Sunday, January 12, 2003

A story published today by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that the University of Pittsburgh promised to consider providing domestic partner benefits to its employees. In return, gay and lesbian workers pledged to suspend their lawsuit against the school.

Both sides saw the deal, struck in May 2001, as a way out of the protracted dispute that divided the campus and spawned a challenge to Pittsburgh's gay rights law.

But the truce didn't last.

The university concluded after several months of study that it "would not be prudent" to extend health care coverage to unmarried partners of employees, a decision that American Civil Liberties Union lawyers called "morally bankrupt."

Now, both sides are going back into court, arguing once again over a form of health coverage that has become far more common, nationally and in Pittsburgh, than when former legal writing instructor Deborah Henson filed the first complaint against Pitt in 1996.

In a brief filed in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court, Pitt attorneys want a ruling on their motion to permanently bar the city from hearing the case. It involves seven current and former workers who say Pitt discriminated by denying them the benefit for their partners.

As part of the filing, Pitt has renewed its argument that a 1990 city law protecting gays and lesbians from discrimination was not valid.

It's not clear if Judge Robert Gallo will address that part of Pitt's motion, which triggered campus protests and criticism from gay rights advocates across Pennsylvania after Pitt raised it in 1998.

"If you don't buy fairness and equality as a reason, I think it comes down to economic vitality and competitiveness," said Witold Walczak, legal director of the Pittsburgh ACLU. "Are you only going to go after the best and brightest straight students and employees? Or are you going to compete on an even footing for all the best students and employees?"

He called Pitt's position "bigoted and increasingly obsolete."