The compilation and codification of City ordinances of general application, passed and approved on or before November 19, 1979, through Ordinance 108635, filed with the City Clerk by the City Attorney on September 19, 1980, the 1980 Supplement thereto, including ordinances passed and approved on or before December 31, 1980, filed with the City Clerk on May 30, 1981, and the 1981 Supplement thereto, including ordinances passed and approved on or before December 31, 1981, and filed with the City Clerk, are adopted as the Official Code of The City of Seattle to be known hereafter as the "Seattle Municipal Code." The Code may be cited by its abbreviation "SMC." Ordinances of general applicability passed and approved after December 31, 1981, and numbered from Ordinance 110330 remain valid and subsisting law of the City. Such ordinances shall later be made part of the Seattle Municipal Code in the manner provided in Section 1.01.030.

(Ord. 110757, § 1, 1982; Ord. 109994, § 1, 1981; Ord. 109560, § 1, 1980.)

In accordance with RCW 35.21.550, copies of the Seattle Municipal Code shall be received in all courts and administrative tribunals of the City and the state as ordinances of the City of permanent and general effect without further proof. Failing or declining to codify an ordinance does not affect the applicability of the ordinance as law. If there is a substantive omission or inconsistency between the Seattle Municipal Code and an ordinance, the ordinance controls.

(Ord. 125890, § 1, 2019; Ord. 110757, § 2, 1982; Ord. 109560, § 2, 1980.)

In accordance with RCW 35.21.560, new, amendatory, or other materials altering the Seattle Municipal Code shall be adopted by the City's legislative authority as separate ordinances, as provided by Article IV of the City Charter, prior to inclusion in the Seattle Municipal Code. After adoption of the Code, any ordinance amending the codification shall set forth in full the section or sections, or subsection or subsections of the codification being amended, as the case may be, and the same shall constitute a sufficient compliance with Article IV, Section 9 of the City Charter, requiring sections to be amended to be set forth in full in the text of the amending ordinance.

(Ord. 109560, § 3, 1980.)

In accordance with RCW 35.21.570, adoption of the Seattle Municipal Code by Ordinance 109560 constitutes sufficient compliance with Article IV, Section 7 of the City Charter, requiring that no ordinance shall contain more than one (1) subject to be clearly expressed in its title.

(Ord. 109560, § 4, 1980.)

To maintain the codification created from the compilation of ordinances maintained by the City Clerk pursuant to the City Charter, the City shall employ and from time to time fix the compensation of a competent code reviser in the Law Department, with additional legal and clerical staff as may reasonably be required. "Code reviser" means a lawyer qualified and designated to codify and revise City laws without substantive change or alteration of purpose or intent.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The code reviser shall codify all laws of a general and permanent nature enacted by the City Council and assign numbers and captions to each title and division of a title (including but not limited to chapters, sections, and subsections). The code reviser may create new titles, parts, and subparts of the code, or otherwise revise the organization of the code, as required to effectuate orderly and logical arrangement of laws.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The code reviser may edit and revise laws for presentation without changing their meaning, in the following respects only:

A.

Make capitalization and divisions of titles uniform in style;

B.

Substitute a specific code reference for "this ordinance," a reference to a section of an ordinance, or phrases and terms of similar import;

C.

Substitute the proper calendar date for "effective date of this ordinance," "date of enactment of this ordinance," and other phrases in which an appropriate date may be substituted;

D.

Strike out numerals where merely a repetition of words and substitute, where advisable for uniformity, words for numerals;

E.

Rearrange misplaced material, incorporate omitted material, and correct clerical, typographical, spelling, and syntactic errors by way of changes, additions, or omissions;

F.

Correct errors in citations to laws and make such citations uniform in style;

G.

Correct errors or omissions in numbering or renumbering parts of the code;

H.

Correct and update names of departments or other entities and titles of positions or officers;

I.

Divide long sections of an ordinance into multiple parts of the code and consolidate two or more sections of an ordinance into one part of the code, and reorder parts of the code to make the order uniform with other parts of the code, as long as no division or consolidation changes any meanings or effects of the laws; and

J.

