Board loses quorum after 2 members walk out before vote on plus-1 plan to offer healthcare to agency’s same-sex partners
DOUBTFUL DEEDS | When two board members walked out of a meeting this week, breaking quorum, Chairman John Danish had to look at the bylaws in order to proceed. (David Taffet/Dallas Voice)
When two DART board members walked out of a meeting this week before a vote on a domestic partner benefits plan, the board lost quorum and the item was delayed until October.
Michael Cheney, who represents Garland, and Randall Chrisman, who represents Carrollton, voted against the item at a committee-of-the-whole meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 24. But the item passed 9–2 and needed a final vote by the board later that evening.
DART board chairman John Danish pulled out the bylaws to double-check quorum requirements. A quorum consists of two-thirds of the board or 10 of 15 members in attendance. In addition to the two members who walked out, four were absent, including two Dallas board members who are supporters of the plan — Amanda Moreno Cross and Jerry Christian.
“He was blindsided,” Resource Center spokesman Rafael McDonnell said about Danish.
Others who had attended the meeting, planning to thank the board for passing the benefits, agreed.
When Danish realized business couldn’t continue without a quorum, he called a recess and managed to coax Chrisman back to vote on other pending issues, including the budget for the new fiscal year. The budget that passed already includes the cost of DP benefits.
After other items passed, Chrisman again walked out.
Danish then called for public comments.
Of those from the LGBT community who came to speak, all walked out except Cd Kirven.
Kirven blew up at the remaining board members and said afterward she was surprised she wasn’t escorted out by security. But the board members who listened to her appeared equally frustrated after debating the issue for more than a year and expecting it to pass without debate as it had in committee that afternoon.
McDonnell said Chrisman and Cheney have poisoned the effectiveness of the board.
“If Cheney and Chrisman stabbed them in the back on this, there’s no trust,” McDonnell said. “You need trust to be effective.”
DERAILED | LGBT advocates planned on thanking the Board of Directors for their vote, but after the delay tactics, only Cd Kirven, front, chided the board over her disappointment. (David Taffet/Dallas Voice)
DART spokesman Morgan Lyons said the item is on the Oct. 8 agenda and he expects action to be taken on it then. If it passes then, the sign-up period continues throughout October and employees will still be eligible to participate, with the benefits starting Jan. 1. If it doesn’t pass and is pushed to a November meeting, the benefits won’t take effect until January 2015.
Lyons refused to comment on what would happen if board members are absent and Cheney and Chrisman are allowed to continue with their delay tactics.
The fight for what DART called healthcare equalization began in July 2012 when Andrew Moss contacted DART about being added to his husband’s health plan. Moss is a former DART police officer who left for health reasons while his husband continued to work for the agency.
After a Change.org petition and correspondence from Resource Center, Moss received a letter from DART explaining its position. Human
Resources told him they “preferred not to get into the choices of their employees.”
In August 2012, Resource Center CEO Cece Cox met with DART Deputy Executive Director Jesse Oliver to discuss domestic partner benefits.
Since then, McDonnell has attended every board meeting and those committee meetings where the topic was discussed. For each board meeting after the administrative committee approved a plan in February, he’s arranged speakers to discuss the variety of reasons DP benefits should be offered.
That list of speakers has included three ministers, a rabbi, two former city council members and representatives of about 20 LGBT and allied organizations.
Discussions continued until April when further discussion of DP benefits was tabled until after the Supreme Court ruled on California’s Proposition 8 and the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Despite the suspended discussions, speakers continued to address the monthly board meeting.
After the court rulings led to restored marriage equality in California and federal benefits for same-sex married couples, DART took up the topic again in August.
But because of an attorney general’s opinion, the domestic partner plan became a plus-one plan, which was approved by the administrative committee. Any DART employee could add another adult living in the same residence and sharing financial responsibilities.
At a committee-of-the-whole meeting earlier this month, board members were confused by the change and the possible added expense of covering heterosexual partners who lived together.
Michael Muhammad, DART’s vice president of diversity and innovative services, said DART already covered common-law spouses. So the arguments by some board members for not covering same-sex partners fell apart as they realized the agency already was insuring the domestic partners of heterosexual employees.
The committee-of-the-whole then voted in favor of the plus-one plan. Only Chrisman voted against passage. Cheney abstained. The committee-of-the-whole had to take a second vote before passing it along for a full board vote.
The final vote by the committee-of-the-whole happened at the committee meeting this week. Cheney changed his vote from abstain to no. He called for a roll call vote, and when his name was called, he said he consulted with Garland city officials who encouraged him to vote no.
Garland Mayor Douglas Athas said he did speak to Cheney.
“I’m not opposed to that vote,” he said. “He struggled with it.”
Athas said his opposition to the plus-one plan is that it’s open to abuse. He said he understood the position it put same-sex couples in, but the plan could cover nieces, nephews or anyone else and the agency had no way to monitor it.
The tactics to break the board meeting later that evening worries activists who have followed DART’s progress on this issue and hope it passes in time to be implemented in 2014.
“We need a crowd on Oct. 8,” McDonnell said.
He asked members of the community to wear red shirts. DART board meetings begin at 6:30 p.m. at DART headquarters, 1401 Pacific Ave.
Meanwhile, McDonnell said some LGBT organizing needs to be done in Garland.
“We have been invited to bring equality to their doorstep,” McDonnell said.
In addition to bringing Garland residents to the next DART meeting, he’s planning to help Garland residents petition the council for a nondiscrimination ordinance. The next Garland City Council meeting is on Oct. 1 at 7 p.m. at Garland City Hall, 200 N. Fifth St.
This article appeared in the Dallas Voice print edition September 27, 2013.