KSHB 41 reporter Elyse Schoenig covers issues surrounding health care costs. If you have a story idea, share it with Elyse by sending her an e-mail.
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The cost of period products keeps going up. According to the research firm Circana, the average price of a pack of pads has risen 41% and the price of tampons by 36% since 2019.
Here in the Kansas City area, state sales taxes are a price pain point. Missouri and Kansas both enforce state sales taxes on period products. People on both sides of state line have advocated to eliminate this, but a bill has yet to be signed into law.
“We noticed that our bathroom didn't really have reliable pads or tampons, and definitely not easy access,” Notre Dame de Sion High School senior Becca Houlehan said.
Houlehan and her classmate Izzy Zschoche have stocked their school - and nearly twenty other schools, churches, and more - with free period products. They have their own nonprofit: Equity.Period.
“Tampons and pads by themselves are very pricey,” Houlehan said. “A bigger pack can be up to $20.”
People often look to their local libraries and schools to get free products. But not all public bathrooms carry them either.
The Kansas City Public Library system recently decided to start reallocating some of its funding so that all branch bathrooms are stocked with period products.
“We feel like progress should be much more ahead than where it is and there shouldn't be taxes on period products,” Zschoche said. “Because it just makes them that much more expensive.”
That's where these two are trying to make a difference. Zschoche was able to get Prairie Village to install free period products in all its park restrooms. Both of them have testified multiple times to lawmakers, too.
“$20 of pads or tampons versus a meal, whether that's fast food, whether that's groceries, whatever it is, people have to make that choice,” Houlehan said.
While the high school seniors will keep responding to the need, the goal is that one day, their efforts are no longer needed.
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