The Michigan House passed its own version of an anti-bullying bill for schools, one week after the Senate passed a controversial bill that critics say would have given students a license to bully on religious or moral grounds. The Detroit Free Press reports that the House bill included no such language and provides protection against bullying for all Michigan children. Though the bill received bipartisan support (passing 88-18) some Democrats said it does not go far enough. Michigan lawmakers have faced criticism nationwide since the Senate passed an anti-bullying bill last week that included language that said policies against bullying could not prohibit "a statement of a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction of a school employee, school volunteer, pupil or a pupil's parent or guardian." House Republican leaders said that they did not support that language and would work toward a compromise. The compromise is the bill the House approved Thursday. The main sponsor, Representative Phil Potvin, (R-Cadillac) recounted stories of two Michigan children who killed themselves after being bullied. He said Michigan is one of just three states in the nation without an anti-bullying law on the books. "Our students deserve it. We cannot stand on the sidelines anymore," he said. The House bill now goes to the Senate for consideration.
Defeated in his first attempt at re-election this week, Milton City Councilman Alan Tart is crying foul. "It is politics at its worst," he told 11Alive News on Friday. Tart is talking about two robo calls that went out to many Milton voters the night before Tuesday's election. He shared one with 11Alive, which said, in part, "As the only openly gay Democrat in North Fulton, Alan needs every vote to ensure that a progressive voice is heard on the council." Tart said the calls are fakes, designed to help him lose the election, which he did. First elected in 2007, he has never hidden the fact that he is gay. He even has a photo with his partner on his campaign website. But he never made an issue of it and neither did anyone else until the fake robo calls. "It has nothing to do with my ability to do my job as shown by my track record the last four years," he insisted. The fake calls came out not long after the Atlanta Progressive News website wrote articles on how unusual it was for Tart to hold office in a largely conservative, Republican suburb of metro Atlanta. Tart also says he is an independent and not necessarily a Democrat. Like those in other Georgia cities and counties, local elections are non-partisan. It is even against election rules for anyone to campaign on behalf of a political party. Fake campaign calls on behalf of a candidate who did not authorize them are also illegal under state law. Tart's opponent, winner Lance Large, sent 11Alive News an e-mail saying he had nothing to do with the fake calls which also pointed out he was the conservative Republican in the race. "I did not launch, authorize or have any knowledge of who launched the robo calls," Large wrote. Tart isn't blaming his opponent directly and he accepts the 57-percent to 43-percent loss. But he has filed a formal complaint with Georgia's Secretary of State asking the office to investigate, adding "It's incumbent upon me as a citizen who's still a resident of the city and as a citizen of this country just to shed light on this dirty politics."
On a cool August evening, a man was walking on a paved path through the Medford section of Torbert Macdonald Park when he locked eyes with a stranger. The man, a computer technician who is gay, believed that the look suggested that the stranger wanted sex, according to gay-rights advocates. But the stranger was an undercover state trooper, who arrested the technician - not for a sex crime, but for trespassing - after he wandered 50 feet off the path, according to a police report. Massachusetts State Police arrested 31 men at the park this past summer, most of them for trespassing, reviving fears in the gay community that the police were once again targeting gay men. The sexual orientation of most of the men is unknown, but their arrests prompted gay-rights advocates to meet recently with high-ranking public safety officials in Governor Deval Patrick’s administration. “There is some concern whether or not the State Police are up to old tactics,’’ said Amanda Escamilla, a victim advocate with Fenway Health’s violence recovery program, who attended the meeting on November 4. “There is reasonable belief that it could be happening again, and, if it is, we want to make sure that it stops.’’ In 1989, State Police agreed to stop using undercover officers as decoys to crack down on alleged sexual activity between men at highway rest stops, according to a Boston Globe report at the time. But police officials say the recent work at the Medford park did not target any one group. Their overall goal, they say, was to maintain safety in state-owned parks and protect delicate grounds, which have been damaged by people veering off main paths to use drugs or engage in sex. Officials at the state Department of Conservation and Recreation said that “men who have sex with men’’ go off main paths at the Middlesex Fells Reservation to have trysts, trampling on natural resources, according to a draft of the department’s resource management plan. The language angers advocates, who said it unfairly blames one group of people. DCR officials said they would revise the language in the plan’s final draft. Karen Wells - undersecretary of law enforcement for the Executive Office of Public Safety, which oversees the State Police - said troopers are prohibited from targeting specific groups of people. “I’m very comfortable from the top down that [police] are treating these types of cases appropriately,’ she said. “I’m also confident that they’re not sending troopers out as decoys.’’ Wells organized the November 4 meeting after hearing concerns from advocates. “I think it takes a little time to figure out what’s really going on here,’’ said Bruce Bell, who runs the legal information line at the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders and who attended the meeting. “The issue is, are [troopers] really just there to kind of make eye contact and find out more about the person, or are there police who are trying to get people to think, ‘I’m gay, and I want to go have sex off trail with you,’ and encourage the person to go off the trail?’’ The technician, who is also a gay rights activist, alerted GLAD after his arrest and said he had learned of other gay men arrested under similar circumstances at Macdonald Park, said Donald Gorton, chairman of the Anti-Violence Project of Massachusetts. Advocates have not independently corroborated his allegations.
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