Lincoln, NE City Council LGBT ordinance hearing; top cop argues forcefully for adoption; Ben Gray slams NE AG Jon Bruning

Last night's Lincoln City Council hearing on a proposed LGBT rights ordinance, which would echo one recently passed in Omaha, lasted from 3 pm to 10:25 pm. AKSARBENT is working on acquiring the complete video of the hearing. When and if we do, we'll have coverage of:

• Astonishingly eloquent testimony by an older PFLAG member recounting her "Steel Magnolias" moment confronting homophobia in a salon and getting some unanticipated support from the owner/beautician
• The most wrenching testimony we saw either in Omaha or Lincoln by a gay counselor who could barely speak as he described trying to talk gay kids out of offing themselves
• A two-time Christian public access TV martyr who described her victimization (as a Christian, of course) at work to the Omaha City Council and as a grade school student to the Lincoln council
• A reel of anti-LGBT equality ordinance testimony by medical professionals AKSARBENT hopes never to have to meet in a doctor-patient setting

In the mean time, here is audio of Lincoln's Public Safety Director Tom Casady arguing strenuously for passage of the proposed LGBT measure and of Ben Gray taking a swipe at Nebraska AG Jon Bruning's suspiciously swift opinion that local LGBT ordinances are unconstitutional.

I believe an ordinance like this is a small step, a very small step, but it's a step towards making Lincoln an infertile ground for the attitudes that nurture the mindset of these two (1993 murderers of Dillards gay shoe salesman Harold Grover) and for all those other people whose own moral conscience is so weak and debased that they judge people by  their characteristics rather than their character...
     I think we could find other examples of that where the law was one step among many that changed a climate. I think of how attitudes in this community have changed towards things like domestic violence and drunk driving and child abuse and neglect during my 10 years as a police officer here in Lincoln. This is a huge and dramatic change and I think that an ordinance like this is one of those bricks in the wall that helps to create that change. There are lots of people in Lincoln that I respect and admire, work with have laid my life on the line with and had protect mine that are protected from discrimination by this ordinance and I stand here in defense of their rights as citizens in this community.
                  —Tom Casady, Public Safety Director, Lincoln, Nebraska

      Bruning, who is pulling a Sarah Palin in trying to jump from AG to senator without completing his term (he also did this when jumping from state senator to AG), once compared LGBT relationships to a guy wanting to marry a chair.
      Last Wednesday, Bruning got a request from State Senator Beau McCoy of Elkhorn, asking him if local LGBT legislation which went beyond state protected classes was unconstitutional. On Friday, McCoy received an opinion from Bruning saying he thought it wasn't.
     Nice to know that Bruning can get the lead out when he wants to use gay Nebraskans as a political football.
     Contrast his recent quick action with what Nebraska Watchdog reported the other day: that Bruning's GOP primary opponent, Don Stenberg, remembered writing Bruning in April, 2011, for an opinion on whether health insurance funds for the state Highway Patrol and other state employees are funds of the state that should be held by the state treasurer; nine months later he still hadn't got an answer from Bruning.
     (Apparently, homophobe Bruning, who has gotten rich in Public Office, didn't attend a single meeting of the State Records Board in 2011. Bruning has been involved in at least two dozen businesses and ventures since being elected attorney general. )
     The Senator's ruling was issued in response to a request from State Senator Beau McCoy who, with the help of the Alliance Defense Fund, tried to head off Omaha's recently-passed LGBT ordinance by trying to get a bill, LB912, through the Unicameral Judiciary Committee last session. He failed, but is still trying to sabotage gay rights legislation throughout Nebraska. (McCoy is running for reelection against Judy Domina.)
     Bruning, unsurprisingly, thinks local gay rights legislation is unconstitutional. City attorneys for Lincoln and Omaha disagree and are ignoring him. AKSARBENT finds the Bruning/McCoy scheme dubious. If local LGBT ordinances really overstep state authority, why has this escaped the attention of city attorney's in both Lincoln and Omaha and why did McCoy try to pass LB912, if it wasn't necessary?