==> please note that there was no "NewsWrap" on Program #631 (5/1/00) because most of our crew was in D.C. covering the Millennium March On Washington for Equality. ----------------------------------------- NewsWrap for the 2 weeks ending May 6, 2000 (As broadcast on This Way Out program #632, distributed 05-08-00) [Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Chris Ambidge, Martin Rice, Brian Nunes, Jason Lin, Rex Wockner, Greg Gordon & Lucia Chappelle] Anchored by Brian Nunes and Josy Catoggio U.S. gays and lesbians gathered April 30th for the Millennium March on Washington, D.C., the fourth national march at the capital in 20 years. Estimates of the crowd at the march and more than six-hour rally ranged from 300,000 to 750,000. The rally highlighted community needs in eight areas: gay and lesbian youth and seniors; racial justice; protections from discrimination and hate crimes; family and health issues; privacy; and military service. Among the many events associated with the March were a wedding ceremony for 3,000 same-gender couples and a benefit concert at the city's Robert F. Kennedy Stadium. There tens of thousands celebrated with stars including Melissa Etheridge, k.d. lang, George Michael, the Pet Shop Boys, and non-gay country music legend Garth Brooks, who has a lesbian sister. One big cause for celebration was Vermont's enactment of civil unions, partnership contracts giving same-gender couples all the state-level benefits and responsibilities of marriage. Although civil unions do not qualify for more than 1,000 federal-level benefits of marriage and are not likely to be recognized by other states, they represent by far the most extensive legal recognition of gay and lesbian couples in the U.S. to date. The first unions will be performed July 1. The state House approved amendments made in the Senate by a vote of 79 - 68, with civil unions actually gaining three votes over the original bill's House passage. Governor Howard Dean signed the bill into law the following day. Dean said, "I think the powerful message is that in Vermont, we tend to value people for who they are, not what they are." That credo will be tested this year as Vermont's state Auditor of Accounts Ed Flanagan bids to become the first-ever openly gay or lesbian U.S. Senator. Although Flanagan's intentions have been known for over a year, he officially declared his candidacy this week with about 100 supporters at a news conference in the Vermont State House. Flanagan is already the only open gay or lesbian ever to be elected to statewide office. Although he's been repeatedly re-elected since coming out, Vermont's intense controversy over civil unions could damage his Senatorial campaign. If Flanagan wins the Democratic primary in September, he'll go on to face the very gay-supportive incumbent Republican Jim Jeffords. Same-gender couples have been a hot topic in U.S. courts and state legislatures, and Washington Governor Gary Locke this week urged the state's Public Employees Benefits Board to extend spousal health care coverage to the same-gender partners of the state's gay and lesbian employees. That was not expected because the state is in a budget crunch this year since voters eliminated a motor vehicle excise tax. The budget Washington lawmakers finally agreed on last week does not include funds for the benefit, and some had wanted to add language to the budget specifically prohibiting it. If the Board follows the governor's lead, most of the cost of the benefit would have to be borne by the rest of the state's workers. But the Virginia Supreme Court struck down Arlington County employees' domestic partner benefits, declaring that the county had overstepped the state's authority to define family relationships. However, a Maryland appeals court has recognized a lesbian co-parent's legal standing to sue for visitation with the child her former partner bore by artificial insemination. In this particular case, the visitation itself was denied because the child is experiencing emotional problems, but the co-parent can try again through the courts in the future. The ruling still sets a precedent for other gay and lesbian co-parents in Maryland that is one of the most favorable in the U.S. And on the last day of Connecticut's legislative session, the state Senate approved a bill to allow second-parent adoptions by both same-gender and unmarried heterosexual couples. The House had already passed the same bill just a few days earlier, but it's not yet known whether Governor John Rowland will sign it into law. But Mississippi Governor Ronnie Musgrove signed a bill to prohibit all adoptions there by same-gender couples. Thanks to an intensive lobbying effort by Donald Wildmon's American Family Association and an association of Baptist clergy, the bill had passed both the House and Senate by overwhelming margins. Utah this year also passed a law prohibiting adoptions by same-gender couples, but the only other state with anything similar is Florida, which bans all adoptions by gays and lesbians. A class-action lawsuit challenging Florida's ban is now in progress. Same-gender relationships have been on the front burner in other nations as well. New Zealand's Parliament voted 64 - 54 to approve in principle amending four laws to give domestic partners the same property rights as legally married couples. Currently same-gender couples in