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ACLU speaks out against Gainesville's Charter Amendment 1

by Ian Fisher
Law Student Writer/ 2L

ACLU staff attorney Shelbi Day (left) and UF Law Professor Danaya Wright (right) discuss the implications of Gainesville's Charter Amendment 1 with students on Thursday, March 18. Gainesville is set to vote on the amendment tomorrow.

On Tuesday, a local Gainesville election could send ripples throughout the country.

Gainesville will vote on Charter Amendment 1, which would repeal part of the Gainesville city charter that grants nondiscrimination protection to lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders. According to Shelbi Day, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Florida, the proponents of this amendment are looking to spread their anti-gay agenda throughout the country.

“They know that if they’re successful here, it will send a clear message that, ‘If we can do it in Gainesville, we can do it anywhere in the South,” Day said. “We either nip it in the bud here and say the discrimination stops here and we slow this effort down, or we see kind of a broader widespread effort throughout the country, and that’s really no exaggeration.”

The amendment, drafted by the Thomas More Law Center in Ann Arbor, Mich., would roll back Gainesville’s city charter to allow no more protection than Florida law provides.

Professor Danaya Wright said the drafters of the amendment have drafted it to roll back Gainesville’s protection to get around the Supreme Court’s holding in Romer v. Evans, which says that a law can’t be passed based on sheer animus.

“It’s very clear why the Thomas More Law Center chose to write the amendment the way they did and not just simply say that Gainesville is prohibited from ever adding sexual orientation to the nondiscrimination policy because that would run afoul of Romer.”

Florida does not grant any protection based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Day said the amendment passing would make it legal to discriminate against someone who is gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender in many ways including employment, housing and credit.

“The bottom line is this allows discrimination to be legal in Gainesville,” Day said. “It takes away protections based on sexual orientation that have been in place in Gainesville for over 10 years.”

The amendment has become such an issue since the Gainesville City Commission added a gender identity protection clause in January 2008, Day said. The proponents have used this addition to make a public safety argument, Day said.

Amendment 1 supporters have mainly argued that passing this amendment would allow men to enter women’s restrooms and claim protection.

“In essence what they’re arguing is that men can go into women’s bathrooms, victimize women and children, and somehow evoke Gainesville’s nondiscrimination laws to negate any criminal offense that they might have committed, which is just absurd,” Day said.

“Plain and simple, it’s just absurd. The notion that you can evoke a nondiscrimination law to justify a crime is just crazy. But it plays on people’s fear, it confuses people, and unfortunately it works.”

Day said that in 108 cities and counties that protect citizens based on gender identity, there has not been a single confirmed incident where a nondiscrimination law has been used to defend a crime.

“These nondiscrimination laws have been in effect in various places for up to 35 years,” Day said. “So we have 35 years of history that tells us what they’re saying will happen won’t.”