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April 15, 1999

Council votes for health benefits for same-sex partners

Council votes for health benefits for same-sex partners

Senate Council has called on Pitt's administration to offer health benefits to same-sex domestic partners of faculty and staff.

The resolution that Council approved by a 17-9 vote (with four members abstaining) on April 12 also urged Pitt to drop its challenge to Pittsburgh's anti-discrimination law and to the jurisdiction and authority of the city Human Relations Commission.

Senate Council knew the vote was only symbolic.

Pitt senior administrators aren't required to obey Council recommendations, and Chancellor Mark Nordenberg made it clear they wouldn't follow this one.

Prior to the vote, Nordenberg said: "I don't see the policy [on benefits for same-sex couples] changing in the near term, even if the resolution today is approved, which I expect it will be."

Until state lawmakers redefine "marriage" and "family" to include homosexual couples, Pitt won't be required to extend health benefits to same-sex partners, he said.

The University is asking the city Human Relations Commission to dismiss a complaint by Deborah Henson, a former legal writing instructor here, who charged Pitt with discrimination because it denied health benefits to her lesbian partner.

A city ordinance forbids discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Attorneys for Pitt say the University denied health benefits to Henson's partner based on marital status, not sexual orientation. (Henson's attorneys point out that homosexuals can't legally marry in Pennsylvania. So Pitt did, in effect, discriminate against Henson because she is homosexual, they maintain.) Pitt attorneys also argue that the city lacks the legal authority to force employers to extend benefits to domestic partners.

The Human Relations Commission expects to rule by June 1 on Pitt's motion to dismiss Henson's complaint.

Nordenberg pointed out to his fellow Senate Council members that the Human Relations Commission itself does not offer domestic partner benefits to its own employees.

Penn State's faculty senate backed off on recommending same-sex benefits for PSU employees after state legislators indicated they would cut Penn State's appropriation in response to such a change, Nordenberg said (adding that he had no inside knowledge of the incident, but knew only what he'd read of it in newspaper accounts).

Pitt offers health coverage to employees, their spouses and their children without regard to sexual orientation, the chancellor said, "but coverage essentially stops there. It isn't extended to parents. It isn't extended to in-laws. It isn't extended to siblings. And it isn't extended to domestic partners, whether of the same sex or the opposite sex."

Nordenberg distributed lists of the 18 Association of American University (AAU) schools that offer health benefits to domestic partners, and the 39 that do not.

All but four of the AAU universities that offer domestic partner benefits are private, while the schools that don't offer such benefits include 25 major public universities, Nordenberg said.

Just because most AAU universities don't offer domestic partner benefits doesn't make that the right policy, the chancellor said. "But it would be difficult for me, knowing what I do about [the AAU schools that don't offer domestic partner benefits], to dismiss them as morally or socially deficient universities," he said.

Joel Cornfeld, president of the Graduate and Professional Students Association, said the list didn't impress him. "I look at this list and say to myself, 'Do I want my university to be more like Penn State [which does not offer domestic partner benefits] or the University of Pennsylvania [which does]? Do I want my university to be more like Iowa and Iowa State [which don't], or like Stanford and Harvard [which do]?"

"How many universities in the AAU will be playing in a professional football stadium in a couple of years?" Cornfeld asked, referring to Pitt's plan to play home football games in the Steelers' new stadium beginning in 2001. Should Pitt reject the opportunity to play in a state-of-the-art stadium just because most AAU schools play in less modern facilities? he asked.

English professor Phil Wion said he and many other people would be proud if Pitt took a lead role in extending benefits to domestic partners, rather than waiting to be compelled by law and peer pressure from other universities.

Senate Secretary Douglas Metzler said Pitt should have seen Henson's lawsuit as an opportunity to tell Harrisburg lawmakers: This is the way society is heading. And rather than waste thousands of dollars fighting this lawsuit, we're going to extend health coverage to same-sex partners.

Other faculty members of Council said Pitt policies should be based not just on money, but also on moral principles and larger issues such as the increasing number of Americans without health insurance.

Christina Paulston, of linguistics, accused Pitt senior administrators and trustees of compromising the University's moral standards for fear of offending legislators and potential donors.

"I think that is reprehensible," Paulston said, addressing Nordenberg. "I think that is not the business of a university, Mark, and I think you know that. We must not allow this to come to pass: That, for the expediency of money, we do something that most of us either don't care about or know to be morally wrong."

When it came to a vote, 17 faculty and student members of Senate Council approved the resolution. Nine members, including Nordenberg and the other administrators present, voted against it, while four members (including representatives of the Staff Association Council) abstained.

Faculty Assembly and the Graduate and Professional Students Association also have passed resolutions urging Pitt to extend health benefits to same-sex domestic partners and drop its challenge to the city anti-discrimination law.

— Bruce Steele


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