A city in Alabama has recalled a local law which criminalised the use of a gender-appropriate bathroom by transgender people.
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The City Council of Oxford, Alabama has just rescinded a law it passed last week in response to Target’s announcement that its restrooms are trans-inclusive.
“The City Council finds that its citizens have a right to quiet solicitude and to be secure from embarrassment and unwanted intrusion into their privacy while utilizing multiple occupancy bathroom or changing facilities by members of the opposite biological sex”, noted council members in the new ordinance.
The only item on the meeting agenda was “Resolution No. 2016-56-Resolution to recall Ordinance No. 2016-18”.
Councilor Charlotte Hubbard read several reasons why the ordinance should be repealed. Title IX does include a non-discrimination clause that protects transgender students. “It was a safety issue when we passed the ordinance last week and it’s a safety issue today”. And of course, Oxford does have Target store.
Waits has suggested that Target’s policy would make it easier for sexual predators to assault possible victims.
As we learned today, there could also be an economic component to this repeal.
“The OVC board presidents were concerned about the discriminatory impact on those associated with our championship”, OVC commissioner Beth DeBauche told the Anniston Star. The laws have drawn the ire of the LGBTQ community, with many activists claiming their civil rights are being violated.
Earlier this week, the city council in Rockwall, Texas, unanimously rejected a measure proposed by Mayor Jim Pruitt that would have prohibited transgender people from using restrooms consistent with their gender identities.
“Nothing short of full repeal of this outrageous law is acceptable”, said HRC Alabama State Manager Eva Walton Kendrick.
“The very women and children the Ordinance purports to protect may be forced to carry their birth certificates and submit to “gender inspections” in order to gain access to the restroom”, says the letter, which was also signed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU Foundation of Alabama. The meeting area was packed to capacity in the small northeast Alabama city of about 21,000, with at least 100 people for the debate on the measure, the TV station said.
Waits argued that the ordinance is a common sense concept and that public safety shouldn’t be compromised for the general public because “of the personal decisions of a few”.
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However, the council members had gathered Wednesday to discuss recalling the ordinance.
