News
2008-04-04
Kansas City
Passes Transgender Protections
The Kansas City,
Mo., city council voted to extend antidiscrimination
laws to protect expressions of gender identity. Council
mem
The Kansas City,
Mo., city council voted to extend antidiscrimination
laws to protect expressions of gender identity. Council
member Beth Gottstein, the measure's primary sponsor,
said that though she expected some resistance, it
was time to pass the measure.
"If our city code
doesn’t protect everyone, it protects no one,"
she said in a statement Thursday released by the Human
Rights Campaign. "I am proud that we have taken this
action to make clear that no one in Kansas City should
have to face discrimination."
Mayor Mark
Funkhouser said in a statement on Wednesday that he would
support signing the measure into law because sexual identity
should be covered just as race, religion, gender, and
sexual orientation are currently in the city.
“Perhaps
it was an oversight that gender identity was not included in
the original legislation. If so, it was a mistake that
we must now right,” he stated, according to TheKansas City Star. “The rights protected
by these laws ought to be extended to all
people.”
Kansas City will
join more than 90 municipalities, 12 states, and
Washington, D.C., in providing such protection. (The
Advocate)
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