City Not Preparing Contractors for Compliance with Equal Benefits Law
The Mayor's Office of Contracts has yet to receive instructions on how to explain and enforce a major new law for those doing business with the city even though it goes into effect before the month is out. Mayor Michael Bloomberg's office refuses to say whether it will enforce the law.
As of October 26, 2004, the 2,600 businesses and non-profit organizations that do more than $100,000 worth of contracts with the City of New York must certify that they provide the same health and leave benefits to the domestic partners of their employees that they do to the spouses of their workers. If a contactor can't purchase domestic partner insurance from its carrier, it must compensate the employee who has a domestic partner.
I called the Office of Contracts in late September and the person answering the phone said, "We've been getting a lot of calls on this, but we haven't been given any direction on it." There is no information on the contract office's Web site. She suggested I call the City Council, "which passed the bill."
Councilmember Christine Quinn, the chief sponsor of the Equal Benefits Bill, said, "That is a completely ridiculous response. The law is clear. The executive has to implement it. But the mayor is opposed to it. We cannot take legal action until the date of implementation has passed. If that date comes and they have not done what they are legally bound to do, the Council has retained outside lawyers to take them to court. Sadly, I'm not surprised, though I am disappointed."
The Equal Benefits Lawwas passed by the City Council in May by a vote of 43 to 5 and vetoed by Mayor Bloomberg. The Council then overrode the mayor's veto overwhelmingly by a 41 to three vote (with four abstentions) in June, but Bloomberg said he would "probably" take legal action to block its implementation.
Jordan Barowitz, a spokesperson for the mayor, says "the city is still reviewing its options" with respect to enforcing the contract requirement. There has been speculation that either Bloomberg or a city contractor such as Catholic Charities would sue to stop the law from taking effect, although Msgr. Kevin Sullivan, the director of Catholic Charities who testified against the bill, did not return a call for comment on their plans on whether or not to comply with the law.
The benefits that contractors must equalize include health insurance, pension, retirement, disability and life insurance, leave policies, tuition reimbursement, legal assistance, dependent care insurance, moving expenses, membership discounts, and travel benefits. Any of those offered to the spouse of an employee must be offered to the domestic partner of an employee.
Bruce Millman, a labor and employment lawyer who advises many clients who are contractors, sent out an advisory(in pdf format) to his clients of the compliance date. While he said he was not "challenging" the law, his release stated that "these costs may be particularly difficult for small businesses" and that "the law will likely encourage couples who are living together to register as domestic partners because they will have a real economic incentive to do so."
Cynthia Goldstein, a San Francisco official who administers that city's 1997 lawthat served as a model for New York's, disputed speculation that the law burdened contractors. She said that it did not drive up contracting costs and that virtually all contractors complied, including the Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco.
There is a clause in the New York law specifically for religious contractors that may have moral objections to co-habiting employees. It says that instead of covering a domestic partner specifically, the employee can name one other person of unspecified relation on his or her benefits policies. While that clause led to Agudath Israel, an orthodox Jewish organization with many city contracts, to drop its opposition to the legislation, it did not assuage Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New York, another big contractor, who has yet to announce whether it will comply with the law.
Council Hearings on Police Misconduct at Anti-Republican Demonstrations
The streets may be cleared of barricades and masses of police, but the controversy over whether the New York Police Department violated the rights of protesters and bystandersat demonstrations during the Republican National Convention will continue for a long time to come in the courts and in City Council hearings.
On September 15, the Council Committee on Government Operations, chaired by Councilmember Bill Perkins, held a hearing on police conductduring the demonstrations. No one from the Police Department or the mayor's office showed up to testify and Perkins indicated that he would consider using subpoena power to compel their testimony, though he hoped that it would not come to that.
The big bones of contention remain whether protesters were processed in a timely fashion and the conditions at the holding pen where thousands were jailed at Pier 57.
The law requires that an arrestee be arraigned within 24 hours. Many of those detained after these demonstrations spent two to three days at the pier, which many testified was filthy and hazardous to health.
Chris Dunn, a lawyer with the New York Civil Liberties Union, testified that his organization had met with the police as early as January 2003 to prepare for these demonstrations, but was troubled that when the actions came, "some of the most basic things for processing people were not in place" at the detention center such as fingerprinting equipment. He called Pier 57 "grossly inappropriate."
