$50,000 Prop 8 donor chairs large Md.

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The Latest: $50,000 Prop 8 donor chairs large Md. company Foulger-Pratt developing hotel for pro-gay Kimpton By REBECCA ARMENDARIZ, Washington Blade Nov 17 2008, 3:32 PM | | |

The chairman of a family-owned property development, management and construction company based in Rockville, Md., donated $50,000 to support Proposition 8 days before it passed, according to public records. Sid Foulger, a Mormon, established Foulger-Pratt in 1963, according to the company's web site. His sons and son-in-law have since taken leadership positions in the business; they did not make Prop 8 contributions. The company is divided into four operating units: Foulger-Pratt Contracting, LLC, Foulger-Pratt Development, Inc., Foulger-Pratt Management, Inc. and Pioneer Building Services. Sid Foulger does not directly manage any of the branches, but acts as the chairman. His office did not return calls seeking comment on the Prop 8 donation. Among Foulger-Pratt's completed projects is the Mormon temple in Kensington, Md. The contracting portion of the company is in charge of a large Silver Spring, Md., transit center, and the development company has projects in the works at the University of Maryland and with Kimpton Hotels. San Francisco-based Kimpton has earned a 100 percent score on the Human Rights Campaign's Corporate Equality Index and has a strong gay-friendly reputation. Foulger-Pratt has signed a letter of intent with the hotel chain to build a four-star hotel in Park Potomac, an "urban village" in Potomac, Md., for completion in 2011. Alan Baer, senior vice president of people and culture for the Kimpton Hotel Group, confirmed plans for the project but said it hasn't broken ground yet. "From a business perspective, you don't sit around the board room table and discuss your religious or social preferences, said Baer, who is gay. If we go into a room where it's publicly known that the company's beliefs are [anti-LGBT], then we would certainly question whether we want to do business with them." Baer emphasized that Sid Foulger's donation to support Proposition 8 was a personal contribution and not a corporate one. "When we talk about diversity and inclusion, it's not just about ethnic or religious background or sexual orientation. It's more fundamentally about diversity of thought. The worst thing I could think of would be a board room full of people with my exact background and my exact beliefs," he said. Baer said he is not concerned that working with Foulger-Pratt would tarnish his company's progay image. "I don't know what part of the decision Sid Foulger had in hiring us, he said. Their organization hired Kimpton to run and operate the hotel that they're developing. They hired us knowing who we are and how we operate our hotels. People can support what they want, but we're not going to operate our business any differently." Kimpton Hotels has a campaign in place to raise funds for HIV/AIDS research. The D.C. beneficiary of the company's Red Ribbon Campaign is the Whitman-Walker Clinic. Transgender activist Dana Beyer, who works for at-large Montgomery County Council member Duchy Trachtenberg, said that focusing on Foulger's donation is counter-productive. EMAIL SIGNUP RSS FEED PAGE BY PAGE FACEBOOK TWITTER SIGN UP

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$50,000 Prop 8 donor chairs large Md. company - Washington Blade

"Sid Foulger isn't a player in the business anymore. The name is out there, but he himself made a personal contribution. He's an 87-year-old guy," she said. But Dan Furmansky, executive director of Equality Maryland, said the donation raises some serious questions. "Across the country, there are jurisdictions that have established laws to ensure that the contractors a city or county does business with adhere to equality practices. Citizens of Montgomery County need to hold our elected officials accountable for doing business with a company whose chairman and CEO has contributed to the devastation of thousands of families," he said. The Mormon church aggressively supported Prop 8, which bans same-sex marriage in California and puts about 18,000 such marriages already performed in legal limbo. Reaction to Prop 8s passage has included protests at Mormon churches and boycott threats targeting companies that donated to the effort. Local activists have not yet called for a Foulger-Pratt boycott. Permalink

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Please review and follow Washington Blades current Comment and Discussion Policy. Guidelines updated as of August 22nd, 2009. You are fully responsible for the content that you post. 0

Eddie89 Phoenix, Az

Plus, $50,000 is no chump change. At least not to me! How many deceitful yes on 8 ads did that money buy? Posted 11/18/08 - 10:30 AM

Eddie89 Phoenix, Az

If you or your business is anti-equality and pro-discrimination, 0 then you don't get my money. Simple as that. There is no shortage of other companies whose chairman and CEO did not contribute to Prop. 8, yes or no. They chose to stay out of it entirely and just run their business. Or better yet, those that contributed to NO on 8 and they should be rewarded for their stand for equality. I.E. Levis, AT&T, PG&E, etc. Posted 11/18/08 - 10:28 AM

stephenclark Washington, DC

If the worst thing that Alan Baer can imagine is sitting around a table at which everyone acknowledges the basic civil rights of gays and lesbians, he needs to get out more. Posted 11/17/08 - 7:46 PM

ErikDC Bowie, Md

Boycott them. They want to be prejudiced against us? They need to discover our dollars can be prejudiced, too. Posted 11/17/08 - 4:57 PM

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$50,000 Prop 8 donor chairs large Md. company - Washington Blade

MEMPHIS (AP), | Nov 13, 12:46 PM

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP), | Nov 13, 10:51 AM

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