Another Common Ground gay-rights bill has died. But this one wasn't killed by opposing state lawmakers - it was done in by the sponsor herself.
Rep. Jackie Biskupski, D-Salt Lake City, pulled a measure Friday that would have sought voter approval to repeal a portion of Utah's gay-marriage ban (known as Amendment 3) to avoid confusion about which protections are the legal equivalent of marriage.
It's not that Biskupski has changed her mind about the amendment's language being "misconstrued" to deny legal protections to gay and transgender Utahns. It's that she believes the Common Ground Initiative stands a better chance of success without it.
"Maybe pulling my bill will give some people an opportunity to really have an open mind," Biskupski said.
The trouble with her long-shot legislation was this: Some people feared Biskupski's bill would pave the way for civil unions, a legal relationship that recent polls show Utahns overwhelmingly oppose.
While Biskupski insists civil unions weren't her objective, she said retiring the bill might keep slippery-slope-toward-marriage arguments from eroding support for the Common Ground Initiative.
"By dumping that bill," said Mike Thompson, executive director of Equality Utah, "we are bringing attention to the most important items on our legislative agenda."
Those items include a bill sponsored by Rep. Christine Johnson, D-Salt Lake City, to make it illegal to fire or evict someone for being gay or transgender and another by Rep. Jennifer Seelig, D-Salt Lake City, to expand legal protections for same-sex couples to visit a partner in the hospital, inherit property and make medical decisions.
A recent Salt Lake Tribune poll found 56 percent of Utahns support broader legal rights for same-sex couples, specifically on matters of inheritance, hospital visitation and employment discrimination.
Biskupski's pullback comes barely a week after a legislative committee snuffed out a seemingly more benign gay-rights bill. Sen. Scott McCoy's wrongful-death measure would have allowed a cohabiting financial dependent - besides a spouse, child or parent - to sue when a breadwinner suffers a wrongful death.
Soon to come on the Common Ground docket: The final language of Seelig's bill, which would grant same-sex couples greater rights to inherit property and collaborate on medical issues by filing "declarations of joint support" with their county clerks.
The LDS Church has taken no formal position on the Common Ground Initiative. But backers of the bills continue to cite church statements that the church would not object to expanded legal protections for gay and transgender Utahns "so long as these do not infringe on the integrity of the traditional family or the constitutional rights of churches."
