About a year ago, physician Shannon Rose and her partner Jane Brooks, a student at California Western School of Law, wanted to adopt a child. They decided first to become foster parents with the goal of adopting the foster children, so they contacted Olive Crest Family Care and Adoption Agency, an agency based in Santa Ana that has contracts with the County of San Diego.

In July 2002, a social worker at Olive Crest told them that lesbian couples were welcome as parents. But in September the agency told the two women that the agency had suspended their adoption process under a new foster-family recruitment policy. Under the new policy, the agency would only consider “nuclear families” as prospective parents. In short, prospective parents had to be married heterosexuals.

According to The Los Angeles Daily Journal, Olive Crest denied the charges. But last week the Daily Journal reported that a former employee of Olive Crest filed a wrongful termination suit against Olive Crest in early August. In her suit, Jeri Lyn Miles alleges she was a worker in the San Diego office and she knew that a lesbian couple (Rose and Brooks) had applied to become foster parents. However, Miles alleges that another worker in the San Diego office refused to perform a scheduled inspection because the prospective parents were lesbians.

Miles said she contacted Olive Crest President Donald Verleur II, but he ignored her requests for him to order the worker to make the home visit.

In October 2002, Miles indicates that an investigator from the state Department of Social Services’ community-care licensing division visited the San Diego office, interviewed her and looked at files. The investigator concurred that bias had occurred and had Miles sign a plan of correction.

Allegedly, when Miles told Verleur, he accused her of prompting the review by the state and he was unhappy she signed the plan of correction. Miles noted that Verleur was unhappy because the plan of correction required the agency staff not to engage in bias based upon sexual orientation. In December Verleur fired Miles.

Miles alleges in her suit that Olive Crest turns away 100 children per month because of a lack of qualified foster and adoptive parents while providing services to 3,500 children and families each year.

Olive Crest receives tax dollars in the form of federal, state and local funds. It is subject to California’s Civil Rights Act, which prohibits bias based on sexual orientation. State law also prohibits employers from retaliating against employees who file claims of bias with state agencies.

The attorney for Olive Crest, Daniel M. Livingston, told the Daily Journal that the charges are untrue and that Olive Crest would vigorously defend the case.

The two suits are extremely important in terms of gay bias. It is rare to have an employee within a business who comes forward and tells the truth. Most employees fear losing their jobs and often cover for the wrongful acts of their employers.

What is necessary here is a criminal indictment against Olive Crest and the employees who engaged in such bias.

First, District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis should file criminal charges against Olive Crest. As a contractor with the County of San Diego (and the State of California) Olive Crest certified under penalty of perjury that it does not engage in bias when, in fact, it did. There is now probable cause to believe that the agency provided false certification.

To the extent Olive Crest has contracts with other counties, Attorney General Bill Lockyer’s office should investigate the charges of bias and take measures to bar the agency from obtaining state tax funds. To the extent there are any federal laws prohibiting contractors receiving federal funds from engaging in gender or sexual orientation bias, the U.S. Attorney’s Office should investigate, as well.

There are thousands of children caught in the foster care system in California. Many of these children are GLBT and deserve parents who understand them. Last year, in light of substantial evidence that GLBT foster children suffer physical, emotional, and sexual abuse at the hands of hateful foster parents, the legislature passed a bill to safeguard against abuse by foster parents. Governor Davis, facing re-election, vetoed the bill under intense pressure from right wing groups.

In the next few weeks, as the legislature considers laws to protect gay and lesbian couples, the legislature should amend the bill to include the safeguards the Governor vetoed last year. Armed with Jeri Lyn Miles’s testimony, the legislature and the governor can really do something for “the children.”