Council retreats from anti-discrimination updates
The Sioux Falls City Council indefinitely tabled a pair of proposals Tuesday that would have expanded the city's anti-discrimination laws.
The measures would have banned the city from discriminating against transgender people in its internal hiring decisions, and made it a city offense for private employers, landlords or business owners to discriminate against lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender people.
City Councilor Christine Erickson made a motion to withdraw the proposals at the request of City Attorney David Pfeifle, who originally pitched the changes earlier this year but reversed course last week, citing conversations with Attorney General Marty Jackley.
The votes were 6-1 and 5-2, with Michelle Erpenbach the sole councilor seeking to keep both items on the agenda.
“I can’t tell you when or if it will come back. There’s nothing hidden in there. I don’t have any feet crossed, no hands crossed, nothing,” Mayor Mike Huether told a crowded Carnegie Town Hall just before the vote.
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Pfeifle cited South Dakota's probable involvement in a multi-state lawsuit against the federal government over its interpretation that Title IV laws guarantee transgender students the right to use the bathroom of their choice, whether based on their biological sex or gender identity.
The directive to school districts threatened a loss of funding if the directive wasn’t followed. A similar executive order in 2014 instructed cities to revise their Equal Employment Opportunity policies or face consequences, which initially prompted the city attorney's proposal.
Jackley said last week if the court deems President Obama’s directive to schools was an overreach, conceivably, the executive order of 2014 could also be an overreach.
LGBT people and their advocates questioned the city's rationale for pulling the proposals, saying that strengthening local anti-discrimination laws would have no bearing on the state’s case.
“None of this has anything to do with whether you choose to do the right thing,” All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church Rev. David Kraemer told the Council, urging members to ignore the City Attorney and pass the proposals anyway.
The crux of the issue in the multi-state lawsuit is the bathroom accommodations. The letter stipulates schools must allow transgender students to use the bathroom of their choice, and, under Jackley's interpretation, prohibits a school district from establishing separate bathrooms for transgender students.
“The president’s policy foreclosed other options,” Jackley said.
Erickson, who proposed removing the proposals from the agenda, could not be reached for comment following the meeting.
Councilor Pat Starr, who unsuccessfully offered a substitute motion to defer action until January 2017, said he took his cue to support the city employment measure from Sioux Falls voters, who in April overwhelmingly approved adding sexual identity to the list of protected classes in the city charter.
“With 75 percent of the citizens of Sioux Falls voting for adding sexual orientation as a protected class during our last city election … I think the people who testified at least deserve a date when we could discuss in the future,” he said. “I’m shocked that the rest of the council didn’t want to have a discussion.”
HOW THEY VOTED
To withdraw revision to City Hall employment policy: Yes-Christine Erickson, Greg Neitzert, Theresa Stehly, Rick Kiley, Marshall Selberg; No-Pat Starr, Michelle Erpenbach
To withdraw revision to city-wide anti-discrimination policy: Yes: Erickson, Stehly, Neitzert, Kiley, Selberg, Starr; No-Michelle Erpenbach