The City Attorney’s Office is preparing revisions to the city’s noise ordinance after police issued citations to striking hotel workers, raising the ire of labor advocates, clergy and civil liberties groups who said the law’s provisions violate free speech protections.
Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo said on Monday, May 20, the revisions will be brought forward to the City Council for consideration in June.
The announcement came just after 40 Pasadena hotel workers, faith and labor and local civil rights leaders gathered on the steps of Pasadena City Hall, calling on the City Council to amend the ordinance and direct police to stop enforcing its provisions. In effect, they say, those provisions, in the city’s municipal code, outlaw all protests on public sidewalks and thus muffle free speech.
“Police go over there and try to intimidate us,” said Rosa DeMauro, who has worked at Hilton Pasadena for 22 years. “They think they are the best, and they want to stop us.”
Manuel Jaimes, another striking worker, said the protesters “have been harassed by the police.”
“Most of the time, when we’re coming out of a strike, all the time, we see the police, we know they’re going to come by aggressively. We’re just expecting that they’re going to say something about it, something that we don’t expect,” said Jaimes, who has worked at Pasadena Hilton for more than 30 years.
Jeremy Blasi, general counsel for Unite Here Local 11, said the police issued six citations to five different people at two different protests: one on Dec. 12 and another on April 12. There’s one person who was cited twice, because they were present at both protests.
No arrest was made, but the police seized the striking workers’ handheld bullhorns at the protests and detained them briefly, Blasi said. The arraignment for the people cited last December and this April will take place on June 3 and June 12, respectively, he added.
Blasi said it’s nearly impossible to meet the city’s noise ordinance requirement.
“If you’re on the sidewalk, you’re invariably going to be standing next to a property line,” Blasi said. “So if you take the measurement from right next to where you’re standing, you are going to be 5DB over the ambient level.”
“If you’re even just having a loud conversation or calling out to someone, or raising your voice in any way, singing, chanting, without amplified sound, and if you add amplified sound, just a handheld bullhorn, there is zero chance you could possibly comply with the law. And that is a problem, because it’s very well established that people have a constitutional right to protest on public sidewalks.”
Those in the rally included workers from Hilton Pasadena and Hyatt Place Pasadena. The participants, clad in red tee-shirts bearing the words “hotel workers on strike,” gathered on the front steps of Pasadena City Hall to rally for around 30 minutes before entering to speak in front of the City Council.
The Council Chambers, which has the capacity for around 60 people, was standing room-only on Monday evening. Twenty comment cards were submitted, primarily from the striking workers.
Prior to the beginning of public comment session, Mayor Victor Gordo said the City Council, by law, cannot give directions regarding prosecutions. But he also disclosed the city attorney was working on revisions.
The city code makes it “unlawful for any person to create, cause, make or continue to make or permit to be made or continued any noise or sound which exceeds the ambient noise level at the property line of any property by more than 5 decibels.”
The code also outlaws drumming or use of other instruments or devices for the purpose “for the purpose of attracting attention by the creation of noise within the city.”
That provision exempts high school bands or “duly licensed” parades and others authorized to perform.
Last week the ACLU, in a letter to the City Council, city attorney and to the police chief, argued that the provisions were unconstitutional in the context of labor protests, because they “very likely violate the First Amendment” and the Liberty of Speech clause in the California Constitution.
“… This conclusion is not a close call,” wrote Peter Eliasberg, chief counsel of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California. “Both provisions clearly fail to meet the applicable standards for regulations that impinge on First Amendment-protected conduct and, in the case of the latter provision, additionally violate other well established legal principles. We urge the City to amend the Noise Ordinance to eliminate these provisions.”
Pasadena officials acknowledged that citations were issued as a “last resort.” But they also noted that enforcement of the provisions is a balancing act between the free speech rights of protesters and those of nearby residents and businesses impacted by the protests.
“The City supports the free speech rights of protesters and does not take sides in disputes, but must balance the rights of those protesting with those nearby residents and businesses impacted by protest activities,” city spokesperson Lisa Derderian said, noting that the number of citations – six – was relatively low in the context of months of protests.
“Union members are free to exercise their constitutional rights, and society has to live with some level of disruption at times to honor those rights. However, that right of expression is not unlimited, and it must be balanced against the rights of residents and businesses to have some level of quiet enjoyment of their property.”
The ACLU’s letter came after months of protests at the Hilton.
Dozens of cooks, housekeepers, dishwashers, bellmen and others continued have been walking out as the call for higher wages and better working conditions.
One action, which began at dawn on New Years Eve, was part of a massive strike involving 15,000 workers from 60 Southern California hotels that began over the July 4th weekend. Employees at the Hilton staged another walkout earlier in December.
The workers’ primary goals include wage increases to keep pace with the soaring cost of housing in Los Angeles, quality and affordable health insurance and humane workloads, according to Unite Here Local 11, which staged walkouts at hotels across Southern California and Arizona over the summer.
Unite Here Local 11 says it represents more than 32,000 hospitality workers in Southern California and Arizona who are employed in hotels, restaurants, universities, convention centers and airports.
“We’re very glad that they’re taking a look at the noise ordinance, and we look forward to a vigorous review of it, and changing it so that our right to protest is not infringed upon,” said Mike Kinman, the Tenth Rector of All Saints Church. “I wanted to let them know that it is being selectively enforced.”
Metro Editor Ryan Carter contributed to this article.
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