Jeffrey Schweers

Democrat staff writer

After he was lambasted for challenging the constitutionality of Leon County’s human rights ordinance in an ongoing sexual harassment suit, Tallahassee millionaire Rick Kearney has donated $100,000 to a nonprofit coalition working to expand statewide legal protection for gays and lesbians.

“This contribution reflects my longstanding commitment to LGBT equality and serves as an investment in improving Florida’s reputation for equality and inclusion,” Kearney, CEO of Mainline Information Systems, said in a news release. “I’m proud to stand with Florida’s business leaders to advocate for equality for all, by addressing these overdue protections to Florida’s civil rights statute."

The donation comes a week after Shaina Thorpe, attorney for former Kearney Center employee Sarah Bohentin, said Kearney's motion could harm the only protection local gays and lesbians have against workplace and housing discrimination.

“He goes after the ordinance without any thought what the implications of it could be, and then the moment he’s called out on the dangers to the LGBT community he tries to buy his way out of it by contributing to Florida Competes,” she said.

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Ron Sachs, CEO of Sachs Communications and a personal friend of Kearney’s, said they had been talking for the last few weeks about how Kearney could support the LGBT community.

“Rick’s been searching for an opportunity to do something meaningful in this arena,” Sachs said. “He saw Florida Competes and said that looked like a meaningful effort."

The timing of his donation seemed more than coincidental, said Jeff Peters, a lawyer who helped draft the 2010 amendment that added protections for the LGBT community into the county's human rights ordinance.

"Rick has obviously seen that his ridiculous move to attack the Leon County human rights ordinance has backfired and caused greater harm to his image," Peters said. "He never should have gone that route. To say he's donating $100,000, I think that’s a PR move and nothing more."

In an email to the Democrat, Kearney said that Mainline and his other businesses “have been leaders in providing equal benefits to all employees,including employees’ legal partners in company family activities, leave policies and benefits.”

Kearney’s donation to Florida Competes, formerly the Florida Businesses for a Competitive Workforce, is the largest single donation by an individual to date, said Christina Johnson, a spokesperson for the organization.

It’s also Kearney’s first donation to the organization, she said.

“I hope this largest-ever single donation prompts other business leaders to step forward in support,” Johnson said.

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Florida Competes is a coalition of businesses that include AT&T, Darden Restaurants, NextEra Energy, the parent company of Florida Power & Light, and Walt Disney World Resorts. It’s supported passage of the Competitive Workplace Act, which would amend the state’s 1992 civil rights act to include protections for members of the LGBT community.

The group’s been around for several years, but the legislation had its first committee hearing last year before the Senate Judiciary Committee, where it received a 5-5 vote. A tie vote means a bill doesn’t pass.

“That’s the closest we’ve come,” Johnson said.

Twin bills have been filed in the Senate and House this session to add equal protections for gays and lesbians in the state’s civil rights act.

Bohentin filed her sexual harassment suit under the county ordinance in November, a year after she was fired from the Kearney Center. She later amended the complaint to include a count under the state’s civil rights act and a count of defamation after comments were made in the Democrat by Kearney and his lawyer that she had illegally deleted company emails.

Kearney’s lawyer, Phillip Russell, challenged the constitutionality of the county ordinance because it didn’t have administrative remedies and a cap on damages. He maintains those issues could be easily remedied without threatening the protections the ordinance provides to the LGBT community and the other protected groups.

Circuit Judge Charles Dodson said the constitutionality issue has to be cleared up before the suit can go forward, and ordered the lawyers to add Leon County as a third party.

Contact Schweers at jschweers@tallahassee.com. Follow him on Twitter @jeffschweers.