Some state lawmakers say Fayette County Public Schools are defying state law.

The accusation is over the bathroom designs for a new middle school.

Our June Lefler has more.

A new middle school in the Hamburg area of Lexington is under construction.

Mary Brittain Middle School is named after Kentucky's first black female doctor.

And the school is slated to open at the beginning of the next school year.

But a state lawmaker from Nicholas Ville is scrutinizing the new bathroom stalls.

And notice there are no signs of boys or girls restrooms.

And when parents discovered these, they were outraged with this new design.

I believe that Fayette County Public Schools is attempting to circumvent the requirement of Senate Bill 150 that schools quote, not allow students to use restrooms, locker rooms or shower rooms that are reserved for students of a different biological sex.

The General Assembly passed Senate Bill 150 and 2023.

Opponents called it anti-trans legislation.

The district says it's not making any political statement and is complying with the law.

The principal has determined that there will be a set of restrooms that are for boys.

There is a set of restrooms that are for girls and that there's nothing that stated that this these restrooms are neutral or gender neutral, if you will.

The district superintendent says these restrooms might make the school safer.

A community safety Advisory Council signed off on the new design approach, citing upticks in bad behavior, specifically in bathrooms.

They are simply for privacy purposes and they are for supervision purposes.

Some educators in the room are on board with this approach.

You can have a teacher or an adult standing watching, sending the kids into the area one at a time to use the restroom in the enclosed stalls, and then they wash their hands and they come out and you have their eyes on them every minute, except for when they understandably have their own privacy.

A Republican senator doesn't buy that.

This is not private to me.

I don't know if you have a daughter or have grew up with sisters.

If you have a girl in her cycle that goes in there and has issues, she has to come out of there covered in blood.

No privacy to wash your hands.

I mean, it is it is humiliating to think that a middle school girl would have to go through that.

With the hall open and people passing through.

Senate Bill 150 outlines how boys and girls bathrooms should be separated.

But it also says gender non-conforming students should have some access to unisex single stall bathrooms.

Representative Matt Lockett proposed an update to mandate 90% of bathrooms be designated by sex.

For Kentucky Edition, I'm Jeanne Lefler.