AN ORDINANCE relating to the City’s criminal code; removing the crime of drug traffic loitering and associated references in the Seattle Municipal Code; amending Section 10.09.010 of the Seattle Municipal Code and repealing Section 12A.20.050 of the Seattle Municipal Code.
Agenda Item two Capital 119807 related to the city's criminal code, removing the crime of drug traffic, loitering and associated references some elements of the code amending section 10.0 9.0 a kind of settlement for code repealing section 12 a point 20.0 50 of the Kalamazoo Code. Thank you so much, ben. I will move to pass. Council Bill 119807. Is there a second? Back in. Thank you so much. It has been moved and seconded to pass the bill. Council Member Lewis You are the prime sponsor of the bill, so you are recognized in order to address this item. Thank you, Madam President. I'm going to speak. My remarks will be broad enough to cover both ordinances. So that's including 119808. I can't remember. Council Member Lewis Would you like for both bills to be read into the record and then we can vote on them separately so that folks can comment on both bills as a package? Well, I'm going to leave the bulk of the comments on 119808 to Councilmember Peterson, who is a co-sponsor on that measure and has some remarks that he wants to give. So I actually I'm not I guess I would rather just go ahead procedurally and do them separately on the pre-arranged. But my comments will be broad enough to speak to both of them. And I'll let Councilmember Peterson speak more in depth on 119808. So, you know, in repealing these ordinances, this is something that's been on my to do list since taking office in January. As a former prosecutor in the city attorney's office, I believe in our social contract of being a community that is guided by a system of law. But I've always felt that these particular statutes criminalize conduct that is so innocuous and speculative that it makes a mockery of that entire system of justice. And keeping them on the books just continues to perpetuate that mockery. I know I can cite as a basis for moving these laws that the city attorney, Pete Harms as a standing policy to not charge these or these particular crimes. Or I could cite our own reentry report, which radically a couple of years ago in 2018 were recommended the repeal of these manifestly unjust ordinances. But in truth, you know, I think the real reason for repeal goes back even further and it goes back deeper. And it speaks to the fact that many people in our community, particularly communities of color, have been urging repeal of these ordinances for years. And indeed, it is not accurate for us to call these ordinances outdated. As I mentioned in briefing this morning, I firmly believe that I think to do so implies that these ordinances had their purpose and had their day and new realities had made them irrelevant. And, you know, fax machines are outdated. Like these laws were never appropriate. They were wrong when they were enacted. And they are wrong now. And I want to thank the many community organizations, many of whom who spoke up today, who have been organizing on both these ordinances and have long been educating the public on the need for these repeals. You know, we heard from Decriminalize Seattle, a coalition sex worker outreach project, Green Light project, and many more. And this is an important step. These repeals and I'm proud of prime sponsor both of these repeals. And I look forward to helping to to right these historic wrongs and and be an ally of the work the community has done on these. And I want to thank Kamala Brown in my office, who helped with these together and assured central staff for their hard work on getting this legislation, this timely legislation together and cuing it up now. And I urge passage of both of these bills. And now when we get to 11 9808, I know Councilman Peterson has remarks speaking to 1198 that I went through, which for him to speak for me on. Thank you so much. Councilmember Lewis, are there any other comments on the bill? Councilmember Herbal, please. Thank you. I just want to quote from a section in the October 2018 reentry report that is I found particularly moving in, producing and delivering the report. Many individuals and organizations provided support and expertize. And the report authors provide an acknowledgment that, again, I'd like to share. The acknowledgment is we also recognize those who have been supporting folks returning from incarceration and organizing for institutional change for a very long time. We know that much of that work has been done without compensation or acknowledgment that done with love and an unyielding commitment to family and community strength. We thank you for that work and hope these recommendations support you. We also acknowledge that the individuals most impacted by the recommendations in this report are unable to join us at the cities tables as they are still incarcerated. We did this work in Your Honor. And before I close my comments, I also want to just highlight that another one of the reentry report's recommendations was the expansion of the current pre file diversion program. And in the last few weeks we received a set of recommendations from from the city attorney's office as it relates specifically to the Council's prior interest. We, during the budget process, passed a statement of legislative intent asking for these recommendations from the city attorney. And they're looking at a model of of a of a program that will serve 25 and older and would base the program model on the successes of the young adult program through that is we all know is she's one she's 180. They identify the need for funding for racial equity tool kit in designing the expansion model and. Let us know that the the cost to complete the racial equity toolkit would be about $25,000 of one time money. So I just want to I want to mention this take this opportunity. So my colleagues on the Council know of my interest in implementing the recommendations of the city attorney to to begin the, the RET process, the racial equity toolkit process to develop an adult program and look forward to hopefully talking about the resources that the city attorney needs to do this right in our June rebalancing package. Thank you. Okay, colleagues, thank you so much. Any other comments on on this first bill? Customer service data, please. Council president. I want to. Thank the. Co-Sponsors of this legislation, and I know that Councilmember Lewis and customer Peterson are speaking. I want to thank Councilmember Morales as well. I believe that you're a co-sponsor of the legislation in front of us, too. And thank you all for bringing this forward and really lifting. Up. The voices that we've heard from today's public comment and so many of the folks that we had worked with this last last year's budget to provide additional dollars to sex workers as folks are trying to both have self-determination and respond to upcoming issues that they see on a daily basis and knowing that they're in the driver's seat to make those decisions. So we're really excited about the work that you've done and to give a huge thank you to the reentry work group who produced these policy recommendations. This is a really great step forward in undoing the racist policies that go all the way back to the war on drugs. And I'm excited that we as a council are taking these steps, especially during this this movement that is demanding action. The Black Lives Matter movement demanding accountability and action. And I look forward to voting enthusiastically. Yes. On this. Thank you so much. Councilman Mosqueda, any other comments on this first bill? Looks like there are no additional comments on this particular bill. So I will go ahead and ask the clerk to please call the roll on the passage of the bill. The want. I. Strauss i. Purple. Herbold, I. Juarez. Hi. Lewis. Hi, Morales. All right, let's get a. I. Petersen I President Gonzalez I nine in favor and unopposed. The bill passes and the chair will sign it. I had ask that the clerk please to fix my signature to the legislation on my behalf. Okay, folks, moving along. I would ask that the clerk please read agenda item three into the record. Agenda Item three. Taxable 119808 release of the city's Criminal Code, removing the crime of prostitution, loitering.