Courts

Lawyer Moms Responsible For Second-Ever State Law Requiring Courthouse Lactation Rooms

Way to go, Nevada!

By  
on

Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts on motherhood in the legal profession, in partnership with our friends at MothersEsquire. Welcome Jennifer Shogren to our pages. Click here if you’d like to donate to MothersEsquire.

Women face immense barriers to breastfeed. For decades, women across the country have had to express breast milk in empty rooms at courthouses only to be unexpectedly interrupted by court staff, security, or others — assuming a suitable secluded place could be found in the first place. One female prosecutor was told to pump her milk in a basement jail holding cell. For decades we have had to pump in unsanitary bathroom stalls, trek out to stifling or freezing cars, and everywhere in between. We are told that breastfeeding is the best way to nourish our babies, but we are not given the support and accommodations to be able to do so. Unsatisfied with this, two lawyer moms teamed up to create a change for the better.

To that end, Nevada recently passed a new law that requires all state courthouses to provide a lactation space for the public that isn’t a bathroom and creates a state-funded matching program. Nevada is only the second state in the country to pass such legislation, following Illinois.[1]

The law was proposed by a Nevada attorney and mom, Jennifer Richards, who is a member of Mothers Esquire.  She was inspired to pursue the legislation after reading an article for the Nevada Lawyer Magazine by another Nevada attorney, mom, and Mothers Esquire member, Jamie Combs. Jennifer and Jamie were able to connect through the organization with other Nevada attorneys and lawyer moms across the country for advice and resources.

Nevada’s Lieutenant Governor Kate Marshall, also a mom and a lawyer, was a strong proponent of the bill and recounted her experiences at a courthouse pumping in a dirty bathroom while a line of people waited. Assembly Majority Leader Teresa Benitez Thompson, a mom of four, carried the legislation through the legislature and secured additional funds to create a state matching program for lactation pods in courthouses that may be historic or lack the space to easily comply with the new law.

While motherhood has been considered a barrier to women entering the legal field, dedicated lactation rooms in courthouses will help to remove that barrier. In Nevada, women make up 34 percent of the legal profession, a number that continues to grow as more women are entering and graduating from law school. We have a female majority legislature, a female majority Supreme Court, and, in Clark County, a majority of female judges. And, of course, women make up approximately half of the state’s population. New mothers will naturally be among the jurors, parties, witnesses, and others who come to court to resolve disputes or to see justice done — and now they will be able to safely breastfeed there, all thanks to the support of two lawyer moms.

[1] However, it should be noted that Puerto Rico requires “shopping malls, airports, and public service government centers to have accessible lactation spaces and diaper changing spaces that are not bathrooms.”  Louisiana also requires certain state buildings to contain lactation spaces.

Sponsored

Jennifer Shogren is a native Nevadan, a graduate of the University of Nevada, Reno, and Gonzaga University School of Law.  Before joining the state, she worked for various legal aid organizations providing advocacy for seniors and vulnerable adults, including extensive work defending individuals under guardianship proceedings. She has the distinction of having argued a case in front of the Nevada Supreme Court.

Sponsored

Topics

, , ,