BATTLE OVER SAME-SEX MARRIAGE
For some, a lot is riding on San Jose benefits vote
Alan Gathright, Chronicle Staff Writer Monday, March 8, 2004
San Jose city employee Tina Salas and her partner of 21 years, Kathleen Chavez Salas, spent a rainy night outside San Francisco City Hall, huddled under a tarp, soaked to the skin, to get married last month.


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Fragile compromise seen on banning gay marriage
By Raphael Lewis, Globe Staff, 3/9/2004

After a weekend of polling and cajoling colleagues, state Senate President Robert E. Travaglini said yesterday he had marshaled a majority of lawmakers for Thursday's constitutional convention to support a compromise amendment that would ban gay marriage but create civil unions.
Travaglini cautioned, however, that "this situation is rather fluid" and that "it would be very difficult to do a head count with any degree of accuracy," but said he believed the fragile coalition would hold together in the end.


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Gay couples file suit in Seattle; mayor joins debate
By Seattle Times staff
STEVE RINGMAN / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Six gay and lesbian couples sued King County today for the right to marry after they were denied marriage licenses.

The six couples, some with children in arms, were greeted at the door of the fourth-floor King County Administration Building office by County Executive Ron Sims, who said he supports their right to marry but is forbidden by state law from issuing licenses to partners of the same sex.


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Same-sex couples flock to gay-friendly Canada
Rona Marech, Chronicle Staff Writer Tuesday, March 9, 2004
On this side of the border, advocates of same-sex rights are calling it a "brain drain," while their counterparts in Canada are boasting of a "gay gain."Since Canada's immigration law was changed in 2002 to recognize same-sex partners for immigration purposes, an ever-growing number of gay and lesbian couples have uprooted and migrated -- especially couples in which one partner is a U.S. citizen and one is not.


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Board again rejects ALSO plea
The county's children's services board refuses to give $25,000 to help fund the program for gay youth.
BY KRISTI CECCAROSSI
MANATEE COUNTY --They thought they had a convincing case this time.
Figures on how many gay and lesbian teens were using their services or needed to, federal data on the problems facing those teens and personal stories of discrimination and abuse.