Houston Equal Rights Ordinance Rejected by Voters Known as HERO, the measure would have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, race and a dozen other categories By Dan Frosch
http://www.wsj.com/articles/houston-equal-rights-ordinance-rejected-by-voters-1446608809
Known as the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, or HERO, the measure would have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, race and a dozen other categories. It was backed heavily by Houston Mayor Annise Parker and a cadre of national Democratic political figures, and proponents poured more than $3 million into the push to pass it.
Supporters conceded defeat on Tuesday evening shortly after the Associated Press called the election in favor of opponents. Roughly 61% of voters opposed the measure and 39% backed it, with 96% of precincts and early voting totals tallied.
The defeat of the bitterly contested ordinance represents a rare recent win for social and religious conservatives, four months after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of gay marriage. Opponents of the measure had argued that the ordinance would infringe on businesses’ religious freedoms. In placards and advertisements, they asserted that it would allow people born as men to freely enter women’s bathrooms.
Ms. Parker, a lesbian, said those against the measure had wildly distorted its intent with a fear-based campaign that included a television commercial showing a man following a little girl into a bathroom stall. She said such laws hadn’t caused public safety issues elsewhere.
“No one’s rights should be subject to a popular vote,” Ms. Parker said in conceding the election Tuesday night. “This was a campaign of fear-mongering and deliberate lies.”
Jared Woodfill, co-chair of Campaign for Houston, the main group opposing the ordinance, described the fight over it as a David vs. Goliath battle, adding that despite a parade of national figures who supported the measure, “they didn’t have Houstonians who were going to live under the ordinance on their side.”
“Houstonians sent a very clear message to the mayor, the city council and the rest of the country that we do not believe that men should able to go into female restrooms, showers and locker rooms,” he said.
Since the Supreme Court ruling, gay-rights proponents have focused on establishing new discrimination protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in the workplace and the public sphere, while religious conservatives have fought for their right to refuse to accept gay marriage.
Religious conservatives had rallied to the battle in Houston after the city earlier tried to subpoena the sermons of pastors who opposed the measure for signs of electioneering from the pulpit.
Both sides had sought to cast the fight over the measure as critically important, saying the outcome in such a large city could energize or deflate their cause.
Opponents had been fighting to keep the measure from taking effect ever since it was initially approved by the Houston City Council in May 2014.The Texas Supreme Court sided with the opposition in July, saying they had gathered enough valid signatures to put the ordinance to a citywide vote.
In recent weeks, the rhetoric over the measure grew especially heated.
In an ad released by the campaign against the measure, former Houston Astros baseball star Lance Berkman urged voters to reject it, saying it would allow “troubled men who claim to be women” to enter women’s facilities.
Opposition signs proclaiming “No Men in Women’s Restrooms” sprung up across Houston, including in the Near Northside neighborhood, a largely Hispanic area near downtown, where the signs were sprinkled around an apartment complex on Monday, urging voters to defeat the proposal.
Greg Abbott, the state’s Republican governor, lent his voice to the opposition on Monday, saying on Twitter, “Vote Texas values, not @HillaryClinton values.”
Last week, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton voiced her support for the measure, the White House released a statement backing it, and actress Sally Field joined civic leaders in Houston in a final push to pass the measure.
Across Houston on Tuesday, residents told of how the furious debate over the issue had influenced their vote.
In the affluent River Oaks neighborhood, Cindy Seligmann said she had been torn over the measure and doubted it would actually cause much harm. But Ms. Seligmann said she ultimately was swayed by the television commercials and decided to vote against it.
“We’re a socially liberal family. But then throwing the bathroom thing in there, it just messed up the whole proposition,” she said. “If you have a boy part you go to the boy’s bathroom, if you have a girl part you go to the girl’s bathroom.”
Outside Hogg Middle School in the city’s Heights neighborhood, where hipster coffee shops and thrift stores sit near old bungalows, Belinda Ybarra said she voted for the measure. Ms. Ybarra said she thought opponents had exaggerated the measure’s potential impacts.
“I think people are making more of a big deal than what it really is,” she said. “I know people say they don’t want men in women’s restrooms. But what man is going to go in a women’s restroom unless it’s a man that thinks he’s a woman.”
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