Also much discussed was a demonstration by the War Resisters League conducted without a permit starting from Ground Zero. At first, police said that the marchers would be able to proceed if they went two-by-two, stayed on the sidewalk, and did not impede pedestrian traffic. Despite video evidence that the march was proceeding lawfully, police subsequently announced that everyone was under arrest. Councilmember Perkins himself was a witness to the demonstration and arrests.
Michele Weinstein, a city worker who just happened to be passing by when the Ground Zero protest was taking place, testified that it was "a quiet demonstration" until "red-faced police suddenly surrounded the demonstrators and started shouting, 'You're blocking the sidewalk," even though she could see pedestrians freely proceeding. When she offered a peace sign of support to the protesters, police told her that if she did not have press credentials, she would have to leave. When she told the officer that it was her "First Amendment right" to stand on a public sidewalk, he threatened to arrest her.
"I wanted to be arrested," she said, "but I'm a mother of twin toddlers and my children needed me. I was distressed at having my constitutional rights deprived. I did oppose the Bush agenda and the Iraq war and I had to say it."
Michael Shiller, a filmmaker with press credentials, was ensnared in a police net used to capture demonstrators at the downtown action. He said he was detained for 16 hours in handcuffs, his hands turning "numb." He was not allowed a phone call until 24 hours had passed. And he and the intern with whom he was working were not released until 48 hours had passed. He called the city's conduct an attack "upon our entire democratic process."
Several witnesses testified that arrestees were held more than 24 hours in order to prevent them from going back in the streets and demonstrating again against the Republicans.
At a press conference on September 20, Mayor Bloomberg said there is not "one shred of evidence" that protesters arrested were locked up for long periodsto keep them from joining other demonstrations, the Daily News reported. "They broke the law. We will prosecute them. They might as well just plead guilty and go on."
Charges Of Sexual Harassment in the City Council
Just as the City Council was conducting its closed-door investigation into charges that City Councilmember Allan Jennings sexually harassed five female staffers, a story broke that Councilmember Vincent Gentile had been accused of sexually harassing his chief of staff, John Martin.
"When the councilman became aware that I was looking for a new place to live, he on no less than four occasions invited me to move in with him," Martin said in an affidavit. "I thought these invitations that I cohabitate with him were entirely inappropriate."
Gentile denied the charges and said that he is not gay. But the Gay City News reported that civil rights attorney Tom Shanahan now claims he had an affair with Gentile in 1994; he has made this public now, he says, "as a matter of principle." As a State Senator, Gentile voted against the Sexual Orientation Non-discrimination Act, the state lesbian and gay rights bill, in 2002, but as a Council member has supported gay rights initiatives.
Andy Humm is a former member of the City Commission on Human Rights. He is co-host of the weekly "Gay USA" on Manhattan Neighborhood Network (34 on Time-Warner; 107 on RCN) on Thursdays at 11 PM.
Although New York was the scene of the largest demonstrationprotesting a political convention in United States history on August 29, most civil libertarians saw convention week not as a triumph for dissent, but as another indication of the erosion of the right to protest in the city.
While Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly had promised respect for the First Amendment, and the right to protest peacefully, serious charges have been raised by protesters, civil liberties attorneys, public officials, and at least one judge that the city overstepped its legal authority in arresting and detaining more than 1800 (some of whom turned out to be bystanders and working journalists).
The City Council plans a hearingon the arrests on September 15 at 10 AM in the Government Operations Committee.
OMINOUS SIGNS BEFORE THE CONVENTION
In an address at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice on August 17, just prior to the Republican National Convention, Mayor Bloomberg referredto the First Amendment as a privilege rather than a right, and added, "...if we start to abuse our privileges, then we lose them, and nobody wants that."
Bloomberg's focus was on projecting an image of a city in control, in hopes among other things of convincing the Olympics to come to New York in 2012. The original security budget of $25 million for convention week mushroomed to $70 million, the mayor said, with $50 million of that to be paid by the federal government.
But his comment turning rights into privileges further disturbed those who had criticized his refusal to allow the use of the Great Lawn in Central Park for a rally after the United for Peace and Justice march on August 29th. The group argued that it is the only large, public space in Manhattan appropriate for such a mass gathering. The city offered the West Side Highway instead. The protest organizers agreed at first, then said no; only the park would do. The city, especially the Parks Department and the Central Park Conservancy, argued that the Great Lawn had been rehabilitated at substantial cost and that protesters would damage it. A last minute court action seeking a Great Lawn permit was denied. The upshot was that there was no rally at all -- no chance to articulate why there was such a huge protest -- and the Great Lawn will probably be lost for some time to come as a gathering place for rallies.
