The Seattle City Council voted on Tuesday to adopt civil rights protections for people who are polyamorous or in other nontraditional relationships, as well as people who identify as asexual or pansexual.
Seattle city code already prohibits housing or employment discrimination based on characteristics like race, homosexuality, immigration status or disability. The new measure, which passed unanimously, extends those protections.
“Seattle has long been a leader in recognizing and seeking to protect all of our neighbors’ basic rights,” said Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck, who sponsored the measure. “This update reflects how people actually live. It ensures that all residents can participate fully in civic, economic and community life without fear of discrimination.”
Seattle joins a small but growing number of American cities — including Oakland, Berkeley and Portland — that have adopted legal protections for polyamorous people. Olympia became the first city in Washington to do so earlier this year.
The city council cited research suggesting that about 5% of Americans are in a consensually nonmonogamous relationship. Visibility has grown in recent years, but during Tuesday’s council meeting, a number of polyamorous people who testified said they still face a lot of stigma.
“Some of the most painful conversations in my community are about having to hide the people we love, or being the person who is hidden,” said Tyson Holman, who is polyamorous and co-chair of the Seattle Coalition for Family and Relationship Equity. “All of this we do to avoid discrimination.”
Richard Gilmore, 73, said he is part of a polyamorous family of two other men and two women that will soon be celebrating its 26th anniversary. It is a part of his life he has felt pressure to keep hidden.
“Some of us have experienced the fear of discrimination, especially in the workplace,” Gilmore said.
Jessa Davis, the co-chair of the city’s LGBTQ+ Commission who has been a leading voice advocating for polyamory protections in Seattle, acknowledged that nonmonogamy often catches headlines in a way that is “sort of flashy and clickbaity.” (A 2017 headline by the satirical news site Clickhole read: “Be Prepared: Experts Warn That This Polyamorous Relationship Could Expand To Cover All of Seattle By 2021.”)
But polyamory is about much more than that, Davis said.
“It’s more about how family is today and having the law catch up with how people live their lives in community,” Davis said. “It’s about allowing people to show up authentically and to be supported.”
In addition to consensual nonmonogamous relationships, the bill also covers multi-parent families, multi-generational households and other diverse family structures. It does not mandate expansion of employer provided benefits.
The city’s Office of Civil Rights is tasked with enforcing potential violations of Seattle’s anti-discrimination laws. In a memo, the office estimated that an additional $121,000 in funding would be ideal to “maximize awareness and compliance with the new protections.”
The new ordinance will go into effect on June 1, 2027.
