ABOVE: Watermark file photo by Dylan Todd.
HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. (AP) | Three North Carolina municipalities plan this week to discuss ordinances to expand more anti-discrimination protections to LGBTQ citizens.
Town boards for these Orange County communities have placed proposals on their agendas on successive nights, which began Jan. 11 in Hillsborough. Carrboro’s council meets Jan. 12 and Chapel Hill’s on Jan. 13.
LGBTQ rights groups say the ordinances, if enacted, would be the first approved since the General Assembly’s 3 1/2-year pause on such rules expired Dec. 1. These groups have urged their passage by towns and cities. The moratorium emerged from a compromise between Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper and Republican lawmakers to do away with the state’s 2016 “bathroom bill” related to transgender people.
The ordinances would make it unlawful within town limits for businesses to discriminate in employment and in offering goods and services to the public on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity and other differences. Some proposals would subject violators to misdemeanors and fines.
