City of Atlanta v. McKinney

• Decision Date: 14 March 1995
• Docket Number: Nos. S94A1610,S94X1612,s. S94A1610
• Citation: 454 S.E.2d 517,265 Ga. 161
• Parties: , 67 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 646, 19 Employee Benefits Cas. 1065 CITY OF ATLANTA et al. v. McKINNEY et al. McKINNEY et al. v. CITY OF ATLANTA et al.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

Page 517

454 S.E.2d 517

265 Ga. 161, 67 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 646,

19 Employee Benefits Cas. 1065

CITY OF ATLANTA et al. v. McKINNEY et al.

McKINNEY et al. v. CITY OF ATLANTA et al.

Nos. S94A1610, S94X1612.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

March 14, 1995.

Joe M. Harris, Jr., Kendric E. Smith, Renata D. Turner, Robin Joy Shahar, Asst. City Attys., Clifford E. Hardwick, IV, City Atty., Atlanta, for City of Atlanta, et al.

Wendell R. Bird, David J. Myers, Bird & Associates, G. Stephen Parker, Joshua R. Kenyon, Southeastern Legal Foundation, Inc., Atlanta, for McKinney, et al.

Harry H. Harkins, Jr., J. Patrick McCrary, Atlanta, amici curiae.

FLETCHER, Justice.

These appeals involve a challenge to City of Atlanta ordinances that prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, establish a domestic partnership registry for jail visitation, and extend insurance and other employee benefits to domestic partners of city employees. The trial court ruled that the city exceeded its powers in enacting the domestic partnership ordinances, but dismissed the claims challenging the anti-discrimination laws. We hold that the city has the power to enact the anti-discrimination and registry ordinances, but exceeded its authority in extending employee benefits to persons who are not dependents under state law. We affirm in part and reverse in part the trial court's grant of judgment on the pleadings to the plaintiffs in S94A1610 and affirm the grant of the city's motion to dismiss in S94X1612.

The Atlanta City Council in 1986 amended its charter's bill of rights and its code of ordinances to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. See Ordinance 86-0-0190 & 86-0-0308. The ordinances prohibit sexual orientation discrimination in city employment, artist selection, festival admission, Atlanta Civic Center exhibitors, licensed alcohol beverage establishments, and vehicles for hire. "Sexual orientation" is defined as "the state of being heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual."

In June 1993, the city council passed an ordinance providing for the establishment of a domestic partnership registry in the city's business license office. Ordinance 93-0-0776 defines "domestic partners" as "two people of the opposite or same gender who live together in the mutual interdependence of a single home and have signed a Declaration of Domestic Partnership." The declaration is a city form in which the partners "agree to be jointly responsible and obligated for the necessities of life for each other." The ordinance extends visitation rights to city jails to domestic partners and their family. In August 1993, the city council adopted an ordinance that extended employee benefits to domestic partners.

The City of Atlanta recognizes domestic partners as a family relationship and not a marital relationship and shall provide sick leave, funeral leave, parental leave, health and dental benefits, and any other employee benefit available to a City employee in a comparable manner for a domestic partner, as defined herein, as for a spouse to the extent that the extension of such benefits does not conflict with existing laws of the State of Georgia.

Ordinance 93-0-1057, § 3.

State representative Billy McKinney, two city council members, a city taxpayer, a city employee, and a retired city employee filed a declaratory judgment action seeking to have the four ordinances declared invalid and unconstitutional and seeking damages. The city moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim. After a hearing, the trial court granted the plaintiffs a partial judgment on the pleadings under OCGA § 9-11-12(c), declaring the domestic partnership ordinances ultra vires, void, and unconstitutional under the Georgia Municipal Home Rule Act and the Georgia Constitution, but dismissed the plaintiffs' claims related to the anti-discrimination ordinances and damages. The city appeals the judgment invalidating the domestic partnership ordinances in S94A1610. McKinney appeals the dismissal of the claims challenging the anti-discrimination ordinances and seeking damages in S94X1612.

S94A1610. DOMESTIC PARTNERSHIP ORDINANCES.

¹

1. "Municipal corporations are creations of the state and possess only those powers that have been expressly or impliedly granted to them." Porter v. City of Atlanta, 259 Ga. 526, 384 S.E.2d 631 (1989). The Municipal Home Rule Act of 1965 grants a city the legislative power to adopt ordinances "relating to its property, affairs, and local government for which no provision has been made by general law and which are not inconsistent with the Constitution." OCGA § 36-35-3(a) (1993). In determining the validity of an ordinance, this court must decide whether the city had the power to enact the ordinances and whether the exercise of its power is clearly reasonable. Porter, 259 Ga. at 526, 384 S.E.2d 631.

