City considers transgender discrimination ban

Orlando may out law discrimination against transgender people, forbidding businesses and landlords from denying employment, housing or public accommodation to those who identify themselves as a member of the opposite sex.

If the City Council approves, transgender people would be added to the list of classes that are formally protected from discrimination. Orlando businesses would be prohibited from denying jobs or promotions, turning away renters or buyers of homes or refusing service at restaurants, bars, hotels and other accommodations to people because they are transgender.

Orlando’s anti-discrimination ordinance already includes sexual orientation, as well as classes formally protected from discrimination by federal law: race, national origin, religion, gender, disability, age and marital status.

“I think it’s appropriate as we continue to try to promote diversity, fairness and equality in Orlando,” Mayor Buddy Dyer said. “The cities that are going to be successful are the ones that are able to attract the young, smart entrepreneurs, the people who do startup companies and high-tech. And they want to live in socially progressive cities.”

In 2002, before Dyer was elected, Orlando drew nationwide attention when it adopted anti-discrimination protection for gay people. It was a controversial issue at the time. Thousands of letters, cards and email from opponents across the country deluged City Hall before the vote. The final public hearing lasted five hours, with critics weighing in.

Orlando was among the first cities in Florida to protect gay people from discrimination, butmany others followed. Cities and counties that added that protection more recently, including Orange County in 2010, also included transgender people — someone born a man who identifies as awoman, or vice versa.

But Orlando City Commissioner Patty Sheehan, who championed the protections for gay people, said it would not have passed 12 years ago if gender identity had also been included.

Now 27 cities and counties in Florida include protections for both gay and transgender people, and Orlando is one of the last remaining major cities in the state that doesn’t protect both.

Gina Duncan, who had surgery in 2007 that completed her transition from male to female, said it’s time for Orlando to add protection based on gender identity.

“The gay and lesbian community has progressed steadily, but the transgender community is running to catch up,” said Duncan, who has worked with Orlando officials on the issue as transgender inclusion director for Equality Florida.

A 2011 survey conducted by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the National Center for Transgender Equality found that the unemployment rate among transgender people is twice that of the general population.

In Florida, 81 percent reported workplace harassment or mistreatment, and 56 percent reported being fired, not hired or denied a promotion because of their sexual identity. In the area of housing, 14 percent said they had been denied a home or apartment. And 47 percent reported being verbally harassed in places such as hotels and restaurants.

In the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) community, transgender people face the most discrimination, Equality Florida’s Michael Farmer said.

“I think there are a lot of gay and lesbian men and women who are able to hide who they are if they live or work in a place where they’re more likely to face discrimination,” Farmer said. “But if you’re a transgender person, oftentimes it’s more difficult.”

An advisory board already has recommended the inclusion of gender identity in Orlando’s ordinance. The City Council is expected to take it up on July 28 at the first of two public hearings.