Dear Editor of Real Change News,

There is no good reason to keep Seattle's sidewalk sitting ordinance on the books.
The law is officially known as, "SMC 15.48.040 Sitting or lying down on public sidewalks in downtown and neighborhood commercial zones" It is redundant and causes me personal frustration because I am harassed for occasinally sitting down downtown.
This law is redundant because it is already illegal to obstruct pedestrian traffic in the city of Seattle. I can see no other justification for the law than that people soitting are interfering with others free movement. If a person is sitting on private property, the building owner or manager can ask them to move as security guards sometimes do
Another City of Seattle law "SMC 12A.12.015 Pedestrian interference" states,
"A person is guilty of pedestrian interference if, in a public place, he or she intentionally obstructs pedestrian or vehicular traffic."
The law also states, "Obstruct pedestrian or vehicular traffic means to walk, stand, sit, lie, or place an object in such a manner as to block passage by another person or a vehicle, or to require another person or a driver of a vehicle to take evasive action to avoid physical contact."
This is a reasonable law as long as the penalties are not too harsh, and can ussually be enforced as needed by a police officer simply asking the interfering person to move. A scenario I've seen play itself out many times without further incident.

The law causes me personal frustration because Seattle's Metropolitan Improvement District (MID) employees bother me sometimes when I am sitting in the downtown area. None of these instances involved the obstruction of pedestrian or vehicular traffic.
MID employees have ordered me to not sit at the Convention Center near the temporary library location, at the bus stop in front of Nordstroms, in front of Pacific Place and at a Second Avenue bus stop between Pike and Union.
Ussually when I am harassed by the MID I am sitting on my trumpet case for less than five minutes because I stop and realize that I need to write something down in my organizer.
The third time I was approached by an MID employee I told him to call a cop. He did, the cop said that he agreed with me that the law was unnecessary, but that instead of arguing with the MID I should call my city council representatives.
I have called all my city council representatives and the mayor to ask them to repeal the law. Nick Licata's office emailed me the two laws regarding pedestrian interference and sidewalk sitting.
Three other council member office staff members told me that if I wanted to change the law, I should start a grass roots campaign to do so.
This letter is the next step in that campaign. Please write your representatives and ask them to repeal this law.

Greg Spence Wolf

The pedestrian Interference law can be founfd at
http://clerk.ci.seattle.wa.us/~scripts/nph-brs.exe?d=CODE&s1=12A.12.015.snum.&Sect5=CODE1&Sect6=HITOFF&l=20&p=1&u=/~public/code1.htm&r=1&f=G

The sidewalk sitting law can be found at

http://clerk.ci.seattle.wa.us/~scripts/nph-brs.exe?s1=15.48.040&s2=&S3=&Sect4=AND&l=20&Sect1=IMAGE&Sect3=PLURON&Sect5=CODE1&d=CODE&p=1&u=/~public/code1.htm&r=1&Sect6=HITOFF&f=G