- Newport residents spoke out about transgender people using public bathrooms
- One woman said she saw a trans person using the women’s locker room.
- One transgender resident felt like she was being turned into a predator.
Outrage erupted at an Oregon swimming pool after it was claimed a transgender woman was seen stripping naked in front of women and children.
A woman said she feared for her safety after the incident in the locker room at the Newport Aquatic and Recreation Center, it reported. KATU.
“We don’t want our children to see people of the opposite sex or people transitioning to the opposite sex naked or naked,” Newport resident Linda Dinerstein said at a council meeting on the issue Monday.
The issue arose after Parks and Recreation said it had been “answering questions” related to gender identity and public restrooms.
Newport resident Linda Dinerstein (pictured) expressed concerns about safety after witnessing a transgender person wearing the locker room at a city council meeting on Monday.
Community member and transgender woman Mary Grace Frederick (pictured) said concerned residents were making her out to be a predator.
Dinerstein said he saw a person who appeared to be a man openly dressing in the women’s locker room at the Newport Aquatic and Recreation Center (pictured).
‘I personally witnessed a person who appeared to be a man, dressing openly in the women’s locker room. Later, the recreation center reported that she was a biological woman who was in the process of transition.
Community member and transgender woman Mary Grace Frederick shared an opposing viewpoint during the same meeting.
She said: “The people here tonight who are sitting in this room have called me a sexual deviant and a predator.” There is no suggestion that Frederick was the woman involved in the locker room incident that triggered the complaint.
During the meeting, Newport Mayor Jan Kaplan said bathroom use was not the problem and more education is needed.
‘There are assumptions that people make. “If I see you as a predator, and I see you through that lens, because you’re different from me, then I’m going to interpret anything you do as predatory,” Kaplan said.
On May 6, City of Newport Parks and Recreation Director Michael Cavanaugh affirmed the city’s commitment to its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion statement after they began receiving an increase in concern about the use of the bathroom, reported KOIN.
“Public spaces are for everyone and the city works diligently to ensure they are inclusive, accessible and safe,” Cavanaugh said.
‘Our city is diverse, vibrant and thriving thanks to the many people who live and work here. The City of Newport and Newport Parks and Recreation will not tolerate discrimination, harassment or violence toward any patron or staff.
Cavanaugh said people who feel uncomfortable can use the facility’s gender-neutral bathrooms and that the city of Newport follows state law on public accommodations and discrimination.
Oregon law requires equal accommodations regardless of race, sexual orientation, gender identity, or other origins.
In Washington, an elderly woman has filed a $350,000 case against her city and its YMCA for banning her from a pool after she objected to a trans woman using its women’s locker room.
Julie Jaman, 82, says Port Townsend and its Olympic Peninsula YMCA defamed her and illegally banned her from the center and is seeking compensation for “emotional distress” from the July 2022 incident.
Jaman was kicked out of the swimming complex and banned after encountering Clementine Adams, a male-to-female trans employee at the YMCA, in the women’s locker room and asking her to leave.
The case highlights tensions between trans activists, who say society must accept their chosen sexual identity, and women who want biological men to stay out of their locker rooms.