Meet Harold & Clay -- The Bilerico Project

via The Bilerico Project:

Meet Harold and Clay

Filed by: Kate Kendell

April 20, 2010 9:30 AM

The response to the horrific story of Clay Greene and Harold Scull has been very gratifying and inspiring. Clearly, their story struck a chord in all of us. To some degree we can't help imagining ourselves in exactly this situation. Forty-eight hours ago, few people knew their names, and now a Facebook page in their honor has more than 7,000 fans. Quite simply, this case demonstrates how our relationships as LGBT people are so fragile, especially when we reach our later years. Just one small incident, in this case a fall down some steps, sends the world crashing down.

Harold and Clay were in a committed relationship for twenty-five years, and they lived together for twenty years. Both Harold and Clay had worked in Hollywood and were passionate collectors of film memorabilia. Harold had worked for MGM studios in the 1950s and was a favorite of Louis B. Mayer in the studio's heyday. At the same time, Clay worked in television with many popular stars of that period. In addition to his film industry career, Harold was an accomplished artist and avid collector, especially of Mexican and Central American Santos religious art and artifacts. Art, heirlooms, and memorabilia graced the walls of their leased home, in which they planned to live together until their deaths.

Several folks have commented about the legal status of Clay and Harold's relationship. These tragic events began in April 2008, one month before the California Supreme Court's historic marriage ruling. By the time the California Supreme Court ruled and marriages began for that brief six months, Harold was already hospitalized and Clay imprisoned in a nursing home.

The two men had not registered as Domestic Partners, and they may not have even known that option existed. But they had filled out all the paperwork that attorneys advise same-sex couples to create, including wills and powers of attorney for health care.

In every case our clients are human beings, and they are not perfect, which is why we all identify so fiercely with those we represent. At the time of Harold's fall he had already been experiencing some degree of mental impairment, and had been drinking. He fell down the stairs and became angry when Clay wanted to call an ambulance because he was afraid of what the result might be. (And as it turned out, he had good reason to be.) The paramedics who arrived on the scene suspected the possibility of abuse. But that suspicion was false. What happened over the next two months is when the nightmare truly began. Once Harold was released from the hospital to a nursing home, the county refused to tell Clay where Harold had been placed, forced Clay into a nursing home where he did not need to be, auctioned all of his possessions, including treasured and valuable works of art and family memorabilia, and took away his two beloved cats. The level of inhumanity is staggering.

After 25 years of a rich and shared life of devoted commitment, a couple at least deserves being able to be at each other's bedside at the last moments of life. Not only was Harold denied that comfort, and Clay denied the ability to be there to say goodbye to his life partner, but Clay was stripped of everything that mattered and gave him stability in his life.

We can't change what happened to Harold and Clay, but we can do what we try to do every day: to create a world where what happened to Harold and Clay never happens again.

Greene v. County of Sonoma et al.: Download a copy of the complaint

Going Offline To Get ENDA On Line: What We Need To Do Now

via The Bilerico Project:

Going Offline To Get ENDA On Line: What We Need To Do Now

by Dr Jillian T Weiss

t's looking more and more like a vote on ENDA is going to be a reality. When exactly is not yet known, but on Monday, Congress will be back in session, and I hear that final scheduling will begin.

A "markup" must precede a whip count, and a whip count must precede a House vote, and each of these items requires notice, so I don't think we'll see a House vote before May 1.

That's good, because we need some time to organize.

It's not enough to write emails, and though telephone calls are good, what's better is the community organizing to show support. Frankly, I think ENDA is going to pass the House by a large majority, but the Senate backers, Merkley and Harkin, are weak on the issues, and are going to need a lot of help.

While the news sounds optimistic, and it is, there is some serious counter-pressure. We can't sit on the sidelines behind our computers while this is happening. If there's not some serious cheering from the LGBT side of the stands, egging on our leaders, they will fold at crunch time. It happens all the time.

I think we ought to be organizing rallies in the key states and districts where the votes are closest to the line. That means the Senate, and that means The Nine. I refer to the 9 possible Senate yes votes that have not yet committed, Murkowski, Pryor, Lincoln, Bill Nelson, Lugar, Hagan, Conrad. Voinovich and Byrd.

That means getting neighbors together and working on getting emails of supporters together, telephone conference calls of people willing to organize, conversations with supportive family, friends and neighbors, scheduling rallies and informational meetings. And not in Washington DC, but in Juneau, Little Rock, Miami, Indianapolis, Raleigh, Bismarck, Cleveland and Charleston.

