Last Friday, Equality California’s Executive Director Geoff Kors, sketched this year’s legislative agenda for the organization at The San Diego LGBT Community Center’s monthly Community Coalition Breakfast. Kors also addressed the upcoming California Supreme Court case on same-sex marriage and recent findings from a post-Proposition 8 voter survey.

“I want to talk about the work other than Prop. 8 that’s going on … and also touch on the court case and some take-aways from some research that was done in the days immediately after the campaign,” said Kors.

EQCA has introduced two resolutions thus far: one in the Senate and the other in the Assembly seeking to invalidate Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment that renewed the ban on same-sex marriage in California. The resolution states that any measure that attempts to take away a group’s fundamental rights must, according to the state constitutions’ Equal Protection Clause, follow the state’s constitutional revision process, requiring the legislature to vote on it before it goes to the ballot.

“The reasoning is that such a fundamental change, such as getting rid of equal protection for a whole group of people, you need a more deliberate and involved process. The thought that you can actually get your fundamental rights one year and lose them the next election and then get it back every two years would make the whole equal protection clause meaningless,” said Kors.

EQCA sent the first resolution to the judiciary committee of the State Assembly last week. Last Tuesday, the Senate heard the resolution in its judiciary committee. Next, it will go to the floor of both houses. The goal is to have both resolutions pass before the California Supreme Court hears oral arguments on March 5.

EQCA filed a lawsuit challenging the measure’s legitimacy, with help from the National Center for Lesbian Rights, American Civil Liberties Union, and Lambda Legal, just days after Proposition 8’s passage. Since then, people have been wondering whether the 18,000 same-sex couples who were married in California between June 17, 2008, the date that same-sex couples became legally able to marry in California to Nov. 4, when Californians voted on Proposition 8, would be invalidated.

“The 18,000 marriages will remain marriages,” said Kors, “Prop. 8 wasn’t retroactive. There was nothing in it that said it was, and they [EQCA’s attorneys] think it’s highly unlikely that it will have any impact on anyone who was married before the election. “The rest of it,” said Kors, “is another story.”

The next bill in store for 2009 is Assembly Bill 103, which proposes to end a discriminatory tax on those who hold property together but are not married. Currently, same-sex couples who have not registered as domestic partners will have their property reassessed when their partner dies.

“In the current financial situation, because some people lose their home because they choose not to get married or aren’t in a domestic partnership seems like a really bad thing. So this bill is to equalize that for any two people who co-own property,” said Kors.

EQCA will be introducing several other bills into the legislature later this year.

One bill would establish an unpaid state holiday on May 22 in recognition of the late gay politician Harvey Milk’s birthday. Senator Mark Leno first introduced the bill last year. Last September, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed it, arguing that Milk was known only in San Francisco.

“It’s important that our history is taught, that youth learn about our history and that they see themselves as the future,” said Kors, adding that the Harvey Milk Bill would be a first step toward accomplishing that goal. EQCA is optimistic that the governor will sign this time around, said Kors, particularly in light of the Oscar-winning biographical film, Milk.

GLBT domestic-violence services are the focus of another EQCA-sponsored bill. The bill seeks to enable GLBT domestic-violence service providers to acquire access to the state’s domestic violence general fund for programs that specifically address GLBT domestic violence. Last year, with the help of the EQCA, GLBT domestic-violence service providers received $400,000 in funding from various sources but were unable to receive funding from the state’s general fund for domestic violence services. This bill would open the entire state fund to GLBT domestic violence service providers.

“Given the current economic state that we’re in, it’s really important that our community organizations have the same access to government funding as any other community organizations,” said Kors.

Other legislation in store for 2009 includes a bill to help transgender people born but not residing in California to be able to change their gender identity on their birth certificates and a bill to require all state health surveys to include sexual orientation and gender identity as voluntary identification categories.

Currently, the state does not collect any health-specific information on GLBT people. “It’s really hard to provide proper health care to LGBT people without information on what their needs are,” said Kors.

Kors also reviewed several key findings from a recent post-Proposition 8 survey on California voters. “We wanted to find out why the electorate voted the way it did and to learn as many lessons as possible,” said Kors.

Among the findings was that, paradoxically, nine percent of respondents who voted yes believed that the measure was “unfair, unnecessary, and wrong.” Yet they voted affirmatively because they believed it would preserve traditional marriage and stop the teaching of same-sex marriage to children in elementary school.

“What it really comes down to is that given the choice of tradition or equality … you know going to hell or voting for equality, a lot of people wouldn’t vote for equality,” said Kors, especially when you add “children to the mix.”

When also asked if there was anything that could change their minds about same-sex marriage, 73 percent of these same voters said no, while nine percent said that they either did not know or checked the ‘other’ box. That nine percent is where the marriage equality movement needs to focus its attention on, said Kors, calling it “our best shot.”

Audience response to Kors was overwhelmingly positive.

“I thought it was helpful and informative … . It was interesting to hear what needs to change and what direction we’re going in, and that’s why I was here today,” said Jamie Felix, resident of Mission Hills.

“There was a lot of information that I didn’t know. So I learned a lot,” said Michael Mobley, a resident of San Diego’s southeast region.