DOVER, Del. (AP) — Gay rights activists in Delaware are hoping the third time is a charm for a bill prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation.

The sexual orientation bill could be one of the most controversial topics considered by lawmakers this year.

The bill, similar to measures that failed to win passage in two previous legislative sessions, cleared the state House by one vote last year. It faces an uncertain future in the Senate, even though Gov. Ruth Ann Minner took the unusual step of holding a news conference in Legislative Hall last year to voice her support for the measure.

“I think most of our senators feel that no one should be discriminated against when it comes to hiring practices or employment,” Minner said last month.

While supporters of the measure believe they have the 11 votes necessary to win passage in the 21-seat Senate, the bill must first get out of committee. In 2002, a similar measure died after Sen. Robert Venables, D-Laurel, a staunch opponent, kept it locked up in his Small Business Committee.

Senate president pro tem Thurman Adams has yet to assign the current bill to a committee. Adams said that he has made his committee selection but has not informed any other lawmaker of his decision.

“We’ll announce it next week,” said Adams, D-Bridgeville.

Supporters of the bill have been heartened by Adams’ statements that he believes the measure should and probably will be voted upon by the full Senate. But Adams said the future of the bill is up to the chairman of the committee.

“If I can believe Thurman Adams, it’s going to come to a vote in the Senate some time this year,” said Bob Martz, president of the Delaware Liberty Fund, a political action committee working on behalf of homosexuals, bisexuals and transgender people. “I’m taking Thurman Adams at his word, and he has publicly said that he thinks this bill should come to a vote.”

The proposed legislation adds sexual orientation, “whether real or perceived,” to age, race and other factors that cannot be used to discriminate against people in employment, housing, public accommodations, insurance or public works contracting.

The bill exempts religious groups in most circumstances and does not require employers to offer health care or other benefits to partners of gay and lesbian employees.

Martz said the bill does not provide special rights to gays and lesbians, but “is just evening the playing field.”

But the Rev. John Campbell, rector of Trinity Reformed Episcopal Church in Hockessin, said there’s no need for the bill because there is no evidence of widespread discrimination against gays and lesbians.

“I haven’t seen it demonstrated where gay homelessness and gay unemployment are a problem in Delaware,” he said.

Campbell said forcing people to hire or house gays and lesbians infringes on property rights and the right of free association. He said gays and lesbians have no right to make sexual orientation the identifying characteristic of their lives and expect other people to tolerate its various manifestations.

“When the law says homosexuals have a right to associate with you even if you don’t like it, it says something ... These people are not content to lead their own lives. They don’t want tolerance, they want to make it mandatory,” Campbell said.

Martz agrees that people have the right to free association, but that there are limits.

“In the business world in terms of employment, housing, insurance, absolutely not,” Martz said.

Campbell compared the measure to the statewide indoor smoking ban that took effect more than a year ago, which he said also erodes the property rights of business owners.

“There’s a problem with secondhand sodomy that’s equally as dangerous as secondhand smoke,” Campbell said, referring to sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS.

Drew Fennell, executive director of the Delaware chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said the language used by some of the opponents of the bill is evidence itself of the discrimination faced by gays and lesbians.

The bill cleared the House last year after lawmakers defeated several amendments, proposed by House Majority Leader Wayne Smith, that supporters said would have gutted the measure.

One amendment offered by Smith, R-Wilmington, was to delete the phrase “real or perceived,” which supporters say is a key piece of the legislation. The language allows a heterosexual person, for example, to bring a discrimination claim against an employer who fired the person because he thought the employee was gay.

Smith said removing the word “perceived” would help ensure that an employee dismissed for legitimate reasons couldn’t use the law as an excuse to bring a discrimination claim. He noted that “perceived” is not found in existing language that prohibits discrimination based on age, race, gender or marital status.

Another amendment offered by Smith and defeated by House members stated that the legislation would not require public schools to provide instruction on sexual orientation and behavior, and that the General Assembly affirms that human sexuality instruction must focus exclusively on heterosexual orientation and behavior.

On the final day of the legislative session last year, amendments identical to the two defeated in the House were placed with bill in the Senate by Venables and Sen. John Still, R-Dover.

“They’re inconsistent with the spirit of the bill,” the ACLU’s Fennell said.

The amendments are likely to generate more heated debate in the Senate, as is a November ruling by Massachusetts’ highest court that that state’s ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional.

“Massachusetts has maybe focused this issue from a different angle,” Smith said.