PORTLAND, Maine - The Portland City Council is set to vote Monday on a resolution to remove the exclusion for trangender health care services from the municipal employee health plan.
The resolution is sponsored by Mayor Ethan Strimling and City Manager Jon Jennings and co-sponsored by the entire City Council.
Strimling says the resolution makes clear that the city supports health care services for trangender people in order to protect the health, safety and quality of life for all Portland residents.
"The city of Portland has been on the forefront of LGBTQ issues from the beginning: the first municipality to say that you can't fire somebody if they're gay or lesbian, to just a few weeks ago saying we're not going to spend any money in South Carolina, based on the law they put in place that would discriminate against trans community," Strimling says.
The city says that by implementing this change, which is expected to go into effect on Jan. 1st, Portland will join more than 60 municipalities across the county that have also removed exclusions for transgender employee health coverage.
Portland's city council will consider such a resolution on June 20. Maine LGBT groups say more than 60 cities across the nation, including Boston, Providence and Burlington, have passed similar policies.
