Pritzker signs gender-neutral bathroom law
All single-occupancy public restrooms in Illinois must be designated as gender-neutral beginning Jan. 1 under a law Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed Friday.
The legislation, sponsored by Democratic state Sen. Melinda Bush of Grayslake, prohibits signs outside any single-occupancy public restroom from designating a specific gender. The measure was approved unanimously in the Senate and by a vote of 109-5 in the House this spring.
“Making single-occupancy restrooms gender neutral is inclusive, but it also just makes sense,” Bush said in a statement. “It’s a small change that will make a big impact for thousands of Illinoisans.”
Bush called it “a common-sense measure that will benefit individuals who don’t identify as male or female as well as parents and caregivers who have dependents of the opposite sex.”
Under state law, people can use the bathroom that corresponds with their gender identity, according to Equality Illinois, an LGBTQ rights group that backed Bush’s legislation.
Public bathrooms and locker rooms in recent years have become battlegrounds in the fight over expanded rights for transgender people in Illinois and around the country.
In northwest suburban Palatine, for example, a controversy has simmered for years over whether transgender students should be allowed to use the locker room that corresponds with their gender identity.
Palatine-based Township High School District 211 in 2015 began allowing transgender students to use corresponding bathrooms and locker rooms after the U.S. Department of Education found its policies violated federal anti-discrimination law. The district since has allowed transgender students to use the locker rooms if they change in private areas.
The accommodation resulted in a federal lawsuit from a group of parents who opposed the policy, which was dropped earlier this year. It also prompted an ongoing Cook County lawsuit from Nova Maday, a transgender former student who argues that the requirement to use a private changing area is discriminatory.
In a decision earlier this month, the Illinois Human Rights Commission found that a similar arrangement by Lake Park Community High School District 108 in Roselle, which was modeled on the District 211 policy, denied a transgender student “full and equal access” to the boys locker room.
Transgender rights also have been a divisive issue within the state Republican Party. Then-Gov. Bruce Rauner riled social conservatives in 2017 by signing a law making it easier for people to change the sex on their birth certificates to match their gender identity. Former state Rep. Jeanne Ives of Wheaton attacked Rauner for signing the bill, among other social issues, and nearly upset him in the 2018 GOP primary.