Patronizing prostitutes in Seattle just got a bit more expensive. Today, the city council approved a proposal to slap johns with $150 fine to pay for counseling services for prostitutes and their clients.

One of the proposal’s biggest supporters is City Attorney Tom Carr, who was quoted in the Seattle Times today touting the new "john school" program. "What Seattle is trying to do is to really help the true victims of the crime," Carr told the Seattle Times. "which are women who are driven by drug addiction or alcohol addiction or mental illness.”

But Carr hasn’t always been such a staunch supporter of the john school and may have even had a hand in derailing a push for a similar program—designed to reduce recidivism—four years ago.

In a 2005 email exchange with staff in City Council Member Nick Licata’s office, it’s apparent that Carr wasn’t buying into a push for a john school. “In my view, the low recidivism rate for johns suggest the arrest and contact with the criminal justice system is enough of a deterrent,” Carr wrote, adding in another email that “I don’t oppose fining johns and using the money to help the real victims of their crimes. I just don’t believe that a [john school] is worth the effort.”

"His opposition was a very heavy damp rag," says council member Nick Licata, who also proposed a similar program in 2005. "If the city attorney says [the program's] not useful, his opinion carries a lot of weight.”

Carr says that in 2005—when Licata was initially pushing the program—he wasn’t convinced the john school would have an impact on recidivism rates.

Over a ten-year period, Carr says, he only found 7 repeat offenders out of about 1,000 cases. However, Carr acknowledges that it’s tough to track prostitution cases across the county and state. “Someone we catch in Seattle may take their business to Sea-Tac,” he says.

Carr says his change of heart came in the last six months after he read a study out of California, which shows john schools do in fact have a significant impact on recidivism.
“I don’t think we should just do a program because other people are doing it. It’s got to have a purpose,” Carr says. “I think I was wrong.