The lack of job prospects in Utah didn't deter Michael Mitchell from coming back. He'd had enough of New York City after nine years. And soon after he landed in the Salt Lake Valley, it seemed like a career matchmaker had been meddling in his life.
Unity Utah, the gay-lesbian political action committee, needed a director with nerve, tact and an understanding of Beehive State politics. Mitchell, a native son of the Mountain West who created GLAMA, the Gay & Lesbian American Music Awards, plunged headlong into the job in August 2001. Utah's public officials have kept him busy ever since.
This isn't the same Utah Mitchell departed in the 1980s. "There has been a gigantic shift," he says. The gay-lesbian-bisexual-transgender community's annual Pride Day has grown from a small Sugarhouse Park picnic into a parade and festival attended by 30,000. The annual events' sponsors include Washington Mutual, Showtime and the Gastronomy restaurant group.
Not that Salt Lake City is turning into San Francisco. The 2003 state Legislature, Mitchell says, was a kind of snapshot of conservative Utah — though colored slightly by a new openness, a new variety of views.
This year, however, state lawmakers considered endorsing the federal "marriage amendment," which would have called a man-woman union the only legitimate kind in America. A vote for that amendment, Mitchell said, would have been a vote against equal rights for nontraditional families.
One Friday night in January, Mitchell rallied hundreds of Unity Utah supporters at the Capitol, in a protest of the amendment. Soon after, the Legislature abandoned it. The lawmakers did so, Mitchell hopes, because they realize that "they represent all of Utah, not just those who think the same way they do."
In February another piece of legislation concerning the gay community was reintroduced in the House of Representatives: a hate-crimes bill that would have imposed stiffer penalties for crimes committed against people because of their race, religion or sexual orientation. For the first time in six years, the bill passed in the House, only to be called back for more debate. Ultimately its sponsors, Reps. David Litvack, D-Salt Lake City, and Jim Ferrin, R-Orem, withdrew the bill, fearing substitutes and amendments would water it down to nothing.
"As disappointing as it is, I think it was a good thing to let it die until next year," Mitchell said. This time, he organized no Capitol protests.
"I think many lawmakers would have been put off by a rally or demonstration," said Mitchell.
Mitchell himself is well-versed in Utah's political norms and dominant religion. He grew up Mormon in Preston, Idaho, was seminary class president and Scripture Chase champion. He made his sexual orientation known at age 21, while a student at Utah State University.
"I came out because coming out meant I was being truly who I was," he recalled. "There's enough dishonesty in the world without my adding to it."
As director of Unity Utah, Mitchell goes wherever he's invited to speak about gay rights. He and members of the gay community also extend invitations of their own, such as the one to West Valley Mayor Dennis Nordfelt.
The night Nordfelt was appointed last November, he said that as mayor he would seek to uphold the "traditional American family," which for him didn't include gays or lesbians. Days later, a neighborhood group of same-sex couples invited him to a barbecue.
"I went with trepidation," acknowledged Nordfelt, a 60-year-old retired police chief. After dinner, he offered to hear everyone's concerns about West Valley life — and for about 20 minutes, the neighbors held forth on traffic, taxes, schools and crime.
It dawned on the mayor: These constituents had the same worries as just about everybody in his city.
"I came away from that with an expanded understanding, and appreciation for my neighbors," Nordfelt said.
"Given the chance, Utahns are a lot more accepting," added Mitchell. Contrary to what people outside the Beehive State may believe, "the far-right people aren't mainstream Utah."
Yet Mitchell cautions that the state, and the country for that matter, have distances to travel before gays and lesbians feel as safe as their straight neighbors. Many stay in the closet because they fear losing their jobs and being "shut out of their communities," he said.
"We would like to know that the sex of the person we love won't keep us from teaching, from being elected to office, from giving blood," Mitchell said. "Equal rights for us are just like equal rights for everyone else. We want to be able to serve our country," in the military, as teachers, elected officials and Scout leaders.
The 2000 Census showed thousands of same-sex couples live in both rural and urban Utah — but for each person who checked that box on the census form, many didn't take the chance, Mitchell believes. Two of the state's largest faith communities, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Catholic Church, teach that homosexuality is abhorrent — with some members asserting gay men suffer from an "addiction" from which they should be rehabilitated.
Mitchell, no longer a practicing Mormon, was a member of a Dutch Reform congregation in Manhattan and now goes to the Episcopal Cathedral of St. Mark near his home in Salt Lake City. Still, he often confronts one of the most persistent misconceptions about gays: that they're irreligious.
"My spiritual belief holds that God created us exactly how we are and loves us exactly how we are," he says. "Our path is to find out exactly who we are, and to love ourselves and each other as fully as possible."
Mitchell adds that he learned those principles from his parents, devout members of the LDS Church.
E-mail: durbani@desnews.com