SAME-SEX BENEFITS Lawsuit against University of Pittsburgh continues despite changes

The university said the benefits won't be provided retroactively.
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- As a plaintiff in the 1996 lawsuit against the University of Pittsburgh seeking same-sex benefits, Deb Henson is pleased that Pitt will offer them in January, even though she won't be able to use them.
Henson left Pitt several months after the suit was filed to return to New Orleans, where she now works as an appellate legal brief writer for the city, which offers such benefits.
"I'm glad for the people that are there, certainly. I just wish Pitt had come around sooner," said Henson, who had been a legal writing instructor at Pitt. Her decision to leave wasn't based on Pitt's refusal to offer the benefits, she said.
Equality issue
Although Henson's partner was only without benefits for a brief period until she got a job of her own, Henson said in a telephone interview Thursday that the issue of same-sex benefits was always primarily one of equality.
Mark Friedman, a postdoctoral research fellow in child psychiatry, said that while he was pleased that benefits now will be offered, he still feels the stigma of being treated as a second-class citizen by the school.
"That sort of pain doesn't go away overnight, and we still live with that," he said.
Legal matters
It remains unclear what impact Pitt's decision will have on the lawsuit, which sought the benefits and compensation for the costs that plaintiffs were paying for benefits for their partners.
Pitt's announcement came in a memo to staff Wednesday and wasn't the result of any recent negotiations with attorneys for Henson and six other plaintiffs, three of whom are still at Pitt, said Witold Walczak, litigation director for the American Civil Liberties Union in Pittsburgh. Pitt didn't ask the ACLU to drop the suit in return for offering the benefits, Walczak said.
"I was in shock. We had no idea that this was coming," Walczak said at a news conference Thursday.
Still going
B.J. Strassburger, an attorney on the case, said the suit is active, although "the big war is over."
He and Walczak said they still needed to discuss the matter with their clients. Walczak said he has no idea how much money could be at stake if the case proceeds. For some, it could just be the retroactive cost of benefits, but some clients, he said, have spent "tens of thousands" of dollars on medical costs.
Pitt's benefit program had been operating legally before the decision, and there's no requirement to extend the benefits retroactively, said Pitt spokesman Robert Hill.
"We think that what they were seeking in the suit, we have provided," he said.
Pitt decided to offer the benefits to stay competitive and not because of the lawsuit, said Chancellor Mark Nordenberg. Nearly 80 percent of members of the Association of American Universities, which Pitt considers its principal peer group, offer domestic partner benefits, Pitt officials said.
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