A transgender ordinance introduced to the City Council more than a month ago has set off a sparring match between local LGBT organizations, after some groups announced they were pulling support for the ordinance.
Equality Illinois announced on April 17 that it was ceasing support for a long-anticipated ordinance that would have created protocol for police in handling transgender detainees.
The ordinance was introduced to City Council in March by Ald. Proco Joe Moreno, after talks with LGBT organization The Civil Rights Agenda ( TCRA ) .
Some say the ordinance, backed by an LGBT coalition of more than 30 groups, was not the same document that groups had agreed upon, and that it lacked the teeth to make it enforceable.
"The proposed ordinance that was introduced in March removed all major enforcement and accountability components that we had previously discussed were essential to include," said Bernard Cherkasov, CEO of Equality Illinois, in a statement.
The statement also notes that Center on Halsted and Lambda Legal withdrew support for the ordinance.
The ordinance has seen several drafts over the past few months. It was originally inspired by the efforts of Lakeview Action Coalition ( LAC ) , which has been working for two years to create a general order within CPD for transgender issues LAC lost some ground on the initiative when the Mayor's office turned over, but the organization has continued to work internally on the policy. ( Disclosure: this reporter attended one early meeting on the LAC order in a non-reporter capacity ) .
At the same time, other groups like TCRA and Illinois Gender Advocates ( IGA ) began talks about introducing an ordinance that would mandate the general order that LAC had been trying to push through.
Chicago activists looked to a pre-existing Washington, D.C. police policy for help. The D.C. policy largely failed, said activists, because it lacked oversight from the community. The policy was implemented, but D.C. advocates alleged that it was not followed.
In Chicago, activists sought to solve that issue by proposing a city commission of 11 volunteers, five police officers and six transgender advocates, to oversee CPD's implementation of the policy.
But the ordinance that was introduced on March 14 was not the same ordinance that groups had agreed to. Most significantly, it replaced the commission with oversight from the City Council's Human Relations and Public safety committees.
Moreno told Windy City Times that the change represented a compromise among aldermen that would cut down on cost and bureaucracy.
Anthony Martinez, executive director of TCRA, issued a press release that day praising the ordinance and thanking Moreno.
"This ordinance will ensure that when a transgender individual is at their most vulnerable, in the custody of police, that they are treated with the same respect as any other person, and are not victimized because they are living their life authentically," Martinez said in the statement.
Community members grumbled that the ordinance had been gutted, but it was not until EQIL put out a press release on its dissatisfaction that such concerns came to light publicly.
Cherkasov argued that such an ordinance would not provide the protections sought for the transgender community.
"You don't start with a weaker position and compromise to a stronger position," he said. "That's never worked."
Equality Illinois went further in its statement, however, to note that: " [ f ] ollowing the City Council meeting, Anthony Martinez, Executive Director of coalition member The Civil Rights Agenda ( TCRA ) , offered public praise and validation for the proposed ordinance to the press. Equality Illinois underscored that this praise for the proposed ordinance was offered by TCRA alone and did not reflect the views of Equality Illinois or its coalition partners."
Tensions between EQIL and TCRA
For some, the release magnified a seemingly bitter relationship growing between Equality Illinois and TCRA, the state's two most visible policy-focused LGBT organizations. TCRA Policy Advisor Rick Garcia was a founder of Equality Illinois who was fired from his position at Equality Illinois in late 2010 amid community protest. Garcia has been an ardent critic of the organization and Cherkasov since.
Most close to the two organizations have noted that the relationship has not been amicable, even before Garcia took on a policy role at TCRA last month.
"Equality Illinois is threatened by The Civil Rights Agenda," Garcia said. "Because the Civil Rights Agenda is doing the work and they just sit around trying to make money off the work of other organizations."
Cherkasov has been quiet about the fallout with Garcia and would not respond directly to criticisms from TCRA, but said that Equality Illinois' work speaks for itself.
