Switzerland: New laws proposed for legal Prostitution (Time.com)

By TINA FASSBIND / TAGES-ANZEIGER / WORLDCRUNCH Tina Fassbind / Tages-anzeiger / Worldcrunch - Fri Jun 3, 3: 35 pm EST

This position is in partnership with Worldcrunch, a new global news site translated stories of note in foreign languages in English. The following article was published in the Tages-Anzeiger.

ZURICH - responsible and have decided that this city in expansion of the legal sex industry should be better organized. Zurich municipal authorities have proposed a series of amendments to the current regulation of prostitution which would allow prostitutes continue plying their trade, but only in three specific areas - including an equipped with the new cabins to accommodate their clients.

The proposed measures, which require the approval of the Council of the city, including prohibiting prostitution Street along the Sihlquai Bank and in the occupied area of the Langstrasse. In Exchange, the activity will be allowed between Aargauerstrasse and Würzgrabenstrasse, outside the city centre, where booths will be built to accommodate the sex workers and their clients. (See pictures of South Korean prostitutes to protest against the closure of brothels).

Street prostitutes will be able to always work in the pedestrian area of nightlife of the city, the centralized Niederdorf and soliciting customers of vehicle in Allmend Brunau. The Zurich City Council expects that the new laws go into effect January 1, 2012.

Introducing new measures to the media - at a press conference on 25 may City Hall was three of the nine councillors of city of Zurich: Claudia Nielsen, Daniel Leupi and Martin Waser, which are responsible, respectively, for the health and environment policy, police and social issues.

Leupi explained that the purpose of the Council of the city by presenting the measures to combat trafficking in human beings, offer an appropriate response to the victims, minimize the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and to protect sex workers and the whole of the population of the violence. (Is Mexico City a red-light district?)

Councillor Waser explained that at peak hours, when up to 120 sex workers can work at the same time, street solicitation can be a real disruption to ordinary people - thus the need to harness the activity of the designated areas.

According to Nielsen, the number of sex in Zurich in 2010 had increased significantly in recent years, with many new workers arriving from Hungary. Nielsen said that the increase in the number of workers has also increased the risks of pimping and trafficking human. The new measures, she explained, were not the so anti-prostitution as the fight against trafficking.

As the sex workers often have information on their rights, Nielsen said, the Council sought to advise prostitutes by establishing direct lines of communication. Once the new regulation is in place, the sex workers - they work or the streets - will also have to obtain licences.

Introduction "sex boxes".
Other developments include the creation of a special commission in which representatives of NGOs local will also sit and measures to ensure that resources are allocated as efficiently as possible.

The Council had initially planned to build 10 cabins, commonly known as boxes of sex, of Altstetten - more to be built if the amount of activity warrants. The resources currently allocated to destination will be switched to the new area, so additional fees only, provided $ 2.8 million will be those to build the boxes.

The new Altstetten prostitution zone will be easy to monitor, control and protect, say members of the Council. It will be operated and maintained by social services. Residents of the region have been informed of the plan. Plans for the design and construction of boxes of sex, should be ready in the spring of 2012, are already underway.

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How flooding can restore the wetlands of Louisiana (Time.com)

The discourse on New Orleans have centered if the flood of the river Mississippi more severe in more than a quarter of a century causes catastrophic damage in a city still recovering from Hurricane Katrina. And for good reason: the flood carved a destructive path from Cairo, Illinois, at Vicksburg, Mississippi and you are prompted for the Republican Governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, ask the Federal Government for emergency assistance. But just maybe it is a misfortune: the flood could actually help fragile wetlands of Louisiana.

Of course, floodwaters of the river Mississippi is destructive. Many people along Weirs open to mitigate the outbreak is likely to lose their homes. Water can also destroy oyster beds, especially in Lake Borgne, between the Mississippi and the Gulf of the Mexico. Long term effects will be not obvious for several months. But, said Alex Kolker, a geologist at the Louisiana universities Marine Consortium, it may be an opportunity to let nature help resolve an artificial problem. "It will be a fascinating time," said Kolker. (See the photos in the flood zone).

Only a year ago, the worst oil spill in American history slathered million litres of oil through the coast of Louisiana. The muck covered cane tall, resembling bamboo and grass that points together vegetation which includes wetlands, South of New Orleans, preventing them from receiving oxygen. Many experts feared it would take years for the wetlands recover, and that the industry of seafood from Louisiana core - particularly oysters, shrimp and fish cannot execute suspicion of oil - is at risk. These sediments is crucial: the loss of vegetation is accelerating the erosion of soils and the Islands.

