During negotiations, the university system’s administration said it wasn’t feasible to offer same-sex benefits, citing budget constraints. Consultants to the administration estimated at the time the benefits would cost an additional $600,000 to $1.2 million a year, system spokesman Tom Gluck says.
“Because our fiscal situation overall was a very challenging one, and health care costs in particular ... to expand benefits in any way to more people for more services, this was not the time to do that,” Gluck says.
Nearly 300 colleges and universities nationwide provide some form of domestic-partner benefits, including 23 in Pennsylvania, according to Washington, D.C.-based Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay rights advocacy group. They include Pennsylvania State University, Temple University and the University of Pittsburgh, which receive state funding but are not state-owned.
The state system’s faculty union is concerned that not offering same-sex benefits puts the universities at a competitive disadvantage, union president Patricia Heilman says.
“The pressure is even more intense for us to obtain domestic-partner benefits, because we actually compete with Pitt, Penn State and Temple for faculty,” Heilman says.
— Associated Press
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