Pali administrators opened a gender-neutral bathroom in the upper E Building over the summer to replace the ones that were closed in the M Building last year.

Director of Operations Don Parcell said the female bathroom was changed because it “balanced out the number of boys and girls’ gender-specific restrooms available on the second floor.” He added that “a girls restroom was needed to be used to service all genders.”

Parcell said the process went well and took about a month.

According to Parcell, the M Building restrooms closed last year because there were “too many instances of multiple students going into [the single person] restrooms, plus way too many instances of vaping [and] setting off alarms.” Parcell said the M Building restrooms have been permanently transformed into faculty and staff bathrooms.

Parcell described the process as “very expensive,” but added that Pali didn’t pay anything because all the necessary funds were donated. Parcell said the donors who funded this process also offered money to renovate some of the gender-specific restrooms on campus.

Parcell said that there are currently three gender-neutral bathrooms at Pali: one in the gym, one in the AA Room and the newly opened one in the E Building.

Senior and President of the Trans-Awareness Club Tyler Collins said that he was “concerned because [he] didn’t really know what bathrooms would be available to [him]” after the closure of those in the M Building last year. Collins met with several faculty members and Pali’s Justice League to voice his concern and find a solution.

Collins said he is “really glad that we have a new gender-neutral bathroom running again” and hopes that the “Pali community comes through and learns to respect these bathrooms and the campus.”