Atlanta banishment legislation dropped; task force to study prostitution issues
In a work session today, the Atlanta City Council’s Public Safety Committee dropped the proposed banishment ordinance targeting prostitutes and decided to instead form a task force to study the root causes of sex work.
Proposed by Atlanta Police Chief George Turner, the “banishment ordinance” could bar convicted prostitutes from “areas of prostitution,” or even from the entire city after a second prostitution conviction.
Atlanta Bar Association comes out in support of gay marriage
The Atlanta Bar Association voted unanimously this month to sign on to an amicus brief — a legal brief filed by a person or group that is not a party in the case but has a strong interest in it — urging the U.S. Supreme Court strike down Prop 8 in California and allow for legal marriages of same-sex couples.
The Atlanta Bar Association’s board of directors, which has one openly gay member, is one of numerous non-LGBT bar organizations and other groups recruited to support marriage equality and ask the nation’s highest court to rule against Prop 8 by lawyers in California with the Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP firm with offices in Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Angel Poventud hopes to revitalize Adair Park with his home as a community hub
For Angel Poventud, what began as a home renovation project in October 2011 has become a vision for a full-blown community revitalization effort in southwest Atlanta.
“I really believed that I would be living in the house within six, at most nine, months,” Poventud says after providing a tour of his ongoing project.
March could be key month for gay marriage across the nation
The United States Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in two separate same-sex marriage cases in late March.
Arguments on Proposition 8, California’s constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages, are scheduled to be heard March 26, while arguments on the Defense of Marriage Act, the 1996 law that forbids the federal government from recognizing same-sex unions, will be heard the following day.
School funding anti-discrimination bill introduced in Ga. House
A bill to prohibit state tax dollars from going to private schools that discriminate against students, including LGBT students, has been introduced in the Georgia House by lesbian state Reps. Simone Bell (D-Atlanta) and Mary Margaret Oliver (D-Decatur).
House Bill 456 was introduced Feb. 22. State Rep. Spencer Frye (D-Athens) was an original co-sponsor of the bill with Rep. Bell. He said while he is no longer a co-sponsor he still supports the bill “100 percent.”