Sponsor: Athlete bill may be dead for year

Would block transgender girls from school sports

One week after Florida lawmakers voted to block transgender girls from playing on girls and women’s school sports teams, the controversial bill seems to have died in the Senate.

Lawmakers likely won’t have time to craft legislation that “respects the inherent dignity of each person,” a key senator said. The bills would have called for any athlete — transgender or not — to endure forced genital inspections in order to “prove” they’re allowed to play on the teams should anyone question their gender.

Florida’s House of Representatives voted last week to ban transgender girls from girls and women’s sports teams, following a national push by conservatives that GOP-controlled statehouses have taken up across the country.

Opponents said the bill (HB 1475) was bigoted and unnecessary. They noted that both the Florida High School Athletic Association and the NCAA already have policies that provide ways for transgender students to join school sports teams, and that the bill’s sponsors admitted there have been no documented problems since the associations adopted the policies in 2013.

The Senate had proposed a less-strict version (SB 2012) than the House, one that provided some options for transgender girls to play sports.

Sen. Kelli Stargel, that bill’s sponsor, proposed amending her bill to make it more similar to the House version. But when it was to be taken up by the Senate rules committee, she asked that it be postponed.

In an emailed statement, she suggested there likely wasn’t time to deal with this issue this session.

“I believe Florida should protect the ability of girls and women to safely participate in athletics, and I think there is consensus among my colleagues surrounding that underlying policy objective,” she said. “We want to get there in a manner that respects the inherent dignity of each person, while at the same time acknowledging the fact that the biological differences between men and women can be significant, and can vary based on how far along a person is within their transition.”

Stargel, chairwoman of the Senate’s appropriations committee, said her top priority as the Legislature’s session nears its end is to work on passing a budget. “In a time-limited environment, I don’t know that we will have sufficient time to revisit SB 2012 this session,” she said.

House lawmakers who voted for the “fairness in women’s sports act” said it is needed to protect female athletes who could be denied athletic opportunities if they had to compete against transgender students who were assigned male at birth.

It would allow students to compete only on teams that match their gender listed at birth.

The FHSAA requires documentation of “consistent identity and expression” and medical information as part of its process to clear transgender students to play on school sports teams. The NCAA allows transgender women to compete on women’s teams after a year of hormone therapy.

A bill similar to the House version passed in Idaho last year and quickly landed in court where a federal judge ruled that state could not ban transgender females from female sports teams. Idaho’s law is now on hold during appeals, but similar bills have been passed in several other states, and they have been introduced in more than 25.

The NCAA said recently it would only look to hold its championships in states that are “free of discrimination” and said its policy is based on “inclusion and fairness.”

The NCAA has several championship events scheduled in Florida in the coming year, including tennis in Altamonte Springs, golf in Howey-in-the-Hills and Orlando, volleyball in Tampa, rowing in Sarasota, and cross country in Tallahassee.

In Florida, opponents of the House bill said it targets transgender students, who already face more violence and discrimination than their cisgender peers. The bills could have kicked transgender athletes off sports teams on which they already play.

Fort Lauderdale city commissioners planned to pass a resolution opposing the bills on Tuesday. Vice Mayor Steve Glassman proposed the resolution, saying it speaks to the city’s nondiscrimination values.

“Demeaning and marginalizing transgender students is not what Fort Lauderdale stands for,” he said.