Solutions Journalism:
Chandler looks to Glendale in non-discrimination ordinance battle
By: Reagan Creamer
This article was written for a solutions journalism assignment at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.
CHANDLER, AZ — At Chandler’s very first Pride event, the celebration’s organizer clutched her iPhone as she approached the stage one last time.
As the music slowly faded and multicolored booths began to come down, Eduarda Schroder made a FaceTime call. There was one last person she wanted to show the crowd.
The light of her screen illuminated Schroder’s smile as her child, Jude, picked up the call. Walking through the emerald grass at Arrowhead Meadows Park, Schroder beamed as she introduced 24-year-old Jude to everyone she strolled past.
Stepping up to the stage, Schroder flipped her screen around to show Jude the nearly 150 people there — double the night’s anticipated turnout.
Holding back tears, Schroder said the event would not have been made possible without them. Jude, who is non-binary and transgender, is the reason Schroder says she advocates for the LGBTQ+ community in Chandler.
She worked with the city to host the “Pride in Chandler” event in November.
But there was still work to do.
Chandler is the largest city in Arizona without a non-discrimination ordinance in place. Such a law, supporters say, would extend protections to LGBTQ+ Chandler residents against discrimination in the workplace, housing and public spaces.
In 2021, four Arizona cities adopted antibias ordinances, the most to ever do so in a single year. The new additions bring the state’s total to 10 cities with antibias laws in place — providing protections to nearly half of Arizona’s population.
Three of the four cities are included in the Human Rights Campaign’s Municipal Equality Index — an inclusivity measuring tool. Glendale, Mesa and Scottsdale all saw boosted rankings in this year’s scorecard. According to the human rights group, the scorecard ranks cities based on “how inclusive municipal laws, policies and services are of LGBTQ+ people who live and work there.”
All three cities saw at least a 20-point increase from 2020 to 2021.
Glendale leaders, who helped the city to adopt an inclusivity ordinance earlier this year, say the city is now at an economic advantage. Glendale Chamber of Commerce president Robert Heidt says he has received calls from residents who say they feel safer with the ordinance in place.
Heidt is now pairing up with leaders in Chandler to help the city pass its own ordinance. Schroder and other community leaders are looking to Glendale as an example as they call on Chandler’s city council to pass an antibias law.
Glendale City Council adopted its non-discrimination ordinance on May 26. In a unanimous decision, all seven councilmembers agreed to ban discrimination against LGBTQ+ residents in public places, housing and employment.
According to a news release from Glendale’s Public Affairs Department, the ordinance added the words “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to its current discrimination laws.
However, the law does not apply to churches and other religious institutions. It also does not apply to schools, sports leagues and “single-sex designated areas” (like dressing rooms) in public places.
The law, which leaders say took years in the making, was passed within 45 days after being formally proposed.
“From a municipal standpoint, that is literally unheard of,” Heidt said of the council’s quick timeline.
Before the ordinance was passed, Heidt says he received phone calls from residents experiencing discrimination in Glendale.
“I had businesses and members who said to me, time and time again, ‘I don't feel welcomed in my community, I don't feel truly part of it. My identity has to be suppressed because of who I love, or what I believe,’” Heidt said.
Over six months since the law was adopted, Heidt says the types of phone calls he receives have changed.
“We received many calls from people saying ‘thank you’ and that they feel more protected than they did before,” Heidt said. “At the end of the day, if anything, it lets people know, when they put their head on their pillow at night, they can sleep a little easier knowing that they are protected.”
Heidt says the ordinance also gave Glendale an economic advantage. He says inclusivity is one of the top priorities for businesses looking to relocate and expand their sites.
“If you don't have that, as part of your core culture, as a city, you're ruled out,” Heidt said. “You might have the best location. You might have the best incentives. But if you're not inclusive and welcoming, you could get ruled out simply for that.”
Angela Hughey, co-founder and president of ONE Community, agrees.
“Businesses want to move or grow into regions that they know value everyone,” Hughey said. “And also treat their employees the same way that they're treated inside of work.”
Hughey says the business community has already overwhelmingly had LGBTQ+ protections in place so companies want their employees to remain protected outside of work, too.
“If you have a campus in Scottsdale, and then you have a campus in Gilbert, and you have LGBTQ employees that literally travel from Scottsdale, where they have full protections, and in their travels to Gilbert, or in this case Chandler, they lose the same protections as their non-LGBTQ counterparts.”
Hughey said LGBTQ+ visitors also are more likely to visit cities and support their businesses.
“It's really important for businesses that all of their employees have the same protections from a travel and tourism standpoint,” Hughey said. “If you don't have an inclusive ordinance in place, you're not just negatively impacting LGBTQ travelers, you are also not getting the full effect of our friends and family as well.”
Heidt says passing the ordinance has made people recognize Glendale as a welcoming, accepting place.
The Human Rights Campaign, a national organization that releases municipal equality rankings of major cities every year, recently recognized the impact of Glendale’s new law.