A bunch of emails and letters doesn't cut it. A blog post about a few people who sent in letters in Butte doesn't cut it. Four people waving signs at the side of the road outside the statehouse doesn't cut it. Either we will have mass community support, or we will wait for another shot at ENDA down the road.

When This Is Happening

According to the Advocate, a source with knowledge of the process said the floor vote was likely to be scheduled first, at which point the committee vote would then be coordinated to precede it by about a week.

The source said that representatives Barney Frank, Tammy Baldwin, and Polis would undertake an informal vote count (known as a "whip count" in Hill patois) upon returning from recess on April 12 and, assuming the numbers look good, majority whip Jim Clyburn would launch an official whip count while the Democratic leadership worked on scheduling a floor vote.

So that will take time, and that will give us time.

We're going to need a strong, diverse strategy.

Who Needs To Do What And When

We're going to need the advocacy organizations, like HRC, The Task Force, NCLR, and NCTE, which have staffs and budgets to weigh in on Capitol Hill with their suave lobbyists and glossy flyers.

Equally important are the state organizations, that have connections to local people who can be mobilized to bring local pressure to bear in the district.

We also need people who can bring respectful civil disobedience to bear when that type of pressure is needed.

Lastly, the most important element is spontaneous community organizing in local areas. While some organizations have some facility with this, like HRC, which has been continuously working in the background on the weak links through community organizing, like Rep. Bill Owens from upstate New York, and the Diaz-Balart brothers in Florida, we need locals successfully organizing the local community to talk to those legislators and demand equality through meetings and rallies.

Organizations are good, but it is no substitute for individuals standing together in solidarity. At the same time, organizations can be helpful in bringing that about. We need a partnership between our federal and state organizations -- and we have one. It's called United ENDA. I hope that the people running United ENDA will use their connections to bring about community organizing from the ground up (not the top down). Parachuting someone in from DC to hold a rah rah session and post a note online about it does not cut it. They are going to have to work with local activists, many of whom are not necessarily tony white-shoe suavity machines, but who want justice for their communities. They're contradictory, weighed down by day-jobs, not always quick to return phone calls or to go along with the corporate line, but they are essential in this fight.

Did you notice how Organizing For America handled health care reform? They collected millions of emails and used them not only to ask people to call their legislators, but also organized local meetings and info sessions and rallies. They had websites you could go to that would give you five names of local supporters in the swing districts, and you could call them and ask them to call their legislators or attend a meeting. I did that several times. With all the money our community has, why don't we have those things at work?

Why We're Having Problems In The Senate And What To Do About it

One thing I'm thankful for is that freshman Senator Jeff Merkley, whose silence on ENDA suggests that he is overwhelmed by his new job and not up to leading in this fight, is not being left to twist in the wind by the Dems. As the Advocate reports, Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa is also playing a central role in shepherding the measure since he chairs the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. In 1990, Harkin sponsored and helped pass the Americans With Disabilities Act, which prohibited discrimination against people with disabilities. Obviously he knows how to make legislation happen, but I'm concerned about his understanding of the issues.

Frankly, I think Senator Harkin frankly needs a kick in the pants too, after his Senate hearing omitted any transgender witnesses, the one thing that HRC is now bemoaning that the Senate doesn't have enough education on.

As reported in The Advocate story, Alison Herwitt, HRC's legislative director acknowledged that the Senate poses more hurdles because of that issue. "We still need to continue to do education in the Senate around the gender identity language," she said, adding that House members were much more proficient on the issue."

Where were these people when the trans-less Senate hearing was being organized?

And then The Advocate story quotes a source familiar with Harkin that made me cringe:

"It's doable this year, but far from assured," said the source, adding that Harkin has personally vowed to help lobby his colleagues one-on-one for the bill. "He's committed to working on it. It's going to require a lot of work with the moderates to convince them that this isn't an election loser."

With friends like that, who needs enemies?

Get Moving

HRC and NCTE and the other orgs are going to need to offer daily assistance to the state organizations that actually have people on the ground in those cities, and GetEqual, Equality Across America and JoinTheImpact are going to need to start calling meetings in those cities where we need feet on the ground.

Hey DC orgs, what are you willing to do to help local activists in those cities?

Hey grassroots orgs like Get Equal, Equality Across America and Join The Impact, what are you willing to do to help local activists in those cities.

Hey local people in those cities, what are you willing to do to get job equality?

Get offline, get organized.