California town wants to fight the state for the right to out trans kids to their parents

The city of Huntington Beach, California, is fighting the state’s ban on the forced outing of trans kids in schools, according to a recent meeting discussing a proposed ordinance to oppose this ban.

Mayor Gracey Van Der Mark referred to A.B. 1955– the state law protecting queer kids from being forcibly outed by schools to their parents – as a “grave injustice” and a “predatory act,” at the meeting. She also alleged that this would mean teachers would face a misdemeanor for noncompliance with the ordinance.

Related:

The forced outing of queer students is now illegal in California’s public schools

“LGBTQ+ students across California can breathe a sigh of relief” now that the first-of-its-kind law was passed, one LGBTQ+ org said.

“The notion that an educator’s act of communicating a child’s gender identity or gender expression to the child’s parents is ‘education’ itself is specious. An educator acting as a communication barrier between a child and a parent about a highly private and personal issue such as gender is not an act of ‘education,’ but a brazen act of sabotage toward parents,” says a request to prepare an ordinance by Mayor Gracey Van Der Mark.

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“It is also a deprivation to those children in need of obtaining the help, support, formation, love, and care the child should be getting from home. A.B. 1955 is not ‘education’ and therefore has no preemptive statewide authority.”

The mayor, in her request and at the meeting, focused on “parental rights” but made no mention of the risks trans kids face of being outed to homes that aren’t supportive. There was no mention in the request of the high youth homelessness rate among LGBTQ+ youth.

However, this meeting featured pushback against the mayor. Councilmember Rhonda Bolton asked if this would mean a lawsuit leveled against the city, to which Van Der Mark responded that the city would “explore any options or possibilities to assist any parents who would like to overturn A.B. 1955” and start “looking into the problem.”

Bolton said that they would have no standing in court to challenge A.B. 1955, so it’d be a waste of time and money to file the suit. Councilmember Dan Kalmick also stated that the city doesn’t have jurisdiction to enforce this since there is no authority to issue ordinances to local school districts, especially not to those that overlap with other Orange County cities.

The city’s residents had mixed reactions to the ordinance. While some expressed support for it, others were opposed.

Trans resident Renn, who was the head of their school’s gay-straight alliance and heard stories of parents abusing their LGBTQ+ children, was concerned for the future of kids and pushed back on the ordinance.

“If we’re actually concerned about the future of these children, we need to give them a better education,” Renn said.

Eva Weiss also questioned where the city is finding the money for this since many issues in the city are going unaddressed while they’re repeatedly trying to sue the state of California.

“Isn’t[sic] lawsuits a lot of money also? But somehow the city finds money for it,” she said.

Deborah Feliz was concerned about issues like homelessness, trash, and crime and opposed this use of city funds.

“We do have issues here,” said resident Deborah Feliz. “Homelessness, crime, trash, out of control e-bikers, illegal short-term renters, lack of police force, and a shortage of city funds, which I do believe are all things this city could put a dent in — if it was only willing to do what was best for the city, not the state, not the church, not their personal gain.

“Going forward, consider this: Stop suing the state. Start compromising.”

The city made headlines earlier this year when voters in the city approved a measure to ban Pride flags from being hung on city property.

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