Benefits for Unmarried Partners Lauded : Health: Measure would extend medical and dental coverage to domestic partners of city employees. Proponents say cost will be negligible.

Ingrid Herda may not have any immediate plans to marry her partner, but she would like him to have the same health coverage as she does.

So she was pleased when three Los Angeles City Council members introduced an ordinance Tuesday that would extend medical benefits to the unmarried domestic partners of city employees--both heterosexual and gay.

“I’ve been waiting for this,” said Herda, a management analyst in the city’s Bureau of Sanitation. She sees no reason her partner should not be eligible for the same benefits provided to the spouses of her married co-workers. “Just because I choose to live with someone and not marry them--if we’re sharing everything in the household, it’s a partnership. . . . I don’t see that big a difference other than a piece of paper that makes one relationship legal and one not.”

The proposal, authored by Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg and seconded by Councilmen Zev Yaroslavsky and Richard Alarcon, would allow city employees who have lived with domestic partners for at least a year to obtain medical and dental coverage for them and any dependent children.

“We think it’s a small amount of money but a large step forward,” said Goldberg, the first openly gay member of the council.

Based on the experience of other cities that have adopted similar programs, proponents expect about 1% of the city employees to sign up for the extended benefits. That would add about $758,000 to the $21.6 million the city spends annually on spousal benefits (excluding the Department of Water and Power). A 1987 survey indicated that 4.2% of the city civilian work force lived with an unmarried partner.

Although Mayor Richard Riordan says he wants to study the proposal before taking a position, Council President John Ferraro says he expects the measure to pass. “We found out it’s a lifestyle that’s rather prevalent and I don’t think we can ignore it,” he said of unmarried couples. “I don’t think there’s any doubt it will pass.”

Saying he would support Goldberg’s proposal, Councilman Rudy Svorinich Jr. commented: “I don’t think the government needs to tell me who I should have my medical benefits cover. . . . This is an issue of health care, not an issue of domestic preference.”

The city has offered sick and bereavement leave to workers with domestic partners for several years, but a number of unions representing city employees have not written the benefit into their contracts. Henry W. Hurd, the city’s employee benefits administrator, says only about nine couples--two-thirds of them gay--have signed up for the leave.

Around the country, there is a slowly emerging trend of cities and private corporations extending benefits to unmarried partners, usually both gay and heterosexual. Surveys indicate that a relatively small percentage take advantage of the programs and that the majority of participants are usually heterosexual.

In Laguna Beach, which has offered medical benefits to domestic partners since 1990, 18 of about 200 city employees have signed up, according to the personnel department. Only one was gay. “We haven’t noticed any significant change in our claims experience,” said an employee.

In Seattle, where fewer than 5% of the city’s 10,000 employees have opted for partner benefits, the program has increased medical insurance costs by about 1% annually. Again, most of those participating (67%) are heterosexual.

“It’s certainly not an issue in the city anymore and it was front-page news for a year,” said Sally Fox, the city’s benefit manager. “It’s spreading and people are accepting it.”

If the benefits package is adopted in Los Angeles, local union representatives predicted, the response would be similarly restrained.

“My sense, from talking to my members and other people, is that there’s not going to be a huge amount of people who would sign up for it,” said Michelle Buehler of Local 347 of the Service Employees International Union, which represents about 6,500 city workers, mostly blue collar.

John Wyrough, executive director of Council 36 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said workers are still reluctant to reveal their personal relationships to their bosses, regardless of their sexual orientation. Further, he said, in many couples, both partners work and have their own insurance coverage.