Health club harasses transwoman
Told to use either daycare bathroom for children or men's room

Ethan Jacobs
ejacobs@...
Bay Windows - MA,USA
8/17/2006

http://tinyurl.com/owsvg

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Image: http://baywindows.com/Media/PublicationsArticle/nwest.jpg
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Natasha Lee West, a transgender woman, was a member of the Bally
Total Fitness club in Worcester for one year in what she calls "male
mode" before deciding to take the step to present herself as female
at the gym last June. For the past three years she has lived as
female everywhere except for on the job and at the gym, but after
finalizing her name change, getting breast implants and getting a
new driver's license with her female name and photo, she decided the
time was right to live as female full time. West said when she first
told the management at the gym in June that she was going to be
living full time as female, manager Dale Stoddard seemed supportive.
She showed Stoddard the document approving her name change from her
birth name to Natasha as well as her new license.

"I presented this information to them and they didn't seem to have a
problem with it," said West.

One week later she says things had changed. She said a female staff
member, who she was unable to identify, asked her what her gender
designation was on her driver's license. West said that the gender
marker on the license was male. The Registry of Motor Vehicles,
according to Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, requires that
individuals have completed sex reassignment surgery to change their
gender marker, and while West has had breast implants, she has not
had sex reassignment surgery.

West said the staff member told her she could not use the women's
changing facilities or restroom. West told her she was willing to
forgo using the changing room, but she needed access to a restroom.
She said the staff member led her to the gym's daycare center and
told her she could use the children's bathroom. West said the
bathroom consisted of a small plastic toilet with the seat raised
only about a foot off the ground, but she agreed to use it.

"I actually went and did my workout, and when I went home I was
stewing about it, because it was so degrading," said West.

The following week she said she complained to Stoddard, who agreed
that West should not have to use the children's bathroom. But his
solution shocked West; he told her she would have to use the men's
room.

According to West, the gym bathrooms are located within the changing
rooms, so Stoddard's solution would require West to walk through the
men's locker room and into the men's bathroom. West, who said she
regularly passes for female in her day-to-day life, said she was
afraid of the reaction she would get from the male customers by
passing through the men's locker room and using the men's bathroom.

"[I told Stoddard,] '"I pass 100 percent, and if I go in there
there's going to be guys running out and you're going to lose more
members than you realize,'" said West. But she claims Stoddard was
unwilling to let her use the women's room.

Stoddard did not return a call to comment for this story. When Bay
Windows tried to reach him at Bally Total Fitness in Worcester the
staff member answering the phone confirmed that West was a member
and that the club had changed her name in their computer system.

Michael West, Natasha's partner and a transman, said he has filed
two separate complaints on his partner's behalf with the Bally
national service center in Norwalk, California. He said after the
first complaint the service center contacted Worcester and told the
local gym to resolve the problem. In response to that request he
said Stoddard invited Natasha and Michael West in for a meeting
about two weeks ago, in which West showed him a letter from her
therapist stating that she was living as female full time, but he
stood firm in his decision to force West to use the men's room. He
told them he would speak with national headquarters and contact them
that day to give them a final answer, but West said the couple has
received no contact from Stoddard since that meeting.

Michael West said he filed a second complaint after that meeting,
but it has not prompted any action from the company, and Michael
West doubts their willingness to force the Worcester gym to allow
West to use the women's room.

"They're not giving me indication that they're willing to step in,
but they filed [the original] complaint" with the Worcester gym,
explained Michael West.

Matt Messinger, a spokesperson for the national corporate office of
Bally Total Fitness in Chicago, said the Worcester gym, like the
majority of their gyms, are owned by the national Bally Total
Fitness Corporation and are bound by its policies. As far as
accommodations for transgender members Messinger said, "According to
our policies, basically the way we have handled these issues in the
past is if the person has clinically gone through a change of sex as
well as it shows on their driver's license, it's clear that they've
changed their gender, we will go ahead and allow them to use that
space and do what they need to do. Otherwise our policy is to not to
do that."

Messinger also said where available gyms may offer transgender
customers the option of using an alternate non-gender specific
bathroom if one is available.

In response to questions about West's complaint Messinger said, "At
this time we're continuing to investigate Natasha's case, her issues
that she's brought forward with us and try to bring it to a
conclusion that is best for all our members and everyone involved."

Yet West said she is not convinced Stoddard has the same benign goal
in mind. West said the Bally contract has a clause saying membership
can be terminated without a refund if a member disturbs other
members. She suspects Stoddard expects West's use of the women's
room will cause enough of a disturbance that he could revoke her
membership and keep her money. She said he was unwilling to put his
decision to allow her to use the men's room in writing. West has one
more year left on her contract with the gym.

"He either figured, A., there's no way she's going to walk in the
men's room looking like she looks. Or he wanted me to go in there
and get kicked out of the club and pay the rest of the contract, and
his problem is over. And because the agreement [to use the men's
room] was verbal he could deny he said it," said West.

After the last meeting with Stoddard, Michael West sent out an
e-mail plea for assistance to transgender activists and
organizations as well as LGBT media, including Bay Windows. Diego
Sanchez, co-chair of the Massachusetts Transgender Political
Coalition (MTPC), said he advised the couple to contact GLAD to find
legal support, but he said outside Boston, Cambridge and
Northampton, which all have nondiscrimination ordinances protecting
transgender people, there is likely little legal recourse.

"The sad fact is that in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts we do not
have a law that is protective or inclusive relative to access of any
kind, and whether it's an item as privileged as health clubs or one
as simple and basic as employment or housing or healthcare. We don't
have inclusion," said Sanchez, who said he was not familiar enough
with this case to comment on the substance of West's complaint.

West said she is taking a wait-and-see approach to the situation,
but she is unsure how it will be resolved. She said she believes the
incident is a product of lack of understanding of transgender lives.


"I'm not going in there to peep at women," said West. "I've done a
lot to get to where I'm at. I'm not doing it to infiltrate the
women's room, which is the way he's treating it. They need to be
educated on it."

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