On March 15, during a Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee meeting in Maine, GOP Rep. Richard Pickett of Dixfield voted against providing incarcerated women in the state with guaranteed access to products like pads and tampons. His reasoning? It’d be too fancy.

"Quite frankly, and I don't mean this in any disrespect, the jail system and the correctional system was never meant to be a country club,” Pickett said, according to a tweet from a reporter on the scene. “They have a right to have these and they have them. If that wasn't the case, then I would be supporting the motion, but they do."

As noted by the Beacon, a 2017 policy announced federal prisons would guarantee free menstrual products to all women, transgender, and nonbinary people. But there are no similar policies for state or county jails, “which house the majority of incarcerated people,” the newspaper reports. According to the Press Herald, many Maine jails already provide free access to menstrual products, but in many cases inmates have to request them. The new bill would reportedly give them unrestricted access to these products at no cost, and does not specify how many products inmates can have at one time.

Despite the federal policy change, allocation of products in 2017 was still irregular, according to a Bureau of Prisons report from the same year, forcing people in certain institutions to pay for products anyway or use a size not meant for their body type.

According to the Beacon, Whitney Parrish, Maine Women’s Lobby director of policy and programs, said during the meeting, “Imagine you’re a person who has their period inside of a correctional facility. You’re given a limited supply of menstrual products per month, often of low quality due to cost saving, and when you run out, you’re out.” She continued, “You may have no money to go to commissary, and if you do, you may have to weigh that purchase against other necessities, like making phone calls to your children or attorney. You are forced to make the impossible decision of constructing your own menstrual products, using anything from clothing or notebook paper in place of a tampon.”

Parrish isn’t exaggerating. According to accounts published by Women’s Health in 2016, women have been forced to use everything from notebook paper to dirty shower sheets to create dangerous makeshift pads and tampons.

“Without adequate access to clean and hygienic menstrual products,” Parrish said, “you may face serious health consequences. This happens every single month, and for some with irregular cycles, more frequently. Menstrual products are not a luxury item by any means.”

Meagan Sway, ACLU of Maine policy counsel, said that the bill was crucial “so that future commissioners are not tempted to save money in their budgets or use menstrual products as tools of control by denying women access to basic necessities.”

The bill passed committee 6-4, but is not yet law.