Speaker 2: Agenda Item three. Taxable 119808 release of the city's Criminal Code, removing the crime of prostitution, loitering.
Speaker 0: And.
Speaker 2: Associated recklessness and felonies. The code and many sections 8.. 70 and 12 point 10.100. A repealing section 10.3 would send a pat on the back.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. I will move to pass. Council Bill 119808. Is there a second second? It's been been seconded to pass the bill. Councilmember Peterson, I understand you're going to take the first go at speaking about this bill. And then I understand Councilmember Morales would like to make some remarks. I'm after you also as a co-sponsor of of the bill. So, Councilmember Peterson, you are recognized to in order to address this item, please.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Council President So first, I want to thank everybody who took the time to email us, to email our offices and to call us and to call in today for public comment to support Council Bill 119808 to repeal the Prostitution Loitering Law. The brutal killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police, which followed countless other wrong acts and centuries of racism, have refocused our nation's attention on the need to prevent disproportionate impacts of our law enforcement system on black, indigenous and other people of color, and repealing problematic laws on our books such as these loitering laws. That's a small but important step that the city council can take. Council Bill 119808, if adopted today, will repeal Seattle's Prostitution Loitering Law, which is currently Section 12.1 0.010 of our Seattle Municipal Code. I believe it's vital that we support the recommendation of the Seattle Reentry Work Group to repeal this law, to eliminate another potential source of disproportionate harm or jeopardy to communities of color from our policing and carceral system. Thank you to councilmembers Lewis and Morales for co-sponsoring this, and thank you to the city attorney and also Councilmember Herbold for her work on this issue. I want to thank Kara and my staff and also our show on our city council, central staff for their work and engagement on this legislation. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Peterson, for those remarks. Counselor Morales, please.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Council President Gonzalez. I do want to thank Councilmember Lewis for bringing forth this legislation. We know that loitering laws have a deep and harmful racist history. So these bills do offer an important first step, as many of our callers mentioned today. We do have a lot more work to do to protect our neighbors who are sex workers. And I just want to say, as many of our public I'm interested as well. I look forward to working with Cherie Lascelles with the Green Light Project and the Decriminalize Seattle Coalition to understand the best way to move forward with decriminalizing sex work so that they feel safe calling the police so they can access health care and banking. We know that we also this is a complex issue, so we need to make sure we're protecting sex workers by not conflating consensual sex work with those who are being trafficked. And we need to enforce and prosecute traffickers so that we can end that exploitation that's happening. This is just the beginning. And we've been in communication with with Cheri for a while and look forward to continuing a conversation to make sure that we continue this work and the steps that Jackie Brown outlined when she called in as well. So thank you to Councilmember Lewis and for your co-sponsorship as well, Councilmember Peterson. And we will continue to move this work forward.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much, Councilman Morales, because remember, Lewis, would you like to make some remarks about this bill as well? Yes. Thank you, Madam President.
Speaker 3: Just very briefly, I think Councilmember Peterson accounts for an excellent job of summarizing the critical nature of this repeal. And the only thing that I would say just sort of looking beyond this repeal to kind of the future of the task that's in front of us, I had the great privilege of being able to see a very moving presentation by the folks who do organizing at the for a Commons at the 36 District Democrats earlier this year, when there were still in-person meetings of that organization where a number of people with lived experience having been sex workers are working with sex workers in the Aurora corridor presented about the challenges that community is facing and really that the the lack of comprehensive city services to help folks get the resources they need through the programing of a were a commons to finally get out of the cycle that they're in. You know, these repeals are a really good start, but it does underscore the need for investment and standing up of tiny house villages, of permanent supportive housing, of wraparound services, of a lot of the ancillary resources that are critical for folks who are trying to break the cycle of being in cycles of trafficking, substance addiction and sex work in the city. And I look forward to working with everybody here to try to make those commitments. I think it's certainly part of our conversation around defunding and rightsizing of services in our conversation about the police department. And I look forward to continuing to work with all of the organizations that we've talked about here today and the great impact the work of our commons is doing in this area. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Lewis, for those words and for that work. Are there any additional comments on the bill? Councilman Mosqueda and then Councilmember Strauss. Thank you. Council President And thanks again to the co-sponsors of this legislation.
