In the final days of 2018, the owner of a rental unit in Middleburg, Florida evicted her tenant Randal Coffman because of his sexual orientation. “You didn’t tell me you were gay until yesterday. Do you think I want homosexuals coming back and forth in my place like that? You have to leave this place,” she said. The apartment is located just a few minutes from Jacksonville, where LGBTQ people are fully protected from discrimination, including housing discrimination. But those protections stop at the city limits – and with no explicit LGBTQ protections at the state or federal levels, discrimination like this occurs all too frequently.
“You think you’re protected in one city – but then you’re not protected in the next one,” Randal said. “And it’s not fair to people all across the country. It’s not fair that we’re protected in one place and not protected in another. This isn’t even the first time I’ve faced harassment – you basically have to hide who you are unless you’re in the gay side of town. It’s just like that here.”
Even as he deals with the fallout from this experience, Randal has words of encouragement for other LGBTQ people dealing with similar discrimination. “Everything will work out,” he said. “It may not work out as it’s supposed to or as you think it will, but as time goes by, we’ll have more laws. And eventually we’ll all feel safe.