Seattle sex workers alarmed by proposal to re-criminalize “prostitution loitering” | Aug. 28–Sept. 3, 2024

A proposal to criminalize street-based sex work has sparked widespread concern among sex workers, anti-trafficking groups and their allies, who say it could harm vulnerable community members. The draft ordinance would undo legislation the Seattle City Council unanimously passed in 2020  that, over concerns of racial disproportionality in enforcement, repealed criminal penalties against sex workers.

The new bill, introduced by Seattle City Councilmember Cathy Moore on Aug. 1, would revive criminal penalties against street-based sex work and allow judges to exclude people accused or convicted of the crimes from entering certain areas of the city. Moore, who represents parts of North Seattle, has said the bill is intended to address the presence of visible sex work along Aurora Avenue North.

A return to criminalization

Moore’s ordinance is one of several efforts by the new Seattle City Council to address public safety concerns. The law was announced on the same day conservative Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison proposed similar legislation to enact two banishment zones in downtown Seattle for people accused of public drug use and possession.

The proposed ordinance has several key components. Firstly, it would reinstate the misdemeanor offense of “prostitution loitering,” defined as intentionally soliciting payment in a public space in exchange for sex. It would also introduce as a gross misdemeanor the criminal offense of promoting prostitution loitering. This offense is defined broadly and could include giving a ride to someone suspected of engaging in street-based sex work.

The second portion of Moore’s ordinance would enact a “Stay Out of Area of Prostitution” (SOAP) zone covering Aurora Avenue North between North 85th and 145th streets, extending a few blocks to the east and west of the road. Under the proposed law, a Seattle Municipal Court (SMC) judge could exclude a person who has been charged or convicted with the new prostitution loitering-related offenses from entering the SOAP zone by court order. A person does not need to be convicted to receive a SOAP order. They may also receive a SOAP order as a condition of release on bail but be tried at a later date.

The bill also hands down guidance to police officers for the purpose of minimizing harm to sex workers and survivors of sex trafficking, including offering opportunities for diversion from the criminal legal system. However, such diversion programs currently do not exist, and the legislation includes no funding to set any up. In an Aug. 16 newsletter post, Moore wrote that, after receiving feedback from constituents, she would introduce an amendment to exclude sex workers from receiving SOAP banishment orders. Under the tenure of former Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes, the city phased out most requests for SOAP orders.

In an email, Seattle City Council spokesperson Jesse Franz wrote that the text of Moore’s amendment has not yet been made available. Moore declined a request to comment on her legislation.

Targeting sex workers

Amber Bergstrom, a volunteer with the peer-led mutual aid group Green Light Project (GLP), said many street-based sex workers fear the new law could result in expanded police harassment. GLP, which is made up of current and former sex workers, has carried out twice-weekly outreach on Aurora Avenue North since 2019, distributing food, safe sex supplies and other resources to sex workers.

“We’ve heard from a lot of the people that we talk to that work on Aurora, and they’re really afraid of what (the law) could mean for them,” Bergstrom said. “And they are specifically concerned about the fact that if they get arrested and they go to jail, that can impact them further when they get out of jail, especially if they have children or they have apartments — how does that affect them in the long term?”

Several factors have made street-based sex work more visible in Seattle in recent years. In 2018, Congress passed FOSTA-SESTA, a law that banned websites like Backpage, which allowed people to post classified advertisements. This resulted in many sex workers losing their primary method to obtain and screen clients, with a lot ending up working on the street. Bergstrom said many of the people who were laid off during the COVID-19 pandemic turned to sex work as a way to make up the lost income.

Bergstrom added that the city council’s 2020 repeal of the prostitution loitering ordinance improved the working conditions of sex workers. Without the fear of potential arrest, sex workers can now work in groups and keep an eye on each other to ensure their mutual safety.

“When we first started doing outreach, people were a lot more isolated, because they had to continually keep walking and moving to avoid arrest,” Bergstrom said. “And so they couldn’t stand on one corner in a group and work together, because that would attract the attention of the police.”

Bergstrom is also worried the outreach and support work GLP does could be criminalized under the guise of promoting prostitution loitering.

“I am actually concerned for the safety of our volunteers and outreach drivers, because we are frequently asked to give participants rides for a wide variety of reasons,” Bergstrom said. “Someone needs a ride to her home or hotel room to safety because of some incident that happened, or she needs a ride to the hospital because she was assaulted or something happened to her. … Under this legislation, we could be at risk of being arrested as sex traffickers, even though we’re literally just trying to help the folks that ask us for help.”

During an Aug. 13 meeting of the Seattle City Council’s Public Safety Committee, Moore explained her bill was meant to disrupt the sex trade on Aurora Avenue North as a whole, which she saw as responsible for gun violence and other safety issues in the area. While sex workers would be criminalized under the ordinance, Moore said the intention is to go after “pimps,” people who manage sex workers, and “johns,” the clients of sex workers.

