Love is love
One Royal Oak, an LGBT advocacy coalition in Royal Oak, Michigan claims a huge victory tonight as voters preserved a human rights ordinance that prevents discrimination based on sexuality or gender identity.
From the One Royal Oak folks:
Voters in Royal Oak have passed Proposal A, upholding a Human Rights Ordinance the Royal Oak Commission passed in March of this year. Despite an organized effort by the anti-equality industry, Royal Oak becomes the 30th municipality in Michigan to pass such an ordinance.“This victory belongs to the hundreds of volunteers who came together to stand with their gay and transgender friends, family members, and neighbors to have the conversation about fairness as a Royal Oak value,” said Chris Riley, a Royal Oak native and campaign manager of One Royal Oak. “The teams from Equality Michigan, Kalamazoo Gay and Lesbian Resource Center, and the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force were also instrumental in bringing equality to Royal Oak.”
The ordinance prohibits discrimination in the City of Royal Oak based upon actual or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity, in addition to the law’s existing protections based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, height, weight, condition of pregnancy, marital status, physical or mental limitation, source of income, family responsibilities, or HIV status. It goes into effect ten days after the election.
“Unity Michigan applauds the efforts of Royal Oak voters making sure their city is a place where all hardworking people are treated fairly and given an opportunity to provide for their families,” said Jon Hoadley of Unity Michigan. “In today’s economic climate, we should be helping talented people keep jobs, not get fired from them because they are LGBT.”
This, combined with the news today that Illinois will become the 15th state in the union to recognize same-sex marriages, puts a very nice smile on my face.
This is huge: The Illinois House just passed marriage equality. #LoveIsLove
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) November 5, 2013
Kudos to Chris Riley, Jon Hoadley, Frank Houston, and Emily Dievendorf for their leadership and energy on ballot iniative and my most sincere congratulations and thanks to them and the many, many activists and volunteers they worked with to bring this home.
Job well done, folks. Thanks so much.
[Photo credit: Chris Savage | Eclectablog]
