UC to create more ‘gender-neutral’ restrooms

University of California President Janet Napolitano is responding to concerns raised by gay and transgender students and staff by directing the system’s 10 campuses to create more gender-neutral restrooms and to allow students to update their records with a preferred name that does not necessarily match their legal name.

Napolitano said Monday that the two actions respond to recommendations from a task force that started meeting before she assumed the president’s job and that she has asked to provide her with ongoing advice for how the university can be more LGBT-inclusive.

Several UC campuses already have implemented such changes on their own in recent years.

UC spokeswoman Brooke Converse says that under the new policy all single-stall restrooms will be made available to both men and women instead of reserved for a single sex.