Daily Briefs

ACLU objects to transgender bathroom rule in Jenison schools


GEORGETOWN TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union is objecting to a Michigan school district’s restroom policy for transgender students.

The Grand Rapids Press reports that transgender students in the Jenison district can use a gender-neutral restroom, staff restrooms or restrooms that match their gender at birth.

The newspaper says Jenison transgender students can’t use restrooms that match their new identity. Superintendent Tom TenBrink says the Ottawa County district is not discriminating against transgender students and treats all students with “sensitivity and dignity.”

But the ACLU of Michigan has written a letter in protest. The group says the policy stigmatizes transgender students.

Attorney Miriam Aukerman says a transgender boy should be able to use a restroom for boys. She says the same should apply to transgender girls.

 

$10 million lawsuit filed after girl’s death at Head Start


DEARBORN HEIGHTS, Mich. (AP) — An attorney is seeking $10 million on behalf of the family of a 3-year-old Detroit-area girl who was killed at a Head Start program when she was struck by a table that folded into a gymnasium wall.

A wrongful death lawsuit was filed Tuesday in Wayne County against the Archdiocese of Detroit, Wayne Metropolitan Community Action Agency and St. Albert the Great Church in Dearborn Heights.

The lawsuit says children were at recess Jan. 20 at the church when the table “unexpectedly and without notice detached from the wall and fell directly” onto Lilliana Kerr.

The Associated Press left phone messages Wednesday with the Wayne Metropolitan Community Action Agency. The agency operated the Head Start program.

A spokesman for the Detroit Archdiocese says it does not comment on pending litigation.

 

State Supreme Court hears dispute over privacy, hospital firing


ALMA, Mich. (AP) — The Michigan Supreme Court heard arguments in an unusual case involving a hospital, privacy and a personal protection order.

Tammy McNeil-Marks was fired in 2014 as a clinical manager at MidMichigan Medical Center in Alma. The hospital says she violated privacy rules when she told her lawyer about a patient in the hospital.

It turns out that McNeil-Marks was concerned about her safety because she had a personal protection order against the woman. The woman was served with the order while in a room.

McNeil-Marks says she can’t be fired and should be protected by Michigan’s whistleblower law. But the hospital says her call to her lawyer doesn’t qualify as a report to a public body under the law.

The state Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday.

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