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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 19, 1997)
ju s t o u t ▼ sop to m bo r 19, 1997 ▼ 7 national briefs CALIFORNIA Gay activists are angry about on-air com ments made by an Orange County Christian radio talk show host who said homosexuality should be punishable by death. According to the Sept. 5 issue of the Los Angeles Times, Rich Agozino, host of Crosstalk on radio station KBRT-AM in Costa Mesa, urged callers to write to their state legislators asking them to enact laws that would punish homosexu ality according to biblical law, meaning capital punishment, according to a transcript of the Aug. 29 show. "Lesbian love [and] sodomy are viewed by God as being detestable and abominable.... Civil magistrates are to put people to death who prac tice these things,” Agozino said, according to the transcript. running. The Associated Press reported on Sept. 1. With a colorful rainbow as its logo, Hawaii- based Pride Insurance & Financial Services Inc. opened for business this summer, just as the state’s new reciprocal benefits law—the nation’s first—came into effect, giving couples who can’t legally marry a taste of the married life. A major provision of the law grants insurance benefits to same-gender couples. “A lot of insurance companies won’t even touch gays and lesbians. Let’s just be honest about this.... They don’t have to do anything they don’t want to do,” said Dr. Robert Jenkins, the agency’s founder. Pride Insurance, which is opening offices in Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco, also helps same-sex couples in other states and coun tries apply to become reciprocal beneficiaries under the Hawaii law, which has no residency requirement. ILLINOIS Gay rights activists said Agozino’s statements could incite violence against gay men and lesbi ans. But station manager Ed Personius said Agozi no was simply encouraging listeners to follow the “word of God.” "Rich is simply querying Christians on what the word of God says,” he told the Times. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA Responding to concerns that gay men and others have been indiscriminately added to sexual offender lists around the country, New York Rep. Charles Schumer introduced a measure to dis courage states from using the so-called Megan’s Law to register people convicted solely of con sensual sodomy and similar offenses. Although the Schumer measure failed on a Sept. 9 party-line vote in the Judiciary Commit tee, the American Civil Liberties Union said it was optimistic that the measure would be consid ered on the House floor. Schumer also vowed to continue fighting for the measure. The Schumer amendment would not have altered Megan’s Law registration requirements for child molesters, violent sexual offenders or “sexual predators,” but would have sharpened the focus of the measure by encouraging states to avoid registering persons charged with consen sual sodomy, lewd conduct and other similar offenses, the ACLU argued. HAWAII A new agency aimed at assisting same-sex couples to obtain insurance benefits is up and Most of the 170 Lakeview residents who at tended a community meeting Sept. 4 objected to a portion of the city’s plan to beautify a North Halsted Street and honor the largely lesbian and gay popu lation in the neighbor hood, reports the Chi cago Tribune. The S3.2 million proposal calls for the city to widen side walks and plant 180 trees along Halsted; nearly 200 steel towers would be ringed with rainbow-colored lights reflecting the hues of the gay and lesbian pride flag. According to the newspaper, many people who attended the meeting praised the plan to fix crumbling sidewalks and freshen up the busy business and entertainment stri p. But many speak ers sharply criticized the proposal to string the street with rainbow-colored lights, for fear that would send the message the neighborhood is only for gay and lesbian residents. Other people wor ried that the effort, designed by the city to pro mote a gay and lesbian pride theme, might attract gay-bashers. Construction for the project is set to begin in March 1998. KENTUCKY For the third time in five years, the “fairness amendment,” a proposal designed to protect the citizensof Louisville against discrimination based on sexual orientation, has been defeated by the Board of Aldermen. The Sept. 9 vote was three in favor and seven against, with two abstentions. Immediately following the vote, demonstra tors stepped into a four-lane thoroughfare in front of City Hall to stage a brief sit-down protest. More than 50 people were arrested on charges of ob structing a highway. A hearing is set for Oct. 1. The suit, filed in federal court Sept. 5, says the Museum of Jewish Heritage/A Living Memorial to the Holocaust, offends the beliefs of Orthodox MICHIGAN A mother from Portage is planning to hire an attorney after her 9-year-old daughter was denied enrollment in the local public school because she is HIV-positive, reports United Press Interna tional. An attorney for the Portage Public Schools said on Aug. 28 that officials followed a district and state policy of establishing a panel to study the medical records of any student with a commu nicable disease to determine the risks to other students. It’s unclear whether HIV is classified as communicable. According to UP1, the mother of the unidenti fied girl has told reporters she refuses to turn over the girl’s records to the west Michigan district because it is an invasion of privacy. She has found a private school that will accept the girl. The mother claims the district knew about the girl’s HIV infection at the end of last school year. The child was allowed to attend Woodland El ementary School when classes recently resumed, but was asked to leave three days later. Scientists have long said that casual contact with a person living with HIV will not result in spread of the virus. MINNESOTA Two heterosexual men, Torence Harris and Greg Krebs, are suing the Gay Nineties Theatre Cafe and Bar, claiming a bouncer at the down town Minneapolis establishment discriminated against them when she turned them away at the door because they are not gay. The Minne apolis Star Tribune reports the plaintiffs are seeking damages in excess of $50,000. The suit alleges the bouncer’s action vio lated a 1993 amend ment to the M i nnesota Human Rights Act guaranteeing access to accommodations and busi nesses regardless of sexual orientation. The bar owners are denying the allegations. One of the men was admitted to the bar, they say, while the other chose to wait at the door for his girlfriend. When security personnel suggested he might want to leave rather than loiter at the door, the other man returned and started an argument, which prompted the bouncer to ask both men to leave, the owners contend. NEW YORK Sixteen Orthodox Jewish rabbis have filed a lawsuit to stop the Sept. 15 opening of a new Holocaust museum in Manhattan, reports The Associated Press. Jews because it includes an exhibit honoring gay men and lesbians who were persecuted by the Nazis. The suit says the use of public money to build the museum near Battery Park is unconstitutional. The rabbis are angry over “the elevation of homosexuals to the martyred status of the 6 mil lion Jews,” who died in the Holocaust, says Rabbi Yehuda Levin, the lead plaintiff. Levin, who once ran for mayor, has been a vocal opponent of sexual minority rights. ▼ ▼ ▼ Irving Cooperberg, one of the guiding forces behind the creation of two major institutions in New York’s sexual minority community, died Aug. 20 at his home in Manhattan. His partner of 25 years, Lou Rittmaster, who was with Cooperberg at the time of his death, announced the cause of death as complications due to AIDS. Cooperberg helped establish the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center, the largest or ganization of its kind in New York, and Congre gation Beth Simchat Torah, the world’s largest lesbian and gay synagogue. At the time of his appointment in 1994, Cooperberg was the first and only openly gay member of the Board of Governors of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Philadel phia, Pa. PENNSYLVANIA In a case brought by the Newspaper Guild, a labor arbitrator has ruled that Philadelphia News papers Inc., which owns both the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News, must grant health ben efits to same-sex domestic partners of its employ ees. Among other reasons, the ruling cited the “minuscule” costs of providing such benefits. Sherry Boschert, a spokeswoman for the Na tional Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association, notes the ruling is part of a larger trend. ‘Twice as many media companies have domestic-partner benefits now as compared to three years ago,” she says. You love your parents but9 can you do it all? You can if you enlist Heritage Senior Management Services. 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