Committee to End Pay Toilets in America
Organization (founded 1970)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Committee to End Pay Toilets in America, or CEPTIA, was a 1970s grass-roots political organization which was one of the main forces behind the elimination of pay toilets in many American cities and states.
| |
| Founded | 1970 |
|---|---|
| Dissolved | 1976 |
| Headquarters | Dayton, Ohio |
History
When a man's or woman's natural body functions are restricted because he or she doesn't have a piece of change, there is no true freedom.
Founded in 1970 by nineteen-year-old Ira Gessel, the Committee's purpose was to "eliminate pay toilets in the U.S. through legislation and public pressure."[1][2][3]
Starting a national crusade to cast away coin-operated commodes, Gessel told newsmen, "You can have a fifty-dollar bill, but if you don't have a dime, that metal box is between you and relief."[4] Membership in the organization cost only $0.25, and members received the Committee's newsletter, the Free Toilet Paper. Headquartered in Dayton, Ohio, U.S., the group had as many as 1,500 members, in seven chapters.[1]
The group also sponsored the Thomas Crapper Memorial Award, which was given to "the person who has made an outstanding contribution to the cause of CEPTIA and free toilets."[1]
In 1973, Chicago became the first American city to act when the city council voted 37–8 in support of a ban on pay toilets in that city. According to at least one source, this was "a direct response, evidently," to CEPTIA.[4][5][6]
The group disbanded in 1976, with Gessel saying that CEPTIA "essentially achieved our victory".[7]
Achievements
According to The Wall Street Journal, there were, in 1974, at least 50,000 pay toilets in America, mostly made by the Nik-O-Lok Company. Despite this flourishing commerce, CEPTIA was successful over the next few years in obtaining bans in New York, New Jersey, Minnesota, California, Florida, and Ohio.[8] Lobbying was so successful that by June 1976, twelve states had enacted bans and the group announced that it was disbanding, declaring its mission mostly achieved.[9]
Criticism
While CEPTIA's campaign was successful in largely eliminating pay toilets in the United States, critics charge that the result was not a flourishing of free public toilets, but rather fewer public toilets of any sort than in other countries that did not see a movement against pay toilets.[10][11] In a piece for Bloomberg CityLab, Sophie House called for a reconsideration of the pay toilet bans in the hope of making public toilets more widely available, like most places without pay toilet bans.[12]