Free-speech group to seek review of new community-college rules

Originally published May 21, 2012 at 5:45 PM | Page modified May 22, 2012 at 12:10 PM

New rules governing free speech on Seattle Community College campuses contain far fewer restrictions than an earlier proposal, but some faculty members and students still believe the rules violate the First Amendment.

The newly formed Faculty for Free Speech will petition the state Attorney General's Office for a legal analysis and review of the rule, said faculty member Laurel Holliday, who is a member of the free-speech group. The community-college district's board of trustees passed the new rules Thursday.

At issue is a change to the administrative code that governs free speech on North, Central and South Seattle Community College campuses.

An earlier draft would have restricted the locations of protests and the size and number of signs, among other things. The rule proposal drew hundreds of faculty and students to speak out in opposition.

The rule that passed doesn't include those restrictions, but it contains a trespassing section that allows campus security to remove nonstudents who are being disruptive, limits free speech to the hours of 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., and prohibits camping.

Seattle Community College District Chancellor Jill Wakefield said the district responded to faculty and student concerns by paring down the rules and focusing on prohibiting camping. As part of that, the colleges needed to establish hours of operation, as well as due-process rules for anyone charged with trespassing, she said.

Holliday said faculty and students believe the trespassing section makes it too easy for protesters to be expelled from campus for vaguely defined reasons and that the 10 p.m. ending time for protests, especially for Seattle Central Community College's urban campus, is too early.

The central campus' student council opposed the measure, as did the American Federation of Teachers, the union that represents faculty members in the Seattle Community College District.

Seattle Central's Capitol Hill campus played host to Occupy Seattle for two months last fall. The rule change is not in reaction to Occupy Seattle, college administrators have said, but rather to an incident in which students complained that they felt harassed by supporters of political candidate Lyndon LaRouche.

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Free-speech group to seek review of new community-college rules