Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson's recent heretical blasphemous executive order providing domestic-partner benefits had one major flaw. It didn't exclude gay couples.
To the rest of the modern world, this move did nothing more than to make city employment benefits competitive with most of the fortune 500 companies.
But Salt Lake City is not yet the modern world. We remain an enigma; a world-class city by any measure. Host of the previous Winter Olympic, we boast a state of the art transit system, progressive international award-winning environmental initiatives, and The University of Utah, a first rate science, technology, and research center.
But there remains a palatable tension as the capitol city of a state that boasts the highest (64%) approval rating of Bush.
Last night our city council passed an ordinance unanimously that overrides the Mayor's executive order and provides adults siblings, roommates, and lovers with health benefits for the sole reason of preventing any admission that gay couples are on par with "traditional marriage" between a man and a women.
It simply won't fly. Ask any health insurance professional. But the City Council knew that, unless they didn't, which means no one is doing their homework.
That must be what Salt Lake Tribune Reporter, Heather May means by calling it "historic".
"There was no celebration. No gay-rights advocates or employees lined up to applaud the Salt Lake City Council vote Tuesday night. But the council's decision on health benefits was historic nonetheless."
Yep, "historical" because it became history the second it was passed because our public employees insurance provider (PEHP) won't do it, and even if they could (which they can't) a bill which WILL pass the state legislature forbidding cities from subsidizing insurance for anyone other than employees' spouses or children, will kill it.
You see we made the terrible mistake of electing one of the most progressive mayors in the Country who well into his second term has become the target of a sport called "Shut Down Rocky at Every Turn".
As we say in Utah, "heck", if he passed a rule requiring city contractors to pay a living wage, the state legislature would shut him down. Oh yea, they already did.
Salt Lake Tribune article
Deseret Morning News article