S.F. Law Recognizes Unmarried Partners

San Francisco became the first city in the country Monday to grant official public recognition to homosexual and unmarried heterosexual couples.

Mayor Art Agnos signed the landmark law, calling it “one of the most important milestones in San Francisco’s effort to adopt policies to recognize the diversity of families and to extend to all people in our city the basic human right to form families of their choice.”

Agnos also appointed a “Task Force on Family Policy” to determine guidelines for allowing unmarried city workers to add partners, adult children and extended family members to the city’s health plan.

Though denounced by leaders of the city’s Roman Catholic Church as an attack on marriage and the traditional family, the new law won the unanimous support of the Board of Supervisors before going to Agnos for his signature.