Milo Winslow stood at the microphone in the Lincoln City Council chambers two weeks ago, speaking in support of an ordinance to extend discrimination protections to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
He did it because he believes offering such protections is the right thing to do, that it’s important to have people in the transgender community speak out about why it’s necessary.
He also harbors some serious concerns.
“I went to testify in support because, of course, I’m in support of this,” he said. “But I also think it’s like we’re bringing knives to a gunfight.”
Several members of Lincoln’s transgender community say they worried about the timing of the ordinance, feared supporters weren’t adequately prepared to defend it at the ballot box and predicted opponents would target the transgender community — increasing the mental health stresses on LGBTQ people.
“That’s what myself and others have been trying to explain,” said Natalie Weiss. “It doesn’t matter what else you put in the proposal, once you introduce it, it’s about transgender bathroom access. That’s what the fight will be about.”
The ordinance is much broader than one passed by the City Council 10 years ago, revising the entirety of Title 11, the portion of city code pertaining to equal opportunity.
It adds active military and veterans as a protected class, updates definitions of marriage, race and natural origin. It strengthens definitions and updates disability protections and clarifies the process of the Commission on Human Rights, which investigates allegations of discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodation.
The Nebraska Family Alliance, which is leading the campaign to gather the 4,137 signatures needed to put the issue on the ballot, has dubbed it “a gender identity bathroom ordinance,” which “would allow biological men in women’s showers, locker rooms and restrooms.”
Last week, in a robocall, former Gov. Kay Orr invited voters to come to the Nebraska Republican Party offices to sign the petition to put “Lincoln’s transgender bathroom ordinance” to the vote of the people.
Opponents raise other concerns, including that the ordinance would empower the city to punish citizens for their Biblical beliefs, and some of the more than 260 people the alliance said it had trained to collect signatures have set up inside and outside several churches.
The campaign — called “Let Us Vote” — also stresses that 10 years ago, when the City Council passed the first fairness ordinance, opponents gathered 10,000 signatures to put the question to a vote, but that never happened.
A public vote appears likely this time, and members of the transgender community said they worry supporters overestimate what it will take to mount a campaign for it to win approval at the ballot box.
Weiss said framing the issue as opening the door to sexual predators gaining access to women’s bathrooms is effective messaging for the opposition, especially for people who are undecided or “softly support” LGBTQ issues.
Logan Casey, senior policy researcher and adviser at Movement Advancement Project, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization, said of the more than 330 cities and counties nationwide with LGBTQ-inclusive nondiscrimination protections, relatively few have attempted to repeal them.
When it happens, opponents' tactics are generally predictable, he said, “targeting transgender people in particular and making baseless claims about safety to stoke fear.”
Studies, including one by the Police Foundation that studied sexual assault reports before and after such protections had been enacted in Atlanta, Dallas, Tucson, Arizona, and Miami, have shown such protections don’t increase the number of assaults in bathrooms. Another study, published in 2018 in Sexuality Research and Social Policy, studied crime rates in Massachusetts before and after the adoption of public accommodation laws that included gender-identity protection.
Eric Reiter, recently appointed to the city’s Commission on Women and Gender, agrees with the intended goal of the Lincoln ordinance but questioned the timing.
Listen now and subscribe: | | | |
“I think my concern and the frustration is that for me it didn’t feel like the concerns for transgender people were really taken seriously or taken under consideration," Reiter said.
For one thing, Reiter and others said, it’s a midterm election cycle where voter turnout will be lower and where an anti-transgender agenda is part of the Republican gubernatorial campaign. Republican candidate Jim Pillen recently tweeted his opposition to the Lincoln ordinance. It also comes on the heels of raucous crowds that turned out last year to oppose state health standards that addressed gender identity.
Winslow said the focus should be on passing the Equality Act at the federal level.
Whenever the issue comes up at a local level, he said, hateful views toward transgender people rev up, increasing the risk of hate crimes and increasing mental health issues caused by being targeted.
“It’s one thing when it’s on a national stage,” Winslow said. “It’s another thing when your neighbor is saying it on social media or it happens at the dinner table ... it very much divides families.”
Casey, of the Movement Advancement Project, said just the debate, regardless of the outcome, causes harm.
The Trevor Project, a nonprofit that focuses on suicide prevention efforts among LGBTQ youth, conducted a study last year where two-thirds of LGBTQ youth said their mental health was negatively impacted by debate over state legislation. The organization reported a 150% increase in calls to its crisis hotline last year from young people in Texas, where lawmakers had proposed more than 70 anti-LGBTQ bills.
Lincoln City Councilwoman Sändra Washington, who introduced the measure that passed 5-0 (Tom Beckius and Richard Meginnis were absent), said she reached out to many in the transgender community who supported the ordinance going forward.
She also contacted local mental health workers and national groups to make sure they could offer additional support. The Trevor Project, for instance, increased its social media presence locally, she said.
They also talked about timing. Two years ago — during a presidential election — some didn’t want to move forward then, she said.
Her interest was doing a needed update of the entire ordinance, and that it made sense procedurally, in part because the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled in a case involving housing protections and defined sex to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
The opposition, she said, would have been there whenever the ordinance came forward and the focus would have been the same.
“They’ve all intentionally boiled it down to something Title 11 is not, but if you’re going to run an opposition campaign you’ll spin it the way you want to spin it. It doesn’t matter if it isn’t true,” she said.
“Trying to strategize around whether the opposition shows up feels like a waste of time. Those folks who feel strongly in opposition will be there, regardless.”
Weiss said opponents are well-funded and ready, and were ready to get their message out immediately, and she and others wanted supporters to be more prepared to fund a campaign to begin getting their message out right away too.
Weiss said the work of supporters takes time and longer conversations than a sound bite.
“For our side of the issue, this is about doing what’s right,” she said. “For our opponents, this is a culture war.”
Washington said fundraising among supporters is underway, and despite concerns, those interviewed said they're prepared to support and fight for the ordinance.
OutNebraska, a statewide advocacy organization, is holding a community meeting March 7 on the ordinance, and issued a statement condemning the use of anti-transgender tropes.
Washington said she hasn't lived the experience of transgender people, but also doesn't think there's ever a perfect time to move forward on such an important issue.
"I know what it feels like to be the brunt of discrimination in multiple ways," she said. "And even so, I know my experience is not their experience. The only thing we share is that we've each felt fearful and probably both experienced hurt."
Nebraska Family Alliance volunteers set up along O Street on Monday to gather signatures to force the Lincoln City Council to call for a public vote on the city's new fairness ordinance.
During a public hearing in February, Milo Winslow voiced support for an ordinance to expand the city's protection against discrimination to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
Natalie Weiss said it will take more than a sound bite for supporters of the city's new fairness ordinance to overcome opposition. “For our side of the issue this is about doing what’s right,” she said. “For our opponents, this is a culture war.”
Lincoln City Councilwoman Sändra Washington speaks during the Feb. 7 council meeting on her proposed ordinance to expand the city's protection against discrimination to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
Eric Reiter is on staff with OutNebraska, an organization seeking to make an impact by advocating, celebrating and educating to improve the lives of LGBTQ+ people.