Every year, Equality Virginia monitors all legislation introduced to the Virginia General Assembly and advocates on behalf of Virginia's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.  We work to introduce and support gay-friendly legislation and to oppose and defeat anti-gay bills.

Take Action! Here's how you can help:

Identify your Delegate and Senator. Look them up here.

Stay informed about the issues you care about! Follow bills Equality Virginia is tracking in the General Assembly.

Check out talking points for nondiscrimination in employment and adoption.

Support Non-Discrimination in Employment and Adoption

During the 2012 General Assembly Session, Equality Virginia will be focusing on supporting legislation that protects our community from discrimination in employment and adoption and opposing legislation that seeks to grant state-funded and state-licensed adoption and foster care agencies associated with religious groups the right to discriminate against us.

Nondiscrimination in Employment
Equality Virginia supports workplace nondiscrimination legislation that is inclusive of sexual orientation and gender identity. 

Virginia has no law protecting any public employee from discrimination on the job. We are one of only 20 states where you can still be fired from a state or local job because of your sexual orientation or gender identity. This reality undercuts the Commonwealth’s ability to recruit the best and the brightest, adversely affects our competitiveness, and, ultimately, holds the potential to undercut the quality of state and local services.

EV believes that passage of state and local workplace nondiscrimination legislation is a small step forward in ensuring that Virginia is truly an inclusive Commonwealth. 

Nondiscrimination in Adoption
EV believes that the only factor that should control adoption and foster care placements is the best interests of the child, and this should be an individualized assessment considering all relevant factors.

No prospective parent or child in the system should be refused services on the basis any one factor. Unless the law is changed, however, state-licensed and state-funded adoption and foster care agencies will continue to deny services to children and to prospective parents based on their sexual orientation or other discriminatory factors, compounding the difficulties in finding loving, permanent homes for the thousands of children in foster care and awaiting adoption.

That is why Equality Virginia will be actively supporting legislation that bans discrimination by state-licensed and state-funded adoption and foster care agencies. 

It is also why Equality Virginia actively and strongly opposes so-called "conscience clause" legislation that will specifically authorize the more than forty child-placing agencies licensed and funded by the state that are affiliated with religious organizations to discriminate based on sexual orientation and gender identity in making their services available.

While EV respects the right of individuals to practice their faith without government interference, the child-placing agencies licensed to facilitate adoptions and foster care are functioning as agencies of the state.  As agents of the state, when placing children, they are not engaged in private acts (as would be the case with respect to employment decisions).  Just as the state cannot deny any citizen the equal protection of the laws, neither can the agents of the state, i.e., the licensed child placing agencies, even if they are run by faith-based organizations.

We must defeat the conscience clause legislation, and we cannot do it without your help.  The Family Foundation has hired four new lobbyists for the Session to help get this legislation passed.  You are the key to making their efforts unsuccessful! 

Please see our Portfolio on Richmond Sunlight for more information on these bills.

Talking Points

End Workplace Discrimination in State Employment
Support SB 263  (Ebbin/McEachin)
This Bill Died in Comittee

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Discrimination is wrong. Taxpaying individuals who work hard should not be discriminated against in the workplace because of who they are. That's a fundamental American value.

Virginia has no workplace protections for its state or local employees. The legislature has never codified protections against discrimination on the job for state or local workers on the basis of  race, color, religion, national origin, sex, pregnancy, age, marital status, veteran status, sexual orientation  or disability.  It is particularly important for the legislature to codify protections for GLBT workers because the Attorney General has said that no state or local agency may do so without legislative authority.

Strong public support. The public supports the right of GLBT people to work for the government. 90% of Virginians believe that GLBT people should have this right and 85% of Virginians say GLBT people should have protections against discrimination in all workplaces.

Virginia’s state and local agencies, including hospitals, schools and colleges, are limited in their ability to compete effectively to recruit and retain the best qualified employees to serve the tax payers.

Private employers have long since recognized that inclusive non-discrimination protections allow them to recruit and retain the best and brightest employees. 88% of Virginia’s top 27 private employers, all of the ten top private employers [including Wal-Mart, Northrop Grumman Newport News, Food Lion, Sentara, INOVA, Booz Allen, Target, SAIC, Lowe’s and United Parcel] in Virginia, and 86% of all Fortune 500 companies,  protect employees from discrimination based on their sexual orientation and 50% protect employees from discrimination based on gender identity.

32 other states including neighboring Maryland and the District of Columbia, and more than 162 counties and cities have some workplace protections for public employees based on sexual orientation. Of these 16 states and the District of Columbia and 139 counties and cities include protection on the basis of gender identity. 

Preparation of students at our universities and colleges suffers because we cannot model best business practices, and necessary ethical practices, in our Commonwealth workplaces. The workplaces for which we are preparing our graduates require nondiscrimination, consumers and customers in business expect to be treated without discrimination; and ethical practice of nursing and medicine requires nondiscrimination.

The Joint Commission that accredits our public hospitals now includes among its standards when reviewing accreditation of hospitals and other health facilities whether or not formal nondiscrimination policies and practices of the hospital/facility includes 'sexual orientation' and 'gender identity'.  Phi Beta Kappa considers this in chartering chapters.

