Gay rights advocates pressing employment legislation

GAY AND LESBIAN advocates are trying to get the word out: In most of the state, it's still legal to fire someone because of sexual orientation.

They are trying to change that by lobbying for a bill sponsored by senators Paulette Irons of New Orleans and Donald Cravins of Latayette to prohibit

employment discrimination based on actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. The Lesbian and Gay Political Action Caucus is launching a $5,000 grass roots campaign to persuade lawmakers to pass the bill, which died in a House committee during the last general session. The group plans to distribute more than 20,000 postcards to residents to urge lawmakers to support the bill.

Lagpac co-chairman Chris Daigle is optimistic the bill will at least conic to a vote in the Senate this time, but he acknowledges that gay issues are a tough sell in the conservative Legislature. "I think that our chances are much better than (in 1999) in terms of gay issues in society," he says. "People are a lot more comfortable with gay issues."

The bill is opposed by the Christian Coalition and the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, which says the measure could leave businesses vulnerable to additional lawsuits from disgruntled employees.

"It's a very difficult thing to determine an individual's sexual orientation. It's not like race or gender," says Jim Patterson, LABI employee relations council director. "Sexual orientation is not something that is generally shared."

Managers could fire an employee not knowing that he or she is gay and face a lawsuit, he says. "You could get blindsided for actions that were absolutely not discrinrinatory," he says.

Daigle says that the bill won't prompt frivolous lawsuits since it shifts the burden of proof on the employee. The bill says that the employee's burden of proof shall be "by clear and convincing evidence." "The plaintiff would have to prove that the employer, supervisor or manager of the company had knowledge of the employee's sexual orientation," Daigle says.

The state's current employment nondiscrimination law prevents discrimination based on race, sex, disability, age, religion or national origin. Louisiana law also prohibits discrimination on the basis of pregnancy or childbirth, sickle cell trait, handicap and smoking.

The Louisiana chapter of the Society for Human Resource Management opposes the bill, says Louisiana Director Louis Abshire.

"It adds another protected class that we don't feel is necessary,"' Abshire says. "Sexual orientation is an area that we really don't even want to know about. We don't need to know about it in the workplace."

The New Orleans City Council added sexual orientation and gender identity to the city's nondiscrimination ordinances in 1999. The ordinance allows the city's Human Relations Commission to investigate discrimination claims. Those who violate the statute face fines of up to $500 or up to six months in jail.

While the office logs more than 550 discrimination complaints per year, the office has received only three complaints of sexual orientation discrimination since the new law was adopted two years ago., says Earl Jackson, executive director of the city's Human Relations Commission

The Irons-Cravins bill would not apply to religious institutions, the military or businesses with 15 or fewer fulltime employees.

Daigle says the business community has been more progressive than government in promoting tolerance in the workplace. More than half of the Fortune 500 companies, including Entergy Corp., list sexual orientation in their nondiscrimination policies. Twenty states and 161 cities across the country include sexual orientation in nondiscrimination laws, according to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay and lesbian lobbying group.

Patterson thinks it should be up to each company to decide what to include in hiring policies. State laws protecting gays and lesbians could hurt some business owners whose clients disapprove of their employees' lifestyles, he says.

"If they have a bias themselves, that's a problem from the standpoint of trying to maintain customer relations," Patterson says. I don't like the fact that that exists, but it can be a problem for employers."

Attorney Randal Beach, president of the Louisiana Electorate of Gays and Lesbians, disputes that perspective. I drink there is a very fundamental American premise that people ought to be able to earn a living," he says. I drink that cuts across ideology."