Strike and, if advisable, update obsolete provisions and cross-references.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The code reviser may omit from the code all titles to ordinances, enacting and repealing clauses, statements of facts, findings of fact, recitals, effective dates, declarations of emergency, and severability, validity, and construction sections unless, in a particular instance, it is advisable to codify that portion of the ordinance to preserve the full intent of the law. The omission or validity or construction sections is not intended to, nor shall it change or be considered as changing, the effect given to the ordinance in construing the ordinance of which the validity and construction sections were a part.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

If a part of the code would be served by an explanation, or an edit or revision the code reviser is not authorized to make, the code reviser may place a reviser's note as near as possible to the reference without interfering with the readability of any affected part. The code reviser may add or remove reviser's notes, editor's notes, annotations, or similar material to or from the code and Charter as appropriate.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

Each section of the code shall be followed with a list of all ordinances that have enacted or amended the section. The code reviser shall prepare and maintain a list of dispositions for titles, parts, and subparts of the code that no longer contain valid law.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The code reviser may prepare legislation for submission or make written recommendations to the City Council concerning correction or removal of deficiencies, conflicts, or obsolete provisions in the code or otherwise improving the form or substance of city laws.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The code reviser shall, when appropriate, propose to the City Council the enactment of the several titles, chapters, and sections of the code so that, as expeditiously as possible, the code and each of its parts constitutes conclusive, rather than prima facie, evidence of the law. A proposal made under this Section 1.03.080 must be accompanied by explanatory matter.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The code reviser shall be in charge of and shall provide drafting assistance for city departments, the City Council, and the City Council's committees, members, and staff. The assistance must be confidential and nonpartisan, and neither the code reviser nor any of the code reviser's staff may advocate for or against any bill in their drafting capacities.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

Neither the code reviser nor any of the code reviser's staff may provide an opinion to the public as to the validity or constitutionality of proposed or enacted legislation.

(Ord. 125890, § 2, 2019.)

The provisions of this Code are declared to be separate and severable. The invalidity of any clause, sentence, paragraph, subdivision, section, chapter, title, or other portion of this Code, or the invalidity of the application thereof to any person or circumstance shall not affect the validity of the remainder of this Code, or the validity of its application to other persons or circumstances.

(Ord. 109560, § 11, 1980.)

Except to the extent otherwise provided in a specific ordinance, each ordinance of the City shall take effect and be in force as follows:

A.

If approved by the Mayor and returned to the City Council or the City Clerk within ten days after its presentation to the Mayor, 30 days after the Mayor's approval;

B.

If within ten days after its presentation to the Mayor it is returned to the City Council or the City Clerk without the Mayor's approval or disapproval, 30 days after its return;

C.

If not returned to the City Council or the City Clerk within ten days after presentation to the Mayor, 45 days after passage by the City Council; or

D.

If disapproved by the Mayor and upon reconsideration again passed by the City Council, 30 days after such reconsidered passage.

(Ord. 117178, § 1, 1994.)

For purposes of construction and interpretation, unless stated otherwise, the names and headings of titles, chapters, subchapters, parts (as that term is used in Titles 11 and 23), and sections of the Seattle Municipal Code become part of the law upon their first appearance in an ordinance, whether the ordinance creates the name or heading or whether the ordinance uses a previously created name or heading.

(Ord. 125890, § 3, 2019.)

The following rules of construction apply to the Seattle Municipal Code unless stated otherwise or the context clearly requires otherwise:

A.

Words in the singular form shall also refer to the plural form, and words in the plural form shall also refer to the singular form;

B.

Words referring to one gender shall also refer to the other genders;

C.

"May" is permissive and "must," "shall," and "will" are mandatory;

D.

If a person is authorized by law to discharge a duty by virtue of an office, that person's designee may also discharge the duty; and

E.

Undefined words and phrases must be construed according to the common and approved usage of the language, but technical words and phrases and such other words and phrases as have acquired a peculiar and appropriate meaning in the law must be construed and understood according to the peculiar and appropriate meaning.

(Ord. 125890, § 4, 2019.)

A.

If two or more ordinances amending the same section of an ordinance or the Seattle Municipal Code are enacted, each amendment without reference to the others, each ordinance must be given effect to the extent that the amendments do not conflict in purpose. Otherwise, the ordinance last enacted controls. If a section of an ordinance or the Seattle Municipal Code is amended after the enactment of the section's repeal, the subsequent amendment is void and the section is repealed in accordance with the original repeal's enactment.

B.

If a section of an ordinance or the Seattle Municipal Code is amended without reference to another amendment of the same section, the City Clerk, in consultation with the code reviser, may publish the section in the Seattle Municipal Code with all amendments incorporated in the section. The publication of the section may occur only if the code reviser determines that the amendments do not conflict in purpose or effect. A section published under this subsection 1.04.050.B constitutes prima facie of the evidence of the law but may not be construed as changing the meaning of the law.

C.

If an ordinance or code section refers to another ordinance or code section, the reference includes amendments to the referenced ordinance or code section unless a contrary intent is clearly expressed.

D.

