Three months after the Southfield City Council directed the administration to bring before it a civil rights ordinance that would protect everyone, including the gay community, the issue has not appeared back on the agenda.
“It’s not a top priority for the city,” said council President Sylvia Jordan when asked about it last month. “I don’t see it as a top priority.”
Others object to that assessment.
The measure was sent to the city attorney by a 4-2 council vote. Councilman Sid Lantz was absent.
Jordan, who, by charter, controls what gets put on the agenda, was one of two votes against the council directive; the other was Councilwoman Joan Seymour.
On Friday, Mayor Brenda Lawrence said she planned to ask about progress on the ordinance at Monday’s city council meeting. Lawrence, who, along with Councilman Jeremy Moss, brought the subject before the council in April, attends council meetings but cannot vote, by city charter.
“It’s not about your personal feelings,” Lawrence said. “It’s to ensure we as a government not discriminate against anyone in our city.”
Councilman Jeremy Moss, who also brought the prospect of a more inclusive civil rights ordinance before the council at that same April meeting, said last week that not taking action on an expanded civil rights ordinance flies in the face of a tradition in Southfield.
That began with the 1985 Martin Luther King Task Force and a Peace Pledge authored in 2005 by 13- to 17-year-old Minds of Wisdom members at the Detroit West District Peace Center in Southfield. The pledge has been recited at every Martin Luther King Day since.
The pledge calls for promoting “peaceful relationships with others regardless of religion, nationality, race, sex, or sexual orientation....”
“Southfield is not a bedroom community,” Moss said, noting that other communities, including Sterling Heights, Lathrup Village and Farmington Hills, have passed similar ordinances within the last three months.
Gov. Rick Snyder — and several regional chambers of commerce — also recently have urged passage of an amended civil rights ordinance that includes sexual orientation and gender identity.
“Business leaders have said that it is a priority in the global war for talent,” Moss said. “It’s not just (giving someone) special rights, it’s sending out a message” that the city wants to treat people equally.
Moss said the “mistake” the council made was in not putting a date certain on when the ordinance was to be brought back before the council.
“(Jordan) holds a tight fist on the agenda,” Moss said.
For their part, Jordan and Seymour both said at the April meeting that they were opposed to taking action because the state had yet to do so.
The city council will meet at 1 p.m. Monday in its conference room, to the left of council chambers, in city hall, on Evergreen south of 11 Mile Road.
