Crescent Springs is the 21st Kentucky city to pass a fairness ordinance. City Council unanimously passed the ordinance Monday night.
It extends discrimination protections in employment, housing, and public accommodations to include sexual orientation and gender identity. According to The River City News, the city will establish a three-person human rights commission to handle this.
Chris Hartman is the Executive Director of the Fairness Campaign, an LGBTQ+ advocacy organization based in Kentucky. He says Councilman Justin Hartfiel reached out for help in creating the ordinance.
"He indicated that he thought there was plenty of support to pass it on the council, and it turns out he was right," Hartman said.
Following Monday's passage, eight Northern Kentucky cities have fairness ordinances.
"This all kind of started a couple of years ago when the city of Covington kind of issued a challenge to its neighbors to pass fairness ordinances," Hartman said. "And sure enough, now we've got seven Northern Kentucky communities in the past two years to pass these fairness ordinances."
The other seven Northern Kentucky cities are Covington (2003), Bellevue (2019), Highland Heights (2019), Dayton (2019), Fort Thomas (2020), Cold Spring (2020), and Newport (2020).
So far, 21 cities in Kentucky have fairness ordinances.
Louisville and Lexington were the first Kentucky cities to approve fairness ordinances in 1999.
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