New Zealand have no recourse to the courts for division of property when they break up. Now the Parliament will be drafting amendments to give them the same legal status as divorcing married couples for this purpose, if a couple has been together for at least three years and breaks up after the new laws go into effect. That's expected to be June 1 of next year. Although the Members of Parliament were allowed to vote their consciences, only one MP broke with his party. The Labour, Green and Alliance Parties supported recognition of unmarried couples, while the National, ACT and New Zealand First Parties opposed it. Opposition leader Jenny Shipley said the National Party supports legal rights for gay and lesbian couples, but wants them established in separate statutes from the marriage laws. What may be Nigeria's first gay wedding caused an uproar in the Kano state legislature this week. After reading a newspaper report of the lavish affair, state Assemblymember Yusuf Abdullahi demanded an investigation, calling the report "an embarrassment to the image of the state and to all Moslems." The Assembly voted to investigate the incident, calling both the reporter and the editor of the independent "This Day" newspaper to testify. Homosexual acts are already criminal in Nigeria, but Kano is one of the Muslim-dominated northern states expected to adopt Islamic religious law, which can punish homosexual acts with death. In Wales, a town's newly-elected mayor has announced that her long-time lesbian partner will carry out the duties traditionally borne by mayors' wives. Aberystwyth's mayor-elect Jaci Taylor and her partner Felicity Roberts have been together for twenty years and have never hidden their relationship. But the local Conservative Party leader found the idea of the mayor being publicly partnered to be shocking and embarrassing. Taylor admitted that the decision had "taken guts" but added that, "It shouldn't really be an issue. There are more important issues like getting a better life for people." When Taylor is sworn in in the coming week, she'll be accompanied by both Roberts and her long-separated husband. Taylor has two children and Roberts, six. Scotland's Parliament last week took up the bill to repeal Section 28, which has been the subject of heated public controversy for six months. Section 28 is the Thatcher-era prohibition against local governments using resources to "promote homosexuality" or to teach that same-gender relationships constitute a "pretend family." Although Section 28 has never been enforced, it has served to deter educators from intervening in anti-gay harassment in schools or otherwise supporting gay and lesbian students. But religious and conservative groups have whipped up fears that with repeal, classrooms would be flooded with pornographic propaganda. Nonetheless, the Scottish Parliament voted 103 - 16 to move the repeal bill on to the committee stage. There is one more major public relations ploy by the so-called Keep the Clause campaign before the Parliament takes its final vote next month. With the deep pockets of multi-millionaire Brian Souter, ballots are being sent this week to all of Scotland's four million voters in what Keep the Clause likes to think of as a private referendum. Repeal supporters, including Scotland's First Minister Donald Dewar, prefer to think of it as a mere opinion poll, and many are refusing to participate in protest. Although Keep the Clause has strived to give the vote credibility, the voter rolls used were 18 months old, so many ballots are misaddressed, some are going to dead people, and those who came of age recently are left out. Also a number of households have received multiple copies of the ballot form, and with the mail-in process there is no way to detect those who may vote more than once. Souter and friends reportedly paid about one million pounds for this poll. And finally, the French army issued a welcome to gays and lesbians this week, in an interview with Brigadier General Alain Raevel published in the gay magazine "Tetu". The French army is making a transition from a draft-based force to a professional one, and needs recruits to fill 400 different job categories. Raevel said there is no discrimination at the hiring level, and the defense ministry confirmed that individuals' sexual orientation is none of their business. Raevel emphasized that the French army should be "an extension of society," that would risk cutting itself off from the nation it's there to protect if it recruited only "Rambos." In true French fashion, Raevel noted that the U.S. and U.K. have quite different cultural and military traditions and remarked, "Thank God, here in France we are different." Raevel said that gay and lesbian soldiers would not have to hide their orientation, and he had not heard of anti-gay harassment or discrimination in the ranks. But he did indicate a limit to all this tolerance, saying, "If he or she says, 'This weekend I went to a gay pride march,' that is fine. But if he or she says, 'I am gay and want to be recognized as such,' that could present problems." The defense ministry later clarified that, "problems would only arise, as they have in foreign armies, in cases where there are attempts to proselytize." So while the French army is not "asking" and soldiers are free to "tell," it seems their policy has its own slant on "don't pursue."