EQCA to close some offices

The statewide LGBT advocacy group Equality California is reducing its field operations after next week's elections.

The move comes as EQCA shifts strategy in its public education efforts around marriage equality, and as the federal Proposition 8 legal case is fast-tracked through the courts.

EQCA Executive Director Geoff Kors said this week that the field office closings were still being finalized, but the Fresno, Orange County, and San Jose offices would close sometime in November. He said the Riverside office hasn't been open for most of the year.

He said the goal is to keep offices in Sacramento, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, and the Inland Empire/Coachella Valley open.

"We are significantly reducing the door-to-door canvass program and increasing the coalition work," and other activities, including EQCA's speakers bureau, he said.

Kors said, among other achievements, "In the Latino community, over 30 percent of the people we talked to showed movement after a conversation" about marriage equality. In the black community, that figure was 26 percent.

He said EQCA would release an analysis related to what was learned through the door-to-door work sometime in the next few weeks.

"Ideally, we would be able to continue the field work at the level it had been going," Kors said, but he explained that a combination of the weak economy and the field work's largest 2009 funder not giving money this year made things difficult.

He said the anonymous donor had provided a $500,000 grant.

After the No on 8 campaign two years ago was criticized for virtually ignoring communities of color and voters in the Central Valley and other conservative regions, EQCA had strengthened its outreach efforts. Kors was one of the members of the No on 8 executive committee.

EQCA's total budget, including the Equality California Institute and other organizations, is roughly $6 million to $6.5 million.

Another issue at play has been the Prop 8 federal court case.

U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker ruled in August that Prop 8 was unconstitutional. Backers of Prop 8 quickly appealed the ruling. But one issue that's come up is whether the measure's supporters have standing to appeal the case. Both Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown - the Democrat who's running against Republican Meg Whitman for the governor's post - have declined to defend Prop 8 in court.

Kors said that in August, when the issue of standing became "front and center" and the 9th Circuit appeals court fast tracked the case, it became apparent that "instead of looking at a 9th Circuit decision in 2013, we're potentially looking at early 2011."

Kors indicated the pace also had an impact on funding. A lot of the door-to-door work had been done in anticipation of another ballot measure.

There has been fieldwork supportive of attorney general candidate Kamala Harris and other candidates endorsed by EQCA's political action committees.

Marriage director departs

Kors also said Marc Solomon, EQCA's marriage director, "is likely going to take a position with another organization" but he wouldn't say which one, leaving that to Solomon.

Solomon said that he has accepted a position with the national Freedom to Marry organization, which confirmed his hire.

Kors said the hope is that Solomon will "continue spending a good chunk of his time working with us and our coalition partners."

The total cost savings from closing regional offices and Solomon's position are approximately $1.3 million, Kors said.