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Clinic advocates urge council to strengthen protections for noise‑sensitive healthcare areas
Summary
Volunteers and observers at A Woman’s Choice clinic told the Raleigh City Council that proposed changes to the noise ordinance could weaken protections for patients and staff; they urged the council to treat healthcare facilities as noise‑sensitive, to apply the same standards to amplified and unamplified sound and to improve enforcement.
Speakers representing A Woman’s Choice clinic and volunteer legal observers urged the Raleigh City Council to preserve and strengthen noise protections for healthcare facilities during a public hearing on a proposed amplified‑sound ordinance.
Gabrielle Long, community outreach organizer and patient advocate for A Woman’s Choice, told the council that “excessive noise, especially amplified shouting, continues to reach well inside our building, disrupting care and creating distress for our patients in vulnerable moments.” She asked the council to “recognize health care facilities as noise sensitive areas within the noise ordinance, apply the same standard to both amplified and unamplified sound within 300 feet of these facilities,” assign a proposed noise monitor to clinic days when amplified sound is used, and ensure consistent training and enforcement by Raleigh Police Department officers in noise‑sensitive areas.
Stephen Blake, a volunteer legal observer at the clinic, cited language from the existing city code in his testimony: “The current noise ordinance, section 12 5 0 0 7, prohibits the creation of unreasonable noise within a 150 foot perimeter from a noise sensitive area, including healthcare facilities providing treatment requiring patient recovery,” he said, and urged the council to “strengthen and not weaken protections provided to noise sensitive areas.” Blake and other witnesses said enforcement has been inconsistent; he stated that protesters have been warned to move on only a few occasions and that, to his knowledge, no citations were issued.
Kelsey McLean, a clinic volunteer and former staffer, described repeated events of amplified and unamplified shouting near the clinic and said the noise materially interferes with patient care and recovery. McLean and Long called for clearer, enforceable distance standards and better training for officers and noise monitors so staff can rely on the ordinance to protect patients.
Speakers framed the request as a public‑health issue rather than a restriction on expression. Testimony did not propose specific new statutory text but asked the council to (a) treat healthcare facilities explicitly as noise‑sensitive in the amendment, (b) adopt parity in standards for amplified and unamplified sound within a specified radius (testimony suggested 300 feet), and (c) assign monitoring resources and consistent officer training to enforce protections. The hearing produced no formal council action.