Editorialists from the New York Times and Post to the Toronto Globe and Mail and USA Todayexpressed shock and dismay that so great a public space was being eliminated as a venue for First Amendment expression.
And they weren't the only ones. Bob Zuckerman of Brooklyn was so incensed that the protesters were forced into Union Square Park, "a thirtieth of the size," that he says he wants to run for City Council and do something about the restrictions on legal protest. Doug Muzzio, a political analyst and professor at the Baruch School of Public Affairs, said, "You have an increasing loss of public space. City Hall Park, for instance, doesn't allow for the free flow of people. The refusal of protest in Central Park signals the loss of _expression of voice. Bloomberg is not as bad as his predecessor. Rudy didn't like the First Amendment. Bloomberg just doesn't understand it."
"UNNECESSARY ARRESTS"
Veterans of protesting in New York such as Ann Northrop of ACT UP, the AIDS activist group, and the ad hoc Gays Against Bushthat formed just for the convention, cast a jaundiced eye on the police response to the week's protests. "It's the same old thing," she said. "We go out, the cops arrest some of us unnecessarily, beat us up in jail, and hold us for too long for no good reason. The police feel the need to control everything with forces way out of proportion to what's needed and I find that extremely depressing--and I'm depressed about the lack of rational conversation about this."
Northrop left the big march on Sunday for a few hours to lead a small gay contingent to Bryant Park on Sunday to protest against Mayor Mike Bloomberg's recent vetoes of gay bills as he was playing host to a "Big Tent" event for the gay Log Cabin Republicans. While what happened to her did not make much news and was not nearly as dramatic as some of the larger unpermitted street marches that sprang up during the week--and occasionally turned violent--it is illustrative of what has happened to the right to protest in New York City.
At first, Northrop's group of ten demonstrators was allowed to stand on the sidewalk at the West 40th Street entrance to the park, holding signs and passing out fliers to attendees. Then a polite police officer told them they would have to move thirty yards away from the entrance, where they could no longer engage the politicians going to the reception nor hand them leaflets. "We're not moving," Northrop said, "it is a public sidewalk." Then ten burly cops looking like linebackers got out of a van to make the protesters move.
Another woman told me that she was nearby when police arrested the anarchists in the big march who had burned the dragon. When she saw one police officer being rough on one of the people being arrested, she started shouting at the cop to stop. That led to her arrest, $100,000 bail (later reduced to $10,000), felony charges.
"ZERO TOLERANCE FOR PEACEFUL PROTEST"
After the big Sunday march, Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, was more upbeat than many of the veteran protesters with whom I spoke, saying that her group was "pleased" that it "went off with few incidents" and at "the level of cooperation from the New York Police Department who largely cooperated to resolve the logistical problems that are inevitable at any demonstration." She did complain about the arrests of cyclists in the march and of "harassment of legal monitors."
Two days later, however, on Tuesday, August 31, Lieberman felt the situation had degenerated with the mass arrest of protesters at the World Trade Center, which she labeled "a clear example of a 'bait and switch operation' by the NYPD. They misled marchers into believing they would be allowed to march on the sidewalk, and then arrested them indiscriminately after they began to march. This example of zero tolerance for peaceful protest is unacceptable. Such action by the NYPD effectively stifles political debate at a time when people most want their voices heard."
By Thursday, United for Peace and Justice was out protesting again, this time against what they called the "appalling" conditions at Pier 57, a former bus garage being used as a detention center for arrestees during the convention. "Most people have to sleep on the filthy and possibly toxic floor," the group said in a statement. "Arrestees have gone for many hours without access to food, water, phones, or lawyers." Gotham Gazette blogger Jon Winklemantalked about his harrowing experience in detention for 44 hours.
Inside the convention hall, some ACT UP protesters got in using credentials that they legally obtained. When they rose from their seats to voice their dissent, they were quickly subdued, pummeled and hustled out of the hall by security personnel and the Secret Service, while convention delegates chanted "Four more years!" to drown them out.
