Install restroom in Gateway Plaza

Posted

It’s disappointing to learn that Gateway Plaza will open without a restroom.

Toilet availability is fundamental to human dignity. Everyone needs clean, safe, away-from-home restrooms. Visitors feel welcome knowing there are public facilities that are open, clean, safe, open, and easy to find.

By helping get people out of cars and onto their feet, bicycles and transit, public restrooms enhance community livability and mitigate environmental warming. By supporting physical activity and fitness, they contribute to public health. A person with a short “bladder leash” is vulnerable to dehydration and the adverse effects of extreme urinary retention. Mental well-being suffers, people cannot be out with family and friends because restrooms are not available.

I call on Port Townsend City Council to line up the necessary lodging tax funds and install the promised restroom in Gateway Plaza as soon as possible.

Carol McCreary
Port Townsend