When U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, pointed out that providing benefits to the partners of gay employees would be a smart way for Uncle Sam to attract and keep talented workers, she explained why she's sure: The strategy is a success in her home state.

"The state of Maine has already worked through (possible stumbling blocks). And has a lot of safeguards built in," Collins said at the first congressional hearing on legislation to give gay-partnered federal workers the same benefits as married heterosexuals.

These include health care, retirement benefits, relocation expenses and coverage under the Family and Medical Leave Act.

The first-rate hearing Sept. 24 before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee was a critical first step for a plan that Congress could pass as early as next year.

The federal government needs its benefits package to catch up to what workers — especially young gay and gay-friendly workers — already expect and find offered by 15 state governments and more than half the Fortune 500 companies.

But the hearing — by spotlighting corporate and state role models — also underscored an encouraging fact about Congress.

More and more lawmakers represent states that either in their own employment practices or in those of their major private employers already provide such partner benefits. That "back-home" connection is incredibly important to getting politicians to grasp that offering these benefits is simply a smart business move.

The 15 states who've led the way are Vermont, New York, Hawaii, Oregon, California, Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island, Washington state, Iowa, New Mexico, New Jersey, Montana, Alaska and Illinois. They'll be joined by Arizona in October.

So, about one-third of both House members and senators hail from states that have taken the step for their own government workers proposed in legislation introduced by the Senate panel's chairman, Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., and Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis. Those states' delegations include both presidential nominees — Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, already a co-sponsor, and Sen. John McCain of Arizona.

Of course, major employers in the other states — from the Big Three automakers headquartered in Michigan to Office Depot headquartered in Florida to J.C. Penney headquartered in Texas — offer partner benefits as a way to get top workers and send a signal about their inclusive corporate values.

Witnesses, who included an executive from diversity-champion IBM and leaders of federal employee unions, stressed the urgency of updating federal benefits packages. The federal government is expected to lose a third of its fulltime workforce over the next five years, a whopping 530,000 retiring workers.

Sadly but predictably, Howard Weizmann, deputy director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, argued against partner benefits, repeating feeble hypotheticals, such as the potential for fraud, that other witnesses easily shot down.

But no one explained better than Collins why the nation's largest employer needs to modernize: "If the federal government is going to compete with the private sector for some of the most talented workforce, we need to use some of the same incentives to attract ... and keep qualified individuals."

Congress needs to get the message: Equal pay and benefits for equal work isn't just a matter of fairness. It also makes good business sense, whether for private enterprise or Uncle Sam.

Deb Price of The Detroit News writes the first nationally syndicated column on gay issues. To find out more about Deb Price and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

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