Two hundred people turned out for a domestic partnership workshop held at The Center on Wednesday, Oct. 6, concerned about the complexities and fine print of the Domestic Partners Rights and Responsibilities Act (AB 205) set to go into effect Jan. 1. The forum, for those already registered as domestic partners and those considering it, outlined the many responsibilities same-sex couples and opposite-sex couples aged 62 or older will incur.

Local attorneys Leigh Kretzchmar, Julie Brown and Larry Ramey fielded a variety of questions during the two-hour forum, noting several times throughout the evening that each couple’s needs are different and that many of the finer points of AB 205 have yet to be worked out.

Community property laws, parental rights, pre-partnership agreements and the effects domestic partnerships may have for military personnel and those seeking to immigrate to the U.S. comprised the bulk of the questions.

One of the major changes with AB 205 comes to fiscal responsibility, specifically impacting domestic partners’ joint funds and how those funds are handled if the domestic partnership is dissolved. Domestic partners who do not wish to hold their property as community property or to assume responsibility for one another’s debts should consult an attorney prior to Jan. 1, Equality California has said.

“This is all new, and that makes lawyers very excited,” Ramey joked. “I don’t believe this will be the full-employment act for attorneys, but I do think it will be for accountants.”

Gov. Schwarzenegger recently passed AB 2580 to help domestic partners establish what is essentially a pre-nuptial agreement pertaining to community property and joint responsibility. When AB 205 goes into effect, community property becomes retroactive, meaning that all property acquired from the first day of a couple’s registration as domestic partners – not just what is acquired after Jan. 1, 2005 – will be considered joint assets.

Under AB 2580, domestic partners have until June 30 to waive their spousal support and establish divisions in their assets.

Though domestic partners will benefit from the state’s property tax cuts for married couples, tax issues could get messy, Ramey said. “This is, I think, the real area where we’ll have an incredible problem.”

Individual court cases and the case law that is established as a result may need to unravel the bulk of the tax tangles, because it is unclear how some of the tax laws will be implemented, and a period of confusion is likely to follow AB 205’s enactment.

Presumption of parenthood regarding children born during the partnership is technically guaranteed under AB 205, but is still in a state of flux. Kretzchmar advised domestic partners to go a step further and get protections through stepparent or second-parent adoptions. However, presumed parentage can conflict with second-parent or stepparent adoptions.

“Technically speaking, under the law, you can’t adopt a child that is already your own, which is what presumed parentage is,” Kretzchmar said, adding that both types of adoptions, which help guarantee parental rights to the non-biological or non-adoptive parent of a child across state lines, will most likely continue until an adequate legal solution is sorted out.

Those who are seeking immigration or serve in the military are advised against registering as domestic partners, since both fall under federal jurisdiction and AB 205 only applies to state laws.

Local immigration lawyer John Smith said that non-U.S. citizens who are in binational relationships and register as domestic partners may be viewed by the government as intending to stay in the country, which can be equity for those who possess green cards or have asylum petitions pending, but could be disastrous for those that don’t.

“For the same reasons as with immigration, registering as a domestic partner is not recommended for people in the military because it is considered a public record,” added Bridget Wilson, a local lawyer who specializes in military law. “…It can lead to everything from separation to court martial,” due to the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, she added.

Two schools of thought are cropping up around whether or not same-sex couples who were either married in Massachusetts or received a civil union in Vermont should register as domestic partners if they relocate to California.

Both Lambda Legal and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force have advised couples in this situation to doubly protect themselves by registering as domestic partners. Other lawyers disagree, saying that doing so would not only create a nightmare of state-law legal wrangles if the union dissolves, but would, as a political statement, undermine the validity of their marriage or civil union.

“Couples who have married in a location that recognizes and allows same-sex marriage are often confused about whether or not to register as domestic partners in California,” explained The Center’s director of public policy, AJ Davis. “These marriages are legal and valid and should be valued as such. Unfortunately, at the same time, these legal unions are not recognized by the State of California and, therefore, do not incur any of the rights and responsibilities of marriage on these couples while they reside here. In order to protect their relationship and their family to the fullest extent of the law, couples will still need to register as domestic partners with the State of California. … There is some concern regarding what will happen if a couple that has registered as domestic partners and has married in another location decide to terminate the relationship. Each locale and institution has its own dissolution procedure, which may lead to some confusion for couples who separate and the attorneys that represent them.”

The legal confusion and expense created by the “separate but equal” nature of AB 205 lends additional ammunition to marriage equality activists.

“For the LGBT community, these expanded rights and responsibilities allow us to protect our families as much as possible while we continue our struggle for full equality,” Davis said. “Domestic partnership, while utterly important and a huge step in the right direction, is still a separate institution. History tells us that separate is never equal. The differences and confusion that surround this separate institution only go further to show the need for full marriage equality.”

AB 205 grants domestic partners spousal privilege, which assures that confidential communications cannot be subpoenaed by the court, and that one partner cannot be forced to testify against the other. The issue gained national media attention when Kelli O’Donnell, the partner of comedian Rosie O’Donnell, was forced to submit private emails the two had exchanged to a New York court during a highly publicized lawsuit trial this year involving the demise of Rosie O’Donnell’s magazine, Rosie.

Insurance coverage, pension funds, veterans’ benefits, retirement benefits, liability, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), trust funds, inheritance rights and the designation of annuities were also discussed at the forum.

In answer to a concern about county-to-county versus state-to-county jurisdiction, Ramey essentially summed up the multitude of technicalities and gray areas AB 205 is expected to create: “We’re going to litigate it. That’s the only way around it.”

Kretzchmar, Brown and Ramey highly encouraged couples to keep hard copies of all agreements; not doing so has kept divorce lawyers in business for years, they said.