LESBIAN COUPLE SEEKS SPOUSAL PRIVILEGES AT COUNTRY CLUB: From the Associated Press

Late in the day, when most others have cleared the course of rolling hills and serene lakes, B. Birgit Koebke, golfs alone at her country club. If a group happens to be ahead of her, they no longer allow her to play through.

"I just sit there and wait," she says. "They've made it impossible for me to enjoy the club."

Koebke, a 47-year-old television sales executive, is a longtime member of the Bernardo Heights Country Club. She is also lesbian, and her extended drive to win club golfing privileges for her partner of 12 years, Kendall French, has left few members willing to play with her.

Koebke hopes the California Supreme Court will hear her argument that the state's civil rights laws should require the club to give French, her state-registered domestic partner, the same benefits given to spouses.

Bernardo Heights maintains that state law allows it to limit such privileges to legally married couples.

John Shiner, a Los Angeles attorney representing Bernardo Heights, says the club simply wishes "to make a distinction between those who are legally married and those who are not married. ... I should add that this has absolutely nothing to do with sexual orientation." ...

The club rejected suggested compromises, such as issuing free guest passes for French. Koebke suggested it create a "significant others" category, which also could benefit widows who didn't wish to remarry for financial or other reasons. In 1996, the club's board of directors agreed to consider the idea, but first restricted that significant others would have to be of the opposite sex of the member. Regardless, the measure failed.

The club suggested French buy her own membership, an invitation she finds insulting. "Tell me," she says, "how many of the other members are willing to pay double for their household?"

In 2001, Koebke filed her lawsuit. A San Diego Superior Court judge dismissed her claims in 2002. But last March, an appellate court partially overturned the ruling, ordering the trial court to consider Koebke's claim that the club treated unmarried heterosexual couples as spouses. It rejected Koebke's challenges of the interpretation of California's civil rights law. The state Supreme Court is expected to announce in coming weeks whether it will hear her appeal.

French and Koebke, who are represented by the gay-rights defense fund Lambda Legal, would like the court to find the state's 1959 Unruh Civil Rights Act protects them from discrimination based on marital status. Since California law bans same-sex marriage, they argue, Koebke cannot fully enjoy the benefits of her membership.

Club counsel and member Thomas Monson wrote of Koebke's lawsuit in a 2001 letter to members saying the club was "a family oriented organization" and that the board "recognizes the State of California's strong public policy favoring marriage."

Koebke says she saw Monson's statement as a personal attack against her family. Monson declined to comment for this article. ...

Nationwide, clubs are divided about how to treat same-sex and unmarried couples, with about a third offering some form of benefits, according to Andrew Fortin, spokesman for the National Club Association, a Washington-based trade group of about 1,000 organizations.

Many, he says, are waiting to see what will happen with Koebke's case.

A similar conflict is unfolding in Atlanta, where the Druid Hills Golf Club was found to violate the city's anti-discrimination ordinance by refusing spousal benefits to a lesbian couple and a gay couple. Efforts to mediate a solution broke down in late May.

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posted by Eve at 11:52 PM | link

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