Statehouse Correspondent
BOSTON -- Eight candidates for governor met at a forum Tuesday where all spoke in favor of addressing lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community concerns, with the exception of independent candidate Scott Lively, whose anti-gay comments repeatedly received boos and laughter.
All five Democrats and three independents seeking the corner office attended the discussion, hosted by MassEquality and WGBH at the Boston Public Library, while Republican Charlie Baker did not.
"The LGBT community has made great strides in recent years, finally gaining the civil rights that every person deserves," said Democratic candidate Joe Avellone. "Yet we know we still have so much work to do."
Topics included challenges confronted by gay youth and elders, domestic violence, marriage equality, health care and AIDS-related issues, and homelessness.
"Rates of homelessness in Massachusetts have been going up during the current administration. That's obviously the wrong direction," said independent candidate Evan Falchuk.
"When you look at the statistics around LGBTQ youth homelessness, so many of them are homeless because they've been kicked out of their homes, because their parents haven't been willing to accept them. It's a horrible, horrible thing to imagine going through as a young person," he said.
Falchuk said more state funding should go to organizations that help people in these situations.
Democrat Juliette Kayyem spoke about the importance of issues related to HIV and AIDS, which have declined but still remain problems for the LGBT community.
"It begins first with prevention and public education," she said. "Secondly though is treatment. As a state we can buy in bulk, we can think of creative ways of working with the private sector and the medical community to reduce the cost of these very expensive and yet life-saving drugs."
On the issue of domestic violence in the LGBT community, Democratic candidate Don Berwick said he sees it as part of a broader problem.
"I think it's part of the general problem of providing services to support healthy families and mental health in our commonwealth. This has been cut severely," he said.
Lack of funding is also a problem for services for elderly people in the LGBT community, independent candidate Jeff McCormick said.
"When I talk to elders in this situation, they can be in 60 or 70 year committed relationships and they have to turn their whole lives in a different direction," if they develop a neurological disease he said.
Finding the funding to help people affected, including paying for housing and nursing facilities, will be increasingly difficult, but the state will need to find a way, McCormick said. "We've got to listen, and you have to be creative, and we have to come up with a solution here," he said.
Independent candidate Scott Lively was the only candidate who opposed almost every position endorsed by the other candidates, saying he was "in this race to advance a biblical world view."
"As governor I would ban LGBT propaganda to children" as has been done in Russia, he said.
Treasurer Steve Grossman, who is running as a Democrat, responded with a different bible quote in his own closing statement.
"Giving another part of the Bible equal time, I'm going to quote the Book of Deuteronomy, where it says in Deuteronomy 16:20 'Justice, justice thou shall pursue,' " he said.
Grossman endorsed similar policies to the majority of candidates to address the concerns of the LGBT community, as did Attorney General Martha Coakley, also running as a Democrat.
Coakley said after the forum that she thought it was productive.
"I think we had a good discussion and most people I think are in agreement that we're on the right side of history, that we should keep this movement forward to prevent discrimination and provide services for seniors and kids who need it," she said.
(H/T: lowellsun.com)
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