LGBT activists say soon-to-be New York governor David Paterson will be a boon for LGBT rights and a healer in Albany.
He has been there in every critical fight over the last two decades,” said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, naming hate-crimes legislation introduced in 1987 and passed in 2000, the Sexual Orientation Nondiscrimination Act (SONDA) passed in 2002, and the ongoing fight to legalize same-sex marriage.
Paterson was also an early supporter of same-sex marriage, going on record as early as 1994. According to LGBT activist and Democratic political consultant Ethan Geto, he took a critical part in lobbying for passage of Gov. Spitzer’s marriage equality bill in the New York State assembly last year.
