A conservative Utah think tank now says Salt Lake City's anti-discrimination ordinances can stay on the books as long as the Legislature tweaks them to exempt religious organizations and their followers.
Sutherland Institute President Paul Mero says that would create a "level playing field" for religious freedom.
Religious organizations and their subsidiaries -- for instance, the LDS Church and Deseret Book -- already are exempt from Salt Lake City's new laws protecting gay and transgender residents from housing and employment discrimination. So are businesses with fewer than 15 employees and landlords who rent out portions of their own homes.
Salt Lake City will fight any legislation that attempts to expand the religious exemption, says Ben McAdams, Mayor Ralph Becker's senior adviser.
"The exemption would swallow the rule," he says, if any person of faith could be excluded.
Last month, the city passed two measures that ban housing and employment discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. The policy, a first for Utah, received a rare endorsement from the LDS Church. The church reiterated its opposition to gay marriage but praised the protections for gay and transgender people as "fair and reasonable."
At the time, Sutherland dismissed the church's endorsement as a "public-relations opportunity" and called on the Legislature to overturn the "unsound" ordinances.
But at a forum broadcast online this week, Mero says he studied the church's statement and, "personally speaking, I trust that my church can see around corners that I cannot."
Still, he says, the anti-discrimination rules "clearly infringe on religious freedom."
"Were it not so, there would be no need for a religious exemption [for churches and their wholly owned subsidiaries]," he says. "It's only fair and reasonable to preserve these same protections for all people of faith in Utah."
McAdams say the city's religious exemption mirrors those found in the state's fair-housing and employment laws, which bar discrimination based on characteristics such as race, religion or sex. Salt Lake City's law, he adds, is consistent with the U.S. Constitution.
"We are confident that we will hold the ground" on Capitol Hill, McAdams says. "My advocacy at the Legislature is focused on expanding protections for the LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] community -- not narrowing them."
