Domestic partner rights among key gay forum issues

Twelve candidates for Las Vegas municipal positions shared their ideas on domestic partnership, anti-discrimination legislation and a civilian police review board during a forum Thursday night at the Gay & Lesbian Community Center.

The event, held before a standing-room-only crowd at the center on East Sahara Avenue, featured six of the nine candidates for Las Vegas mayor and some animated give-and-take involving front-runner Oscar Goodman.

Goodman, a nationally known criminal defense attorney, drew the largest applause and the most questions.

He vowed to have a "rainbow coalition" in City Hall, to appoint an ombudsman to serve as liaison with the gay community and to stand up to discrimination.

Goodman lashed out angrily -- although not by name -- at mayoral opponent Arnie Adamsen for his decision to air "negative ads" claiming Goodman represented "bad people" for years.

"I represented people who were unpopular and causes that were unpopular," Goodman said, adding that he believes anyone who thinks his clients were bad people would likely believe other types of "unpopular" people are "bad."

Adamsen, a veteran city councilman, did not attend and did not answer a questionnaire submitted prior to the event by the Gay & Lesbian Center.

Developer Mark Fine said he supported current Mayor Jan Laverty Jones' decision to offer benefits to domestic partners of adults of the same sex who live together.

One man in the audience asked him to clarify that position -- because Jones has not offered those benefits and the issue has been temporarily shelved by the council.

Fine then corrected his position and said he would support benefits for domestic partners.

All candidates who spoke said they favored state Assembly Bill 311, which would ban discrimination based on sexual orientation in the workplace.

Several other candidates talked about their empathy for the gay community.

Mayoral hopeful Hillary Michael Milko hinted that he befriended gays while working for two years on "The Young and the Restless."

Municipal Court Department 4 candidate Craig Hendricks told the crowd he had lived in predominantly gay West Hollywood for three years and enjoyed his time there.

But he won rousing applause when he told the audience that someone vandalized the campaign sign in his front yard by drawing a mustache on his face and writing the words "I'm gay" coming out of his mouth.

Jessie Walsh, a deputy public defender running for Municipal Court Department 4, told the packed crowd that a new mayor should work to get more funding for a larger Gay & Lesbian Center.

"I believe that everyone is entitled to be heard, to be respected and to be given a fair hearing under the law," she said.

Other mayoral candidates who attended were Frank LaSpina, Tom McGowan and Anthony Snowden.

Municipal Court Department Four candidate Bert Brown, City Council Ward 1 candidates Paul Holder and Linda Gray, and City Council Ward 3 candidate Carlo Poliak also spoke.

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