Conservative group to push transgender bathroom bill

The leader of a conservative state advocacy group Wednesday said he plans to bring another so-called transgender bathroom bill in 2017.

Dale Bartscher, executive director of the Family Heritage Alliance, said the conservative Christian group approved a draft of a bill last week that would bar transgender students from using the bathroom, locker room or shower room if it doesn't match their biological gender at birth. The bill calls for schools to offer accommodations for "students with unique privacy needs, including transgender students."

While details of the legislation, including which legislator would carry it, weren't firm Wednesday, Bartscher said it was important to bring the debate back to the Legislature. He said he hopes it could be approved there sooner than at the ballot box, where voters could have a chance to weigh in on the issue in 2018.

“Quite frankly, we don’t want to see any initiated measure in 2018, we want to see the Legislature approve it and the governor sign it,” Bartscher told Argus Leader Media. “This issue is on the front burner for a lot of South Dakotans."

The South Dakota Legislature approved a bill similar to the draft Bartscher hopes to bring, House Bill 1008, but Gov. Dennis Daugaard vetoed it.

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Civil liberties and LGBT advocacy groups in the state have already begun campaigns to quash such a bill. The American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota, the Center for Equality and Human Rights Watch have launched fundraising campaigns ahead of the legislative session and have worked to raise awareness about the obstacles that transgender students already face in school.

Heather Smith, executive of the ACLU of South Dakota, said the organization is prepared to fight against any legislation that it sees as discriminatory against the LGBT community.

"We are especially prepared to fight any shameful legislation like HB 1008 that singles out vulnerable children for isolation, bullying, and harassment in schools," Smith said. "Legislation like HB 1008 is nothing more than a shameful attempt to enshrine discrimination into state law, and that’s simply not in keeping with South Dakota values."

Terri Bruce, a transgender rights advocate from Rapid City, said lawmakers should consider the additional bullying that could result for transgender students under a proposed bill as well as the possible ramifications for the state's budget.

"South Dakota depends on state sales tax revenue to run the state, if our state enacts some law that targets trans kids, there is going to be an economic backlash," Bruce said. "And we just have to ask ourselves, 'Why are we targeting children?'"

Bartscher said the group was also planning to bring resolutions opposing efforts to legalize medically-assisted suicide and declaring that pornography is creating a "public health crisis." 

A Box Elder man, Jack Heyd, recently began circulating petitions to put a transgender bathroom law on the South Dakota ballot in 2018.

In North Carolina, legislators were called back into a special session Wednesday to consider repealing a similar measure approved earlier this year.

Follow Dana Ferguson on Twitter @bydanaferguson, call (605) 370-2493 or email dferguson@argusleader.com

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