Redwood City Seeks Buffer Zone For Planned Parenthood Location

REDWOOD CITY, CA — Redwood City is seeking to create a buffer zone around a Planned Parenthood facility to stave off anti-abortion protesters.

The city council voted unanimously at an April 25 meeting to draft a letter to the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors requesting a buffer zone around the Planned Parenthood location.

The council meeting happened before a leaked draft of a Supreme Court majority opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade — the 1973 ruling that legalized abortion in all 50 states — was published by Politico and later confirmed to be authentic by the court.

But Redwood City Mayor Giselle Hale, who brought the item before the council, said in a staff report that the Planned Parenthood was already seeing an increase in protest activity.

“Efforts to harass, obstruct, or otherwise interfere with individuals seeking reproductive health care services often deter and even prevent individuals from obtaining necessary reproductive health care services,” Hale wrote in a letter attached to the report. “These factors can lead to increased patient stress that may affect the efficacy and complication rate of the medical care sought within.”

Similar measures have been passed in San Francisco and Walnut Creek.

The council had to request that the county’s Board of Supervisor approve the buffer zone because the Planned Parenthood location, at 2907 El Camino Real, is in unincorporated Redwood City and outside the jurisdiction of the city council.

Click here to view the staff report and Hale's full remarks.