West Hollywood Law Would Expand Rights of Unmarried Couples

In an effort to broaden the rights of West Hollywood’s homosexual population, Mayor Valerie Terrigno has introduced legislation that would allow unmarried couples to register their relationships with the city and provide medical insurance and other benefits to the unmarried partners of city employees.

The “domestic partnership” measure, which is similar to a law enacted by the Berkeley city government late last year, has been urged by homosexual activists as symbolic recognition of gay relationships. The bill’s supporters add that unmarried heterosexual couples and even unmarried senior citizens who live together could benefit from the law.

“The intention is to give some recognition to caring relationships between two people,” Terrigno said. “Allowing domestic partners to register is a way of saying that the relationship is equal to marriage in the eyes of the city.”

Under Terrigno’s definition, a domestic partnership could be registered with the city if a couple met 10 conditions, the most crucial being that the partners “share the common necessities of life” and are “responsible for each other’s welfare.”

Visitation Rights

Terrigno said she would like to see provisions protecting domestic partners from rent increases if they moved in together and granting them visitation rights in jails and hospitals.

But Terrigno and supporters of the plan were careful to add that any partnership registration probably would have little legal or financial impact. “I don’t think it would have much value in court,” Terrigno said.

The bill was received favorably at a council meeting last week, but questions raised by several council members about the definition of a domestic partner indicate that the measure may undergo some changes.

Councilman Steve Schulte objected to Terrigno’s definition. He suggested that domestic partners be required to live together for a period of time before they are allowed to register with the city “to show that they have some kind of commitment.”

Terrigno opposed a time limit. “Heterosexual couples have been known to get married on a whim,” she said. “What does it matter whether people have known each other for six minutes or six months?”

Terrigno also said that domestic partners need not be living together to register, drawing an objection from Councilman Alan Viterbi. “I would hate to see this used to provide benefits to anyone who is not a true dependent,” he said.

Senior citizen activists say that elderly unmarried couples who live together to pool financial resources and look after each other might qualify as domestic partners.

“You hear a lot of seniors complaining that when they move in together in an apartment, the landlord raises their rent,” said Janet Witkin, the executive director of Alternative Living for the Aged, a group that encourages the elderly to live together as an alternative to old-age homes. “If they had the same rights as a married couple, they might be able to protect themselves against that.”

The bill, however, is primarily aimed at West Hollywood’s homosexual population. Besides the measure’s symbolic value, Terrigno said it could also help male homosexuals who have been unable in the past to visit lovers hospitalized for AIDS.

Search for Insurance Firm

“I’ve heard of all kinds of horror stories about people who were not allowed in to visit their partners because they were not immediate family,” she said. “One of the provisions of the bill would give domestic partners the same visitation rights that married couples get.”

The bill would have even greater impact on the lives of unmarried West Hollywood city government employees. Terrigno said a city commission on financial benefits is already searching for an insurance firm that would be willing to provide medical and dental coverage to domestic partners as well as married couples.

Finding such an open-minded insurance company may not be easy. Berkeley City Manager Daniel Boggan Jr. said he is still trying to find such a firm. The Berkeley domestic partnership law, passed last December, covers 1,200 city employees.

Boggan said if insurance companies are not willing to insure Berkeley’s unmarried city employees, the city could provide its own self-insurance coverage. But Boggan admitted that Berkeley’s city government would prefer an outside insurer. “It would give our employees more choices, certainly,” he said.

The situation is less urgent in West Hollywood, where council members expect to take their time studying the measure before putting it to a vote.

“We’re certainly favorable to the concept,” Councilman John Heilman said. “I think there are a lot of details that have to be worked out and I’d like to hear what the public thinks.”