Speaker 1: I would be.
Speaker 0: Remiss if I didn't also take a quick moment to recognize and thanks to Ray Lascelles for their longstanding work with the people of Color Sex Worker Outreach Project and the Green Light Project. I was really honored that my office, led by Aretha Basu.
Speaker 1: Worked with.
Speaker 0: The folks.
Speaker 1: There to include Park Slope in last.
Speaker 0: Last year's budget cycle to get funding for the critical.
Speaker 1: Harm reduction work that they do. And really.
Speaker 0: Really proud of this council. Excited to take this vote again today. Thank you, Councilmember Mosqueda. Okay. We're going to hand over now to Councilmember Strauss, please.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Council president. Thank you to the bill's sponsors. This is a good piece of legislation. As Councilmember Lewis stated earlier, this is not outdated because there was never a date that this was necessarily appropriate. It reminds me of using traffic stops to find to investigate other crimes that are not related to that traffic stop. So I just want to briefly say thank you to the councilmembers for bringing this forward, the sponsors and community for making this happen. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Strauss. Any other comments on the bill? He's seeing and hearing none. I would ask that the clerk please call the role on the passage of the bill.
Speaker 1: Want. Strauss.
Speaker 3: Hi.
Speaker 1: Purple. Hi. Suarez, i. Luis, i. Morales, i. Let's get. I. Petersen.
Speaker 3: I.
Speaker 1: President Gonzalez i. Nine in favor and unopposed.
Speaker 0: The bill passes and the chair will sign it. And I'd ask that the clerk please affix my signature to the legislation on my behalf. Okay, folks, we have reached other business on our agenda. Is there any other further business to come before the council? Councilmember Was that a place? Thank you. Council President. Just a quick update.
Speaker 1: On council.
Speaker 0: Briefing this morning. I described the process for.
Speaker 1: Wednesday's budget committee meeting. I noted that.
Speaker 0: There's two sessions as we have per usual.
Speaker 1: Wednesdays at 10 a.m. and a.
Speaker 0: 2 p.m.. Unfortunately, the technology is not going to work. For one, you are able to sign up.
Speaker 1: So we will still have an 8 a.m..
Speaker 0: Sign of opportunity and a noon sign up opportunity. For both of those hearings.
Speaker 1: We will be asking.
Speaker 0: Folks to just speak at one or the other. So instead of having folks sign up just at the 8 a.m. time frame, you do have a chance as well to sign up at.
Speaker 1: Noon, beginning at noon.
Speaker 0: For our 2 p.m. hearing. And we encourage as many people as possible.
Speaker 1: To get into the window again, one.
Speaker 0: Minute timeslots, because there's going to be a lot of people signed up. But I did want to correct the record.
Speaker 1: A 10.
Speaker 0: A.m. sign up starts at 8 a.m..
Speaker 1: And a 2 p.m..
Speaker 0: Public testimony starts at noon. Thank you, Councilmember Muscat, for that clarification. And just to remind folks, the ordinary rules around public comment do apply to those pre-registration sheets. I think that the interest of Budget Chair Mosqueda is to make sure that there aren't two bites of the apple, as they say, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, largely because we want to hear from as many different people as we can. So we will be following duplicate protocol here. And if in if folks have signed up both in 8:00 AM at the 8:00 hour and at the 10:00 hour, please be aware that you will only be allowed to provide public testimony once on Wednesday and not twice. And so our legislative I.T. department will work with the chair to make sure that those duplicates are called out appropriately. Have I stated that intent correctly? Sure. State. That's correct. Thank you so much. Absolutely. I just want to make sure that it's crystal clear for those folks who are looking to sign up and pre-register for public comment on Wednesday. Thank you. Is there any other further business to come before the council? He hearing? None. Colleagues, this concludes the items of business on today's agenda. Our next city council meeting is Monday, June 29th, 2020 at 2 p.m.. There will be another remote meeting. That is it for today. We are adjourned and I hope that you all have a wonderful afternoon. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
AN ORDINANCE relating to the City’s criminal code; removing the crime of prostitution loitering and associated references in the Seattle Municipal Code; amending Sections 12A.10.070 and 12A.10.100 and repealing Section 12A.10.010 of the Seattle Municipal Code.