TALLAHASSEE — For 10 years, proponents have tried to pass the Florida Competitive Workforce Act, which would protect gay and transgender people from discrimination in the workforce, housing and public accommodations, like restaurants and hotels.
On Monday, an audience packed into the Senate Judiciary Committee room for what some saw as a “historic” event, the bill’s first hearing.
Fortune 500 CEOS, human rights activists and other business groups came to the hearing Monday to tell senators that a broader anti-discrimination law would make Florida more globally competitive and attract talent that might be turned off to a state not as progressive as they’d like. Instead, the conversation initiated by some senators and dozens of others who showed up in opposition focused on which public accommodations transgender people, who identify with a gender different from the sex they are born with, would be allowed to use.
What bathroom or locker room would the bill allow a transgender person to use?
Could a transgender woman be hired as a camp counselor and sleep in the girls cabin?
Under the bill, filed by Sen. Joseph Abruzzo, D-Boynton Beach, employers with more than 15 employees could not deny a gay or transgender person a job or service based on their sexual orientation or gender identity, nor could a gay or trans person be denied access to a public accommodation such as a restroom, movie theater or hotel. (Gymnasiums are not defined as a public accommodation in Florida statutes.)
Concerns about men posing as transgender women to gain access to bathrooms and locker rooms, and disagreements over what should be considered a public accommodation stalled the bill and almost killed it for good.
After a tie vote, the bill would have been finished this session if Sen. Jeff Brandes, R-St. Petersburg, had not revived it for further discussion Tuesday. If the committee fails to pass the bill Tuesday it is essentially dead.