Washington, DC - Congressman Edolphus Towns, 10th District, New York, has introduced legislation that would require buildings that receive at least $ 1.5 million in federal funds to have a two-to-one ratio of women's and men's restrooms.  H.R. 693, "the "Restroom Gender Parity in Federal Buildings Act of 2007," will impact future Federal projects bought before the House of Representatives' Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

The issue of insufficient women's restrooms may be found in many professional places of employment as well as sporting and theatre venues.  Most women who have ever attended a sold-out sporting event have a story about important plays they've missed because they were standing in line, waiting for the restroom.  Meanwhile, their male companions were able to zip in and out of the washroom and make it back to their seats with time to spare.

One example of this is the old County Stadium in Milwaukee, at 54,420-capacity stadium.  The old venue has 447 toilets and urinals for men, but only 241 fixtures for women.  Milwaukee's answer to the problem is Miller Park which holds 12,000 fewer people and has 316 men's fixtures and 300 women's fixtures. 

"This has become a major problem nationwide.  There are women who have medical conditions who may need to relieve themselves more frequently one of them being pregnancy," said Congressman Towns.

The states of California, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia already have restroom parity legislation on the books.  Also, the cities of Honolulu and New York have passed mirroring laws as recent as last year.

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