Sometimes called a civil union, a domestic partnership is a state- or local-government-recognized relationship. When recognized on the state level, such as in Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, California and New Jersey, a civil union can confer extensive benefits, but these benefits differ from state to state.

New Jersey’s recently passed legislation, for example, offers certain financial rights including the right to claim joint tax status for state tax purposes. Domestic partners may claim mandatory insurance coverage and pension benefits if their partner is a state employee, but this protection does not extend to public benefit programs. And, while private employers are not obligated to pay for domestic partner coverage, insurance companies must offer coverage to domestic partners on the same terms they offer it to spouses. The bill also designates "domestic partnership status"as a protected class against which employers, landlords, lenders, and others cannot discriminate. The bill provides important personal rights such as the right of hospital visitation, often reserved only for immediate family members, the right to consent to organ donation, and the right to name one another in a health care proxy.

In comparison, Vermont's civil union law is the most comprehensive. Great care was taken to insure that same-sex partners in a civil union are accorded each and every benefit (and obligation) accruing to married couples. Over a thousand Vermont laws were amended to include civil union partners in the many laws regulating marriage.

In contrast, New York State has been slow to join the trend toward domestic partner recognition. Only a few laws have been enacted here that explicitly grant rights to domestic partners. One is found in the Public Health law, wherein domestic partners are accorded equal hospital visitation rights alongside spouses and next-of-kin. This applies at any hospital, nursing home or health care facility. A further provision of the Public Health Law confers equal priority on domestic partners and surviving spouses in determining control over the disposition of funeral remains. (Of course, this assumes that a domestic partner will not also have a spouse, a possibility that seems not to have been contemplated by the statute). Also of interest, if only for its curiously narrow scope, is section 4 of the Workers Compensation Law, which provides that, for the purpose of workers compensation death benefits a domestic partner shall be considered the surviving spouse. In addition to limiting the applicability of the section to only those employees with domestic partners who had no spouse at the time of death, the employee must also have died in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

While not mandating coverage for non-spouses, the state Insurance Law allows for group health insurance contracts that offer benefits to persons "chiefly dependent upon" a covered member of the group for support and maintenance. Such a definition clearly may include domestic partners, but there is no specific obligation on an insurer to provide benefits to domestic partners. New York City Local Law no. 27 entitles registered domestic partners of current and retired city employees to certain medical, health and retirement benefits. However, under most other circumstances, the provision of health benefits to a domestic partner in New York State remains entirely optional with the group insurance carrier.

It is an odd feature, perhaps, of the New York State laws benefitting domestic partners that persons seeking the benefit of such laws do not have to be a "registered" domestic partners. Every statute that grants domestic partner benefits provides a broad definition of domestic partner that includes registered domestic partners, but also provides alternative methods by which an individual can qualify as a domestic partner, without the trouble of registration. Which begs the question — why bother? Expedience and convenience, are two good reasons. Having to prove to a hospital administrator, before gaining hospital visitation privileges, that you are "dependent or mutually interdependent on the other person for support, as evidenced by the totality of the circumstances" may be a problem, especially when the "other person" is in intensive care and time is short. Similarly, the prospect of having a funeral director weigh the evidence of your "interdependence" before granting you permission to control the disposition of your loved one’s’ remains, may strike some people as demeaning and daunting at such a difficult time.

Thankfully, registration as a domestic partner is neither difficult nor expensive. Suffolk County Local Law No. 26-2006 provides a means to registration as a domestic partner for Suffolk County, New York residents. The requirements for registration include the following: (1) both partners to the domestic partnership are Suffolk residents (or at least one is an employee of Suffolk County); (2) both are at least 18 and mentally competent; (3) neither party is legally married to a third party; (4) neither party is a domestic partner of anyone else, nor has been within the past six months; (5) they are not so closely related that they would not qualify for marriage because of this reason; (6) the parties have lived together for at least one year and have a "close and committed personal relationship;" (7) they complete an affidavit; and (8) provide two documents showing financial interdependence, chosen from a menu of options. [Forms can be found at the Suffolk County Clerk's website.]

Upon each of the parties submitting the necessary affidavit and proof, and paying the $20 filing fee, domestic partnership status is granted to qualifying couples. A certificate of registration is issued, and each domestic partner is granted a nifty ID card. A record of the registration is kept in the County Clerk’s office.

The domestic partnership ends when one of the partners files a termination statement with proof of service of a copy on the other partner, or one of the partners dies or marries a third party.

Nothing in the Suffolk County registration law grants rights or benefits to the partners. In fact, the statute specifically says as much, and even clarifies that nothing in the law requires "any religious or denominational organization...to provide health benefits to domestic partners."

Finally, although domestic partner status is commonly viewed as an alternative to marriage for same sex couples, there is no limitation in the law on the gender or sexual preferences of the couple. Frankly, domestic partner status is good idea for many non-traditional couples, whether homosexual or heterosexual, and should be an integral part of overall financial and estate planning that may include reciprocal wills, health care proxies, and a domestic partnership agreement which may dictate, for example, the distribution of jointly held property upon termination of the domestic partnership.

Clifford J. Petroske
May 18, 2008