In May of last year, a bill was introduced in the SC Legislature that that required schools to create teen dating violence prevention policies. Rep. Joan Brady sponsored the bill. Another rep, Greg Delleney created an amendment requiring the bill to pertain to only heterosexual relationships.
Delleney said that he was afraid that the bill without the amendment would "force" schools to teach about same-sex relationships.
Because of this ridiculous amendment, a large group of gay and lesbian South Carolinians and their allies raised hell and held a press conference at the State House, leading to the bill being tabled.
However, the bill is not only back but recently came up for in discussion in the Senate Education Committee last week. The education sub-committee voted 3-2 to keep the discriminatory anti-gay language in the bill.
This coming Wednesday, the Teen Dating Violence Bill is one of six bills which will be discussed by the full committee (17 senators total).
And the situation gets more interesting, so to speak.
According to SC Pride Movement President Tamera Tedder, a representative of the SC Pride Movement spoke with Sally Coffin in regards to this meeting. Coffin handles K-12 legislation for Senator John Courson, who is the Chair of the Senate Education Committee. The representative learned from Coffin that comments from the public will NOT be heard at this meeting. Comments are only taken when the sub-committee meets, which occurred last week.
In other words, no one will be allowed to voice their opinion about the bill.
However, according to Tedder:
"While we cannot speak at the meeting, we can still show our disapproval by showing up at the hearing. We would like to have as many people as possible there to oppose the discriminatory language that is being used in this bill. The hearing will take place at 10:00 am in room 105 of the Gressette Building on the capitol grounds. There are 90 seats in the hearing room. Standing is not allowed and seats will go quickly."
Wednesday is going to be an interesting day at the State Legislature. And though I am not going to be able to make it, I will keep you posted on what happens.
Related post:
Press conference justifies my faith in South Carolina
Lots of folks are working to get the inclusive language back in the bill. Its amazing what a little networking can do. If you can be there, please show up. If not, think good thoughts!
ReplyDeleteI didn't even know about this. Is there any hope for this state, I wonder. But then I think of Rep. Brady ...
ReplyDeleteThank you for telling me about it.