Another Long Island school district has been blocked from enforcing its transgender bathroom ban after the state stepped in to freeze the controversial policy, according to New York and local officials.
Locust Valley School District’s resolution to prohibit transgender students from using bathrooms and locker rooms that don’t align with their biological sex cannot be enforced thanks to a new order issued by state Education Commissioner Betty Rosa on Nov. 18.
The district’s bathroom ban — instituted by Locust Valley’s school board about a month earlier — is nearly identical to the also-frozen and first-in-the-state ban passed in Massapequajust weeks before.
“In accordance with the Commissioner’s directive, and absent an overriding administrative or judicial determination, the district must now follow the Commissioner’s interpretation of state law, which is that students may use a bathroom or locker room consistent with their gender Identity,” the school board said in a statement.
Rosa’s order effectively ties Locust Valley to the ongoing legal battle already unfolding in Massapequa, where the New York Civil Liberties Union challenged the district’s policy on behalf of a transgender student.
In that case, the commissioner issued an interim stay in October preventing Massapequa from enforcing its resolution “pending an ultimate determination” — now adding Locust Valley as a related party because of the “near identical nature” of the two policies, the new order said.
The districts’ newly adopted policies had required all students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that matched their sex assigned at birth.
The Locust Valley school board said in its statement that it is now “navigating a complex and evolving legal landscape shaped by federal and state mandates” and “pursuing further legal counsel” as it sorts out the fallout from the commissioner’s order.
District officials have repeatedly cited Title IX and a January executive order issued by President Trump that declared there are only two sexes, male and female — and warned that federal funds “shall not be used to promote gender ideology” — as justification for the policy.
But state officials have said that New York’s laws protect transgender students’ access to restrooms and locker rooms that align with their chosen gender identity.
After being hit with the freeze, Massapequa escalated its fight and filed a federal lawsuit against the student’s parents, the commissioner and other top state officials.
The outcome of that case could have implications for Locust Valley, according to Rosa’s order.
Both Massapequa and Locust Valley are represented by lawyer Nicholas Rigano, who did not respond to a Post request for comment.
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