Human Rights Commission: Women-Only Swim At Brooklyn Pool May Resume
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- The city's Human Rights Commission has decided women-only swimming hours at a Brooklyn pools to accommodate mostly Orthodox Jewish women don't violate the constitutional separation of church and state.
As WCBS 880's Peter Haskell reported, the pool at the Metropolitan Recreation Center in Williamsburg, Brooklyn will resume its women-only swimming hours after the decision issued Wednesday. It came after a months-long investigation prompted by an anonymous complaint.
Commission officials said the women-only swims fall within the city's human rights law and would have a minimal impact on other people's access to the pools.
"Giving women a couple of hours a week the opportunity to enjoy this pool and have separate swimming just makes total, total sense," said State Assemblyman Dov Hikind (D-Brooklyn).
Hikind said the women-only pool hours are not just for the Orthodox Jewish community.
"You know, the idea of separate swimming for women was for all women always," he said.
The pool at the St Johns Recreation Center in Crown Heights will also be allowed to keep women-only swimming hours, but men-only swimming hours will be discontinued, according to a DNAInfo report.
Orthodox Jewish women's beliefs bar them from bathing with men.
Civil libertarians had argued restricting men's access to public pools is wrong.
The special swim sessions will be open to anyone who identifies as a woman or a girl, including transgender people.
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