Miami Beach joins court fight for women who were denied entry to Orlando strip club
What do the policies of an Orlando strip club have to do with anti-discrimination protections in Miami Beach?
A whole lot, it turns out.
Attorneys for the city of Miami Beach are leading a statewide effort to protect local anti-discrimination ordinances after an Orange County Circuit Court judge ruled in May that Florida’s anti-discrimination laws overrule local ordinances.
The constitutional chain reaction was sparked by a lawsuit filed by two women who were denied entry to an Orlando strip club in 2018 because the strip club’s policy prohibited women from entering the business unless they were accompanied by a man.
When the women sued, their lawyer cited Orange County’s Human Rights Ordinance, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of traditional factors, like sex and race, but goes beyond the Florida Civil Rights Act by protecting LGBTQ residents and others.
Because the judge ruled that the state law preempted the local ordinance, Orange County’s anti-discrimination law and 45 others across the state are at risk of being voided, as the plaintiffs appeal to the Fifth District Court of Appeal in Florida.
“The worst case scenario is that local discrimination ordinances that protect LGBTQ people around the state of Florida would cease to exist,” said Robert Rosenwald, Miami Beach’s first assistant city attorney. “Gay and trans folks would have absolutely no protection from discrimination in the state of Florida.”
It would go further than that.
Miami Beach’s anti-discrimination ordinance prohibits discrimination in employment, housing and “public accommodations” on the basis of any of 18 factors, including gender identity, sexual orientation, union membership and country of origin.
The Florida Civil Rights Act is much more narrow. It only covers “race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, national origin, age, handicap, or marital status.”
On Thursday, Miami Beach led a coalition of 21 municipalities in filing an amicus brief — friend of the court — brief encouraging the appellate court to overturn the trial court’s decision.
“If allowed to stand, the trial court’s decision will harm the most vulnerable people across our state by preventing local governments from barring discrimination against people not yet protected by state or federal law,” said Mayor Dan Gelber. “Together with 21 other local governments, we are taking a stand in court today to ensure that the additional protections offered by local discrimination laws will continue to make our cities and counties the fairest and most equitable places to live, work and play.”
Monroe and Broward counties joined Miami Beach and others in the filing. Rosenwald filed the court papers after an attorney in the original case called him to warn about the potential stripping of local discrimination protections.
“The city of Miami Beach took it upon itself to call every local government in the state that has a Human Rights Ordinance, all 46 of them, and asked them to join our coalition and sign our brief,” he said. “It’s a very dangerous situation because the judiciary in Florida has changed a lot recently, and they’ve shown a strong willingness to ignore prior precedent and just reverse it.”
Rosenwald said Florida Supreme Court precedent is on the city’s side. Many of the cities and counties with Human Rights Ordinances have enjoyed its protections since the 1980s. In Miami Beach, he said, the local ordinance was passed in the early 1990s.’
“If they follow the law, the decision on appeal should be short and it should reverse the trial court,” he said. “But with the current judiciary, anything can happen.”
The case is not expected to be decided until next year.
