House Bill To Repeal 2010 Missoula Montana Anti-Gay Discrimination Ordinance Likely To Die In Committee

The Helena Independent Record reports that a Senate committee chairman said Wednesday he intends to let die in his committee a controversial bill that would nullify Missoula’s 2010 ordinance that bans discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people. Senator Jon Sonju, (Republican-Kalispell) who chairs the Local Government Committee, said he learned from representatives of Missoula that not one discrimination complaint on these grounds had been filed against any businesses in the 11 months the ordinance has been in effect. As a result, Sonju said he said he sees no need for the bill at this time. House Bill 516, sponsored by Representative Kristin Hansen (Republican-Havre) had been approved by the House and then by Sonju’s committee last Friday. However, on Tuesday, the full Senate voted 44-5 to return the bill to the Senate Local Government Committee, apparently to kill it. “I don’t think the bill will get out of committee,” Sonju said, adding that if a sufficient number of discrimination complaints are filed against Missoula businesses in the future, a bill could be introduced in another session to address the issue. The stubbornly anti-gay Hansen said Wednesday that she intends to ask that the bill be brought back to the full Senate for a debate. Also Wednesday, at a meeting of House Republicans, Hansen played a threatening voice mail she had received regarding HB516. She said she turned it over to the Helena Police Department, which is subpoenaing the phone records. If they find who left the message, the lawmaker said she would ask that charges be brought against the caller. The voice mail, from what appeared to be a male caller, said “Here are some of my thoughts for you. If I were you I would stop spreading hate and intolerance and bigotry against people and their loved ones. The Bible says you reap what you sow, and you and your loved ones are going to get that hate back and then who knows what might happen to you.” It ended with an insult against her that contained with it some obscenities. “That’s not isolated,” Hansen said. “I get regularly, sometimes daily. I’ve also been accosted twice in Helena by members in opposition to 516 in my face, shaking their fingers in public places, in restaurants, calling me all of these names and more.”