Full General Counsel's Report on HRO Legal Environment

[Metro Jacksonville]

Full General Counsel's Report on HRO Legal Environment



In one of the last real acts of the Brown Administration, one of the most damaging issues (to Brown) during his campaign for reelection--- the Human Rights Ordinance was shuffled off to the office of General Counsel to sort out whether Jacksonville, in fact, even needed to protect LGBT citizens from discrimination.  After all, both front runners maintained that simply enforcing the existing laws obviated the need to pass any further legislation.  The General Counsel was tasked with finding out whether or not that was true---strictly from a legislative and legal environment.  Join us for details after the jump.

Read More: http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2015-jul-full-general-counsels-report-on-hro-legal-environment

[PBCHRC]

The information provided by Equality Florida is incorrect. 

Neither the City of June Beach not the Village of Tequesta, both of which are located in Palm Beach County, have human rights ordinances. 

The Cities of Boynton Beach, Delray Beach and Greenacres, all of which are also in Palm Beach County, all have SO/GIE inclusive HRO's.  All three have been enacted in 2015. 

In addition, the City of Leesburg, which is not in Palm Beach County, has an SO/GIE inclusive HRO.

Additionally, while St. Augustine and Sarasota (neither of which is located in Palm Beach County) both have SO-inclusive HROs, our  researchers have been unable to verify that they also include GIE. 

I hope this information will prove to be of assistance.

Judge Rand Hoch (retired)
President and Founder
Palm Beach County Human Rights Council
www.pbchrc.org

[PBCHRC]

You are most welcome.  It is unfortunate that a statewide organization such as Equality Florida, with highly paid staff and a annual budget of over $2 million cannot get the information correct.  (In contrast, PBCHRC is  an all volunteer organization with an annual budget of $25,000 to $35,000)

I did learn of one more city that Equality Florida missed:  The City of St. Augustine Beach, which has an HRO that includes SO and GIE.

[Redbaron616]

And anyone who does not believe that all of this is wonderful and beautiful will be hounded out of the public square. Particularly anyone who disagrees with this for religious purposes. But that's okay. We can discriminate against them.

[Debbie Thompson]

Scratching my head an trying to figure out what we've learned from this report that we didn't know before.  Oh, wait, that's right.  It was a stall tactic.  It never had to produce new information.  Redbaron, the HRO would add non-discrimination language for employment and housing.  It's your right to believe homosexuality is wrong if you believe that.  It would make it not OK to refuse to hire or rent to a gay person based on that belief.  That's all.  It wouldn't make you change your religious convictions.  So do you think it's OK to tell a fully qualified gay person they can't work for you, or rent an apartment from you, all other things being equal, solely because they are gay?  Because that's what they face now.

[IrvAdams]

A law passing a HRO is a no-brainier that the public is firmly behind. I believe that pressure will be brought to bear and our leaders can be convinced to do the right thing, the only logical thing.

All citizens deserve the simple respect of equal treatment and legal protection from someone else's personal beliefs.

[For_F-L-O-R-I-D-A]

There is a clear tension between rights but this is nothing new. For example, the bakers who lost under an HRA in Washington. They did not want to partake in creating the speech of the cake for a gay marriage since it went against their beliefs. However, if they had refused to make a cake that said "Gay Marriage is Wrong - 1 Corinthians 2" then they would have not been discriminating and (at least in a Colorado Supreme Court case under their HRA) were able to discriminate upon speech they subjectively but consistently considered offensive. I guess which is it? If you discriminate based upon strict animus, no one is debating that is wrong, but specifically in speech related service issues concerning religion, there is a case to be made on both sides when it comes to compelling speech which involves service. Also, I don't think you can discriminate against anyone in a renting situation under Fair Housing so that is moot. SCOTUS struck down that right across the board when it said someone cannot discriminate against co-habitating lovers.

I am not saying either side is right or wrong, but there is definitely a tension. There is probably a good place to meet somewhere in the middle with some specific religious exemptions on speech but both sides seem to be about total victory or nothing.