A pair of Ohio-based moms are crying foul after reportedly being turned down for a family swimming pool pass in their community.
WBNS Channel 10 reports that Melody Mohn and her partner, Hela Young, attempted to buy a family pass at Galion's Heise Park that included Young, she was told that a city ordinance defined a family as a mother, father and up to three children.
"We're not the only same-sex couple, and we're not the only non-traditional family, either," Mohn, who said she had purchased a family pass for herself and her three children for the past nine years, told NBC 4.
Without the family pass, Mohn noted, she and her children will not be able to visit the pool as often as they'd like. “It costs about $16 each time and that adds up quick,” she told the Coshocton Tribune.
Meanwhile, members of the Galion City Council have vowed to update the ordinance and re-evaluate the wording surrounding the definition of "family," but since the pool closes next month, it's likely Mohn and Young won't be able to obtain a family pass until 2015.
"We certainly don't want to do anything to prevent children and parents to go swimming in our pool," Carl Watt, Galion City Council president, told NBC 4.
He went on to add, "I mean, 20 years ago, it probably fit the scene, but not today. Not today's lifestyle."
In 2012, a Virginia-based fitness club began offering "household" memberships in lieu of "family" memberships after two gay men were stripped of the latter when management discovered they were a same-sex couple. In the meantime, the couple's two-year-old son was reportedly denied access to a swimming pool.
At the time, Will Trinkle described to ABC 13 as being akin to "someone [punching] us in the stomach."
"It's from a place we couldn't imagine that there would be this kind of discrimination and this kind of attack," he added. "We have come a long way but this shows we still have a long way to go."
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