Via Shutterstock

Via Shutterstock

The only clinic that provided abortions to women in Fairfax, Va. closed last month.

NOVA Women’s Healthcare, which provided more abortions than any other clinic in the state, closed in June after its attempt to relocate was hampered by the city’s zoning department. The Washington Post reports:

NOVA Women’s Healthcare was in an office building on Eaton Place, just off Route 123 near Interstate 66, since 2006. Antiabortion protesters stood outside the building daily, the clinic was sued twice in the past three years by its landlord, and it likely faced a need to upgrade or move after Virginia changed its regulations to require abortion providers to have hospital-grade facilities.

After finding a possible alternative space in March, the clinic applied for a nonresidential use permit to retrofit that space in another office building. But the permit was denied in May because officials decided parking at the building was not adequate, zoning administrator Michelle Coleman said.

NOVA chose not to seek a special exception to the parking rules from the city council, Coleman said. The Fairfax City Council then became aware of the clinic’s attempt to relocate.

That’s where last week’s council “this-is-about-zoning-not-abortion” vote comes in. Sponsored by Steven Stombres, who is also the chief of staff to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the vote put abortion clinics in a new zoning category, separate from doctor’s and dentist’s offices. The new regulation requires abortion clinics to obtain a $4,800 “special use permit” that requires council approval.

Tarina Keene, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia, said in a statement last week the ordinance “singles out women’s health centers for an onerous, expensive, and arbitrary approval process.”

As a representative from NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia pointed out to the Post, NOVA Women’s Healthcare also provided basic gynecology services, like STD tests and pap smears. It’s unclear if the clinic will open elsewhere.

Now when Fairfax City’s women do an Internet search for a safe abortion provider, they will find only an anti-abortion “help center.”