Gay, Lesbian Couples Get ‘Partnered’ in San Francisco : Proposition K: Hundreds take advantage of the new law on Valentine’s Day to formalize their relationships.

With the debut of a landmark new law, hundreds of gay and lesbian couples celebrated Valentine’s Day here by doing the next best thing to getting married.

They got partnered.

For the first time ever Thursday, the pairs could swap rings, flowers and kisses in a short civil ceremony, plunk down a $35 fee and walk away with purple and white certificates of domestic partnership.

Like marriage, the ritual--simply referred to as “partnering” by some organizers--is usually accompanied by the exchange of vows.

Under Proposition K, a domestic partnership measure adopted by voters, same-sex and non-traditional couples are permitted to formalize their relationships, but do not get any of the legal benefits of marriage.

To qualify for a domestic partnership certificate, a couple must declare that they share living expenses and have lived together for half a year.

The law went into effect on Valentine’s Day, the busiest day of the year for civil marriages. Proponents of the measure said the timing was coincidental, but recruited volunteers to direct the 325 non-traditional couples who flooded City Hall on Thursday.

“It couldn’t have happened on a better day,” said Kurt Barrie, an aide to Supervisor Harry Britt, the sponsor of Proposition K.

An elaborate late-afternoon ceremony ended the day, with dozens of couples descending the stairs of the City Hall rotunda, many of them proudly holding aloft their new certificates as an announcer introduced them, two by two.

Britt, speaking to a crowd of about 500 supporters gathered below in the atrium, compared the day to an “important event for the American family.”

“The American family must not be an institution of fear, but an institution of care and understanding,” Britt said. “The lesbian and gay family is not an abstraction--it’s you.”

Although the first day of registration drew a large turnout of homosexual couples, there also were a few non-traditional heterosexual couples among the applicants.

“Marriage is something we don’t want,” said Meredith Nielsen, waiting for her certificate with her partner, Hal Danielsen. “It’s nice to be in a city that feels the same way about traditional couples as they do about non-traditional couples.”

Danielsen nodded, adding: “I don’t want to have a wife. I don’t want to be a husband.”

F. Joseph Leonard of San Francisco said he took the day off to fill out the paperwork to recognize his relationship with his companion, Rick E. Campoy. He called Proposition K “a step in the right direction” but added that he would someday like to see marriage legalized for same-sex couples.

“We’ve already got wedding gifts,” he said, smiling at Campoy. Both men plan to have their last names legally changed--his to F. Joseph Leonard-Campoy, his partner’s to Rick E. Campoy-Leonard.

Across the room, at another table, Mari Coates and Monica Rosenthal were poring over two pink and white forms used to declare the partnership.

“I’m nervous,” Coates said. “This is a public acknowledgement of a relationship. It’s a powerful statement.”

The declaration was made somewhat easier, Coates said, by the tolerance and support of local voters. “Thank God for San Francisco,” she said.