University Sweeps Away UCI’s Domestic Revolution

UC Irvine’s quiet little experiment with domestic partnerships is over.

Domestic partnership, if you have never heard the term, is a radical concept. It means that people in stable, amorous relationships, regardless of their sex, deserve the same legal rights as married couples.

At UCI, for the last year and a half, it meant that committed gay couples, as well as unmarried heterosexual couples, could live together in married student housing as long as one of them was attending the university.

For reasons of economics and convenience, this was a big deal. A two-bedroom apartment at the university’s Verano Place, within easy walking distance of classrooms, rents for less than $600 a month. In Irvine, that’s cheap.

For reasons of fairness and consistency, it was an even bigger deal. It meant that the university, albeit quasi-officially, recognized that same-sex couples are entitled to more than a paper declaration of equality.

Unlike the city of Irvine, where the recent passage of Measure N removed gays and lesbians from protection granted by a human rights ordinance, University of California regulations bar discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

But there are exceptions, at UC Irvine and the other eight UC campuses. Where the law discriminates against gays, such as in the military and by denying them a marriage license, so too may UC.

That’s a message that UC Irvine has now made perfectly clear.

Beginning immediately, the university will no longer allow unmarried couples to apply as a family to rent at Verano Place. Only non-traditional families that can prove a blood tie--i.e. brothers, sisters, cousins, in-laws and the like--will have that right.

Has this decision been made because unmarried couples have abused the university’s largess? Not at all.

Since the pilot program began in September, 1988, just 11 non-traditional families have applied and all of them--three lesbian couples, four cases of siblings, three adult children with their parents and one extended family--have been accepted.

And everyone involved with the program--from Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Horace Mitchell to housing administrators to non-traditional and traditional renters--has told me that there were no glitches.

The reason for the change, quite simply, is politics. The University of California is afraid.

“There have been discussions at the level of the Council of Chancellors about the appropriateness of housing gay and lesbian couples in married student housing,” Mitchell told me. “And that group has consistently reaffirmed that it is not the policy of the university to allow gays and lesbians in married student housing. . . .

“There are general concerns, about spousal benefits, life insurance, a whole range of benefits that the university provides. The university said that it is not in a position to make that kind of decision without the courts acting first.”

What that means, essentially, is that small concessions to gays and lesbians may lead to larger ones, involving money that UC is not willing to spend.

“It can be inferred,” Mitchell said when I ran that theory by him. “We went first and nobody followed, and the very clear message was that our going was not consistent with university policy.”

And what that means, UCI’s gays say, is betrayal.

“There is no safe place for lesbians and gays,” said Chris Browning, a psychologist at UCI’s counseling center who is a chairman of Chancellor Jack W. Peltason’s Advisory Committee on Gays and Lesbians.

“This is supposed to be an enlightened atmosphere. Here was just a tiny, tiny scrap, and they took that away too.”

Graduate student Randy Kerr, a member of the Chancellor’s Think Tank on Diversity--which has recommended that the university afford domestic partners the same benefits as married couples--said: “I feel very angry. . . . We smile and we shake hands, and then we turn our backs and the chancellor kicks us in the ass. . . .

“I don’t think I’m overstating the real psychological and emotional damage done by this decision. What the university is saying is that our relationships are not real. Lesbian and gay couples only stay together because we love each other. It’s not because of children or family pressure. This really hurts.”

And after the passage of Irvine’s Measure N, added one lesbian couple granted a Verano Place apartment as part of the pilot program, the implications of the university’s decision seem particularly damning.

“I sort of feel betrayed by the city,” one of the women said. “I never thought this was a liberal place, but I didn’t expect this. I don’t feel very safe here in general. This is one more thing, part of a depressing trend.”

UCI says it will not evict the three lesbian couples already installed in married student housing and stresses that there is nothing to prevent two full-time students from living as roommates on campus, regardless of their involvement.

But, clearly, the university administration and its gay students, faculty and staff members are not even talking the same language. The chancellor, for instance, seems to deny that the pilot program ever existed and insists that there is no discrimination against gays at UCI.

“The administration’s policy has always been that housing at the university campus is for students and their dependents, as defined by the laws of the state,” Peltason told me. “It was never meant for same-sex couples. When I was asked to accept a domestic partnership as the equivalent of a marriage certificate, I said we cannot do that.”

The University of California says that it is not in the business of defining family. But by denying that title to gays, I think they already are.