California No Longer Does Big Business with Biased Companies

The city-by-city struggle that California equality advocates engaged in for 15 years to keep governments from doing business with firms that practice anti-gay discrimination was swept up to victory on Sept. 6, when Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill that makes it illegal for the state to award contracts of more than $100,000 to such companies.

A Sept. 6 Equality California media release that was posted at Windy City Media Group said that since 1996, GLBT parity leaders had worked for and won ordinances in a number of California cities that prevented those municipalities from entering into major contracts with companies that did not treat their GLBT employees fairly.

"It is estimated that thousands of businesses and other entities now offer equal benefits as a direct result of these laws, including automobile companies, most airlines and many Fortune 500 companies and small businesses," the release said.

"Providing the same benefits to an employee with a domestic partner, or same-sex or opposite-sex spouse ensures that workers receive equal pay for equal work," State Sen. Christine Kehoe, the bill's sponsor, said. "California should lead the way for other employers to provide benefits that are non-discriminatory."

"The state's tax dollars earned by hardworking Californians should not be invested in companies that unfairly discriminate against LGBT people and their families," Equality California head Roland Palencia said. "The Equal Benefits bill will ensure that the state does not enter into major contracts with companies that discriminate against same-sex couples.

"We are grateful to have Governor Brown and Senator Kehoe continuing the fight for the rights of all California workers."

Gov. Brown has long been a proponent of GLBT equality measures. While serving as the state's attorney general under then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Brown declined to defend an anti-gay ballot initiative, Proposition 8, in court. The initiative narrowly passed in 2008 after a deeply divisive campaign, and stripped the then-existing right to marry from gay and lesbian families in the state.

More recently, Brown signed a bill that provides for the inclusion of GLBT historical figures and their accomplishments in school lessons. Opponents of that law hope to put a repeal measure on the ballot next year.