Category: Speech

Elections, Mayor Harrell, Speech

Mayoral Candidate Wilson Withdraws from KOMO-Sponsored Debate, Citing Sinclair’s Censorship of Jimmy Kimmel

By Erica C. Barnett

Update: On Friday, Sinclair announced it would air Kimmel’s show.

“I’m pleased that Sinclair Broadcast Group has made the right decision, and I’m proud to have played a small part in standing up against federal government overreach and censorship,” Wilson said in a statement. “I’m also very excited to join the October 8 debate at Seattle University, which will be broadcast on KOMO TV.”

Seattle mayoral candidate Katie Wilson announced Thursday that she won’t participate in a debate co-sponsored by KOMO TV at Seattle University on October 8 unless KOMO, a Sinclair affiliate, lifts its boycott on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, which is now airing in most US markets after ABC suspended the show under pressure from the Trump Administration last week.

“I’m proud to be in a position today to play a small role in resisting the creep of authoritarianism in our country, and I hope that Sinclair Broadcast Group  will decide to stand up and do their part too,” Wilson said.

ABC yanked Kimmel’s show in response to right-wing outrage after the late-night host joked about Trump’s callous response to a reporter who asked how he was holding up after the murder of right-wing provocateur Charlie Kirk.

Earlier this week, Kimmel reappeared with a 28-minute monologue focusing on free speech. Viewers in markets whose ABC affiliates are owned by the right-wing broadcaster Sinclair, including Seattle, couldn’t watch the show on TV, because Sinclair is refusing to air the show again “until formal discussions are held with ABC regarding the network’s commitment to professionalism and accountability,” according to a company press release. (Sinclair did not immediately respond to PubliCola’s questions on Thursday).

“I want to participate in that debate, and I hope that Sinclair makes the right decision,” Wilson said. “And I hope that [it will go on] regardless, if KOMO is not able to participate.”

Chris Daniels, a longtime local TV journalist who’s now a senior reporter for KOMO, is scheduled to moderate the debate. He did not immediately respond to questions. We’ve reached out to Seattle University, the lead sponsor of the planned event, to find out if they will seek a different media sponsor and moderator if Sinclair doesn’t decide to air Kimmel again between now and October 8.

In a statement, Mayor Bruce Harrell called Wilson’s decision “hypocritical” given that she criticized his administration for allowing a fundamentalist Christian group to hold a rally at Cal Anderson Park in the heart of Capitol Hill, Seattle’s historic LGBTQ+ neighborhood.

“Standing up for the First Amendment cannot be situational or opportunistic, as it is for Katie Wilson,” Harrell said. “My opponent happily provided an interview to KOMO this week prior to Kimmel returning to the air. Hypocritically, in May, she advocated for denying free speech permits protected under the First Amendment.

On Thursday, Wilson brought up  her KOMO interview, saying that it “didn’t sit right with me” and contributed to her decision not to play ball with KOMO until Sinclair stops censoring Kimmel.

Wilson didn’t support denying a permit to the anti-trans group. In the Bluesky thread that was the source Danny Westneat selectively quoted in the column linked in Harrell’s statement, Wilson said the city should have turned down the heat by granting the permit in a “less contentious spot.” Instead, police pepper-sprayed, tackled, and arrested dozens of people who showed up to protest the extremist event.

Harrell said he was ” exploring effective options in partnership with Seattle’s Federal leaders—who have endorsed my campaign—to restore programming not only in our city, but throughout the nation.”

Business, Speech, zoning

Old-Fashioned Furor Erupts Over Plans for Adult Cabaret License in Ballard
A local property owner says this “park” is too close to a Ballard bar whose owner is seeking an adult-entertainment license.

By Erica C. Barnett

Nextdoor—the social media site for lost cats, stationary bike sales, and NIMBY panic—was buzzing last week with the news that Roam, a bar on the largely industrial south end of Ballard Ave. NW, recently applied for an adult cabaret license.

Laurie Lohrer, who owns a nearby building where a Filson store has operated since 2016, warned neighbors that a new business “has applied to City for ‘Adult Entertainment’ permit to operate a strip club. … We don’t want another Aurora Avenue North scene on Ballard Avenue. It’s our responsibility to protect our community and its family-friendly & safe atmosphere from this incompatible use.”

