Through three terms as an Assemblymember and two terms in the Senate (D-San Diego), Dede Alpert has been a dependable friend of the GLBT community. Currently the first female chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Alpert has always been a strong advocate for women and public education, as well as a reliable supporter of GLBT rights. She has authored several pieces of landmark legislation, some of which established new national standards. Alpert’s Workplace Violence Safety Act of 1994 allows employers to obtain restraining orders against people who threaten employees or their places of work and has been used as model legislation in many other states. The Mammography Quality Assurance Act of 1992 gave California the most stringent mammography standards in the country, while Alpert’s Battered Women’s Protection Act of 1994 supplied $30 million to women’s shelters in 1994-96 and became the foundation for greatly enhanced funding of domestic violence services in California.

Speaking with the Gay and Lesbian Times in 2000, Alpert said her work with Sen. Sheila Kuehl on non-discrimination policies to protect GLBT students was a highlight of her time in the Senate.

“(I’ve heard) testimony from kids about the kind of discrimination they said they felt, either because they were gay or were perceived to be gay — devastating thoughts of suicide and (other) things that it did to young people,” Alpert told the Times. “We really need to be sure that adults in our school system protect all children from discrimination.… I would like to be able to say when I leave in four years that we have an education system California can be proud of and that gives equal opportunity to every single child that lives in California.”

Alpert was also an opponent of Prop. 22 (the Knight Initiative), which banned gay marriage in California. The senator said she also supports the right of gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military: “I truthfully think that the federal policy (‘don’t ask, don’t tell’) has not been a successful one. I think it shouldn’t be an issue.”

Alpert has also been closely involved with several bills aimed at improving the quality of children’s education in California. She was a principal author of the “ABC” education reform package of 1995, which requires the integration of phonics, basic spelling and fundamental computational skills into the school curriculum.