After night of heated debate, Allentown City Council committee forwards 4 abortion-related ordinances to next meeting

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Title: After night of heated debate, Allentown City Council committee forwards 4 abortion-related ordinances to next meeting

Originally reported on www.wfmz.com by WFMZ.com

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ALLENTOWN, Pa. – After a three-hour meeting of intense debate Wednesday night, a special committee of Allentown City Council agreed to forward four proposed abortion rights ordinances to the next full council meeting, currently scheduled for Sept. 7.

The decision was not unanimous among the three-member special committee made up of Joshua Siegel, the sponsor of the bills; Cynthia Mota, council president; and Daryl L. Hendricks.

Hendricks voted “no” on all four proposed ordinances.

If approved by City Council, the ordinances would:

• Create 15-foot buffer zones at hospitals, medical offices or clinics engaged in assisting patients and other persons entering or exiting such facilities. This would prevent abortion protests or reproductive counseling from taking place on sidewalks directly in front of abortion-providing facilities. (Bill 60)

• Make it illegal for any limited-services pregnancy centers to advertise any pregnancy-related service that is deceptive. The regulation would prevent a pregnancy center from attempting to attract women seeking an abortion to its facility under the false pretense that abortion counseling is offered as a service. (Bill 61)

• Instruct all city officials and law enforcement agencies to deprioritize the enforcement of any abortion-related crime if abortion ever becomes illegal nationwide or in Pennsylvania. (Bill 62)

• Protect any reproductive health care service providers from out-of-state investigation or prosecution for providing legal abortion care. The provision would prohibit any city official, officer or employee from providing any information or expending or using any city resources in any investigation that would seek to impose criminal charges against any abortion-service provider. (Bill 63)

This is the second time council has addressed the topic of abortion in response to the June ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court that overturned its 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade.

On July 20, council voted 5-2 to recommend that the City of Allentown cover travel expenses related to abortion access for all city employees, should the need arise because of potential future restrictions on abortion in the state.

During that meeting, a resident questioned why travel expenses could not be granted to all city residents seeking an abortion. Siegel then announced he was drafting legislation to help protect abortion in the city of Allentown.

The special committee meeting Wednesday lasted three hours to allow public comment from over 75 people attending the meeting.

Bill 60: Buffer zones

Bill 60, the buffer zone ordinance, drew much debate. Siegel said there is clear and documented evidence from the local Planned Parenthood that there is a pattern of abuse, harassment and bullying.

“This in no way precludes anyone from speaking their mind, holding signs and saying what they need to say, but it ensures that individuals seeking treatment, health care and accessing their reproductive rights do so without fear of physical intimidation, verbal altercation and bullying,” Siegel said.

“Some of my colleagues have expressed fears that this is outside the parameters of what a municipality can do,” he continued. “I ask for you to look at the evidence and realize that this is not something that is outside the balance of what a city can do. It is quite reasonable and justifiable and, in fact, the least we can do to stand up for women’s reproductive rights. This is pro-public safety, and it is pro-women.”

Anne Kiernan said she was representing the St. Joseph the Worker Defenders of Life group in Orefield.

“There have been no police reports filed against individuals who peacefully offer information to members of the public near abortion centers,” Kiernan said. “Those individuals, referred to as sidewalk counselors, are simply present to offer assistance to women who do not want to abort their babies. The sidewalk counselors help those women who make the choice to save their babies.”

“Planned Parenthood has a monetary interest in blocking women from receiving information about alternatives and other choices,” Kiernan added. “This ordinance, and others like it, clearly support Planned Parenthood at the expense of women who would have chosen life for their babies if only they had interacted with the site sidewalk counselor before entering the Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood does not offer hope to those women. It only offers death to unborn babies.”

Several other women from pro-life organizations in the Lehigh Valley gave similar testimony.

Siegel criticized the large number of women who objected to the buffer zone, calling them misinformed.

“You made your mind (voice) heard and I respect that,” he said. “I think you’re wrong. And to call this divisive is insane. It’s no more divisive than denying the flat Earth theory.”

“The reality is this is not a moral decision; it’s a health care decision,” Seigel continued. “The vast majority of people support women’s access to reproductive rights. The vast majority of people support buffer zones. The vast majority of people believe it’s health care.”

Bill 61: Limited-services advertising

The proposed ordinance on regulating advertising by pregnancy centers — Bill 61 — drew criticism from Jon Merwarth, executive director of Bright Hope Pregnancy Support Centers.

“How can you, with a good conscience, come after a pregnancy support center about deception and think it’s OK for a place that ends parenthood to call themselves Planned Parenthood?” Merwarth asked.

“Planned Parenthood has no plan for parenthood,” he said. “They do not offer early childhood development education, no birthing classes, pregnancy support, no parenthood support. There’s your deception.”

“You call us limited because we don’t provide abortions or contraception,” Merwarth continued. “Why don’t you call Planned Parenthood limited for not offering the things I just mentioned?”

City resident Margaretha Haeussler said she supports the bill.

“I have a really hard time, given the stated position of the pregnancy crisis centers, that they are truly going to give objective advice when they have a stated position that they are anti-choice,” Haeussler said.

“It’s not saying, ‘We’re shutting you down or stopping your services,'” she added. “It’s saying that we do not want you to be able to give deceptive or misleading information to women as they do research and try to make it difficult choice.”

Dr. John Roizin, of Easton, identified himself as an abortion-care provider.

“I’ve had countless patients who’ve gone to these centers and have been told after their ultrasounds that they may be further along than they really are,” Roizin said. “It was just false information that they were fed.”

“And worse than that, I’ve had cases where patients were told that we can’t see anything on the ultrasound and to come back next week and they were told to come back again and again and again,” Roizin said, “and by that time, they were further along in their pregnancy.”

Siegel added that the centers upscale and inflate the risks of abortion.

“Abortion is one of the safest procedures in the medical community,” Siegel said. “It’s no more dangerous than getting a colonoscopy, and I don’t see us banning that. The way that we present information has consequences when you say something like abortion has emotional and psychological complications.”

“If you tell the truth, you have nothing to worry about,” he said. “But I think, frankly, if you’re worried, maybe there’s a reason that you’re worried about that intensified scrutiny.”

Bills 62, 63: Abortion-related crimes, out-of-state investigations

The last two ordinances, Bill 62 and Bill 63, also brought criticism from the pro-life groups and individuals, suggesting that Allentown would be placing itself above the law.

Proponents said it would be no different than deprioritizing prosecuting marijuana possession.

The entire council could potentially vote on the ordinances at its next full meeting on Sept. 7, barring an added meeting before then. Currently, the ordinances look likely to pass, as it appears that only Hendricks and Ed Zucal will oppose them.