For Buttars, some pumpkin bread and gay rights diplomacy

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It was no Versailles. It was no Yalta. But peace -- and perhaps some understanding -- broke out in a West Jordan neighborhood, thanks to two eager gay-rights activists willing to try a new approach, a sometimes-gruff legislator ready to open his door and a generous gift of pumpkin bread.

Eric Ethington and Elaine Ball, founders of the grass-roots, service-oriented Pride in Your Community, stopped Republican Sen. Chris Buttars in his driveway on Saturday morning to share some home-baked bread and conversation.

Buttars invited Ball, Ethington and two other gay activists inside his home for what turned into an hourlong chat about Equality Utah's Common Ground Initiative, a collection of Democratic-backed bills that would provide some legal protections to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Utahns.

"I don't think we were expecting such a warm welcome," Ball said. "It was nice to be invited in."

The bread-and-Buttars discussion chipped away some stereotypes on both sides.

"That group has been hostile to me for many years," Buttars said Tuesday. "They said, 'Hi,' and it was easy to recognize they weren't there to argue or to condemn me. They were there to talk."

He called it one of the few conversations he has had with members of the LGBT community that "wasn't hostile."

Ball initially felt nervous about meeting the conservative legislator, who has tried to thwart Salt Lake City's domestic-partnership registry and student clubs for gay high-schoolers.

Buttars teased her for cracking her knuckles -- a habit he confessed to having to break himself.

"We were probably all a little nervous," Ball said. "It was nice, as the time went on, to realize that we were actually being listened to."

Ball and her comrades used most of the time to talk to Buttars about two bills that would outlaw discrimination against gay and transgender people in housing and employment.

They have more than pumpkin bread to back up their cause: Two recent polls, including one by The Salt Lake Tribune , show most Utahns support such legal protections.

Ethington, who is 24 and works at a company in Provo, shared his personal experiences with being fired and evicted for being bisexual. One instance happened when he was 18 and had been working at a Salt Lake City restaurant for about a year.

"The manager flat out told me, 'I don't want any of the gays working here.' And he sent me out immediately," Ethington recalled. "I felt like [Buttars] was very sympathetic towards those specific issues. He didn't agree with how people are being treated there."

Buttars declined to endorse any of the Common Ground bills but promised to consider them once he has read them.

There is one he knows he won't support: A measure that would repeal part of Utah's constitutional ban on gay marriage. Such a move would clear the way for civil unions.

"I'm me, and I stand for what I stand for," said Buttars, a firm believer in limiting marriage to one man and one woman. "That was a good, sincere group of people. I thought we had a great conversation."

The activists made several more stops in Buttars' neighborhood, delivering 40 more loaves of pumpkin bread to nearby homes, and then stopped in Draper to visit Republican Rep. Greg Hughes. Hughes did not return calls seeking comment Tuesday.

The LGBT do-gooders are not done with their door-to-door diplomacy. Next stop: Utah County.

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