Other Views
By Stacey L. Sobel
© 2007 Stacey L. Sobel

Statewide discrimination law matters

Stacey Sobel, executive director of Equality Advocates Pennsylvania, testified Nov. 15 before the House State Government Committee in support of amending the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act to include sexual orientation and gender identity, H.B. 1400. An excerpt of her testimony follows.

I am speaking today on behalf of Equality Advocates Pennsylvania and the Value All Families Coalition. I would like to thank the Pennsylvania House of Representative’s State Government Committee and Chairwoman [Babette] Josephs for holding this hearing and for asking me to testify on House Bill 1400. I would also like to thank Rep. Dan Frankel, the bill’s prime sponsor and the other co-sponsors, including Chairwoman Josephs, who are here today for your support of this important legislation.

Equality Advocates Pennsylvania and the Value All Families Coalition strongly support H.B. 1400. This legislation provides necessary protections for countless lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Pennsylvanians who are currently at risk of discrimination with no or limited protections in the state.

In 2003, Equality Advocates, then known as the Center for Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights, began working on legislation to add sexual orientation and gender identity or expression as protected groups to the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act. Support for this legislation has grown each year in the legislature. This year, a record 75 House members and 22 senators have signed on as co-sponsors to the legislation. Despite the yearly increased support for this bill, prior committees would not consider the legislation and previous bills did not move to the floor for a vote in either chamber. We are encouraged by the fact that these hearings are being held, and welcome the opportunity to describe the need for the bill and the support that it enjoys.

In addition to gaining legislative support each year, more organizations also support amending the PHRA to prohibit discrimination against LGBT people in employment, housing and public accommodations. You have heard from only some of those organizations in the three hearings you have held around the state. The Value All Families Coalition is comprised of more than 50 organizations that have supported this type of legislation. And there are many other non-coalition members, ranging from the Philadelphia Bar Association to the Pennsylvania Association of Realtors, who support H.B. 1400.

It is vital that undecided members of the Pennsylvania legislature listen to their colleagues and the organizations that support this legislation, since, right now, other states are leaving Pennsylvania behind. Currently, 20 states and the District of Columbia have laws prohibiting discrimination based upon sexual orientation and 13 of these states also include protections against discrimination based on gender identity or expression. Pennsylvania will have to fight even harder to attract and retain talented, educated individuals because our laws do not reflect a fair working and living environment for all people.

In fact, when it comes to support for nondiscrimination protections, recent polling indicates that Pennsylvania law and many legislators lag behind the attitudes of their own constituents. Pennsylvanians believe that the PHRA should be amended to include sexual orientation and gender identity or expression. In statewide polling completed on Nov. 12 by Susquehanna Polling and Research, 71 percent of Pennsylvanians polled supported this legislation. Additionally, 86 percent believed that there should be workplace equality for LGBT people, 84 percent supported laws prohibiting LGBT discrimination in housing and 89 percent favored equal access to public accommodations.

No matter where they live or their party registration, age, gender or ideology, a majority of Pennsylvanians supports H.B. 1400. Some of the polling highlights include:
— Party Affiliation: H.B. 1400 was supported by a majority of Republicans (58 percent), Democrats (81 percent) and Independents (77 percent).
— Age: H.B. 1400 was supported by a majority of voters 18 to 29 years old (71 percent), 30 to 44 years old (71 percent), 45 to 59 years old (72 percent) and 60 years or older (69 percent).
— Gender: H.B. 1400 was supported by a majority of males (66 percent) and females (75 percent).
— Geographic Region: H.B. 1400 was supported by a majority of voters in the Northwest (65 percent), Southwest (67 percent), “T”/Central (63 percent), Northeast (68 percent), South central/Harrisburg (66 percent), Southeast (76 percent), as well as Allegheny (69 percent), and Philadelphia (85 percent).
— Ideology: H.B. 1400 was supported by a majority of self-described conservatives (56 percent), liberals (89 percent) and moderates (72 percent).

We believe that many people support this legislation because they recognize that discrimination against LGBT people occurs every day in Pennsylvania. Eighty-seven percent of those polled stated they believe that discrimination against LGBT people currently exists in today’s society. And 25 percent said they personally know someone who has faced discrimination because they are or were thought to be LGBT.

Sadly, these numbers reflect the reality of what is happening to LGBT people in the Commonwealth, and underscore the pressing need for this legislation. Equality Advocates provides direct legal services and education to LGBT people in Pennsylvania. Although we receive calls for assistance in more than 30 areas of the law, the number-one request for legal assistance from callers to Equality Advocates Pennsylvania is employment discrimination. These calls comprised 22 percent of all calls to our legal hotline last year. Even though 100-200 Pennsylvanians call us with employment problems every year, I believe that far more people face discrimination, but do not call us because they believe that there are no laws in place to protect them where they are. Unfortunately, those who believe they cannot be helped are often correct, since neither federal nor Pennsylvania law prohibits discrimination based upon sexual orientation or gender identity or expression.

While there are now 14 Pennsylvania jurisdictions providing some level of nondiscrimination protections to LGBT people, almost 80 percent of the state’s citizens live in a community that does not prohibit discrimination on the bases of sexual orientation or gender identity or expression. For many LGBT individuals, simply being on the wrong side of a city, county or borough line can mean that the discrimination they suffer — discrimination that would literally be illegal across the street — is entirely legal where it occurred. For the LGBT community, the result is, in a very real way, two Pennsylvanias — a small one where LGBT people are treated equally under the law and a much larger one where they are not.

I am here today on behalf of members of my community who cannot speak for themselves, because to publicly acknowledge their sexual orientation or gender identity in their part of Pennsylvania might mean being fired from their jobs or evicted from their homes.

In sum, Equality Advocates and the Value All Families Coalition believe that it is absolutely critical to amend the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act to ensure that all Pennsylvanians have the same legal protections and opportunities to live, work and contribute to our commonwealth. This bill will allow all LGBT people in Pennsylvania to be treated equally to any other employee, tenant, customer or student. It will also provide these same people the opportunity to seek redress when the treatment they receive is unfair and discriminatory.

I thank the members of the House and Senate who have expressed their opposition to discrimination by supporting this amendment to the PHRA, and I urge you to move this legislation to the full House.

Stacey Sobel is executive director of Equality Advocates Pennsylvania.