Dallas County commissioners voted 3 to 2 on January 13 to allow health workers to distribute free condoms in high-risk neighborhoods to prevent the spread of HIV, The Dallas Morning News reports.

Before it was outlawed in the mid-1990s, county health workers routinely went into communities to hand out condoms and needle sterilization kits. Commissioners enacted the ban because they didn’t want to encourage illegal and immoral behavior.

In 2006 and 2007, Dallas County had the highest HIV rate in Texas.

“What we want to address is prevention,” said Judge Jim Foster, who voted to approve condom distribution along with commissioners John Wiley Price and Maurine Dickey. “An obstacle to doing that has been removed.”

According to the article, the state-funded distribution policy will go into effect immediately.