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BRIAN COYLE: We should pursue three things. First, we should move a second bereavement motion. And in fact, we looked at the original one given us by Carol Johnson and the legal staff and amended that.

And we'll be putting that forward on Monday. And we'll see if it passes, or that legal staff wants to amend its own Amendment, or whether the council wants them to do that, or whatever. But that's the first thing, is trying to provide sick and bereavement benefits to people.

The second thing was that in order to still recognize and give value to domestic partnerships of people, we would still like to pass the ordinance that creates a filing system. But essentially, since we're not able to guarantee economic or health benefits right now, it essentially is a symbolic mechanism and a way to find out just how many people are out there in our workforce that want to be recognized and declare themselves in effect.

And so, in effect, what that second motion does is what the city of San Francisco passed and was validated by the public in a recent vote on a referendum on the issue, which essentially creates a filing mechanism and acknowledges domestic partners but doesn't guarantee anyone any benefits, at least in the year of 1991.

At least, it gives us a way to see who's out there. And hopefully, frankly, from my point of view, we'll ultimately build an argument for why those people should be extended the same health benefits that everyone else enjoys.

The third thing we talked about was the creation of a task force to look at family diversity, to look at not only the domestic partner issue but many other issues related to domestic partners and for that matter, to families of public employees in particular.

And San Francisco did an excellent task force that this is modeled after. And so we're drafting a resolution to that effect. And $15,000 was included in the budget for this year for that. So I assume that that will pass. And those are the three things we've talked about so far.

TOM FUDGE: When you talk about sick and bereavement leave, I'm pretty sure I know what you mean by that. But just briefly explain exactly what that is. What would that allow people to do that they now can't do?

BRIAN COYLE: Well, right now if you have a sick relative or spouse-- but it can even be somebody in your family, not your immediate family-- you can qualify for time off to go and deal with that. The irony is if you're living with a partner, whether heterosexual or homosexual, and you're in long-term relationship but it's not your family, not just your immediate family but even your family, it is often hard to get that recognized and get time off. In fact, there are situations where people were refused that.

So what we're basically saying is that that is a benefit that does have some economic value, although you really can't determine it until the end of the year when supervisors look at how many hours or days people took off. But it's an important one as far as just the-- being able to deal with either sickness or grief in your family.

TOM FUDGE: The business of registering domestic partners, if that's the right expression to use, is that something which is important to sick and bereavement situations, or is that truly something which is really symbolic and looking to the future and possibly offering more benefits you've been talking about?

BRIAN COYLE: Actually, it's important to both. Most of the cities have created registration procedures, no matter what their mechanism for sick and bereavement leave is. The city of New York, for instance, by mayoral edict created sick and bereavement leave but still created a registration process for their own employees to go through to validate that.

Seattle, which extends the full benefits-- it's the most progressive city in terms of public employees and domestic partner benefits-- has a very clear filing procedure. Santa Cruz, which won its domestic partner benefits through labor negotiating process, nevertheless has a filing procedure and an affidavit that everybody fills out.

So it's fairly conventional to do that. Our city attorney may argue against that because, again, they're just trying to avoid, frankly, any recognition of domestic partners. And they want to hand the political hot potato of that to the state legislature and say that it's really up to them to decide.

But these other states did not have to have state legislation to create a filing procedure. Whether it was legislative action, or an executive order, or a labor-negotiated contract, they all still had some kind of filing procedure.

So the answer to your question is really that it serves both as a way to not-- well, to have sick and bereavement leave, not just the decision of your supervisor, because you could still have an arbitrary supervisor that frankly was homophobic or didn't like people who were, quote, "living in sin" that were unmarried but in long-term relationships.

And that means that at least if you can go file, you can say if you want to appeal a decision of a supervisor, hey, I'm on record. I'm out-front with my relationship. And policy decision by the city council has decided that I qualify for this. So whether my supervisor likes me or not or likes my situation or not, I believe I qualify for this.

So there is a point to having the filing procedure. It isn't just a symbolic something. But I think it's also important. I mean, San Francisco just had a huge election with virtually every congressperson in the Bay Area, everyone running for office, virtually every ethnic and special interest group endorsing what is essentially a symbolic filing system because at least it acknowledges the existence of people and their domestic partners, gives social value to that, says that we respect that.

And that was the predominant part of the argument. So I think that's more than just symbolism, too. I mean, it is a form of social acceptance. But frankly, it doesn't have a price tag. And it's hard to see anyone opposing any one of these three items on the grounds of cost since, frankly, the only one that has an actual price tag has already been budgeted in the 1991 budget by the Ways and Means Committee and the council itself, which is the task force expense of $15,000.

And I would hope that further discussion and research and recommendations by that task force will show us the true expense of providing health benefits to domestic partners in the future. And I would hope it wouldn't be too many years before that is done.

Things are changing on this issue all over the country, including IRS rulings and including there are now some insurance companies providing this kind of thing just in the last few months that have made the terms better for people. So I frankly think that as time goes by, the argument against domestic partners on the basis of its cost or that it's too exorbitant or whatever is going to be less of a valid argument.

TOM FUDGE: What about the state? What if anything is going on at the state level in terms of redefining the family or looking at that issue that might affect domestic partners ordinance in Minneapolis?

BRIAN COYLE: Well, I don't think it has to affect the domestic partners ordinance in Minneapolis because, again, in at least 10 to 15 cities across this country, each of which has a different state legislature and different state law, they've still been able to provide some kind of domestic partner benefits and filing system and affidavit and do that as a municipality.

So I just profoundly disagree with the conservatism of our city attorney, who's just, I think, trying to get out of making a tough decision, which is not unusual for that office, incidentally. But I think that if the state legislature would be well advised to begin to examine the whole issue of same-sex marriage, frankly.

And I would point out that the city council or board of supervisors of San Francisco in a recent action of the last month was the first city council to go on record formally encouraging its state legislature of California to recognize and provide provision for same-sex marriages, which goes beyond domestic partners, frankly, because domestic partners is not the same thing as married status.

It doesn't convey the same benefits, especially legal rights as that does. I think the city of Minneapolis would be well advised to look at that and even recommend to the state legislature. But that is a future action because right now I want to try to pass the three things we just talked about.