Now, however, rich in sediments of flood water is led to contaminated wetlands. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Manager of most of the waterways of the nation, has, over the century last, put in place a framework of containment of the Mississippi River, which has deprived ultimately indispensable silt Delta wetlands. That sediment reduced a, experts say, accelerated the narrowing of the Delta. Today, however, the Agency opened two canals to divert part of the Mississippi from New Orleans and wetlands. A channel is the Bonnet Carre spillway, which is to reduce the water in Lake Pontchartrain and thence to the Gulf of the Mexico. The other is the Morganza spillway, which sends water along the Atchafalaya River basin in the Gulf. Water and sediment forced through this channel, say experts, will likely help to rebuild the wetlands to the West of the Mississippi with sediment fresh, especially fishing and shrimp villages as Dulac. The last major flood in 1973, delivered enough of sediment to create what are now big trees covered with mud banks and lush grass. These banks have provided some of the crucial defenses of New Orleans during large storms. (See following a tornado that ripped through the Mississippi).

Flooding is, to some extent, flush out the remaining oil spill last year. Some of the oil will be mix with new sediment and, according to its weight, this amalgam is pushed by the current of the Mississippi River in the Gulf. "That does not mean it is not a problem", warns Richard Steiner, a protector of the marine environment that has studied the effects of oil spill of the Exxon Valdez and BP spill in the Gulf. His primary concern: the thick, dark, weathered mixture infused oil will remain toxic and continue to jeopardize the Gulf and certainly a large part of the wetlands of Louisiana, but perhaps with lower levels of contamination. There is also the risk that some remaining wildlife species will become slathered with oil of re-emerging and die. Still, says Steiner, the best route to save the wetlands of Louisiana finally may be "just left to natural degradation." Formidable that they, the flood waters are all part of the work of nature.

See how New Orleans responds to flooding of the Mississippi River.

See the top 10 U.S. historical floods.

See this article on Time.com

Most popular on Time.com:

View the original article here

How flooding can restore the wetlands of Louisiana (Time.com)

The discourse on New Orleans have centered if the flood of the river Mississippi more severe in more than a quarter of a century causes catastrophic damage in a city still recovering from Hurricane Katrina. And for good reason: the flood carved a destructive path from Cairo, Illinois, at Vicksburg, Mississippi and you are prompted for the Republican Governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, ask the Federal Government for emergency assistance. But just maybe it is a misfortune: the flood could actually help fragile wetlands of Louisiana.

Of course, floodwaters of the river Mississippi is destructive. Many people along Weirs open to mitigate the outbreak is likely to lose their homes. Water can also destroy oyster beds, especially in Lake Borgne, between the Mississippi and the Gulf of the Mexico. Long term effects will be not obvious for several months. But, said Alex Kolker, a geologist at the Louisiana universities Marine Consortium, it may be an opportunity to let nature help resolve an artificial problem. "It will be a fascinating time," said Kolker. (See the photos in the flood zone).

Only a year ago, the worst oil spill in American history slathered million litres of oil through the coast of Louisiana. The muck covered cane tall, resembling bamboo and grass that points together vegetation which includes wetlands, South of New Orleans, preventing them from receiving oxygen. Many experts feared it would take years for the wetlands recover, and that the industry of seafood from Louisiana core - particularly oysters, shrimp and fish cannot execute suspicion of oil - is at risk. These sediments is crucial: the loss of vegetation is accelerating the erosion of soils and the Islands.

Now, however, rich in sediments of flood water is led to contaminated wetlands. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Manager of most of the waterways of the nation, has, over the century last, put in place a framework of containment of the Mississippi River, which has deprived ultimately indispensable silt Delta wetlands. That sediment reduced a, experts say, accelerated the narrowing of the Delta. Today, however, the Agency opened two canals to divert part of the Mississippi from New Orleans and wetlands. A channel is the Bonnet Carre spillway, which is to reduce the water in Lake Pontchartrain and thence to the Gulf of the Mexico. The other is the Morganza spillway, which sends water along the Atchafalaya River basin in the Gulf. Water and sediment forced through this channel, say experts, will likely help to rebuild the wetlands to the West of the Mississippi with sediment fresh, especially fishing and shrimp villages as Dulac. The last major flood in 1973, delivered enough of sediment to create what are now big trees covered with mud banks and lush grass. These banks have provided some of the crucial defenses of New Orleans during large storms. (See following a tornado that ripped through the Mississippi).

Flooding is, to some extent, flush out the remaining oil spill last year. Some of the oil will be mix with new sediment and, according to its weight, this amalgam is pushed by the current of the Mississippi River in the Gulf. "That does not mean it is not a problem", warns Richard Steiner, a protector of the marine environment that has studied the effects of oil spill of the Exxon Valdez and BP spill in the Gulf. His primary concern: the thick, dark, weathered mixture infused oil will remain toxic and continue to jeopardize the Gulf and certainly a large part of the wetlands of Louisiana, but perhaps with lower levels of contamination. There is also the risk that some remaining wildlife species will become slathered with oil of re-emerging and die. Still, says Steiner, the best route to save the wetlands of Louisiana finally may be "just left to natural degradation." Formidable that they, the flood waters are all part of the work of nature.

See how New Orleans responds to flooding of the Mississippi River.

See the top 10 U.S. historical floods.

See this article on Time.com

Most popular on Time.com:

View the original article here