HRC Submits Testimony in Support of New Jersey Surrogacy Bill

Last week, HRC submitted testimony supporting the New Jersey Gestational Carrier Agreement Act (SB 866/AB 2648), a measure that will allow New Jersey residents to enter into gestational surrogacy agreements and establish appropriate parentage of the intended parents. A hearing on the bill was help by the Assembly Human Services Committee on March 19, and after the hearing the committee successfully passed the bill. It has already passed the New Jersey Senate.

“Allowing for surrogacy is especially important to members of the LGBT community as a method to establish parentage and create a family,” HRC Senior Legislative Counsel Alison Gill testified. “Unlike some other methods of family creation, surrogacy may allow such couples to have a genetic relation to their children.” HRC's testimony was endorsed and supported by Garden State Equality.

“Without this legislation, intended parents and gestational surrogates will continue having children through these arrangements but without legal protections or they will be forced to move to other states that afford them more security,” said Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle, D-Englewood, in a statement.

HRC urges the NJ Assembly to swiftly take up and pass this important legislation to help protect LGBT families.

Sources: http://www.hrc.org/blog/entry/hrc-submits-testimony-in-support-of-new-jersey-surrogacy-bill