Asked why Equality Illinois specifically mentioned Martinez in its press release, Cherkasov said that the organization was simply referring to information offered in a TCRA press release.
"TCRA is best-known for issuing press releases," Cherkasov said to Windy City Times. Asked about the biting nature of such a comment, Cherkasov said that it was not the worst thing he could say.
"I bite my tongue almost every single time," he said.
But Cherkasov said the important issue is not tension between the two organizations but the ordinance itself.
TCRA talks about the ordinance
Martinez was in fact unhappy with the proposed ordinance, and TCRA has considered pulling their support for it.
" [ The aldermen ] introduced the ordinance without double-checking with us," Martinez said. But he felt the introduction of the ordinance signaled progress, and that it could later be amended before vote.
Still, Martinez and Garcia knew the altered ordinance was on the table and could be introduced, they said.
Moreno was set to introduce the original ordinance in February, but openly gay Ald. Tom Tunney still had concerns, confirmed Tunney's Deputy Alderman Bennett Lawson.
Knowing that such an ordinance needed support for both gay aldermen ( openly gay 46 Ward Ald. James Cappleman backed the ordinance already ) , Moreno held off a month on introducing it.
Lawson called the original idea to establish a commission "unprecedented."
"We didn't want to introduce an ordinance that couldn't pass," he said.
The sticking point was that the proposed commission added another layer of government at a time when Mayor Emanuel was cutting back on such layers. Late last year, Emanuel axed the city's advisory councils, including the one on LGBT issues ( a new council that combines the women's issues council and LGBT council replaced it ) .
Martinez said that after the ordinance was introduced, TCRA began talks with Moreno and others in an attempt to amend it.
Disagreements over strategy
The possibility of amending the ordinance did not satisfy all the coalition groups, however, who met on April 17 and pulled their support in anticipation of the April 18 City Council meeting.
Center on Halsted and Lambda Legal both withdrew their support of the ordinance, and LAC released a letter to Tunney and other aldermen, amending their position of support to one of non-support for the current proposal.
"We want it to be an ordinance that is going to work the first time," said Lisa Gilmore, who does policy work for Center on Halsted.
Christopher Clark, an attorney at Lambda Legal, said that his organization had not withdrawn support for the ordinance altogether. Rather, he said, Lambda does not support the document in its present form.
But neither group consented to the EQIL press release, and the fact that they were named within it seemed to come as a surprise to those involved.
"No one from our office saw the press release that they issued before they issued it," said Clark.
Gilmore also confirmed that the release was EQIL's and not theirs.
Cherkasov acknowledged EQIL had not consulted with either group before sending the release, but said that the release was not on the position of other groups.
"We just wanted to cite that we weren't the only ones [ withdrawing support ] ," he said.
One group not named in any of the back-and-forth was Illinois Gender Advocates, which focuses solely on transgender issues.
June LaTrobe, policy director for IGA, had been present throughout the process and worked with TCRA on the original ordinance that groups agreed upon.
LaTrobe said that IGA was "saddened" by the changes made to the ordinance, but that they offered "qualified support" for it.
"If anyone is really aware of the legislative process, they understand that things don't always look the same at the end of the process as when they came in," she said.
In the end, Martinez and Garcia said that TCRA might have also withdrawn their support for the ordinance if asked. But they contend that EQIL unfairly targeted Martinez in withdrawing support.
"I was personally offended by this press release, specifically that I was thrown under the bus," Martinez said. "This is the type of political crap that puts our community in danger."
Garcia argues that the process was open to all LGBT groups but that Martinez did a bulk of the "heavy lifting" on the ordinance, only to be scapegoated for its shortcomings later.
The fallout over the ordinance comes at a sensitive time for Chicago's transgender community. News of the withdrawal was released the same day that the community got word that a transgender woman in Chicago had been murdered.
LaTrobe said she found that timing troubling. "We've got this [ ordinance debate ] going on, and we've got people being shot to death," she said.
