Students and faculty at Pacific University unveil a gender-neutral restroom at one of its campuses in February 2016. Illinois is considering passing legislation to make all public restrooms in the state gender neutral. | Pacific University/Flickr
Students and faculty at Pacific University unveil a gender-neutral restroom at one of its campuses in February 2016. Illinois is considering passing legislation to make all public restrooms in the state gender neutral. | Pacific University/Flickr
Illinois state Rep. Adam Niemerg opposed House Bill 1286 which supports creating "all gender multiple occupancy" restrooms in a Feb. 22 Facebook post.
"Legislation (HB 1286) has been filed to create all-gender multiple-occupancy restrooms in Illinois to allow any gender to be in the same restroom at the same time," Niemerg wrote. "Please take a moment to register your opposition to this bad proposal by filing a witness slip right away.”
The bill, which was sponsored by Rep. Katie Stuart in January, states all multiple occupancy restrooms are open to “all genders,” according to a WQAD report.
"Any multiple-occupancy restroom may be identified as an all-gender multiple-occupancy restroom and designated for use by any person of any gender,” WQAD reported.
The bill also requires an all-gender multiple-occupancy restroom to include specified signage, stall dividers, and partitions for urinals.
A similar bill was attempted by the Illinois House in 2021 but failed to pass in the Senate.
In 2019, The General Assembly passed the Equitable Restrooms Act, which "identified all single-occupancy restrooms in public places as gender-neutral and designated them for use by no more than one person at a time, or for family or assisted use."
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