PROVO — Same-sex couples are allowed to attend prom in the school district, the superintendent says.

"It's a non-issue with us," Superintendent Randy Merrill said. "We certainly honor the constitutional rights of students."

Merrill briefly discussed with the Provo Board of Education at its Tuesday meeting a letter the American Civil Liberties Union sent to the principal of Provo High School. The ACLU sent the letter after receiving complaints from separate same-sex couples alleging school administrators told them they could not attend prom or participate in certain events at the dance.

Although he called it a non-issue, Merrill later said his contract specifies that he must discuss with board members anything that could potentially become a legal problem for the district.

The ACLU received the first complaint about Provo High's prom policy in the spring of 2003, said Dani Eyer, executive director of the Utah American Civil Liberties Union.

That year two girls went to prom together, Eyer said. They were not hassled when they entered the dance, possibly because they randomly picked an entrance manned by students and not teachers.

"They danced for most of the evening," Eyer said.

But when it was time for students to promenade down the staircase in front of families, friends and the community, "the administration yanked them out of the line," Eyer said.

The girls left the dance and later contacted the ACLU, which was interested in the case. The girls, however, declined to pursue the matter. One student was no longer attending high school; the other student was young and reticent, Eyer said.

A male couple contacted the ACLU before this year's prom at Provo High. They wanted to purchase tickets for the April 23 dance, but school administrators told them they could not, Eyer said. The ACLU sent a letter to the principal on April 15.

The letter pointed to Utah law that states students cannot be excluded from events based on factors such as race, religion or sexual orientation.

The letter also referred to a 25-year-old case in which a federal court determined that excluding a gay student from prom was a violation of the student's First Amendment rights to free expression and association.

The ACLU letter requested a response from the Provo district and threatened legal action if the students' were excluded.

"We did hear back from Provo. They did agree," Eyer said.

The boys went to the dance and reported back to the ACLU that they had "a really good time," Eyer said.

The ACLU has also intervened for gay students seeking passage to proms at Murray and Copper Hills high schools in recent years and prevailed.

"No one to our knowledge has ever received a disparaging word from students," Eyer said.

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E-mail: lhancock@desnews.com