Jefferson County Commissioner Kate Dean said the Jefferson County Board of Health may consider a proclamation in support of women’s rights on reproductive choice.

Dean told her fellow commissioners at the start of the board of commissioners meeting last week that county public health officials were looking for ways to be proactive in reaction to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision to overturn the landmark 1973 decision Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed women the right to an abortion based on the privacy provisions of the Constitution.

“We just want folks to know that locally we take this very seriously and are doing what we can to try to preserve choice,” Dean said. 

The board meeting began with a rare and raw prolonged statement from Commissioner Heidi Eisenhour.

“I would be remiss if I hadn’t mentioned the happenings of the past week in our country and saying how devastated I am for everybody in our country, but for all the girls and women who will not have a choice in their own healthcare procedures in the future,” Eisenhour said.

“It’s just devastating to me,” she continued. “I have very close young women in my life who are already afraid, even though we live in a state that’s declared it will be a safe harbor state. It’s just a devastating turn of events to have this attack at Roe versus Wade.”

“Sorry to politicize the beginning of our meeting,” Eisenhour quickly added. “I don’t usually do that, it’s not my style or my mojo.

“But this is my mojo: freedom of choice. It’s all it’s about, people,” she said.

The other commissioners also criticized the Supreme Court decision.

“We know the cost of unwanted children in society,” Dean added. “We see a lot of them; they come through the courthouse.”

Commissioner Greg Brotherton called the Supreme Court decision “distressing.”

“The places that are going to marginalize this choice are also the places that are not helping those folks that need a little bit of a hand up when they’re ... having kids.” he said.

“It’s horrible,” Brotherton said.

Later in the meeting, talk returned to the U.S. Supreme Court again, as Brotherton expressed concern about the high court’s decision in West Virginia v. EPA. 

That decision, he said, could have “potentially transformative impacts on how we do business and our very real climate change goals as a nation,” Brotherton said. “It is concerning.”

He said the country had seen a step back for equality.

“I’ll certainly use what political capital I have on the local level to help, to add to this conversation, and preserve choice for women and girls as much as we can.”

“It touches me to the soul ... as I think about my daughter coming into the world, and coming into adulthood,” Brotherton said.