SB 854 - Domestic Partners

• Establishes a statewide domestic partnership registration system requiring filing a Declaration of Domestic Partnership with the circuit court clerk for a $30 fee, with funds directed to the Domestic Violence Trust Fund and Displaced Homemaker Trust Fund.

• Grants domestic partners visitation rights, health care decision-making authority, and decision-making powers equivalent to spouses in health care facilities, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and correctional institutions.

• Permits domestic partners to serve as health care proxies, make anatomical gifts, authorize autopsies, and direct disposition of a deceased partner's remains under the same circumstances as spouses.

• Requires hospitals, nursing homes, and other health care facilities to notify domestic partners of patients' medical conditions, allow access to patients, and permit domestic partners to share rooms with their partners.

• Prohibits domestic partnerships if either party is married, already in a domestic partnership, related by blood, under 18 years old, or if consent is obtained by force or fraud; partnerships terminate after 90 days of filing notice of termination or automatically upon marriage or death.