Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 24, 1990 TAG: 9006280543
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: D-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARGIE FISHER RICHMOND BUREAU
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
And to get it, Andrews has proposed taking office space at the Capitol now used by Lt. Gov. Don Beyer and turning it into a restroom for the 40-member Senate's three female members.
The only alternative, Andrews says, is to turn the male senators' bathroom into a unisex facility.
Right on! said Sens. Eddy Dalton and Emilie Miller.
The women senators currently use a bathroom on the Capitol mezzanine, a floor away from the Senate chambers, which is "pretty darn inconvenient," said Dalton, R-Henrico.
During long Senate floor sessions, male senators who hear the call of nature can dash into the Senate cloak room/lounge/toilet facilities a few steps away from the Senate chamber and be back at their desks in a jif - never missing a word of important debate or a critical vote.
The three women senators - Dalton, Emilie Miller, D-Fairfax, and Yvonne Miller, D-Norfolk - must leave the chambers and negotiate their way to an elevator or up a flight of stairs with a restroom key in hand to use toilet facilities shared by the female staff of the Senate and governor's office.
"I can never get up to the mezzanine without fighting off tourist groups, lobbyists and school groups" touring the Capitol, said Emilie Miller.
If something is not done by the 1991 legislative session, "Eddy and I are going to march" into the Senate men's bathroom, ready or not, Miller said.
Beyer - who presides over the state Senate and is a potential candidate for governor in 1993 - doesn't need the Capitol office space being eyed as toilet facilities, Andrews said Saturday.
"He never uses that office except to come over and hang his hat up," Andrews said. He noted that the state has provided main office facilities for the lieutenant governor in the nearby Supreme Court building for several years.
Beyer had not been informed of proposals to turn his small Capitol office into a restroom until reached by a reporter Saturday. But he laughed and said "Well, I knew the office of lieutenant governor was held in the highest esteem."
Beyer said he is not territorial. "I'm pretty easy to get along with. But I would appreciate being part of the discussion," he said.
Dalton, who lost to Beyer in the 1989 campaign for lieutenant governor, said she was not in favor of booting Beyer out onto the street. She said she just thinks there ought to be potty parity for women senators.
Both Andrews and Emilie Miller recalled that the bathroom debate has been going on for some years, since Republican Eva Scott and Democrat Evelyn Hailey first broke into the male-only Senate.
The issue has been on the back burner ever since, Miller said. The male-dominated Senate kept hoping that it would just go away, but, "What they don't understand is that we are not going to go away. We're going to multiply."
Could another bathroom brawl be in the works? The Capitol has cooled down since Del. Robert Ball, the newly installed chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, got into public relations hot water last January by spending $54,000 of taxpayers' money to install a bathroom and shower in his office.
Andrews, giving no indication that he was going for the double meaning, said, "It's a plumbing problem."
by CNB