Republicans may not have wanted dissenters at their convention, but it is hard to say what crime the protesters committed. Nevertheless, the Manhattan District Attorney's office initially asked for felony charges of inciting a riot, assault, and trespass. It eventually offered to reduce the charges to minor "violations" and some of the protesters were offered Adjournments in Contemplation of Dismissal (basically a promise to dismiss the charges in exchange for good behavior), but they refused the offer, and are prepared to go to trial to achieve full acquittal.
By contrast, I recall that, as a Democratic delegate in 1984, I joined some other Jesse Jackson delegates in heckling Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young for speaking against an affirmative action plank. Former Rep. Bella Abzug, who was sitting in front of me, gave us a fierce tongue lashing for attacking a civil rights leader - but the Secret Service didn't tackle us!
REMEMBERING IN NOVEMBER?
The debate over the tactics the city used to contain protest during convention week will continue long past the president's acceptance speech and the November election - maybe to next year's mayoral election. Some of these issues are headed for the courts, since many of the arrested demonstrators will challenge the charges against them, and some are facing felony charges for arrests in incidents that involved injuries to police officers; more to the point, there likely will be a rash of civil suits charging the city with illegal detention.
It was in the courts that Mayor Rudy Giuliani had his sails trimmed several times he tried to limit protest, especially in front of and around City Hall. The only other counterweight to a mayor and police department determined to limit the right to protest is a City Council willing to write new laws that would rein in the executive and police. But while City Council members plan oversight hearings and hold numerous press conferences condemning police excesses, they have not passed their own "Right to Protest Bill" that would give some teeth to the right to protest in New York.
Not having such protection did make a difference. Exiting the massive march at 34th Street, Caroline Perez of Brooklyn said, "I know a lot of people who didn't come because they were scared-of police, chaos, or because they were immigrants. It says a lot."
Meanwhile, a large group of the protesters went to Central Park's Great Lawn anyway after the march, without incident (but also without a rally). One of these was Roger Donley of Houston, Texas. "When Bush was governor of Texas, people were told they couldn't protest outside the governor's mansion any more," he recalled. "If we don't have the freedom to express ourselves here in New York, we don't have it anywhere in the country."
Andy Humm is a former member of the City Commission on Human Rights. He is co-host of the weekly "Gay USA" on Manhattan Neighborhood Network (34 on Time-Warner; 107 on RCN) on Thursdays at 11 PM.
The Right to Protest in a City Under Terrorist Threat
At the Democratic National Convention in Boston most protests were consigned to a "Free Speech Area"-a concrete pen under a railroad trestle. Many protesters avoided the pen entirely, finding creative ways to get their message out around town. But in the end, despite preparations for an onslaught of protests, relatively few materialized in Boston. Demonstrators either gave the Democrats a pass or are saving their time and energy for New York where the Republican National Convention convenes at the end of August.
Scores of protests are scheduled in conjunction with the Republican convention and most have been given the permits they asked for from the New York Police Department. The gay Summer of Love '04 Concert for Equality, prompted by President George W. Bush's push for the Federal Marriage Amendment to the US constitution banning same-sex marriage, did not get the Saturday, August 28 date organizers sought nor the Great Lawn site in Central Park. The celebrity-studded concert is now set for Wednesday, August 25 in the park's East Meadow.
The massive march planned by United for Peace and Justiceagainst the Iraq war did get the Sunday, August 29 date it wanted and will be able to march past the (empty) Madison Square Garden that is the site of the convention, but demonstrators were denied the opportunity to hold their rally on the Great Lawn. (It will proceed south and end up on the West Side Highway near Chambers St.) Civil libertarians complained that concert-goers are able to use the Great Lawn while demonstrators are not, but United for Peace and Justice decided not to pursue their claim in court, anxious to being publicizing their secured route, since they expect as many as 250,000 as demonstrators from around the world.
The New York Civil Liberties Union was in court to try to stop the police from penning in demonstrators with metal barricades or using other tactics the group sees as overly restrictive. They secured a favorable decision [In PDF Format] from federal Judge Robert Sweet limiting unreasonable searches of backpacks at the demonstrations that was assailed by the Daily News as "nutso" and praised by El Diarioas "an act of sanity." Sweet subsequently modified his order to allow searches if there is a "probability of a threat to public safety and a determination that blanket searches could reduce the threat." In his initial order, Sweet said the city would have to demonstrate a "specific threat" to conduct the searches.
