Opinion: California cities don’t have enough public bathrooms. Here’s one solution

California has a chance to sort out an issue that impacts everybody, however particularly unhoused Californians: public restroom entry. Sadly, there isn’t enough knowledge in regards to the scope of the issue for cities to maneuver towards an answer.

A invoice within the Meeting, AB 1297, launched by Sharon Quirk-Silva (D-Fullerton), would require native governments to stock public restrooms by July 2024, one step to handle the continual lack of restrooms throughout the state.

Entry to public restrooms — amenities obtainable to most of the people that don’t cost a charge to be used — is a human proper. Some teams rely extra closely on public amenities: individuals with out steady housing, households with younger youngsters, supply drivers and transit operators, vacationers and commuters. However public restrooms are extensively essential for public well being. Making obtainable comparatively clear and secure amenities promotes bladder and bowel well being and prevents the unfold of infectious ailments comparable to hepatitis A, shigella and influenza. Analysis exhibits that when extra restrooms can be found, open defecation declines.

Cities throughout California, nevertheless, have too few public restrooms to serve their populations. One current estimate of entry in Los Angeles, by far the state’s largest metropolis with almost 4 million residents, is particularly grim: There are solely 14 everlasting public restrooms on metropolis streets. L.A. has a community of moveable bogs, however they are often right here in the present day and gone the subsequent. Entry to primary sanitation in skid row falls far wanting worldwide requirements for refugee camps.

San Diego, California’s second-largest metropolis, affords a telling case examine. Town just lately needed to confront one other uptick in hepatitis A circumstances — only a few years after a lethal hep A outbreak sickened almost 600 individuals and killed 20 from 2016 lasting into 2018, and a 2021 shigella outbreak sickened 53 San Diegans. These outbreaks have repeatedly been linked to insufficient public restroom entry, they usually overwhelmingly affected unhoused individuals.

In response to those points, my colleagues and I investigated a primary query: The place are the general public restrooms in our group? We rapidly discovered that that is tough to reply.

Details about public restrooms is sparse, arduous to entry and infrequently inaccurate. San Diego County didn’t have a standardized database of public restrooms. A number of of its municipalities haven’t any public info on the restrooms they handle. We submitted public data requests to find these amenities, then compiled the responses with publicly obtainable info to develop a web-based map of all everlasting public restrooms countywide. This stock has primary info, together with the amenities’ hours of operation and options provided comparable to menstrual merchandise and child altering stations.

The info paint an alarming image. Specializing in downtown San Diego, we recognized 22 public restrooms, solely two of which can be found 24/7. The in a single day ratio is roughly one everlasting bathroom to each 204 unsheltered individuals residing downtown. There are even fewer public restrooms in additional outlying neighborhoods.

After we visited the downtown restrooms to audit their options, we discovered that solely certainly one of 22 provided scorching water, 4 (18%) provided menstrual merchandise, seven provided child altering stations (32%) and 9 (41%) provided a gender-neutral or “household” restroom choice.

We additionally interviewed 115 unhoused San Diegans about their restroom experiences on a typical day. Of the individuals we interviewed, 70% reported utilizing a public restroom — if one is obtainable — and 44% reported working towards open defecation as a result of no restroom is close by after they want one. Half of the examine contributors mentioned they skilled discrimination and different obstacles when making an attempt to make use of a restroom.

Passage of AB 1297 could be a essential first step towards growing public restroom entry. It’s mandatory for native governments to survey what restroom entry appears to be like like of their communities and make this info obtainable to the general public.

That is the not the primary time Assemblywoman Quirk-Silva has tried to enact this coverage. Opponents contend {that a} requirement to stock public restrooms would burden native governments. However a greater understanding of gaps in toilet entry would, over the long-term, scale back the work that officers must put towards preventable public well being crises instantly linked to insufficient amenities.

The state can’t cease there. As soon as we all know the place restrooms are, we must always use that info to enhance the standard of current amenities, determine the place extra are wanted and discover artistic options to extend entry, comparable to public-private partnerships and company sponsors to create extra restrooms.

California cities are perpetually prone to infectious illness outbreaks. It’s time to gather the data wanted to make sure that all Californians can safely meet their primary wants — and to carry native governments accountable to handle this public well being drawback.

Megan Welsh Carroll is an affiliate professor of prison justice and public administration at San Diego State and the director of the Undertaking for Sanitation Justice. @bogs.sdsu