From the New York Blade:
When the Empire State Pride Agenda released its “Pride in My Workplace” best practices guide earlier this year, executive director Alan Van Capelle explained why it is so important for companies in New York to be progressive in their policies.
“If you could amend an employment policy written at a corporate office in New York, that can affect 3,000 people on a factory floor in North Carolina,” said Van Capelle. “Suddenly 3,000 people in North Carolina have domestic partner benefits, have protections for sexual orientation, have protections for gender identity and expression, and we have been able to lift the boat for LGBT workers in other parts of the country because we changed a policy here in New York.”
Hmmm… I’ve never thought of it that way before.
July 31st, 2006 at 12:20 pm
Matt,
Prior to all the interest in marriage rights that has developed over the last few years, challenging large multi-state and multi-national corporations to provide equal access to employee benefits was one of the GLBT community’s primary activities. Part of the backlash to the success of the efforts were Colorado Amendment 2, which was famously found to violate the US Constitution in Romer v. Evans, and the lawsuits in Chapel Hill filed anonymously by Publix Heterodoxus challenging out Domestic Partner benefits policy.
It’s nice to see that this is continuing be discussed.