Friday, September 5, 2008

Dallas-area businesses score highly for gay-friendly policies

By Ben Briscoe of Dallas Voice

A new report from the Human Rights Campaign has local gay business people boasting that Dallas is a great place to be an LGBT employee.

In the 2009 edition of HRC’s Corporate Equality Index — released on Tuesday, Sept. 2 — the number of companies nationwide that scored a perfect 100 rose from 195 to 259. But in North Texas, the number doubled, going from four to eight — and with the move of AT&T from San Antonio to Dallas, nine.

“I think it is very positive,” said Tony Vedda, president of the North Texas GLBT Chamber of Commerce. “This means that more and more businesses here reflect the city, which is very welcoming to the GLBT community.”

Andy Smith of Texas Instruments Inc. — one of the local businesses that scored a perfect 100 for the first time — agreed.

“Dallas is a great place to be if you are an LGBT person or an ally,” he said. “This is indicative of the city’s progress. … We have several large companies here that have set the bar, such as J.C. Penney and American Airlines. I think certainly the war for talent and competing with these other companies to attract the best employees had a large role.”

The nine local companies that scored perfect 100s together account for more than 750,000 jobs, a number that makes DFW Texas’ LGBT-friendly employment powerhouse. Houston came in second with five companies that received a perfect score. Austin placed third with two.

Despite the progress, North Texas is still home to the only two companies nationally that received a score of 0 from HRC, Irving-based ExxonMobil and Plano-based Perot Systems. And on a state level, the Equality Forum found in another recent report that Texas accounts for 13 of the 30 Fortune 500 companies that lack employment nondiscrimination policies including sexual orientation.

“When it comes to equality, Texas is a lone and tarnished star,” Equality Forum Executive Director Malcolm Lazin recently told Pink News, Europe’s largest gay news service.

Texas is not one of the roughly 20 states with statutes prohibiting employment discrimination based on sexual orientation, and as such it can serve as a sanctuary for anti-LGBT companies.

Ken Upton

Ken Upton, a senior staff attorney for Lambda Legal’s South Central office, in Dallas, argued that due to the lack of a state law, even employees at companies with good HRC scores aren’t necessarily protected legally.

“In Texas as a general rule, anti-discrimination policies of companies are not enforceable as a matter of law,” he said. “The bottom line is that they don’t provide a lot of relief if someone has an employer that speaks a good a language but doesn’t walk the walk.”

Upton said there are limited federal and city protections for LGBT employees.

But even if some companies’ LGBT-friendliness isn’t legally iron clad, HRC President Joe Solmonese says the report makes him optimistic about the future.

“The 2009 Corporate Equality Index shows that corporate America understands that a diverse workforce is critical to remaining successful and competitive,” he stated in a press release. “In the absence of a federal law that prohibits workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity or expression, it is up to employers to take the lead and implement policies that ensure all their employees are protected.”

HRC evaluated the companies in six areas: Non-discrimination policy and diversity training for sexual orientation and gender identity or expression, partner benefits, LGBT employee resource group or diversity council, positively engaging the external LGBT community and exhibit responsible behavior toward the LGBT community.

North Texas-based AMR Corp. (American Airlines), AT&T Inc., Brinker International Inc., GameStop Corp., Haynes and Boone LLP, J.C. Penney Co. Inc., Kimberly-Clark Corp., Sabre Holdings Inc. and Texas Instruments Inc. each met all of the criteria.

Six other local companies got passing grades: Electronic Data Systems Corp. – 95, Southwest Airlines Co. – 90, Hotels.com LP – 85, Nortel Networks Corp. – 85, Comerica Inc. – 80 and Dean Foods Co. – 73.

And six other local companies received failing grades: Affiliated Computer Services – 60, RadioShack Corp. – 40, Tenet Healthcare – 35, BNSF Railway Co. – 30, ExxonMobil Corp. – 0 and Perot Systems Corp. — 0.

To read the full report, visit www.hrc.org/cei.

Pegasus News content partner - Dallas Voice
The community newspaper for gay & lesbian Dallas.

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