All Children Deserve Loving Permanent Homes

Oppose HB 189 (Gilberts)

Download Printable Version Here.

OPPOSE HB 189 (Gilbert) This so-called "conscience clause" bills would authorize all licensed, state-funded adoption and foster care agencies to discriminate in making adoption and foster care services available to children and prospective parents.

• This is NOT a religious freedom issue. Offering adoption and foster care services to the public is a secular not a religious activity. Children in foster care are the state's children while they are in the system. 

• Adoption is not a private act.  No adoption can be finalized without the approval of the state and a court order.

• Agencies licensed to facilitate adoptions and foster care are functioning as agencies of the state.

• As agents of the state, licensed child-placing agencies are not engaged in private acts (as would be the case with respect to private employment decisions by those organizations).

• Just as the state cannot deny any citizen the equal protection of the laws, neither can the agents of the state, i.e., the licensed child-placing agencies, even if they are run by faith-based organizations.

The substitute offered for HB 189 does not merely codify existing law as proponents claim. It goes FAR beyond existing regulations and makes sweeping changes in current law.

1) HB 189 is NOT limited to faith-based agencies.  It allows all licensed agencies to make placement decisions in accordance with religious or moral policies, including agencies not yet in existence that could write their own moral principles and seek the exemption from state licensing laws.

2) HB 189 is NOT limited to religious beliefs.  It sweeps into the protection it offers any private entity that has moral objections to any proposed child placements.

3) HB 189 is NOT limited to adoption or the rights of birth mothers to choose families consistent with their beliefs, but extends to all private agencies that contract with the state or local agencies to provide foster care services for children in the state's custody.  Foster care children are the state's children in the state's custody.

4) HB 189 grants an affirmative exemption from licensure laws to any private agencies that express objections to placements on moral or religious grounds.  The Commissioner is prohibited from denying or revoking a license based on the failure to comply with rules (such as those prohibiting use of corporal punishment by foster care parents).

5) HB 189 requires state and local agencies to contract with private agencies even if there are concerns about placements being made based on religious beliefs or moral policies that conflict with state licensing standards.

6) HB 189 includes sweeping language granting immunity from "any claim for damages" to any private agency that claims an objection to child placement rules or licensing standards based on religious or moral beliefs or policies. 

Oppose SB 349 (McWaters)

Download Prinatble Version Here.

OPPOSE SB 349 (MCWATERS)This so-called "conscience clause" bills would authorize all licensed, state-funded adoption and foster care agencies to discriminate in making adoption and foster care services available to children and prospective parents.

• This is NOT a religious freedom issue. Offering adoption and foster care services to the public is a secular not a religious activity. Children in foster care are the state's children while they are in the system.
 
• Adoption is not a private act.  No adoption can be finalized without the approval of the state and a court order.

• Agencies licensed to facilitate adoptions and foster care are functioning as agencies of the state.

• As agents of the state, licensed child-placing agencies are not engaged in private acts (as would be the case with respect to private employment decisions by those organizations).

• Just as the state cannot deny any citizen the equal protection of the laws, neither can the agents of the state, i.e., the licensed child-placing agencies, even if they are run by faith-based organizations.

The substitute offered for SB 349 goes far beyond existing regulations and makes sweeping changes in current law.

1) It is NOT limited to faith-based agencies.  It allows all licensed agencies to make placement decisions in accordance with religious or moral policies, including agencies not yet in existence that could write their own moral principles and seek the exemption from state licensing laws.

2) It is NOT limited to religious beliefs.  It sweeps into the protection it offers any private entity that has moral objections to any proposed child placements.

3) It is NOT limited to adoption or the rights of birth mothers to choose families consistent with their beliefs, but extends to all private agencies that contract with the state or local agencies to provide foster care services for children in the state's custody.  Foster care children are the state's children in the state's custody.

4) It grants an affirmative exemption from licensure laws to any private agencies that express objections to placements on moral or religious grounds.  The Commissioner is prohibited from denying or revoking a license based on the failure to comply with rules (such as those prohibiting use of corporal punishment by foster care parents).

5) It requires state and local agencies to contract with private agencies even if there are concerns about placements being made based on religious beliefs or moral policies that conflict with state licensing standards.

6) It includes sweeping language granting immunity from "any claim for damages" to any private agency that claims an objection to child placement rules or licensing standards based on religious or moral beliefs or policies.

Support SB 569 (Ebbin) and SB 647 (McEachin)

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SUPPORT SB 569 (Ebbin) and SB 647 (McEachin) This legislation would ban discrimination by adoption and foster care agencies that contract with the state or receive state funding (directly or indirectly).

•    The best interests of the child should be the sole basis for child placement decisions.

•    Research shows children raised by GLBT parents are not disadvantaged in any way. Such home environments are just as likely to be good for children.

•    Virginia ranks 1st in nation in the percentage of children who age out of foster care (32%) and in 2009 had the lowest rate of public adoptions in the U.S.  More than 1,600 Virginia children are still waiting for loving permanent homes.

•    This bill does not change the law on who can adopt or foster children. It simply ends discrimination against those legally eligible and the children in the system.

•    Ending discrimination against prospective loving parents is in the best interest of children who have a right to a loving permanent home. It is also in the best interests of children who should not be denied services simply because of who they are.