Rachel Kurzius
D.C.’s tense, first-ever council hearing about the decriminalization of sex work lasted more than 14 hours. While the more than 180 speakers represented views across the spectrum, most of them shared one thing in common: they believed their perspective was the one that best addressed the needs of vulnerable people.
For the people in favor of the measure, decriminalizing sex work would prevent some of the city’s most marginalized members—trans women of color, in particular—from entering the criminal justice system for engaging in consensual sex.
But those who testified against the measure argued that it was, in the words of one opponent, “a pimp’s wet dream,” and wondered why the bill didn’t include provisions on housing or other ways of helping folks survive in an ever more expensive city.
“This is not going to solve poverty, this is not going to be the solution to racism or gentrification in our city,” said At-large Councilmember David Grosso, who first introduced the bill in 2017 with the support of At-large Councilmember Robert White. He reintroduced it this earlier year, with the support of two more colleagues. “This is just one, small thing I can do in this city to try to stop putting people in jail simply because they are someone who is trying to make it in this world.”
The Community Safety and Health Amendment Act of 2019 would remove criminal penalties for buying and selling sex. However, it does not allow for the creation of red light districts in D.C. or regulate sex work. Under the bill, it would still be illegal to coerce someone to engage in sex work nonconsensually. Human and child trafficking would remain against the law.
But Bradley Myles, CEO of anti-trafficking nonprofit Polaris Project, disagrees with the idea that the bill is a small measure, like most survivors of trafficking and advocates against human trafficking who testified at the hearing. “Literally, I don’t have enough words in the English language to say how dangerous it would be to pass this bill,” he says. “It could have major impacts on human trafficking.”
On the other side, Tamika Spellman, an advocate at harm reduction nonprofit HIPS DC who helped to craft the legislation, says that many of the opponents of the bill “are trying to conflate this with a cure for trafficking,” and then deeming it a failure. But that’s not the intention, she says. “This is trying to stop the unnecessary mass arrests that are happening.”
Spellman, a 52-year-old trans woman, has been engaging in sex work for decades. She says she’s been subject to many police stings, and, as a result, doesn’t trust law enforcement. “I should be able to go to them when I am in dire need of assistance,” she says.
D.C. police told DCist in June that it has made people who pay for sex the focus of its enforcement efforts, though sex workers are still being targeted as well. Police arrested approximately five “Johns” for every sex worker, per data provided by the Metropolitan Police Department this summer. And from 2017 to 2018, the number of sex work-related charges more than doubled.
A new story from Washington City Paper outlines D.C. police tactics for stings using law enforcement reports of incidents, including having arrestees undress and engage in sexual acts. Spellman says it corroborates her experiences. One time, she says, she held onto a police officer’s penis during a sting because she knew that if law enforcement arrested her, they would have to arrest him as well.
At times during the hearing, people who opposed the bill drew jeers from the crowd of proponents. This prompted Judiciary and Public Safety Committee Chair Charles Allen, the Ward 6 councilmember, to consistently call for order and occasionally threaten to end the proceedings early.
Anthony Lorenzo Green, an Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner from Deanwood in favor of the legislation, says that he was excited to see a council hearing about a “topic that has been very controversial and complicated.” He says that much of the opposition testimony came from national groups, though he acknowledges that many people in his neighborhood also oppose the measure.
“I’ve had many disagreements with my own neighbors and rightfully so,” Green says. “They are concerned about sex work happening behind their homes, near their homes.” Still, he sees decriminalization as the only way forward.
While many of the opponents of the bill were opposed to the idea of codifying sex work in any fashion, Myles, the anti-trafficking advocate, has a different perspective. He says that he would be in favor of a law that legalized the sale of sex (often called the Nordic model, though he called it the “equality model”). He still wants the purchasing of sex to remain a crime, saying that prosecutors need as many tools as possible to target human traffickers.
Grosso rejects this model, because he says that anything driving sex work underground makes it more dangerous for people engaging in sex work.
So does Spellman. “The Nordic model—that is not on the table,” she says, noting that opponents “keep saying that impacted people should be the ones leading it. I think I am one of those people.”
