Nondiscrimination

In addition to championing the struggle for marriage equality, the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund has made significant investments in changing a range policies and practices that keep gay men and lesbians from becoming full, contributing members of society.
 
Our goal is to work with our partners in the movement to establish a national social norm rejecting discrimination against gay people.  That’s why we are supporting efforts to allow gay people to serve openly in the military, and to end discrimination against gays and lesbians in employment, housing and public accommodations.  The Fund’s goals are:

• Support the successful implementation of the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA). The Haas, Jr. Fund is backing efforts to ensure the successful implementation of this anticipated landmark federal law, which would extend employment nondiscrimination protections to gay people living in 30 states that currently do not have such laws.

• Support state and local actions to extend nondiscrimination protections. The Haas, Jr. Fund, the Gill Foundation, the Arcus Foundation and an anonymous contributor created the State Equality Fund, which supports public education efforts to secure nondiscrimination protections at the state and local levels. We hope this will result in increasing the share of the U.S. population living in localities and states with nondiscrimination laws from 50 percent today to 60 percent by 2012. 

• Support efforts to undermine “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT), which prohibits gay people from serving openly in the military. The Haas, Jr. Fund supports the research and communications work of the Palm Center at University of California, Santa Barbara, and the public education efforts of Servicemembers Legal Defense Network to build public and military support for overturning DADT, an action that would mark a crucial gain in acceptance of gay people in American society.