Currently Minnesota local governments such as cities, counties and school districts are prevented from offering domestic partner benefits to their employees. OutFront Minnesota is trying to change this.

This unusual state of affairs stemmed from a lawsuit which led to a court ruling determining no local government could offer such benefits.

Background
In the early 1990s, the City of Minneapolis began offering unmarried municipal employees the opportunity to secure benefits, such as health coverage, for their unmarried partners in much the same way the city offered such benefits to the married spouses of its employees.

A conservative taxpayer, James Lilly, filed suit against the city arguing that it exceeded its authority in providing these benefits. The case went all the way to the Minnesota Court of Appeals which ruled in 1995 (In Lilly v. City of Minneapolis, 527 N.W.2d 107 (Minn. App. 1995) that local governments could not offer benefits that were not expressly set forth in state law (Minn. Stat. § 471.61). This state law allowed benefits exclusively for local government employees, their spouses and children.

In 2007 and 2008, the Minnesota legislature, working with OutFront Minnesota, passed a bill to enable local governments to offer whatever benefits they chose.  However, this bill was vetoed both years by Governor Pawlenty.