Seattle City Attorney nixes plan to give 'allowance' to gay employees

[The Straight Story]

Seattle City Attorney nixes plan to give 'allowance' to gay employees

Despite plans to make an official announcement Wednesday, the city of Seattle will no longer move forward with a plan to give gay and lesbian city employees who get married a monthly "allowance."
The City Attorney's Office, which months ago gave the plan a thumbs up, changed their mind late Tuesday afternoon following a report by KIRO Radio.

...

On Tuesday, KIRO Radio reported that Mayor McGinn and members of the Seattle City Council were set to announce the new benefit at a press conference on Wednesday.

Mayor McGinn confirmed the scheduled announcement when questioned by reporters at an unrelated event Tuesday.

"If the federal government has an unjust law, I don't think it's fair to punish our workers who are following all the rules," he said.

Starting Jan. 1, gay and lesbian city employees who get married under the state's new marriage equality law were to receive a monthly allowance of $90, or approximately $1,080 over a 12-month period.

http://mynorthwest.com/11/2144794/Seattle-City-Attorney-nixes-plan-to-give-allowance-to-gay-employees

[ProgressiveProfessor]

1. To be clear, there a legal impediment that needs to be cleared, the city attorney is

not anti gay. When such stories are posted, it is important to include that kind of context. From later in the cited article

However, in an internal email sent at 4:01 p.m. Tuesday, Civil Division Chief Jean Boler with the Seattle City Attorney's Office said the stipend would violate a state law that prevents the city from providing benefits to married couples that are not provided to state registered domestic partners.

RCW 26.60.015

It is the intent of the legislature that for all purposes under state law, state registered domestic partners shall be treated the same as married spouses. Any privilege, immunity, right, benefit, or responsibility granted or imposed by statute, administrative or court rule, policy, common law or any other law to an individual because the individual is or was a spouse, or because the individual is or was an in-law in a specified way to another individual, is granted on equivalent terms, substantive and procedural, to an individual because the individual is or was in a state registered domestic partnership or because the individual is or was, based on a state registered domestic partnership, related in a specified way to another individual. The provisions of chapter 521, Laws of 2009 shall be liberally construed to achieve equal treatment, to the extent not in conflict with federal law, of state registered domestic partners and married spouses.

[rhett o rick]

2. DOMA is the problem. Contact your congress-critter and tell them to repeal

DOMA. Pres Obama said he wont enforce DOMA, but the problem is that those below him are enforcing DOMA.