Domestic benefits

KVUE's Quita Culpepper reports

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They call it a fight for their civil rights. Some faculty and staff at the University of Texas say it's time for the school to provide domestic partner benefits.

Hundreds rallied on the UT campus Wednesday afternoon. They say they've asked -- now they're telling -- the university to provide domestic partner benefits.

Organizers say having these health benefits for gay and lesbian couples will help employee recruitment, retain staff and it's the right thing to do.

"There's a time to say right is right is wrong is wrong, and providing domestic partnership benefits to all members of our community is the right thing to do," said Dr. Gregory Vincent, UT vice president of diversity and community engagement.

According to a report by UT's Pride and Equity Faculty Staff Association, some employees have been forced to leave their jobs, because they needed health care for their partners. And other qualified professors have decided not to come to UT at all.

Rally organizers say offering partner benefits would cost the university about one-half of one percent of its budget for health expenditures.

Domestic partner benefits would not only help gay and lesbian couples, but heterosexual couples who've lived together long enough to have a common law marriage.

UT's Legal Affairs department says those benefits can't happen, because this is a state university, and it must abide by state law. And that law in the Texas insurance code specifically excludes domestic partners from being eligible for health care benefits.

"We're bound by current law, and that's what we have to follow," said Jeff Graves, UT Legal Affairs department. "The spouse definition that's used in that insurance code section borrows that definition from the family code and that definition expressly excludes domestic partners."

UT officials say the law prohibiting them from offering the health care benefits to same sex couples must be changed by state lawmakers before the university will consider changing it's benefits policy.

"We are asking president powers to take a public stand for what is not only the practical thing to do but the right thing to do," said Dana Cloud, UT associate professor of communication studies.

Here's a look at some of the U.S. universities that already offer domestic partner benefits.

They include many of America's top schools -- Ohio State University, the University of California at Berkeley, UCLA, the University of Michigan, the University of Washington and the University of Illinois.