NEW YORK–According to news reports, the New York City Council is poised today to consider two legislative proposals that would require the New York Police Department (NYPD) to establish “buffer zones” restricting protest activity outside schools and places of worship. Free expression advocates, including the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, warn that the proposed buffer zones could unduly chill participation in lawful protest and other forms of First Amendment-protected expression.

The following can be attributed to Nadine Farid Johnson, policy director at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University:

“Tasking the NYPD to write the rules on where and how people may engage in lawful political protest risks chilling and criminalizing a wide range of activities protected by the First Amendment. It’s especially alarming because these rules would cover schools, other educational facilities, and places of religious worship, which are the sites of some of the city's most vital public discourse.”

For more information, contact: Adriana Lamirande, [email protected]