An update on last week’s post on conservative blogger Joe Guarino’s City Council candidate questionnaires and the issue of domestic partner benefits in Greensboro: Two more candidates have responded to the questionnaire.

Bill Knight, Jr. (At-Large candidate) declined to answer the DP question when he first returned his questionnaire to Guarino but later emailed him saying, according to Joe, that “he is not in favor of the city providing its employees same-sex domestic partner benefits.” See Knight’s full questionnaire response here.

Sandra Anderson Groat (At-Large candidate) also replied, quite simply: “Yes, I do [support domestic partner benefits]. Also most large companies now provide these benefits.” See Groat’s full questionnaire response here.

Guarino flips out at Groat’s response: “She favors same-sex domestic partner benefits for city employees, and cites the provision of these benefits by “most large companies”. The fact that large companies sometimes provide these benefits, however, does not make it ethically correct. Moreover, I somehow doubt that the City of Greensboro is willing to adopt other management practices, and specifically other human resources practices, seen among large companies. Indeed, the situation is quite to the contrary. Why, then, should we feel compelled to emulate large companies on this one issue?”

Guarino’s statement – “large companies sometimes provide these benefits” – is entirely misleading. The overwhelming majority of all Fortune 500 companies offer these benefits. Large companies are not “sometimes” offering these benefits… They are without a doubt offering these benefits the majority of times.

See the previous post: Greensboro ‘07 – The LGBT Vote; candidates respond to domestic partner benefits issue

Technorati Tags: Joe Guarino, Bill Knight, Sandra Anderson Groat, Greensboro, North Carolina, election, 2007, city council