The city argues that the registry ordinance merely provides for an internal list of city residents and employees who have entered into written agreements similar to the one that this court upheld in Crooke v. Gilden, 262 Ga. 122, 414 S.E.2d 645 (1992), and grants domestic partners visitation rights to city jails. The ordinance states that it does not attempt to alter state laws regulating private or civil relationships.

Rights and Duties Created. Neither this ordinance nor the filing of a Declaration of Domestic Partnership shall create any legal rights or duties from one of the parties to the other, except those which specifically refer to Domestic Partnership. Nothing herein shall be construed to explicitly or implicitly create a marital relationship. This ordinance does not attempt to alter or affect the laws in the State of Georgia that regulate any private or civil relationships.

Ordinance 93-0-0776, § 2(A).

Courts have a duty to construe a statute to sustain it if its language is susceptible to more than one construction. Mayor & Council v. Anderson, 246 Ga. 786, 272 S.E.2d 713 (1980). Following this rule, we construe the registry ordinance as creating only a registration system and not any legal rights. Under this construction, the ordinance is valid. First, the city possesses the power to grant visitation rights to the city jail to registered persons. The Atlanta City Charter gives the city the power to "operate, maintain, regulate, [and] control ... corrective, detentional, penal and medical institutions, agencies and facilities." 1973 Ga.Laws 2188, 2256. Second, the registry ordinance is a reasonable exercise of the city's power. The registry is merely the mechanism by which the city can identify the residents and employees who may exercise their jail visitation rights because of their declaration as domestic partners. Because the registry and jail visitation law as construed is a reasonable ordinance related to the city's affairs, we reverse the trial court's grant of judgment on the pleadings concerning this ordinance.

2. The Georgia Constitution prohibits cities from enacting special laws relating to the rights or status of private persons. Ga. Const. Art. III, Sec. VI, Para. IV(c); see also id. (a) (prohibiting a city from enacting a local or special law for which provision has been made by general law). The home rule act also precludes cities from taking "any action affecting the private or civil law governing private or civil relationships, except as is incident to the exercise of an independent governmental power." OCGA § 36-35-6(b). Although the meaning of this provision is ambiguous, it indicates that the state does " 'not wish to give our cities the power to enact a distinctive law of contract.' " See Marshal House, Inc. v. Rent Review and Grievance Bd. of Brookline, 357 Mass. 709, 260 N.E.2d 200, 204 (1970) (quoting Fordham, "Home Rule-AMA Model," 44 Nat'l Municipal Review 137, 142). At a minimum, it means that cities in this state may not enact ordinances defining family relationships. The Georgia General Assembly has provided for the establishment of family relationships by general law. See, e.g., OCGA §§ 19-3-1 to 19-5-17 (1991); see also City of Bloomington v. Chuckney, 165 Ind.App. 177, 331 N.E.2d 780, 783 (1975) ("a city should not be able to enact its own separate law of contracts or domestic relations since these areas are unsuited to less than statewide legislation").

The Municipal Home Rule Act specifically grants cities the authority to provide insurance benefits for a city's "employees, their dependents, and their survivors." OCGA § 36-35-4(a). The issue here is whether the city impermissibly expanded the definition of dependent to include domestic partners. Although the home rule act does not define the term "dependent," other state statutes define a dependent either as a spouse, child, or one who relies on another for financial support. Compare OCGA § 20-2-886 (granting right to health insurance coverage to the spouse and dependent children of public school employees), OCGA § 45-18-8 (1990) ("spouse and dependent children" may be included in the health care coverage of state and other public employees), and OCGA § 34-9-13(a) & (b) (1993) (under workers' compensation statute a wife, husband, or child is "presumed to be the next of kin wholly dependent for support upon the deceased employee") with OCGA § 48-7-26 (Supp.1994) (adopting the Internal Revenue Code's definition of dependent as an individual who receives half of his or her support from the taxpayer and is a member of the taxpayer's household). Domestic partners do not meet any of these statutory definitions of dependent.

The powers of cities must be strictly construed, and any doubt concerning the existence of a particular power must be resolved against the municipality. City of Macon v. Walker, 204 Ga. 810, 812, 51 S.E.2d 633 (1949); City of Doraville v. Southern Railway Co., 227 Ga. 504, 510, 181 S.E.2d 346 (1971). We conclude that the city exceeded its power to provide benefits to employees and their...