A fitness center in Florida has responded to the Florida attorney general James Uthmeier's threat of legal action over the gym's policy of allowing transgender women in the women's locker room.
Uthmeier has accused Life Time Fitness in Palm Beach Gardens of allowing "men into the women's locker rooms."
A fitness center in Florida has responded to the Florida attorney general James Uthmeier's threat of legal action over the gym's policy of allowing transgender women in the women's locker room.Â
Uthmeier has accused Life Time Fitness in Palm Beach Gardens of allowing "men into the women's locker rooms."Â
Life Time has a national policy that allows transgender women to use the facility that corresponds with their gender identity in states where gender-identity protections exist. In areas that are silent on the issue, the company defers to the gender listed on the person's official ID or birth certificate.
"We are carefully reviewing the legal interpretation of the attorney general," a spokesperson for Life Time said in a statement, "so that we can remain in legal compliance while maintaining an environment that allows all of our members to use our services safely and respectfully."
Life Time member Sonja Horton recounted to 12 News the moments that lead her to file a state complaint against the Palm Beach Garden’s facility.
“I went into the ladies locker room to the dry sauna and I was sitting there and a man in bikini walked in and sat across from me and I was like oh that’s strange,” Horton said, noting that she immediately left the sauna to inquire about the gym's policy.Â
“They told me basically whatever you express yourself is where you’re allowed to go and I thought that was interesting,"
Uthmeier asserts that state law protects spaces designated for women and no local ordinance or corporate policy can override that.
“Lifetime fitness tried to hide behind a misread county code,” Uthmeier said. “But the law is crystal clear and so is my message, men do not belong in women’s restrooms or locker rooms period.”
Life Time's legal team sent Horton a response to her complaint that quoted a county ordinance stating in part that its against the law to refuse facilities or privileges against anyone based on race, sex, color, religion, national origin, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression.
