SACRAMENTO (AP) — Gov. Gray Davis has signed a bill banning housing and job discrimination against transgender people, making California the fourth state to extend such protections.

The new law has long been a goal of GLBT activists in the state, said Shannon Minter, legal director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

“It’s a very big issue for the LGBT community in California,” Minter said. “It’s something we’ve been working on for three years…. Transgender people seek nothing more than the opportunity to support ourselves and our families and to be treated with dignity and respect. By enacting AB 196 into law, Californians are sending a powerful message that no person can be denied employment or housing based on gender-related characteristics.”

The measure, signed Aug. 2, will take effect Jan. 1, 2004.

California already prohibits housing and job discrimination against gays and lesbians, but with the new law it will become only the fourth state to extend that protection to transgender people, joining Minnesota, Rhode Island and New Mexico, Minter said.

The new California law will prohibit discrimination against people whose “perceived gender characteristics are different from those traditionally associated with the individual’s sex at birth.”

The measure passed the Legislature earlier this year, the first time such a bill had reached the governor’s desk.

AB 196 was opposed by some business organizations, who said it might result in more lawsuits, and by conservative religious groups, who said it would offend average Californians. The Campaign for California Families, the right-wing group responsible for Proposition 22 (which banned gay marriage in California), had just come off a 23-city tour of California, demanding that Davis veto AB 196 and AB 205, the pending domestic partners bill. At each stop on the tour, the group threatened that the governor’s signing of these bills would ensure his recall.

Supporters cited one study that showed a 70 percent unemployment rate for transgender people in San Francisco, noting that the discrimination against transgender persons in California is rampant.

The bill was introduced by Assemblymember Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), sponsored by Equality California (EqCA), and formally supported by more that 50 other local, state and national groups.

Geoffrey Kors, executive director of Equality California, praised Davis for signing the bill.

“His actions in signing this legislation will help ensure that individuals are judged on their merit, not their gender characteristics,” Kors said in a statement.

The National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC), who endorsed the bill in this session and in its previous attempts, was “overjoyed” with Gov. Davis’ signature.

Many in the transgender community were pleasantly surprised with news of the Gov. Davis’ signature. This was the third attempt for this legislation.

“I can’t even begin to explain the joy and surprise I feel,” said Gwen Smith, founder of Remembering Our Dead, a website devoted to transgender homicide victims. “I’m amazed — and pleased — that Gov. Davis chose to sign this bill, even in the midst of mounting attacks from the religious right and from the conservatives behind the recall attempt.”

“That a second state this year has enacted this type of law is more evidence that enacting non-discrimination protections for transgender and gender non-conforming individuals is supported by our public officials,” added Matt Foreman, National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF) Executive Director.

When the California law goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2004, a total of 68 million Americans (24 percent of the U.S. population) will live in a jurisdiction with explicit language prohibiting anti-transgender discrimination.