It’s no coincidence that the theme of this year’s St. Pete Pride celebration is “Family.” While Pride is often linked to a large-scale street party, a promenade, parties and plenty of shirtless men and bikini-clad women, St. Pete Pride has taken extensive measures to make sure families are welcome at its celebration.
For the past few years, a children’s play area has been available to families, and children nestled comfortably in strollers have become commonplace along Central Avenue.
But beyond that there’s a war raging in Florida against a 1977 law banning gay men and lesbians from adopting children in this state.
The law has been challenged in recent years thanks to rulings by several judges who have deemed the adoption ban unconstitutional. But the battle to repeal it is far from over. A war, of sorts, has been waged on two fronts, one with a much greater potential for success than the other.
Both the courts and the state legislature are involved.
The legal side
Florida is the only state in the nation which specifically prohibits gay men and lesbians from adopting children. It is a law which dates back to 1977 when then-beauty queen Anita Bryant crusaded to stop any and all measures to afford gay people mainstream rights.
Florida does allow gay men and lesbians to serve as foster parents, however, and recent rulings against the adoption ban give LGBT activists hope.
“We have a very good shot at ending the ban,” said Nadine Smith, executive director of Equality Florida. “The ACLU has done a great job demonstrating that there is no scientific or rational basis for Florida’s adoption ban.”
Smith is referring to the ACLU’s representation of Martin Gill, a 47-year-old flight attendant who, along with his partner, is seeking to adopt two brothers who were placed in his foster care by the Department of Health and Human Services in 2004. In this case, the state had begged Gill to take the two half brothers, ages 5 and 9, under his foster care on a Christmas Eve. Gill had been a registered foster parent for some time. At the time the children were placed under Gill’s care they were in extreme distress, according to Smith.
Today the boys have many friends in their North Miami neighborhood, are doing well in school, and are close with the couple’s extended family, which includes two doting grandmothers. A psychologist who evaluated the boys recommended that it would be in the boys’ best interest to be adopted by Gill, testifying that it would be devastating for the boys to remove them from the home.
In November 2008, Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Cindy Lederman found the Florida law to be unconstitutional and ordered the state to allow Gill and his partner to legally adopt the half brothers. Gill and his partner were lauded as exemplary foster parents by Department of Children and Families workers who testified at the trial.
“These children are thriving,” said Circuit Judge Cindy S. Lederman. “These words we don’t often hear within these walls. That’s uncontroverted. They’re a good family. They’re a family in every way except in the eyes of the law. These children have a right to permanency. There is no rational basis to preclude homosexuals from adopting.”
Lederman’s 31-page ruling in the Gill case was quickly appealed by the State of Florida to the Third District Court of Appeals. The court heard the case in August 2009 and a ruling is expected this summer. Many close to the case, however, feel that the ruling may be withheld in hopes that the issue is taken up by the legislature.
Florida never challenged Gill’s abilities as a parent or rebutted the idea that removing the boys from his care would be emotionally devastating to them. Instead, it defended the law. Florida Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Bill McCullum has said he will do all he can to defend the law.
Recently, a scandal involving George A. Rekers, a Southern Baptist minister who testified in defense of the law, broke in South Florida. The founding board member of the Family Research Council allegedly toured Europe with a male escort. The man who accompanied Rekers alleges that he paid him to provide sensual body robs in the nude.
Lederman had scathing words for Rekers. His testimony “was far from a neutral and unbiased recitation of the relevant scientific evidence,” she wrote. “Dr. Rekers’ beliefs are motivated by his strong ideological and theological convictions. … The court cannot consider his testimony to be credible nor worthy of forming the basis of public policy.”
The ACLU of Florida remains confident in Gill’s case.
“From the outset, the State was in a weird position,” says Robert F. Rosenwald, Jr. the ACLU attorney. “It only got more complicated when they tried to find experts. They were looking for serious scientists. They were told no serious scientists would testify on their behalf.”
Rosenwald, who is also the director of the ACLU’s LGBT Advocacy Project, said that he and his team put on the best case that science had to offer and refuted every one of the “bizarre rationales” offered by the State to support the ban.
“A positive decision in the intermediate appellate court would mean that we are one step closer to getting rid of this shameful law that treats gay people like second class citizens and denies homes to children who desperately need them,” Rosenwald said.
If the appellate court rules in favor of Gill, an argument on appeal which might overturn the ban completely will then be heard by the Florida Supreme Court.
A second case pending in South Florida involves a lesbian couple seeking to adoptIn addition, a lower court in Key West found the Florida adoptions ban unconstitutional and allowed Wayne Smith, an openly gay man, to adopt. Since that lower court decision has not been appealed, an openly gay person in Florida has already been allowed to adopt a child by the court in specific defiance of the law.
Lawmakers vs. Public Opinion
Many lawmakers who are battling the adoption ban say that too many fellow lawmakers are reluctant to even hear arguments against it, despite growing public opposition to the law.
“There has been a bill introduced to repeal the ban every year I have been in the state legislature, which means the last four years,” said Rick Kriseman (D-St. Petersburg), “but the bills haven’t even been heard in committee. As long as we have the current very conservative makeup of both the House and the Senate up here in Tallahassee, it is very unlikely that repeal of the ban will even be considered by lawmakers.”
Two recent bills, SB 102 and HB 3, were introduced by Sen. Nan Rich (D-Sunrise) and Rep. Mary Brandenburg (D-West Palm Beach to repeal the adoption ban. Nan said she has introduced a bill into each session for at least the past six or seven years.
Rich agreed with Kriseman, saying repealing the law would be difficult with the current legislature in place.
“The one time that the issue was aired in committee in 2006, there was overwhelming evidence from families, child advocacy groups, mental health professionals, and others that sexual orientation has no bearing whatsoever on whether and individual is qualified to be a parent or not,” Rich said. Rich herself has a long list of accolades as a child advocate. She was awarded the Outstanding Community Partner Award in 2009 by the Department of Children and Families. In 2007 she received the Legislative Voice for Children Award by the Florida Guardian Ad Litem Association.
“A lot of members of the current legislature are bound up in ideology or their own personal religious beliefs,” said Rich. “The people of Florida are way ahead of them on this issue. The more people get to know families that are non-traditional in nature, including LGBT parents, the more they see that sexual orientation has nothing to do with whether you are a good parent.”
Equality Florida has led the fight to overturn the ban in the legislature. In 2004, Equality Florida was successful in getting the first bill aimed at repealing Florida’s anti-gay adoption ban introduced. Senator Mandy Dawson agreed to sponsor the bill and the Senate President Jim King has spoken publicly opposing the ban.
“In 2006, we introduced two bills, one that would repeal the ban outright and one that would make it possible for foster parents who are already raising children to become permanent adoptive parents,” Smith said. “The 2006 bill came within one vote of passing its first senate committee before the Senate president ordered the measure ‘tabled,’ essentially killing the measure.”
According to Smith, public opinion polls show that 55% of Floridians are in favor of repealing of the ban.
“Equality Florida has organized to bring families to Tallahassee to put a human face on ending this ugly policy,” said Smith.
Recent studies show that about 22,000 Florida children are in state custody, with more than 4,000 of them eligible for adoption. Only two states have more foster children waiting to be adopted.
Smith encourages members of the LGBT community to get involved with the ongoing fight.