But the owner of Roam Bar, Nicole Healy, says she isn’t opening a strip club; her plan is to turn the upstairs event space at the bar into an actual cabaret that will include “all kinds of entertainment like comedy, drag shows, and more,” including adult entertainment like burlesque. “I’ve always loved the arts, and while I’m not particularly creative myself, I have so many talented friends who inspire me,” Healy said. “Creating a space they’d feel excited to perform in has been a dream of mine for years.”

Lohrer did not respond to a request for an interview. In her December 8 Nextdoor post, she urged Ballard residents to “TAKE ACTION TODAY!” by writing Councilmember Dan Strauss, who represents Ballard, opposing the permit, and signing a petition she created on Change.org to “Stop Strip Club permit on Ballard Avenue.”

Strauss did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the cabaret kerfuffle.

Lohrer’s change.org petition, which had been removed as of Friday morning, claimed Roam’s license application is illegal, citing a 2007 ordinance that prohibits “adult cabarets” within 800 feet of schools, community centers, child care centers, and parks. The bar isn’t near any of those things, but the petition argues that a nearby street end—a strip of scrubby bushes at the far end of an industrial parking lot—constitutes the kind of “open space” the city council intended to protect when they wrote the ordinance.

The street end, Lohrer argued, “has been improved with enhanced shoreline habitat and bench for public viewing and enjoyment. It is a public park and provides a public open space use.” This is incorrect, according to the city’s Seattle Department of Construction and Inspections. Bench or no bench, “the area remains a city right-of-way use with no formal designation as a park or open space,” SDCI spokesman Bryan Stevens said.

“The submitted plans have demonstrated compliance with these standards as a part of our zoning review process,” Stevens added. “We are waiting for the applicant to address other fire-safety corrections before the permit is approved and issued.”

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In her petition, Lohrer argued that Roam Bar’s plans will “reduce foot traffic of shoppers, diners and to events. It would devalue Ballard Avenue as a safe and attractive place for local & greater Puget Sound residents and other visitors to spend the day or evening.”

“It’s well known that ‘adult entertainment’  businesses often become hubs for ongoing prostitution, disruptive conduct, and criminal activity,” the petition continued. “Few of us want to bring our children, family & friends for an afternoon of shopping, a meal out, or to Sunday Farmers Market—in the vicinity of a strip club.”

There’s no evidence that a bar holding events for adults at night will reduce property values, lead to street sex work, or make the area less “family friendly” during daytime hours.

Before it was removed, Lohrer’s petition had garnered only about 190 signatures.

Healy noted that Roam is “proudly woman-owned” business, and said her “goal is to create a space that is fun, safe, and empowering for performers.”

“If exotic dancing does become part of the mix,” Healy said “there will never be full nudity. For me, traditional burlesque and similar styles of provocative dance are about creativity, artistry, and comfort—not necessarily nudity. I’d want performers to feel completely free to choose their costumes and whether topless dancing is part of their act, without any conditions set by me as the owner.”

Roam opened in October as a neighborhood bar, and features large portraits of entertainers like Lady Gaga and Josephine Baker, created by Healy’s wife.

Seattle has had a long, weird history with strip clubs and other kinds of adult entertainment. In 1988, the city passed a “temporary” moratorium on new strip clubs, then extended the moratorium annually for 17 years. Back in 2003, when Seattle had just four remaining strip clubs (including two that have since closed) Josh and I reported that the only study the city ever bothered doing on their impact on surrounding neighborhoods showed no correlation between strip clubs and public safety problems.

In 2005, federal judge James Robart (better known these days for overseeing the SPD consent decree) declared the then 17-year-old “moratorium” unconstitutional, and the city proposed new guidelines for adult entertainment, including a  “four-foot rule” that required a four-foot buffer zone between dancers and patrons. The four-foot rule was eventually overturned (along with a law requiring strip clubs to be lit up like operating rooms), and the state legislature finally passed a “Strippers Bill of Rights” allowing alcohol sales at adult entertainment venues this year. If Roam gets its license, it will be one of the first bars with a cabaret license in the state (Dream Girls, in SoDo, became the state’s first strip club serving alcohol earlier this year.)

The 800-foot buffer between strip clubs and places where “children congrate” was established in 2007 and has never been contested. According to a report on the legislation, which dubiously refers to “some” unspecified “evidence” that strip clubs caused crime, a key reason for keeping strip clubs away from places where children congregate is that because alcohol was banned inside clubs at the time, “it is believed that consumption of alcohol and drugs may occur in club parking lots, on adjacent public streets, or in the surrounding neighborhood. These activities are particularly problematic and incompatible with locations where children congregate.”

