jus« out ▼ January 19, 1996 ▼ 9
So far, so good
Washington initiative effort fails; Oregon activist cautions:
‘This is no bellwether 9
V
by Inga Sorensen
atrick Hogan knows that tenacity can
pay off.
P
And when your organization’s over
all two-year-budget hovers at the $ 10,000
mark, it’s a good thing that dedication is
to be found in abundance.
“We spent a lot o f time and energy training
volunteers who really cared about preserving
people’s civil rights. They were the heart o f this
effort,” says Hogan of the Seattle-based Bigot Bust
ers, a group which was formed to discourage voters
from signing petitions for initiatives aimed at limit
ing citizens’ basic human rights, specifically the
rights of sexual minorities.
The “effort” Hogan is referring to is the failure
o f anti-gay-rights backers to gather enough signa
tures necessary to place two anti-gay initiatives
before the 1996 Washington Legislature.
Initiative 166 would have prevented govern
ments from granting civil rights protections based
on sexual orientation. Initiative 167 would have
limited adoption and foster parenting rights to mar
ried heterosexual couples.
A lack o f voter interest and disorganization are
cited as primary reasons initiative proponents were
unable to collect the necessary 181,667 signatures
by the Dec. 29 deadline. The work of Bigot Busters
and other groups is also being touted as a factor.
“And I think people here are getting tired o f this
whole issue,” says Hogan, who says the campaign
seemed relatively low key. “It was not emotionally
charged whatsoever. It was actually quite unevent
ful. People in Washington are pretty sophisticated.”
Like their counterparts in Oregon, which has
been bigot busting since the volatile Ballot Measure
9 campaign of 1991 -92, Bigot Buster volunteers this
year headed out to shopping malls and state fairs—
“and lots o f Costcos”— to pass out literature and
encourage voters to “decline to sign.”
It is a call many of the state’s residents appar
ently heeded. In fact, it was the second consecutive
year that anti-gay-rights proposals have failed to
win widespread support in Washington.
Last year, two other anti-gay measures, initia
tives 608 and 610, failed to get on the ballot due to
a lack of signatures. This time anti-gay supporters
tried to go through the Legislature rather than di
rectly to the voters, partly because they had more
time to collect signatures if they took the legislative
route.
Gay-rights advocates have even more reason to
cheer: W ashington state Rep. Val Stevens (R-Ar-
lington), who was ready to push anti-gay bills simi
lar to the initiatives, has backed off due to the short
session and other priorities.
“I’m not going to pursue them this year,” Stevens
told The Seattle Times.
Another group being credited for its work is
Hands O ff W ashington, which has reportedly spent
$1.5 million fighting the initiatives this year and
last. During the past couple o f years the group has
helped form 26 coalitions in both urban and rural
Washington. It also launched a pledge campaign
ever, think it isn’t.
“Anti-gay-rights proponents in Washington state
have never been able to gather enough signatures,”
says Julie Davis, executive director of Basic Rights
Oregon, the successor organization to the No on 13
campaign. “They have never built a base, which in
turn leads to their inability tocollect signatures. That
has never been the case in Oregon, where the
Oregon Citizens Alliance has a solid base and has
proved time and time again that it can get an initia
tive on the ballot.”
“The OCA has been successful since the [late
1980s]. This is not new to them,” adds Marcy
W esterling of the Rural Organizing Project, which
assists human rights efforts in small-town and rural
Oregon. “And I don’t think it’s a matter of people
here being less sophisticated. I think it’s that the
OCA may be more sophisticated at crafting its
strategy than other similar groups.”
Both Davis and ROP’s field network coordina
tor, Kelley Weigel, report that they have heard little
about sightings o f OCA-backers working to collect
the necessary 97,000 signatures to the anti-gay
Julie Davis
that asked W ashingtonians to sign a Northwest
Pledge in which they agreed not to support anti
human-rights measures.
“I think the various groups have worked well
together,” says Kelly Evans, executive director of
Hands O ff Washington. “For instance, Bigot Bust
ers focused on countering the petition signing, while
we worked on different educational components
and a lot o f the press w ork.... W e’re very pleased.”
h eth er the success in W ashington
is a bellw ether for Oregon— which is
currently facing four statewide anti-gay-
rights initiatives aimed at the Novem ber 1996
ballot— remains to be seen. Leading activists, how
W
initiatives on the ballot.
“It seems very quiet out there,” says Weigel.
“We did expect to see some activity at the shopping
malls during the holiday season, but we haven’t
heard o f that happening. It could very well be that
they have enough support that they don’t have to
utilize those very public venues anymore.”
“I think w e’ll see a lot more activity in the next
few months,” adds Davis.
ROP continues to promote its “Enough is
Enough” campaign, of which the centerpiece orga
nizing tool is a postcard that urges Oregonians to
uphold democratic principles and think twice before
signing anti-human-rights petitions. Westerling es
timates that 25,000 have been sent since the cam-
paign was launched several months ago.
Davis, meanwhile, applauds Washington activ
ists’ success, and says the respective camps con
tinue to share ideas and strategies. For example,
Basic Rights Oregon, which unveiled its pledge
campaign several months ago, shared the concept
with Hands Off Washington, which embraced it.
“Activists in Oregon, Washington and Idaho all
model off each other,” says Davis. “For Hands Off
Washington to be interested in the pledge idea was
a reinforcement o f what we are doing in Oregon.”
Davis says her group has collected 6,000pledges
from Oregonians who vow to oppose all anti-gay-
rights initiatives. Basic Rights Oregon is hoping to
gather 200,000 such pledges, and is currently gear
ing up to raise nearly $2 million for the campaign.
One of the organization’s largest obstacles, how
ever, remains the public’s misperception that it is
already illegal to discriminate against someone due
to his or her sexual orientation.
To deal with that inaccurate yet widely held
view, the group is creating a “Fair Workplace Project”
video, which is designed to educate the public about
what is and is not legal with respect to sexual
orientation discrimination, particularly as it pertains
to employment issues. Davis says production of the
video is in the final stages and that it should be
released soon.
She also says she’d like her group to eventually
emulate Hands Off W ashington’s ability to “work
the Legislature,” rather than simply mobilizing Or
egonians to vote no on an initiative.
With the 1-166 and 1-167 defeats under their
belts, Washington lesbian- and gay-rights support
ers have, in fact, turned their sights toward other
measures likely to be considered by state lawmak
ers, who began their 1996 session on Jan. 8. A
handful of anti-gay measures are expected to make
an appearance.
Evans believes that her organization, along with
the Seattle-based Privacy Fund, which is much like
Oregon’s Right to Privacy, will be able to counter
that activity because their respective followings are
savvy on issues involving the state Legislature.
“I think that has a lot to do with the fact that these
initiatives were aimed at the Legislature anyway, so
people really had to make themselves familiar with
the system,” she says. “I think that will greatly help
when we are mobilizing the community around bills
this session.”
“Hands O ff Washington is good at using their
base-building to work the Legislature. They did last
session and they’ll do it again this session. We are
still building our base here in Oregon,” says Davis.
“My hope is that we can come out o f the 1996
elections and begin to take it to a more multilevel
approach. You need all of the components working
together. It takes more than a lobbyist and a bill. It
takes the people.”
Those wishing to contact Basic Rights Oregon
may call 222-6151. To reach the Rural Organizing
Project, call 543-3978.
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