Colleges’ domestic partner benefits still stalled

Jennifer Knight

Monday, Aug. 19, 2002 | 11:13 a.m.

When Maggie Tolan came to work for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in 1996, she took up a cause that she thought would have resulted in something by now.

After learning that her same-sex partner would not receive medical coverage and would pay thousands in out-of-state tuition to get her graduate degree at UNLV, she set out to get the same benefits as married employees.

Now nearly six years later the movement to get domestic partner benefits for university system employees is paralyzed. Existing state laws didn't allow for benefits. Committees within the system have stalled any decision and Question 2, a ballot initiative that would ban gay marriages in the Nevada Constitution, has made for an unwelcoming political climate.

"Given the nature of the current Legislature, I think we've pretty much been told to just wait," said Phil Pownall, UNLV coordinator of disability services. "We don't want to rock the boat tremendously."

When the issue first came to light in 1996, partly at Tolan's urging, it took three years to bubble up through the university system.

In 1999 faculty senates at the Community College of Southern Nevada and UNLV voted to support domestic partner benefits. It seemed like a big step forward for supporters. Since then the issue has languished in a Board of Regents' campus environment committee.

The committee first met on the issue in December 1999 to discuss the definition of a "partner."

In November 2000 the committee requested more information on what benefits regents were allowed to offer.

The issue came up in discussion another four times in 2001 with little movement.

Then on March 5 this year, after deciding that state laws made it impossible for the university system to extend health benefits, the committee voted to send it back to the campuses. Little has been heard about it since.

"It seems to have gotten bogged down either in the committee system or at the individual institutions," said Mary LaFrance, a professor at UNLV's Boyd School of Law. "It's frustrating."

LaFrance, who has been in a 10-year relationship, wants the comfort of knowing that she can extend benefits to her same-sex partner, if needed.

Most supporters of domestic partner benefits partly blame Question 2, which passed overwhelmingly in 2000 and is on the ballot a final time this November, for the lack of appetite by politicians to touch the issue.

"The Defense Against Marriage Act is undoing some of the work that we have done on this issue," said Linda Foreman, a Community College of Southern Nevada professor, who advocated for domestic partner benefits at her institution.

A "yes" vote on Question 2 would amend the state's Constitution to define marriage as only between a man and woman. It would also takes away any "privileges of marriage" or benefits for non-married couples, said Lauri Lipman Brown, executive board member for Equal Rights of Nevada, a committee attempting to fight the controversial ballot initiative.

"A lot of people were misled about Question 2," Brown said. "They thought it was about gay marriages. It was really about benefits."

Supporters of the initiative admit that is the case.

"Once you allow for a domestic partner benefit, there wouldn't be anyone out there who wouldn't apply for it," said Richard Ziser, chairman of the Coalition for the Protection of Marriage, an organization promoting Question 2.

Question 2 won by 69 percent in 2000. Ziser says the issue is still popular and people of faith are on his side.

"For the most part, I would say that most people of faith object to domestic partner benefits when it is their tax dollars that pay for a lifestyle that's against their beliefs."

Worries that a rush of people will sign up for benefits did not pan out nationally. Of the 152 universities and communities that offer domestic partner benefits, only 1 percent of the employee population sign up for them, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education.

"The costs would be nominal," Brown said. "That's a non-issue."

Recent cuts to university system budgets have changed that outlook, Jane Nichols, Nevada's higher education chancellor said.

"In this fiscal climate, it would almost be impossible to start a new initiative that would cost more money," Nichols said.

Nichols said that while universities and colleges may not be able to offer the state's health-care coverage to non-married couples, there are other benefits. Benefits like tuition coverage for domestic partners and other perks extended to married couples within the system are still a possibility.

"I think the board made a commitment to follow up on this," Nichols said. "I think we just need to prod them a little bit."

Tolan has since left her job at UNLV and the state. Her partner of seven years took a position in Arizona on an Indian reservation, where they are trying to enact benefits for domestic partners. She was also able to receive loan forgiveness for her tuition costs at UNLV.

Tolan says she has taken up advocating benefits for domestic partners at her current job at Arizona State University. But she lamented over the lack of progress at UNLV.

"It's disappointing," Tolan said. "I thought something would have come of it by now."