Now that the city can no longer use the excuse that people hang around strip clubs and drink (not that they presented any evidence for this claim in the first place), maybe it’s time to revisit not just the buffer zones, but the prudish insistence that strip clubs and cabarets—enclosed adults-only places where children are not allowed—somehow harm “the children” just by existing.

City Council, Opinion, Speech

Let the People Clap! (And Speak!)
City Council chambers shortly before Council President Sara Nelson shut down a meeting because people shouted at the council to let them testify.

By Erica C. Barnett

Over the past few days, city council members have objected repeatedly to public commenters expressing their support for one another by clapping—an innocuous, brief burst of joyful noise that council members argue is a disruption that slows council meetings down and prevents everyone from being heard.

Ironically, they’ve also terminated public comment before everyone signed up has had a chance to speak, leading audience members to shout and jeer, then compounded this own goal by locking down council chambers and retreating to their offices, where they can vote on divisive issues without having to hear people boo.

City council members have certainly expressed exasperation in the past about vocal crowds; former council president Debora Juarez was well known for chiding clappers and deriding people whose comments sounded too similar for her taste. (Juarez often made a point of dismissing people who used advocacy groups’ templates to express their disapproval by referring to their feedback as “form letters.”)

But the contempt the current council has shown for members of the public who oppose their policy proposals has gone further, and is now a feature of nearly every council meeting.

Last week, for example, Bob Kettle instructed commenters at a sparsely attended public safety committee meeting to snap their fingers instead of clapping, which he suggested would be disruptive. On Wednesday, Dan Strauss told advocates for student mental health spending, many of them current or recent high school students, to use silent “jazz hands” to express approval, and admonished them repeatedly for clapping instead.

And of course, on Tuesday, Council President Sara Nelson repeatedly warned people who showed up to testify against a long list of council proposals to stop being “disruptive” by clapping and cheering supportively. Then she cut off public comment, prompting many in the crowd to yell at her to let them speak. Instead of defusing the situation by extending public comment, Nelson pulled the council off the dais for a recess, then another, before shutting down council chambers and reconvening the meeting remotely.

This lockdown marked the second time in Nelson’s seven-month tenure as council president that she kicked the public out of council chambers. The first time followed a nearly identical template: Nelson cut off public comment, called two recesses, and ordered the public out, leading to an angry standoff in which Councilmember Cathy Moore demanded that police “arrest those individuals” who were shouting from outside the locked council chambers.

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This is going to keep happening as long as the council does not think of people who disagree with their policy decisions as constituents they have to listen to. Right now, a lot of people happen to be extremely pissed off at a vast array of policies the council is attempting to fast-track with minimal public process—a new law criminalizing sex work, jailing people for low-level misdemeanors, and the creation of special no-go zones for drug users and sex workers, to name a few. It isn’t a conspiracy when advocates on these issues show up in council chambers to sound the alarm—it’s a sign that people without access to the council are using the one avenue they have to make them listen.

If the council doesn’t want to hear from people whose views, or mode of expression, they find disagreeable (cue Kettle saying “this fucking drives me nuts” after people chanted “when we fight, we win” two times earlier this week), that’s on them: The job of being a council member is inseparable from the duty to listen to the public, including during official public comment periods, even when the public’s message is basically, “you suck.”

City Council members, especially those whose previous jobs didn’t involve interacting with the public, have responded to public criticism since time immemorial by decrying the “current lack of civility,” or by suggesting that public commenters have been duped by media misinformation or4 just don’t understand how the city works. (Here’s a brief history of “civility” as a political concept, for those seeking extra credit.)

Yesterday, for example, after a large group of young people testified in favor of a budget proposal to release funding for student mental health care, Kettle said they had mistakenly brought their concerns to the wrong place, and that the adults that brought them to City Hall should have taken them, instead, to Olympia. Maritza Rivera accused Morales of making false promises to “the students who were here, who were expecting that if we pass this money, that somehow they’re going to get it immediately.”

The council’s condescension to young people (who, incidentally, were the instigators of the proposal to spend money on mental health care, which Kettle repeatedly claimed “came out of nowhere”) is the flip side of their enraged response to frustrated public commenters on Tuesday. Kids who disagree with the council are confused; adults who disagree with the council are dangerous. My advice for the council is to try something that might feel radical: Just let people speak.

erica@publicola.com