The City Council recognizes that legislation is likely to display amendments to code sections in their codified, revised form rather than as displayed in individual ordinances. If an ordinance's presentation of a code section's current language uses or amends the language of that section as it has been codified or revised, such presentation does not invalidate the legislation for not displaying the correct section language, and the legislation taking effect shall ratify the codification and revision of that section as though the codified and revised language had existed in the previous ordinance.

(Ord. 125890, § 5, 2019.)

For the purposes of this code and any legislation hereafter enacted by the legislature or by the people, the terms spouse, marriage, marital, husband, wife, next of kin, and family shall be interpreted as applying equally to state registered domestic partnerships or individuals in state registered domestic partnerships as well as to marital relationships and married persons, and references to dissolution of marriage shall apply equally to state registered domestic partnerships that have been terminated, dissolved, or invalidated, unless the legislation expressly states otherwise and to the extent that such interpretation does not conflict with state or federal law. Where necessary to implement this Section 1.04.060, gender-specific terms such as husband and wife used in any ordinance, rule, or other law shall be construed to be gender-neutral and applicable to individuals in state-registered domestic partnerships and spouses of the same sex.

(Ord. 125890, § 6, 2019.)

Unless stated otherwise, this Section 1.04.070 governs the computation of time in the Charter or this code. When computing time, whether forward or backward, the day of the event from which the time begins to run is excluded. The last day of the period so computed is included, unless it is a Saturday, a Sunday, or a legal holiday, in which case the period runs until the end of the next day in the direction being counted, whether forward or backward, that is not a Saturday, a Sunday, or legal holiday. When the period of time prescribed or allowed is less than seven days, intermediate Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays shall be excluded in the computation.

(Ord. 125890, § 7, 2019.)

Neither an offense committed nor a penalty or forfeiture incurred previous to the time that a provision of an ordinance or the code is repealed, whether the repeal be express or implied, is affected by the repeal unless a contrary intention is expressly declared in the repealing ordinance. Prosecution for an offense, or for the recovery of a penalty or forfeiture, pending at the time a provision of an ordinance or the code is repealed, whether the repeal be express or implied, is not affected by the repeal but must proceed in all respects as if the provision had not been repealed unless a contrary intention is expressly declared in the repealing ordinance. If a criminal or penal ordinance or code is amended or repealed, an offense committed or penalty or forfeiture incurred while the criminal or penal ordinance or code was in force must be punished or enforced as if the criminal or penal ordinance or code were in force, notwithstanding the amendment or repeal, unless a contrary intention is expressly declared in the amendatory or repealing ordinance. The amendatory or repealing ordinance must be so construed as to save all criminal and penal proceedings, and proceedings to recover forfeitures, pending at the time of the amendatory or repealing ordinance's enactment unless a contrary intention is expressly declared in the amendatory or repealing ordinance.

(Ord. 125890, § 8, 2019.)

The official common seal of the City shall be an imprint of a drawing in profile of the face and head of Chief Seattle in the center of a circle, and on the upper outer edges of the circle and partially encircling the imprint, the words "Corporate Seal Of The," and in a smaller circle under said words and above the imprint the words "City of Seattle," and within the circle and under the imprint the figures "1869."

(Ord. 67033, § 1, 1937.)

The dahlia is designated as Seattle's City flower.

(Ord. 32137, § 1, 1913.)

The Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners is requested to plant and cultivate dahlias in suitable quantities and places, and to make effective displays of said flowers in the City parks and grounds, and to provide dahlias for display and decorations at public and municipal meetings and occasions.

(Ord. 32137, § 2, 1913.)

The officers and employees of the City are requested to encourage the public to plant and cultivate dahlias and other flowers for beautifying private grounds and parking strips to the end that Seattle may be and become known as "The City Beautiful."

(Ord. 32137, § 3, 1913.)

Historical datum point. A base or datum point or line is established on the lower step at the entrance to the Pioneer Block in The City of Seattle, at the southwest corner thereof, the point or datum line being 18.79 feet below the top of the step, the point or datum line being in correspondence with the datum point or line heretofore fixed by Ordinance 383 ^[1]. To distinguish between the historical and current vertical datum, when it is necessary to refer to both, this historical datum point shall be known as the "City of Seattle Datum."

(Ord. 125781, § 1, 2019; Ord. 121291, § 1, 2003; Ord. 1836, § 1, 1891.)

The official geodetic datums to which geodetic coordinates, including, but not limited to, latitude, longitude, ellipsoid height, orthometric height, or dynamic height, are referenced within Seattle city limits shall be as defined for the National Spatial Reference System (or its successor).

(Ord. 125781, § 1, 2019.)