The scorecard evaluates cities in categories of non-discrimination laws, employment, municipal services, law enforcement, and leadership on LGBTQ+ equality. The category with the largest point value is the non-discrimination law category, in which cities can earn up to 30 points.
Glendale scored 72 out of 100 on last year’s scorecard. This year, however, Glendale’s score jumped to 94 — earning full points in the non-discrimination laws category.
Scottsdale and Mesa, other cities that passed inclusivity laws, also saw boosted scores. Mesa moved from 64 to 87, while Scottsdale jumped from 80 to 100. Phoenix, Tempe and Tucson — all cities with ordinances in place — also had perfect scores.
Chandler’s score for 2021? 66.
Still, Hughey and Heidt say, there is more work to be done.
“I still think there's probably some bias and certainly some discrimination that does exist,” Heidt said. “It’s unfortunate, but we will continue to champion and help to educate and evolve people to accepting and belonging.”
As Hughey and Heidt assist Chandler leaders in fighting for a non-discrimination ordinance, they are also hopeful that protections for the LGBTQ+ community will one day be available statewide.
Arizona State Sen. Sean Bowie, a Democrat who represents Mesa, Tempe, Ahwatukee and Chandler in the conservative-learning Legislature, has pushed to bolster anti-discrimination laws. Every year since being elected in 2016, Bowie introduces legislation asking for the state to add four words to its current discrimination law.
“All we’re doing is adding the words ‘sexual orientation, gender identity’ to go along with things like sex and race and age, disability and so on,” Bowie said.
Bowie wants the Senate to extend current protections to those in the LGBTQ+ community. So far, Bowie and his fellow supporting senators have not been able to get the bill passed, leaving it up to cities to individually put laws into place.
“It’s not something the governor or the majority party supports,” Bowie said. “So there’s been an effort for cities to take the lead on this.”
In Chandler, the process of passing an ordinance has not been as rapid as in other Arizona cities. The slow pace affects how Hughey feels about the city.
“My wife and I don't come to the city of Chandler because Chandler has chosen not to have an ordinance,” Hughey said. “The mayor and council are pretty much saying that we're not valued in the city of Chandler.”
Hughey says choosing not to act is an action in and of itself.
Chandler public officials have been talking about a possible ordinance for nearly a year. The Chandler Chamber of Commerce’s Board of Directors sent a letter of support for the law. After several meetings, the council in June decided to conduct a community study.
This October, the council voted to hire Cooperative Personnel Services, an inclusivity consulting agency, to conduct the study, which will ask residents about their beliefs on discrimination in Chandler. Per the city manager’s office, the consulting firm is expected to complete the study by “early spring” of 2022.
As of November, the study has yet to be started.
In response to the delay, Councilmember Matt Orlando, a supporter of the ordinance, says some communities take longer to consider the issue.
“There are some leaders in our community that feel strongly for this issue,” Orlando said. “There are some leaders that are ambivalent. There's some religious concerns from folks that are extremely religious about this issue. And then there's folks that don't want this to be punitive.”
Orlando says the council is in an education phase and that taking time to do a study is the right next move.
“I think it's fair to take a pause to do the survey, do the outreach, do the understanding, get the consultant’s response,” Orlando said. “And then we'll take it from there.”
In the interim, community leaders like Bowie and Schroder are continuing to host conversations with the council. Bowie says council members want to see examples of discrimination but that isn’t always possible to demonstrate.
“Often discrimination — it’s not in an email or it’s not in something that’s recorded,” Bowie said. “It’s maybe someone who’s young and looking for their first apartment who’s maybe transgender and goes to look at the apartment and the person who owns the apartment just won’t rent it to them and won’t give them a reason why.”
Schroder says the council has asked her for examples, too.
“All they have to do is go have some conversations with some high school students that are part of GSA’s (gay-straight alliances),” Schroder said. “And they’re going to learn a whole lot about how unsafe it is.”
Schroder says Chandler’s high school students are the most real examples of how not having an ordinance in place can negatively affect the LGBTQ+ community.
“They’re afraid to fundraise because they are afraid of being bullied within their school,” said Schroder. “That’s Chandler.”
Schroder speaks as an ally to the LGBTQ+ community because she says it can be difficult and frightening to speak out in a city that does not offer LGBTQ+ residents protection. Bowie says this is the reason why discrimination does not make it to official channels.
“Often these are things that are not reported,” Bowie said. “And folks are scared to report them or feel like it won’t make a difference, and folks won’t be held accountable.”
As the city gets ready to start the community study, Schroder says she will continue to do all she can to get Chandler’s non-discrimination ordinance passed.
Despite the slow-moving timeline and pushback from council members, Schroder says she will keep fighting because of Jude.
“I remember when Jude was born and those very first weeks and months of looking at and taking care of this human being who was completely dependent on me,” Schroder said. “It’s an overwhelming emotional experience.
And I knew, and that feeling is always there —”
She paused, grasping for the right words.
“That I would always do anything I could to protect that person. And this is one of the things I have to do.”