The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee recently held a hearing to consider legislation that would mandate a one-to-one ratio of restroom stalls in women’s facilities in federal buildings to urinals and stalls in men’s facilities.
Driving the legislation is committee chair Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., who appears eager to move forward on the bill despite committee ranking member Darrell Issa’s concerns that such a requirement might be arbitrary.
GSA’s public buildings commissioner, Robert Peck, testified that in many cases the capacity of women’s facilities outnumbers that of men’s, and that he was not aware of any complaints.
Nonetheless, Towns argues that many GSA facilities were constructed decades ago when a much smaller percentage of the workforce was made up of women, which is reflected in the building’s accommodations.