About EqualityMaine

A group of volunteers and Equality Maine Team members at a parade.

EqualityMaine is the oldest and largest statewide organization dedicated to creating a fair and just society for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer Mainers. 

Our mission is to protect and advance full equality for all lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer Mainers by creating an inclusive and intersectional movement through political action, community building, education, engagement and collaboration. We envision the day when all LGBTQ+ Mainers and their families are empowered and have full equality in the hearts and minds of Maine people.

A group of eight people smiling with an Equality Maine photo backdrop behind them.

Our Guiding Values

Community

Maine’s LGBTQ+ community is vibrant and diverse; our members are older folks, immigrants, youth, parents, transgender and gender non-conforming, residents of rural townships and cities, students, and are from all economic levels. EqualityMaine strives to represent the needs and interests of our whole community. All voices are important to achieving our mission.

Education

Changing the hearts and minds of Maine people and providing valuable learning opportunities on LGBTQ+ issues are two of our major strengths. We believe in the power of education to support and advance our community.

Collaboration
Working in coalition and with the participation of other progressive organizations is key to our success. We believe in the central role of collaboration as an organizing tool, as well as a guiding principle for all of our programs. Through collaboration, we seek to grow the skills, capacity and power of our partners and our organization so that our work leaves behind a broader, stronger movement.

Power
EqualityMaine recognizes the importance of harnessing our community’s political power to achieve greater and more comprehensive protections for all members of our community. We will continue to strive for the empowerment of our community members, as well as policies that protect and secure our community.

Learn more about the work we do.

PROGRAMS EVENTS

We have pride in our history.

July 1984

EqualityMaine is founded.

EqualityMaine was first known as the Maine Lesbian/Gay Political Alliance (MLGPA). The group was founded in response to the July 1984 murder of Charlie Howard, a young Bangor man who was attacked and murdered simply because he was gay.

MLGPA began with an ambitious desire for full equality, but as a practical matter, it had a humble start. A band of volunteers went to work with $147 that they’d raised by setting up a table at a local autumn festival.
MLGPA’s founding documents were handwritten in a spiral notebook, along with a to-do list of “Nitty-Gritties: checking account, P.O. box fee.”

In the mid-1980s Maine – like many other states – was just starting to engage in new conversations about fairness and equality.

1985

MLGPA released a survey.

This survey measured the impact of violence and discrimination in LGBTQ+ Mainers’ lives. Sixty-seven percent of respondents said they had concealed their sexual orientation in order to avoid discrimination on the job; almost 30 percent had been fired or denied promotions because their bosses learned they were gay. Almost one-quarter of respondents had been denied service in a hotel or restaurant, and 54 percent had been victims of violence motivated by their sexual orientation.

Clearly, the need for non-discrimination protections was real and urgent.

1992

The Joel Abromson Memorial Scholarship Fund was created.

Since 1992, EqualityMaine Foundation’s Joel Abromson Memorial Scholarship Fund has given more than $20,000 in scholarships to young champions of equality, supporting a new generation of grassroots leadership in Maine.

1993

The Maine Civil Rights Act was amended.

For two decades, MLGPA worked to build support for legislation that would protect LGBTQ+ Mainers from discrimination, and to include attacks on LGBT citizens under the state’s definition of hate crimes. EqualityMaine helped draft, lobby and pass legislation that amended the Maine Civil Rights Act to protect LGBTQ+ people from hate crimes.

1999

Same-sex couples got the same hospital visitation rights as married couples and immediately family.

2001

Legislative win!

Legislation requiring insurance providers in Maine to provide health care policies that include domestic partnership coverage to employers that request it is passed after EqualityMaine helped draft, lobby, and pass.

2004

MLGPA changed its name to EqualityMaine.

April 2004

Maine established domestic partnerships for same-sex couples.

November 8, 2005

The Human Rights Act was amended.

After nearly three decades of working to pass non-discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ Mainers, Maine became the 16th state to protect LGBTQ+ people from discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity and expression in employment, housing, education, credit and public accommodations. Maine is the sixth state whose law includes gender identity and expression. 

May 6, 2009

Maine enacted a law to allow marriage equality following legislative approval.

November 3, 2009

Voters rejected marriage equality in a people’s veto.

Opponents of the bill successfully petitioned for a referendum before the law went into effect.

June 30, 2011

EqualityMaine and GLAD announced plans to place a voter initiative in support of marriage equality on Maine’s November 2012 ballot.

 The title of the citizen initiative was An Act to Allow Marriage Licenses for Same-Sex Couples and Protect Religious Freedom.

November 7, 2012

A majority of Maine voters legalized marriage equality.

The initiative, known as Question 1, passed by a margin of 53% to 47%. Maine was the eighth U.S. state to legalize same-sex marriage, and one of the first to pass it by popular vote. This was in part due to our tireless work of our volunteers and lobbyists having conversations with people all over Maine!

July 2013

EqualityMaine announced a new five-year strategic plan.

That new strategic plan focused the organization’s work on issues that affect LGBT youth, LGBT elders, LGBT people living in rural Maine, and transgender Mainers.

January 2014

 Maine Supreme Court ruled in Doe v. Regional School Unit 26 against an Orono school district which had denied a student the use of a bathroom in alignment with her gender identity.

The case marked the first time that a state court ruled that denying a transgender student access to the bathroom consistent with their gender identity is unlawful.

2016

The Maine Parentage Act was passed,  which clarified and expanded the ways someone can legally establish that they are the parents of a child.

The MPA ensures greater protections and equal treatment for children of LGBTQ+ parents. The MPA also extends an accessible path to parentage for children born through assisted reproduction and for children born through surrogacy.

May 10, 2018

EqualityMaine worked with the Human Rights Commission of Maine to make changes to driver’s gender markers on licenses in Maine.

Maine became the third state to offer a non-binary option listed on driver’s licenses after Oregon and California.

2019

Gender identity was formally added to the protections of the Maine Human Rights Act.

The law was amended to add gender identity as its own protected class, joining other protected classes such as sex, sexual orientation, disability, race, color and religion. The law specifically says that denying a person equal opportunity in athletic programs is education discrimination.

May 29, 2019

Governor Mills signed a bill into law that banned conversion therapy on LGBTQ+ minors in the state of Maine.

June 2019

The Maine Legislature banned the gay and trans panic defense.

 Gay panic defense is a legal strategy in which defendants accused of violent offenses claim that unwanted same-sex sexual advances provoked them into reacting by way of self-defense. 

November 2019

Maine residents no longer require certification from a medical provider in order to change the gender marker on their driver’s licenses and state ID cards.

July 2023

Sixteen and seventeen year olds can access hormone therapy for gender-affirming healthcare.

August 25, 2024

The Shield Bill went into effect to protect Maine’s providers of reproductive care and health care for transgender people and people seeking abortions from attacks based on other states’ laws.

Maine joined at least 17 other states and Washington D.C. in enacting this type of law to protect medical experts who provide safe, legal, essential health care amidst a barrage of ongoing and increasing attacks on abortion and related care as well as medical care for transgender and non-binary people.