The student-produced newspaper The Minaret is reporting a possible showdown looming between the University of Tampa faculty and UT President Ron Vaughn over domestic partner benefits:

In the strongest statement to date, the faculty senate overwhelmingly passed a resolution Monday in support of domestic partner benefits, threatening to take their grievances to UT's board of trustees and writing that "any further delay is without warrant."

The resolution, which was confrontational in tone, was delivered sometime Wednesday to President Ronald Vaughn and Provost Janet McNew.

…  The faculty, which voted 19 in favor of the resolution with one abstention and no one opposed, attached a DPB fact sheet to the resolution for the president and provost.

The fact sheet contained statistics and research findings in support of extending DPB. It said studies have shown that same-sex DPB coverage costs less on average than provisions for opposite sex couples.

It also said that a Human Rights Campaign study found not a single reported case of a DPB package being fraudulently used, that 88 percent of the top 50 ranked American universities offer DPB, and that the other three Tier One Regional Universities-UT being the fourth-all offer DPB.

The National Gay News in December reported that among state employees in Florida, "[c]urrently, the University of Florida, Florida International University, Broward Community College, Florida Keys Community College, Hillsborough Community College and Miami-Dade College are the only state employers offering the full range of domestic partner benefits. Those benefits include health insurance, as well as sick leave and bereavement leave." According to its website, USF in 2005 considered offering domestic partnership benefits but there is no evidence it was ever adopted, and the status of USF's same-sex benefits could not immediately be determined.

(UT President Ron Vaughn/credit: University of Tampa) 

This article appears in Mar 5-11, 2008.