A mother who witnessed what she called a disturbing incident at the Nanaimo Aquatic Center earlier this month says she wants to look into a solution for locker room safety.
Janayh Wright and a group of more than 30 people gathered at Maffeo Sutton Park on Sunday.
“I want to create some change and safety for children, so today I hope people will sign the petition. I hope to be able to find a safety link outside of any vulnerable areas so that anyone who has an issue with the behavior of people in that locker room or facility has someone to turn to,” Wright said.
Wright organized this event following a disturbing incident on February 3 that occurred in the women’s locker rooms at the Nanaimo Aquatic Centre.
She says she saw one person walking around in a wig and mask with no bag, towel or bathing suit. The person then reportedly went to a cubicle near their nine-year-old daughter’s dressing room.
“I saw the wig looking down and they were trying to peek under the stand,” Wright said in a Feb. 5 interview.
“When the person came out of the room, still fully clothed, I approached them. They told me it was their human right to be in the dressing room and they weren’t going to leave. A few words were exchanged and I led her out the door.”
She said she then lodged a complaint with pool staff and the police.
In a statement released days after the city of Nanaimo, it said there had been “two reported incidents regarding the activities of a transgender person in the women’s locker room in the past two weeks.”
On Park Sunday, Wright said more training, education and action is needed to address these issues without targeting the trans community.
“There are predators out there who are embracing transgender identity and gaining access to children, and we need staff trained to know how to deal with these predators,” she said. “It’s also not fair to the transgender community because now they’re being targeted and that’s not fair so we have to come up with a security solution.”
A number of young people also showed up on Sunday and said they were concerned the gathering would be an attack on the trans community. But after talking to Wright, they felt a lot better.
“We all have the same point. We all came to this from a different perspective, but I’m glad that after the conversation we realized that it’s essentially the same,” said Kieran Freeman.
Wright says she is excited about the topic because she worries what would have happened if she hadn’t been with her daughter that day.
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