Let’s make this 
official today

Our petition for Sacramento Comic Book Week has two main goals.

1) We’d like the City Council and Mayor to officially recognize Sacramento Comic Book Week because Sacramento is home to some of the nation’s best comic book stops, the home to many nationally known comic creators that have left indelible marks on the medium, celebrated by passionate fans at dozens of comic conventions and events around the city annually. The establishment of Sacramento Comic Book Week would allow for a union of many of these efforts through many decentralized celebrations around the community.

We are nominating the third week, beginning on Sunday, of every September to be declared Sacramento Comic Book Week.

2) Repeal of City Code item 9.12.010   Distributing certain "comic books."
Sacramento, oddly, has an antiquated city code that, in the wrong hands, could effectively ban comic books from libraries and comic shops, as well as educational tools in schools and universities. The code prohibits the sale or distribution of any “comic book” to people under the age of eighteen (18) years in which there is prominently featured an account of crime, and which depicts, by the use of drawings or photographs, the commission or attempted commission of the crimes of arson, assault with caustic chemicals, assault with a deadly weapon, burglary, kidnapping, torture, mayhem, murder, rape, robbery, theft or voluntary manslaughter.

Virtually, every major superhero comic book could be targeted as featuring “mayhem” —every action alongside a biff, bam, pow, thwip, snikt, bamf, or boom— could be contorted into bad faith legal arguments to ban books which would then jeopardize the operations of the dozens of comic shops, dozens of comic conventions, the operations of libraries and museums. We believe comic books are for everybody and this code is outdated, unenforceable, indiscriminately targets one whole medium, and completely unnecessary.

At a time where nationwide efforts book bans have been specifically targeting comic books across the country, Sacramento could say no more, stand up, and deliver a preemptive and principled step to strike this down and affirm our community’s trust in our community and the constitutional-backed rights of free speech.