In addition to the heightened security in New York in the run-up to the Republican convention, the city began the month of August with a threat of attack by Al Qaeda against "corporations or other large public institutions," the New York Timesreported. It was not enough for Homeland Security to raise the city's terror alert from orange, the second-highest level where we've been since the color-coded system was devised, but was specific enough for sites such as the Stock Exchange to be cited in the alert as possible targets. The city has the option of raising the level to red.
Bloomberg Against Using Shareholder Power to Secure Corporate Non-Discrimination Policies
Mayor Mike Bloomberg continued in July to try to stop New York City from using its purchasing and stockholder power to protect private employees from discrimination. Bloomberg criticized City Comptroller William Thompsonfor using the city's ownership of shares in Winn-Dixie supermarkets to persuade the company to adopt a policy banning discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. City and state comptrollers have pushed socially conscious shareholder resolutions for decades and Thompson was joined in the Winn-Dixie effort by Bloomberg's own City Finance Commissioner, Martha Stark, who also leads the New York City Employees' Retirement System and the Teachers' Retirement System, the New York Sun reported.
When Winn-Dixie agreed to the non-discrimination policy in mid-July, Stark said in a release, "Through these pension funds, we will continue to press Winn-Dixie and other companies to guarantee equal employment opportunity for all of their employees - it's good business practice and the decent thing to do. Our effort to modernize the employment policies of the companies in which New York City pension funds invest will continue until they all join Winn-Dixie in guaranteeing equal opportunity in the workplace."
Bloomberg told the Sun that he supports the goal of ending discrimination based on sexual orientation, but "I don't think we should be using the City's investment policies‚ to advance social goals, now matter how admirable those goals are and no matter how much I believe in it."
Ken Sylvester, Assistant Comptroller for Pension Policy, believes that "promoting anti-discrimination policies helps strengthen a corporation and, therefore, protects the pension funds' investment," in addition to protecting the company from lawsuits, the Sun said.
In June, Bloomberg vetoed the City Council's Equal Benefits Billthat requires City contractors to provide domestic partner benefits to their employees if they provide spousal benefits. The Council overrode that veto, but the mayor has said he will "probably" pursue legal action to stop implementation of the law, which is in place in some five cities, starting with San Francisco in 1997.
Bloomberg Vetoes Anti-Bullying Bill
On July 20, Mayor Bloomberg vetoed the Dignity in All Schools Actthat requires the schools to take more action to reduce bullying in the schools. The Council has scheduled a veto override vote for August 12. The mayor says that existing regulations provide the schools with enough power to deal with bullying and harassment, although the Council Act includes protections based on "gender identity," which State Education Law does not. The mayor's veto message said that keeping the schools safe for all students was a "high priority" for him and Chancellor Joel Klein.
The Gay City Newsreported in negotiations between the City Council and the Department of Education, the department "did not fulfill promises to produce satisfying evidence that it monitors bullying and harassment in schools."
Bloomberg says he does support a long-stalled similar bill in the state legislature. "It is an outrage that Mayor Bloomberg can support nearly identical language in legislation pending in Albany while vetoing this very necessary bill," Council Member Alan Gerson (D-Lower Manhattan), the bill's sponsor, told the Gay City News.
Update on Accessible Taxis
The vast majority of City Council members have expressed sentiment in favor of making all new taxicabs that come into service accessible to people who use wheelchairs and 38 of them have sponsored a bill to mandate it, but the council leadership has yet to get behind the effort.
"We're frustrated about inaction from Speaker Gifford Miller and Council Transportation Chair John Liu on the accessible taxi issue," said Jean Ryan of the Taxis for All Campaign. "We've been meeting with Councilmember Liu for months and we still have no bill introduced in the City Council. Taxis use city streets that taxpayers pay to keep up, and yet people who use wheelchairs cannot take taxis. We pay taxes, too, and we need and deserve the same transportation options as everyone else."
Ryan said that information obtained from companies that convert minivans for use as taxis show that "the cost of wheelchair-accessible taxis were the same as or slightly more than the industry pays for sedans now" and that "federal tax incentives would reduce the cost even more."
Andy Humm is a former member of the City Commission on Human Rights. He is co-host of the weekly "Gay USA" on Manhattan Neighborhood Network (34 on Time-Warner; 107 on RCN) on Thursdays at 11 PM.