Worcester City Council delays vote on regulating anti-abortion clinics

WORCESTER — A City Council vote on the city's much-discussed draft ordinances regulating the advertising practices of clinics that advise against abortions, often known as crisis pregnancy centers, will have to wait for September at the earliest.

Councilor-at-Large Donna Colorio used her councilor's right to delay a vote on the draft ordinances to the next meeting. The next scheduled City Council meeting is Sept. 12.

City councilors have also been informed by the socially conservative advocacy group the Massachusetts Family Institute that the city would potentially face a lawsuit if it implemented ordinances regulating the anti-abortion pregnancy centers.

In July 2022, the City Council voted 6-5 in favor of Councilor-at-large Thu Nguyen's order requesting the city solicitor and administration develop a draft ordinance regulating crisis pregnancy centers.

The ordinance requested that Worcester join Somerville and Cambridge in ensuring that any clinic providing services for people who believe they might be pregnant must either directly provide abortions or emergency contraception, or provide referrals.

Nguyen has been vocal about the administration not returning a draft ordinance on their order for over a year.

In June, a class-action lawsuit alleged the actions of Clearway Clinic, a pregnancy clinic that advises patients against abortion, led to the missed diagnosis of a Worcester woman's ectopic pregnancy. The woman claims the ectopic pregnancy threatened her life.

The matter returned to the City Council chamber in July, when Nguyen asked the administration about the time it took to return an ordinance.

City Manager Eric D. Batista and City Solicitor Michael Traynor said an ordinance has been held back as they evaluated the approaches other municipalities and governing bodies took to regulating anti-abortion pregnancy centers.

Traynor expressed deep legal concerns about Nguyen's request: That it could be seen as viewpoint discrimination, that it was under-inclusive, that the city cannot compel the clinics to direct patients to abortion or contraceptive providers, and that the language about "deceptive practices" in the ordinance would not hold up to constitutional questions.

Easthampton Mayor Nicole LaChapelle vetoed an ordinance on anti-abortion clinics in July.

Mayor Joseph M. Petty eventually delayed the debate to the Tuesday City Council meeting.

Friday, the city released two draft ordinances to respond to Nguyen's order. The ordinances came with a strong recommendation that the City Council not approve either ordinance.

One ordinance follows the ordinances in Somerville and Cambridge and the other would require all pregnancy services centers to state whether they are licensed medical facilities and list the services they provide.

Traynor included a July 17 letter from the Wakefield-based Massachusetts Family Institute in his communication.

"Passing these ordinances would invite a lawsuit, waste city resources, and undermine the vital resources these charitable organizations do," Massachusetts Family Institute attorney Samuel Whiting wrote.

The City Council received a second letter from the Massachusetts Family Institute Monday.

Whiting wrote that Traynor correctly advised against the passage of the two ordinances because they are "blatantly unconstitutional."

Whiting also listed several states and municipalities where attempts to regulate anti-abortion clinics were struck down in court, writing that Worcester would face the same legal fate.

"If Worcester passes either draft ordinance, it will experience the same result as the cities and states listed above, and the city councilmembers who voted in favor will have to answer to their constituents about why they wasted city money on such a clearly unconstitutional measure," Whiting wrote.

The Massachusetts Family Institute is listed as a partner in the Church Alliance of the Christian conservative legal advocacy group the Alliance Defending Freedom. The national group is a leading opponent of both abortion rights and the expansion of LGBTQ rights.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Worcester City Council delays vote on crisis pregnancy center regs