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Financial firm to push Ga.-based AFLAC to include domestic partner benefits

The Georgia Voice Editors
Georgia
0

AFLAC

Trillium Asset Management will introduce a shareholder proposal on behalf of Equity Foundation of Portland, Ore., at a May 7 meeting to press AFLAC to change its corporate policy to begin allowing domestic partnership benefits for same-sex couples.

Jonas Kron, a vice president with Trillium, said today that the proposal is mostly symbolic, but he hopes the insurance company's board will take note of the importance of providing domestic partnership benefits to same-sex couples.

Aetna, AIG, Chubb, The Hartford, ING North America, MetLife, Nationwide, Unum, State Farm, Wellpoint, Humana, and Cigna all provide domestic partnership benefits, Kron says. AFLAC does not.

By the numbers: Same-sex marriage in America

The Georgia Voice Editors
National
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80,000

Estimated legally married same-sex couples in the United States.

30,000

Legally married gay couples in the United States who wed in other countries.

85,000

Estimated same-sex couples in legally recognized civil unions or domestic partnerships.

29

States that have amended their state constitutions to ban gay marriage.

40

Percent of the U.S. population that resides in a jurisdiction that offers gay couples some form of state-level protection. Georgia does not.

Facebook relationship status update: In a Civil Union

The Georgia Voice Editors
Culture
0

Facebook — where you can read all about the ups and downs of people's relationships — is now adding "In a Civil Union" and "In a Domestic Partnership" to its relationship statuses.

Some LGBT people are able to record their relationships as "married" because they've been married in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, New Hampshire, Vermont, or Washington, D.C ,  the few states that have legalized same-sex marriage.

But now in a move for more inclusivity, Facebook is adding more options for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people who can't legally married but are in legal relationships.

Savannah approves domestic partner benefits

The Georgia Voice Editors
Georgia
0

Georgia Equality's Kevin Clark

The Savannah City Council voted unanimously last week to authorize the city manager to implement a domestic partner program for city employees. The vote was approved by the nine-member council at its Oct. 7 meeting.

Kevin Clark, chair of the Savannah chapter of Georgia Equality, said about 25 LGBT community activists attended the meeting.

“There was an outburst of enthusiastic applause after the vote,” he said shortly after the vote. “This is a historic and proud day for the city of Savannah.”

Republican commercials get nasty

The Georgia Voice Editors
Politics
0

Not to be outdone by his competitors, Nathan Deal, a republican candidate for Georgia governor, decided to put out his own campaign commercial degrading Karen Handel for her past stated support of domestic partner benefits and adoption rights for gay couples.

Gov. candidate Karen Handel dogged by past gay support

The Georgia Voice Editors
Georgia
0

The gay Republican activist who stated in a 2003 interview that Karen Handel supports gay adoption and domestic partner benefits told the Georgia Voice that he stands by the quote, and provided email exchanges with the GOP politician that show her desire to win gay support.

Meanwhile, another gay Republican leader noted that the staff of Nathan Deal, who is attacking Handel on gay issues as they battle in the GOP primary for governor, welcomed and helped him when he visited Washington, D.C., for the gay Log Cabin Republicans national conference.

“We will be continuing our support for Karen Handel,” Marc Yeager, then-president of the Georgia Log Cabin Republicans, told Southern Voice newspaper in an article published Aug. 15, 2003. “She demonstrated in her last run that she was supportive of domestic partner benefits, and she’s supported same-sex adoptions on the basis of the best interest of the child.”