“We have an ecosystem of a criminal enterprise around commercial sexual exploitation,” Moore said at the meeting. “We have to get a handle on the ecosystem for the public safety of everyone. For the women and the girls and the boys and the men who themselves are being trafficked. We need to get a handle on the public safety for the residents who live in those neighborhoods, for the businesses who are trying to survive in those neighborhoods.”

In an Aug. 1 press release announcing the ordinance, Moore’s office wrote that between mid-May and mid-July, 31 shootings occurred along Aurora Avenue North. Moore argued sex workers were being exploited by organized crime groups who engage in turf battles along the arterial.

Emi Koyama, the coordinator of Coalition for Rights and Safety for People in the Sex Trade, said sex workers were not the cause of gun violence nor the perpetrators of sex trafficking. She said going after sex workers would be ineffective and could in fact harm survivors instead of helping them.

“The focus (of the ordinance) is not helping the women or stopping the exploitation; the goal is to stop gun violence,” Koyama said. “And they see women as a conduit, even though people who are in sex trade are not responsible for gun violence — it’s scapegoating people.”

Racial inequities in enforcement

Moore’s legislation has raised many concerns over racially biased policing and the disproportionate impact on people of color, which was a driving factor for the decriminalization of prostitution loitering in 2020. According to Koyama, street-based sex workers in the Seattle area are predominantly poor women, with most being Black, Brown and/or trans. Koyama added that men of color are disproportionately involved in the sex trade as well.

A policy analysis by the city seems to echo concerns over racial disproportionality. On Aug. 13, The Stranger reported that Moore, in a rare move, ordered a revision to a policy memo produced by council central staff to remove language that discussed potential racist enforcement. One stricken paragraph mentioned that, prior to 2020, most of the sex buyers prosecuted in the SMC were immigrants or people of color.

Koyama said Moore’s legislation is part of a worldview that fails to understand why people become involved in the sex trade.

“It’s a white fantasy,” Koyama said. “They cannot relate to the lives and experiences of mostly women of color who are struggling with homelessness and poverty and substance use and a kind of violence that’s different from the kind of violence they can recognize. And so then it’s convenient that the people they want to target are mostly men of color.”

Supporting survivors of sex trafficking

In addition to sex worker advocacy groups, Moore’s ordinance has also brought criticism from organizations who support survivors of sex trafficking. Audrey Baedke, co-founder of the nonprofit organization Real Escape from the Sex Trade, said criminalizing sex workers could simply drive them further underground and make it harder for survivors of trafficking to get support.

“Laws that focus on people who are being exploited (are) harming people who are already being harmed,” Baedke said.

Instead, Baedke argued, the Seattle City Council should fund more organizations that could provide housing, employment opportunities and other resources to sex workers and survivors of sex trafficking.

“Oftentimes, when someone does leave their trafficker or their pimp, they still have to provide for themselves,” she said. “And that’s where that housing becomes an issue, because if anyone’s going to afford an apartment in Seattle, they have to be making more than minimum wage.”

Bergstrom believes, instead of being demonized, street-based sex workers should be seen as first responders to cases of sex trafficking and especially of child sex trafficking.

“The adult sex workers that are doing street-based work, they really look out for anyone that they think might be underage, and they report it immediately,” she said. “They don’t want minors out there working on the street with them either.”

Creating true safety

Longtime anti-violence activist Theryn Kigvamasud’vashti said many sex workers and survivors of interpersonal and intimate partner violence have never been able to rely on the police for safety. Kigvamasud’vashti, who worked at Communities Against Rape and Abuse between 1999 and 2009 as an advocate and co-director, said that before the internet sex workers would compile safety books with lists of violent johns to avoid.

“The police would try to get their hands on the bad date list, and (the nonprofit organization New Horizons) and myself were really talking about the reasons why we needed to keep that list away from the police,” Kigvamasud’vashti said. “And that’s because some of the bad dates were the cops themselves, and we felt like the cops didn’t want to use the list to target johns. The cops wanted to use the list to target those sex workers.”

For many sex workers, the impact of Gary Leon Ridgway is still felt. Ridgway was the infamous serial killer known for dumping the bodies of his victims along the Green River, which is located just south of Seattle. Ridgway was convicted of murdering 49 women and girls in the 1980s and 1990s who were sex workers and survivors of sex trafficking. For years, law enforcement officers faced public backlash of neglecting the killings because of the social status of the victims.

Bonnie, a sex worker and volunteer with GLP who only shared her first name, accused Moore of being insensitive to how the marginalization of sex workers exposed them to greater violence.

“When Cathy Moore speaks of the success of banishment orders of the ‘90s, that narrative is incomplete without also saying that those are the exact orders that empowered the Green River Killer in the ‘90s,” Bonnie said.

Kigvamasud’vashti shared similar sentiments, as she doesn’t believe Moore’s ordinance addresses the root causes of why people turn to sex work nor would it help bring them safety.

“This law is cosmetic,” Kigvamasud’vashti said. “It doesn’t address the real systemic issues of sexual trauma and violence that exist in people’s lives. And disproportionately, the people who are targeted by laws like this are survivors of early childhood sexual assault.”

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