The Seattle City Council on Monday unanimously passed a resolution sponsored by Kshama Sawant that allows about 11,000 city employees to request unpaid leave for a day of conscience on May 1—International Workers' Day. This year the May 1st Action Coalition is holding the march in support of immigrant and refugee rights, in light of U.S. president Donald Trump's policies that have increased deportations and heavily restricted immigrants from entering the country. 

Sawant and Lisa Herbold both talked about the importance of this May Day march for immigrants in the age of Trump; Sally Bagshaw asked that protesters remain peaceful; and Tim Burgess reminded employees they still had to request the time off. 

But Sawant didn't get the packed City Hall she called for on Friday. There were about 40 attendees in the council chambers at most Monday afternoon, a far smaller crowd compared to the ones at the resolution to boycott the Keystone XL pipeline or past meetings to mandate affordable housing for new developers in South Lake Union.

Still, about 15 people spoke to support the May Day resolution during the public hearing, including some who were part of the Latino community and involved in drafting the resolution. One pointed out that the immigrants they spoke of weren't there today, at a council meeting that starts at 2pm Mondays, because they were busy working. 

So for those who were wondering—out of 281 cities in the state, the Seattle City Council is the only one that holds all its regular meetings before 5pm, according to info collected by the Municipal Research and Services Center. Seattle has held that meeting time since at least the 1960s. (Minutes from the early 1900s showed the council meetings used to be held at 8pm.) The mid-afternoon time poses a challenge for the average worker to attend them, even on live stream.

On the other side of the coin, it's also unusual to have salaried full-time, year-round council members. There's a case to be made for that, of course. Making the council position a full-time job can also attract non-wealthy, working-class candidates with families to support who can't afford to take on a demanding leadership role with little or no pay.

Regardless, it's become increasingly important to make those council meetings friendly to immigrants and workers who, for many reasons, won't find killing their Monday afternoons at City Hall appealing or possible. King County every year shows a more diverse population. As of the end of 2016, state Office of Financial Management estimations showed the following increases in minorities:

Asian—7.8 percent in the past year, 17.7 percent in the past four years. 

Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander—3.8 percent in the past year, 18.5 percent in the past four years. 

Hispanic—3.8 percent in the past year, 15.1 percent in the past four years. 

Black—3.2 percent in the past year, 10.9 percent in the past four years. 

American Indian/Alaskan Native—2.3 percent in the past year, 5.3 percent in the past four years. 

Mixed—3.7 percent in the past year, 16.8 percent in the past four years. 

Updated April 25, 2017, at 9:12am. This post corrects that information was provided by the MRSC, not the Association of Washington Cities.