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&lt;strong&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Dear HR Guy,&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;p&gt;A friend&#39;s company has an HR problem. They have two male transvestites who insist on using the ladies room and the women are complaining. Is there any New York State or New York City law that determines which restroom you have to use? Is using the disabled restroom an option? After 28 years in HR this is a new one to me!!!&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Regards,&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Edward&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Tough situation, Edward! Unfortunately you can&#39;t rely on the law to direct your actions here. Only a handful of other municipalities have enacted legislation to specifically protect transgender and/or transvestite employees (for the record, the difference between the two is that transvestites simply dress like the opposite sex while transgender people take concrete medical steps to physically and emotionally take on characteristics of the opposite sex. to learn more, go here). So you are going to have to make a judgment call here.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Theoretically speaking, you are really dealing with the rights of your employees to not feel threatened vs. the rights of an employee to personal freedom free of discrimination. Practically speaking, you the employer are trying to balance the two to maintain productivity, be fair, and let&#39;s face it -- to avoid a lawsuit.~&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;In this particular case, your obligation is to provide restroom facilities accessible to all of your employees, gender, transgender, and sexual preferences aside. But which restroom should they use? Sounds like you have the typical setup of a multi-occupant men&#39;s restroom and a multi-occupant women&#39;s restroom. So long as there are separate privacy stalls, which are common in every multi-occupant company restroom I&#39;ve ever seen, there shouldn&#39;t be a problem here. Each employee has a place to take care of business behind closed doors. Sure the sink is in a common area, but there shouldn&#39;t be anything all that sensitive going on there as it a public space. If one employee is making inappropriate overtures or otherwise acting inappropriately in that public area of the restroom, you&#39;ve got a clear case of harassment that needs to be dealt with, regardless of the genders of the employees involved.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Yeah, I know, I know -- sounds great, but doesn&#39;t help solve the problem. Look, Edward, it is natural for some women to feel uncomfortable with people in their restrooms that are actually men dressed as women. If you made the transvestite employees use the men&#39;s room, who is to say that men wouldn&#39;t complain that people who look like women are using their restroom. After all, if someone&#39;s done a fine dress-up and makeup job, you might not even be able to tell!&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;So what do you do? Well, time for some good old-fashioned talking. Sit the transvestite employees down and delicately explain to them that some people are feeling uncomfortable because they are using the womens restroom. See if you can work out a solution that is acceptable to all parties. Chances are, the employees in question also feel uncomfortable about the situation since nasty remarks and snickering likely preceded you finding out that there was a problem (HR is never the first to know about anything...). The most simple solution is to have a separate single stall facility that is multi-accessible to anyone of any gender and recommend that as the facility of choice.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;And if the transvestite employees refuse to work out a compromise? Well, hope they don&#39;t, because it only gets more and more ugly from here on down the road. If you have female employees who claim to feel threatened in the women&#39;s restroom and you the employer don&#39;t act to resolve it, you&#39;re putting yourself on the line for a lawsuit. If you do act on it and ban the transvestite employees from using the women&#39;s restroom on the grounds that they are actually men simply dressing as women, you&#39;ll probably be sued for that too. If you want to really complicate things, look at your company&#39;s written dress code. It likely says what is appropriate dress for men and appropriate dress for women. As such, you could always cite the employee or employees for a dress code violation. But that can be a slippery slope, and you may not want to go there!~&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The laws related to transgender issues are still being written and you don&#39;t want your company to be the battleground for any such legislation. Publicity like that you don&#39;t need, and frankly, a month&#39;s worth of full-page double spreads in the New York Times would not only be cheaper, but more effective too!&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Be smart. Work out a compromise that works for everyone. If things are really looking bleak, or you are otherwise excessively concerned about the ramifications of your actions, consult your company&#39;s legal counsel for advice before you get in over your head. Also, be sure to search Vault for additional information on discrimination, such as &quot;Preparing Your Business for a Discrimination Lawsuit&quot;, and hit the message boards for help from your peers.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;HR Guy&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Do you have a question for the HR Guy? Write to him at hrguy@vault.com.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Click here to learn more about transgenderism&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;&quot;Vault.com Inc. (&quot;Vault&quot;) makes available the information and materials on this site (the &quot;Materials&quot;) for informational purposes only. While we hope and believe the Materials will be helpful as a background matter, we cannot warrant that the Materials are accurate or complete. Moreover, the Materials are general in nature, and may not apply to particular factual or legal circumstances. In any event, the Materials do not constitute legal advice and should not be relied on as such. Therefore, if you want legal advice, please consult a lawyer.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;VAULT DISCLAIMS ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.&lt;/p&gt;

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