Dayton Metro Library is pleased to announce their role in supporting menstrual equity - making menstrual products available, affordable, and accessible to everyone - by offering feminine hygiene products in several of their Branch Library restrooms. Products will be available to patrons at no cost.
Product dispensers have already been placed in the Trotwood, Brookville, New Lebanon, Northwest, and Vandalia Branches, with one dispenser for each restroom (excluding the family restroom). The rest of DML’s locations will soon follow, each having their own dispensers installed. Both men’s and women’s restrooms will offer the products, so that access is provided to anyone who might need them, and beyond personal use, someone might need access to the products for a friend or family member in need.
“Gender and racial justice are the work of ensuring access, highlighting disparities, and advocating for the needs of others. Reproductive justice is healthcare, and access to healthcare needs is critical. This should be our normative value,” offers Shannon Isom, President and CEO of the YWCA in Dayton. “The Dayton Metro Library taking an active role in [this initiative] by installing feminine product dispensers is an answer to period poverty - one that each of us should expect in, by, and for community. This action not only provides needed access, but also models to others the need for dignity in all forms of healthcare.”
DML feels it is important to be part of this initiative because of the lack of accessibility and affordability of such products throughout our communities. Feminine hygiene products are not covered by WIC or other government subsidized programs, and that creates a barrier for many of the Library’s patrons and staff.
By offering these products, DML aims to help meet the basic biological needs of everyone who visits its locations and wants to make it easier for patrons to spend time in the Library.
For more information about the Library’s participation in supporting menstrual equity, call the Ask Me Line at 937.463.2665.
Original source can be found here.
Alerts Sign-up