PEOPLE'S VETO

Portland's gay rights ordinance benign? Not to one woman

A worker at a local firm has a story to relate.

©Copyright 1998 Guy Gannett Communications

There are people who defend the statewide gay rights law we're voting up or down on Tuesday by pointing to the city of Portland, where, they say, ''nothing bad has happened'' as a result of that city's similar ordinance, in effect for the past six years.

Well, one person disagrees. Ene Kiildi (pronounced Ay-nay Killdee) immigrated from Estonia eight years ago and went to work for Barber Foods in Portland.

Hiring immigrants is one of the ways Barber Foods has served the Portland area for years. But Kiildi says that the way she was treated by her coworkers and supervisors wasn't very pleasant.

In an interview last week, Kiildi told me her openly expressed Christian beliefs brought her criticism and the threat of disciplinary action, including dismissal, as a result of complaints made against her by homosexual coworkers.

The complaints arose, she said in somewhat halting English, not because she attempted to harangue or persuade others of her beliefs, but merely because they were known to others in the company. ''We Christians used to study our Bibles together at lunch,'' she said, ''and I have a 'Jesus loves you' bumper sticker on my car.''

Kiildi said a female coworker recently approached her, asking Kiildi if she knew she was a lesbian. Then the coworker asked Kiildi if she had a problem with that, in the context of the upcoming gay rights vote.

Kiildi said she replied, ''I don't have any problem as long as you do your work. But you know the Bible says homosexuality is a sin, and you are in danger of going to hell unless you repent.''

Kiildi said the coworker then reported her comments to management, claiming Kiildi was creating a ''hostile work environment'' in the context of Portland's ordinance.

Kiildi said she was counseled not to repeat her words, which left her in a bind: ''The Bible tells me to be a witness to what I believe if someone asks me. She asked, and I replied, and I got in trouble.''

Later, she said, she was asked a similar question, to which she responded in a similar vein. Another complaint ensued, and this time, she said, she was threatened with dismissal.

I called Peter Bickford, the company's personnel director, who initially told me that he would have ''No comment'' on Kiildi's claims. Later, called by a reporter for these papers, he said Kiildi was ''counseled'' twice for ''disruptive behavior'' for ''yelling at her coworkers.''

Whose version is right is anybody's guess. But when I asked Kiildi if she was worried about being fired if I related her story, she said, ''Go ahead. It's the truth.''

And let's not forget that Portland attorney Steve Whiting, whose case was described in this column two weeks ago (and in 450 other papers by nationally syndicated columnist Cal Thomas), says that he was told to resign or be fired from the local law firm where he was a partner for defending Christians in court.

Kiildi is one of the clients Whiting will retain when he opens his solo practice next week. If her complaint ever does get to court, we may find out what really happened.

If Kiildi's version can be trusted, however, Portland's ordinance is not benign. And those who say a statewide law would not be misused should pay attention to the examples of other states.

Lewiston attorney Michael Poulin recently wrote that it is possible under Maine's law for well-financed homosexual groups to file suits to attack affinity groups like the Boy Scouts, or to force schools to hire openly homosexual staffers and teach acceptance of homosexuality to even very young students.

While some deny that, the California Supreme Court is currently taking up a suit brought under that state's gay rights law to force the Boy Scouts to accept homosexual leaders.

And in several towns in Massachusetts, one of those ''rest of New England'' states where gay rights laws are in force, students as young as kindergarten are confronted with a formal curriculum telling them that same-sex relationships are hunky-dory. Parental complaints, meanwhile, have been brushed aside as ''bigoted.''

Are you worried about hate crimes? So am I. That's why I'm voting ''yes'' to void this law on Tuesday, because those who hate traditional morality seem likely to find it an extremely useful weapon to use against the rest of us.

''LOCAL CONTROL'' WATCH: Dozens of commercials by Gov. King, and not one mentions the byword he couldn't stop repeating during the campaign against Question 1 in 1995. Maine's new law will squelch ''local control'' on gay rights, but this year he couldn't care less. Who paid for his commercials in both campaigns? Oh.

- M.D. Harmon is an editorial page writer and editor for The Portland Newspapers.