Small town Oregon residents turns on local swimming pool for letting transgender woman change in ladies locker rooms in front of children

Outrage erupted at an Oregon swimming pool after claims a transgender woman undressed in front of women and children.

A woman said she feared for her safety after the locker room incident at the Newport Recreation and Aquatic Center. KATU.

“We don’t want our children to see persons of the opposite gender or persons transitioning to the opposite gender undressed or naked,” Newport resident Linda Dinerstein said Monday during a council meeting on the issue.

The issue was raised after the parks and leisure centers said they had “asked questions” about gender identity and public toilets.

Community member and transgender woman Mary Grace Frederick (pictured) said concerned residents portrayed her as a predator

Dinerstein said she saw a person who appeared to be a man dressing openly in the women’s locker room at the Newport Recreation and Aquatic Center (photo)

“I personally witnessed an individual who appeared to be a man openly undressing in the women’s locker room. It was later communicated by the recreation center that this was a biological female who was in the process of transitioning.’

Community member and transgender woman Mary Grace Frederick shared an opposing view at the same meeting.

She said, “People sitting in this room tonight have called me a sexual deviant and a predator.” There is no indication that Frederick was the woman involved in the locker room incident that sparked the complaint.

During the meeting, Newport Mayor Jan Kaplan said toilet use is not the problem and that 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 are different from me, then everything you do is going to be interpreted as a predator,” Kaplan said.

On May 6, City of Newport Parks and Recreation Director Michael Cavanaugh reaffirmed the city’s commitment to its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Statement after growing concerns about bathroom use, reported KOIN.

“Public spaces are for everyone and the city works hard 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 against customers or staff.”

Cavanaugh said people who don’t feel comfortable can use the facility’s gender-neutral restrooms and that the city of Newport follows the state’s law on public accommodations and discrimination.

Oregon law requires equal accommodations regardless of race, sexual orientation, gender identity or other backgrounds.

In Washington, an elderly woman has filed a $350,000 lawsuit against her city and the YMCA for denying her access to a swimming pool after she objected to a trans woman’s use of the women’s locker room.

Julie Jaman, 82, says Port Townsend and the Olympic Peninsula YMCA defamed her and unlawfully banned her from the center, and is demanding compensation for the “emotional distress” resulting from the July 2022 incident.

Jaman was kicked out of the swimming complex and banned after meeting Clementine Adams, a trans male-to-female YMCA employee, in the women’s locker rooms and asking her to leave.

The case highlights tensions between transgender activists, who say society should accept their chosen sexual identity, and women who want biological males banned from their dressing rooms.