CONWAY, SC (WBTW) – Horry County School Board members met in a special called meeting Monday to discuss Title IX and the transgender bathroom issue.
The room was packed, and school leaders had to open up an overflow room for concerned parents.
The meeting comes after News13 spoke with one parent in the Horry County School district whose child was born a female, but now identifies himself as a male was suspended after he used the men’s restroom.
School board leaders say their biggest concern is for the safety of all students, but parents like Marshall Baker say the issue is bigger than the Horry County School District.
“I feel like this stuff has been shoved down our throat,” said Baker.
Parents held signs that read “keep kids safe” while shouting scriptures and prayers.
Melanie Moore was in the minority of transgender supporters and took backlash from several parents.
“Everybody is concerned about their children, well the transgender parents are concerned about their children, too ,” said Moore.
The meeting was held for the board to decide whether or not they should continue to comply with a federal court ruling in favor or a Virginia transgender student who wished to use the bathroom of the gender he identified with and many like Dan Doyle had suggestions of their own.
“I think the easiest way to a solution is not by voting whether to approve this law or not. Build them a bathroom of their own,” said Doyle.
Doyle says he has grandchildren in the school district, and says boys going in the girls’ restroom or vice versa is unsafe and he says the school board needs to take action.
“I’m a Christian, and I believe what he said. God don’t make no mistakes. God didn’t make him a boy and a girl,” said Doyle.
School board leaders voted to follow the law under the recent Fourth Circuit Court ruling on Title IX and to file and amicus brief in support of the Virginia school district.
“There will be some financial expense involved. We don’t believe there’s going to be any significant amount of financial resources expended to fight this,” said Horry County School Board Member Jeffrey Garland.
Moore says fighting the ruling is the wrong decision for the district because it’s simply a waste of money.
“I regret that they’re going to use my tax dollars to fight it because they’re going to lose in the long run,” said Moore.
The school board also said non-transgender students will be allowed to use private bathrooms in the nurse’s office if they feel uncomfortable with transgender people in the bathroom.
Nearly all of the school board members said they did not support the Fourth Circuit Court ruling, but that they have to follow the law, and they say they vow to fight it.