stated in his testimony that the office has a “chronic staffing shortage” and recommended that at least three additional staff members be assigned to the office.
Daniel Gleick, the mayor’s press secretary, told the Blade the mayor’s office is reviewing Parker’s budget proposals, including the proposed change for the Office of LGBTQ Affairs.
But in testimony at a May 1, D.C. Council budget hearing before the Council’s Committee on Executive Administration and Labor, Lindsey Parker, Mayor Bowser’s Chief of Staff, appeared to express skepticism over making the LGBTQ Affairs office a stand-alone office. Lindsey Parker expressed her thoughts on the proposed change when asked about it by Councilmember Anita Bonds (D-At-Large), who chairs the committee that held the hearing.
“I would proffer that it doesn’t matter whether the agency is within the EOM [Executive Office of the Mayor] or not,” Lindsey Parker told Bonds. “They will still be reporting up into one would argue the most important agency in the D.C. government, which is the one that supports the mayor,” Lindsey Parker said. “So, it’s the closest to the mayor that you can get,” she said “So, you could pull it out and have a different budget chapter. I actually think that’s confusing and convoluted.”
Lindsey Parker added, “The Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, with their six FTEs right now, if they were a stand-alone function they wouldn’t have all the non-personnel services in order to operate. They need to be under sort of the shop of the EOM in order to get those resources.”
By FETs Lindsey Parker was referring to the term Full Time Equivalent employees.
Rehoboth Beach
Former CAMP Rehoboth official sentenced to nine months in prison
Salvator Seeley pleaded guilty to felony theft charge for embezzlement
Salvator “Sal” Seeley, who served as an official with the Rehoboth Beach, Del., CAMP Rehoboth LGBTQ community center for 20 years, was sentenced on April 5 by a Sussex County Superior Court judge to nine months in prison and to pay $176,000 in restitution to the organization.
The sentencing took place about five weeks after Seeley pleaded guilty to a charge of Theft in Excess of $50,000 for allegedly embezzling funds from CAMP Rehoboth, a spokesperson for the Delaware Department of Justice told the Washington Blade.
Seeley’s guilty plea came shortly after a grand jury, at the request of prosecutors, indicted him on the felony theft charge following an investigation that found he had embezzled at least $176,000 from the nonprofit LGBTQ organization.
“Salvatore C. Seeley, between the 27th day of February 2019 and the 7th day of September 2021, in the County of Sussex, State of Delaware, did take property belonging to CAMP Rehoboth, Inc., consisting of United States currency and other miscellaneous property valued at more than $50,000, intending to appropriate the same,” the indictment states.
“The State recommended a sentence of two years of incarceration based on the large-scale theft and the impact to the non-profit organization,” Delaware Department of Justice spokesperson Caroline Harrison told the Blade in a statement.
“The defense cited Seeley’s lack of a record and gambling addiction in arguing for a probationary sentence,” the statement says. “Seeley was sentenced in Superior Court to a nine-month prison term and to pay a total of $176,000 in restitution for the stolen funds,” Harrison says in the statement.
Neither Seeley nor his attorney could immediately be reached for comment.
At the time of Seeley’s indictment in February, CAMP Rehoboth released a statement saying it first discovered “financial irregularities” within the organization on Sept. 7, 2021, “and took immediate action and notified state authorities.” The statement says this resulted in the investigation of Seeley by the state Department of Justice as well as an internal investigation by CAMP Rehoboth to review its “financial control policies” that led to an updating of those policies.
“As we have communicated from day one, CAMP Rehoboth has fully cooperated with law enforcement,” the statement continues. “At its request, we did not speak publicly about the investigation while it was ongoing for fear it would jeopardize its integrity,” according to the statement. “This was extremely difficult given our commitment to transparency with the community about day-to-day operations during the recent leadership transition.”
The statement was referring to Kim Leisey, who began her job as CAMP Rehoboth’s new executive director in July of 2023, while the Seeley investigation had yet to be completed, following the organization’s process of searching for a new director. It says Seeley left his job as Health and Wellness Director of CAMP Rehoboth in September of 2021 after working for the organization for more than 20 years.
“Mr. Seeley’s actions are a deep betrayal to not only CAMP Rehoboth but also the entire community we serve,” the statement says.
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