Issue Position: LGBT Rights

Issue Position

ENACT THE GENDER EXPRESSION NON-DISCRIMINATION ACT (GENDA)

GENDA will ensure transgender and gender non-conforming people have equal protections in education, employment, Housing, Credit, and Public Accommodations (including banks, bus stations, court rooms, hospitals, hotels, restaurants, libraries).

OUTLAW SEXUAL ORIENTATION CONVERSION EFFORTS

LGBT youth do not need to be "cured" from being who they are. But they do need to be protected from dangerous "conversion" practices, which have created serious negative health consequences, including social withdrawal, depression, and suicide.

ENACT THE CHILD-PARENT SECURITY ACT (CPSA)

Current New York laws unfairly and unnecessarily burden families seeking to have children through the now common practice of gestational surrogacy--where the carrier has no genetic connection to the child. The law must be changed in light of recent medical advances so that New York families can pursue a safe, regulated surrogacy arrangement in their own state that secures the parental relationships of children who are conceived and born with the assistance of egg or sperm donors or gestational carriers.

RESTORE STATE FUNDING FOR HOMELESS YOUTH SHELTERS

Governor Cuomo's first state budget in 2011 cut state aid for homeless youth shelters, including those that serve LGBT youth, who account for about 40% of all homeless youth in New York City. These shelters should be funded at the level necessary to meet the need.

RESTORE FUNDING FOR THE AIDS INSTITUTE

When Governor Cuomo unveiled his "progressive agenda" for 2013, his budget cut funding for the AIDs Institute in the Office of Public Health. Although the number of HIV/AIDS deaths has been reduced in New York State over the last decade, the spread of the HIV virus is still at the level of a generalized epidemic. Because it is spreading most rapidly in low-income and marginalized groups, less than 40% of New Yorkers with HIV are fully virally suppressed. The Aids Institute has served as a model for public health in the nation. HIV clinical services and care coordination providers increasingly serve a larger constituency of low-income people with chronic conditions. The AIDS Institute has helped make this transition successful both for consumers and providers. With NYS Medicaid payments increasingly handled by private Managed Care Organizations (MCOs) instead of the state directly, the AIDS Institute is needed as an independent monitor of MCOs so that health care is not cut for people living with HIV and AIDS. The AIDS Institute provides critically needed prevention and harm reduction programs for people at risk for HIV/AIDS. The experience in the AIDS Institute can also be applied to the growing epidemics of Hepatitis and STDs, which are prevalent in the same populations with high rates of HIV infection.

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