Dear Seattle City Council Members,
The Chinatown International District (CID) Coalition is a grassroots group of people who live, work, and have deep roots in the CID as our cultural heart home. We organize in opposition to displacement, and in service of cultural preservation and community self-determination. We write today to state our fierce opposition to Stay Out of Area of Prostitution (SOAP) and Stay Out of Drug Area (SODA) and refuse to let Council use the CID as a scapegoat to attempt to justify the further criminalization of Black, Brown, and poor people.
As community historians and storykeepers, we recognize these discriminatory bans as echoes of exclusionary policies that have shaped the history of our neighborhood. Chinatowns and other ethnic enclaves throughout the country have always been sites of refuge for the most marginalized and criminalized.
Our community has always included sex workers, drug users, houseless and poor folks. To deny and exclude these populations from Asian American and CID communities is revisionist history and turns a blind eye to the contemporary makeup of our community. This neighborhood belongs to its residents (housed and unhoused) and community members, and not just landowners and politicians.
We are in solidarity with our partner Massage Parlor Outreach Project (MPOP) and want to uplift their voices. They are correct when they say, “Politicians use the moral panic of sex work to cover up the reality of economic struggles, inflation and political discontent. It’s an easy target that makes vulnerable communities more vulnerable.”
SOAP comes in a long line of policies and practices of the State criminalizing sex work in our community. From the Page Act of 1875 to the massage parlor raids in recent years, moral claims about sex work have been used to harm our community, specifically immigrant women.
It is astonishing that in 2024, in a so-called progressive city, the Seattle City Council needs to be convinced that the restriction of people’s movements is unjust and shameful. In the CID and many other redlined areas, it’s upsetting that restrictive bans are even a consideration as it is a blatant disregard for our history of struggle and discrimination.
Not only are these exclusionary zones proven to be ineffective to curb gun and sexual violence, SOAP and SODA will make it more difficult for people to access the services they need. So often are conditions in the CID used to justify the dehumanization and punishment of our unhoused neighbors, often spearheaded by neighborhood elites.
We are disappointed with Councilmember Tanya Woo’s actions to further criminalize our community and wish to make it known that Woo does not speak for the neighborhood. We are here to provide a reminder to Council of the CID’s living legacy of inclusion and respite for the persecuted.
We, as stewards of the Chinatown International District, urge City Council to vote ‘No’ on SOAP and SODA. Our community has always, and will always, include the people you are targeting with these bills and we will always be in solidarity with the most marginalized. We are firmly against criminalization because we know healthy communities do not rely on harm to function.
— CID Coalition
