Update: Just a short while ago, Mayor Frank Jackson signed the bill into law. Details on the bill and its origins in the original story below.


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(Original story 7/13/16): Cleveland City Council will pass legislation at its meeting Monday night that will permit transgender people to use bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity. 

The bill, which was first introduced back in 2013, aimed to add gender identity / expression to the city’s anti-discrimination laws. But it’s assumed the status of another “bathroom bill,” one that’s part and parcel of the the national conversation on transgender rights. The ordinance was tabled after heated council committee meetings back in 2014.

Council President Kevin Kelley said back in June that council had been working hard to craft a piece of legislation that “everyone [was] happy with.”  

City Council’s committee of the whole passed the legislation Monday morning, so it’ll be put to a vote tonight. 

Leila Attassi, reporting for Cleveland.com says that the new version of the bill has slightly different penalty structure for offenses. 

“The latest, amended version calls for complaints to be filed with the city’s fair housing court, which could issue a civil penalty,” Atassi reports. “Ignoring that would trigger a first-degree misdemeanor charge. But penalties would be left to the discretion of a municipal judge.”

This article appears in Jul 13-19, 2016.

Sam Allard is a former senior writer at Scene.

8 replies on “Mayor Frank Jackson Signs Transgender Bathroom Bill”

  1. As a male, I couldnt care less. But I wonder how women feel about this. And how many of them are being honest about it.

  2. If you have a cock and balls, use the men’s room!!!!! When you have them removed, use the ladies.

  3. I’m going to identify with the gender that has the shortest restroom line and no one can do a damn thing about it. MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!

  4. I went in to a ladies restroom at a truckstop several years ago (I am a female) and there were two men dressed as women (hookers to be exact) shaving their faces at the sink. I was not about to use the bathroom with two dudes in there, I don’t care how they “identified”.!!! I had to get the manager and he chased them out (it wasn’t the first time, apparently).

  5. They were hookers… sex with you wasn’t gonna happen for free… or were you offended at the skill.they had to be shaving their legs in a sink?

  6. I’d love for some brave soul to try going to Town Hall on a Saturday night and doing this, you’re still gonna get your ass beat.

  8. As a cis woman, trans women sharing the bathroom with me are not a threat. I welcome my sisters (not just my cisters) as the beautiful souls they are.

    What concerns me is sharing a bathroom with other cis women who are obsessed with wether or not the person in the neighboring stall has the “right” set of genitals for their liking. If you’re spending enough time in the bathroom to be bothered with someone else, you’re the one being inappropriate.

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