Columbus City Council Dads Caucus delivers baby-changing stations to local businesses

A Columbus City Council member and colleagues from the council’s Dads Caucus visited several small businesses in Columbus to deliver baby-changing stations made available under a grant program the council approved last year.

"So last year, Columbus City Council passed a grant program to make sure that local businesses had the opportunity to get baby changing stations in their businesses," a Columbus City Council member said during the visits, describing the installations as an effort to "make Columbus more family friendly."

The outreach stopped at Kitty Bubble, a cat café, where staff thanked the council delegation. "Really thanks them for this, and, we're really happy we got it. And, I'm sure it will get used a lot, so thanks again," a Kitty Bubble representative said. At the Land Grant Extension Bar, which opened in May of last year as an addition to the Land Grant Taproom, staff accepted a unit for the bar’s two restrooms. "We opened up this bar in May of last year as a addition to our regular operations over at the Land Grant Taproom," a representative of the bar said as council members brought in the station.

A New Orleans–style restaurant also received a changing station. The restaurant’s staff described menu items including "gumbo" and "craw etouffee," and said they were "super excited about the initiative." Several business owners thanked the council for supporting small, local businesses and said the stations would help their establishments signal they are family-oriented.

The councilmember who spoke framed the deliveries as follow-through on the council’s prior action rather than a new vote or ordinance. The transcript does not specify how many stations were distributed, the total grant amount, or the exact funding source beyond the reference to the council’s grant program passed "last year." No formal vote or new council action was recorded in the transcript excerpt of the visits.

The visits represent a council outreach effort aimed at increasing family-friendly amenities in private businesses; the direct beneficiaries described in the visits were parents, caregivers and customers of the participating businesses. Further details about the grant’s scope, application process, total funding and the full list of businesses that received stations were not specified in the available transcript.