Manholes in Berkeley will now be called 'maintenance holes'
At a Tuesday night city council meeting, Berkeley became the first city in America to ban the use of natural gas piping in new construction. But that was not the only utility-related issue they saw fit to attend to. No, there was another matter on deck: Eliminating the gendered connotations of words like "manhole" in the city municipal code.
No longer will the streets of fair Berkeley be dotted with manholes, nary a womanhole or nonbinaryhole in sight. With Tuesday night's vote, they have all been transmuted into "maintenance holes," that highest, hardest glass manhole-cover finally shattered.
The item, originally on the council agenda for March 12, was sponsored by councilmembers Rigel Robinson, Cheryl Davila, Ben Bartlett and Lori Droste, reports Berkeleyside. The ordinance eliminates all gendered pronouns from the city code, replacing "she" and "he" with "they."
https://www.sfgate.com/travel/resources/transit/article/berkeley-liberal-manhole-maintenance-hole-pc-14102702.php
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