PeriodPalooza: Volunteers vow to distribute 1 million period products across Colorado
A slew of government officials and volunteers gathered in Denver last week to celebrate a variety of achievements related to menstrual health at PeriodPalooza.
Justice Necessary, a nonprofit working to ensure that every Coloradoan has access to basic hygiene essentials, organized the event.
Volunteers packed up one-month period kits for students in need. This year, Justice Necessary hopes to pack and distribute a total of one million period products to students in need across Colorado.
At the event, Lt. Gov. Dianne Primavera officially designated Wednesday, May 28, as Menstrual Hygiene Day in Colorado. The day has been recognized globally since 2014, when it was established by WASH United, an NGO based in Berlin.
“Access to period products should never be a barrier to education or health,” Primavera said during her speech, according to a news release.
Justice Necessary has been working to provide residents in Colorado with period products and other hygiene products for the past four years. Diane Cushman Neal started the nonprofit when she realized that federal programs like SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) and WIC (Women, Infants, and Children) do not cover the cost of hygiene products.
Last June, Justice Necessary partnered with legislators to pass HB24-1164, a house bill which will require schools to provide free menstrual hygiene products in at least 25% of restrooms by June 2025 and 50% by June 2026.
To support the rollout of the bill, Justice Necessary launched a Menstrual Access Grant which delivered more than 2.5 million organic period products and 1,371 dispensers to over 460 Colorado schools. The organization also helped with distribution and installation of the products.
All of this work is supporting Colorado’s general efforts to become a state with no hygiene poverty, according to the group. In 2022, Colorado was one of the first states to eliminate the state sales and use tax on both diapers and menstrual products.
With appropriate hygiene products, “students can go to school, people can have a job, kids can go to daycare. [Access to hygiene] keeps our society functioning, and lets people live their lives,” said Neal, the president of Justice Necessary, in a statement.
Justice Necessary is currently accepting donations to fund period products on their website: https://justicenecessary.org/