Seattle City Council

SPD police chief loses his cool

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Seattle News:

I’ve been closely covering the debate around universal school meals for students in Seattle, which you can read about here and here. Right now it looks like Seattle might get both universal school meals starting this fall and a voucher-based food program for weekends and school breaks. Today, Mayor Katie Wilson and the Seattle City Council released a joint statement indicating both branches of government are on board with the plan.

The City Council will be voting on a proposal to fund the universal school meals through the general fund on August 4 as part of their mid-year supplemental budget deliberations. 

I’ve seen a lot of speculation that one or more Seattle city councilmembers might have purposefully blocked Mayor Katie Wilson’s universal school meals proposal in order to tank her political capital and have a more successful mayoral run against her in 2029. I cannot say what lies in the hearts of the councilmembers, but something else to consider is the fact that the council isn’t particularly politically aligned with the mayor and might not be worried about crossing her in the same way they might have feared crossing Mayor Bruce Harrell, who helped many of them get elected. 

In the last few weeks, I also wrote about both the D5 Seattle City Council seat race and the 46th LD state representative race.

I’m sure you’re all aware of the tragic shooting at the Seattle Center during the Bite of Seattle food festival on Sunday. PubliCola reported that SPD Chief Shon Barnes was out of town at the time of the shooting, and indeed, was scheduled to be out of town until mid-August, in spite of summer tending to be a time of increased violence overall, and gun violence in particular. 

At a press conference about the shooting on Monday, Barnes snapped at a reporter from The South Seattle Emerald who was asking about his traveling habits, and his chief of staff Alex Ricketts had to step between Barnes and the reporter and escort Barnes away. You can watch the video clip here.

At another press conference today, Barnes was asked about the incident with the reporter and said it merely illustrated his passion for being a police officer. Someone has filed a complaint with the Office of Police Accountability (OPA) about the incident. Barnes was also asked again about his travel schedule, a question he tried to dismiss as quickly as possible.

Other News:

ICE is still getting Washington state data to assist in their immigration enforcement efforts, according to KUOW, meaning the state’s sanctuary law isn’t being fully enforced. This is in spite of the state denying tens of thousands of requests from ICE, the Department of Homeland Security, and Customs & Border Patrol. According to KUOW’s article:

““The records we’re getting show that the rejection doesn’t stop them from getting the data,” said Angelina Godoy, director of the UW Center for Human Rights. “They get rejected using one [Originating Agency Identifier] and then just submit their request under another one. There are thousands of still-open [Originating Agency Identifiers] they can use.””

Leaked video from the San Francisco Police Department’s drone program has shown one of the privacy risks of this surveillance technology. Ben Werdmuller, the senior director of technology at ProPublica, wrote an essay on his personal site about the more inherent problems with such ubiquitous surveillance. Furthermore, Werdmuller wrote that the police drones in San Francisco have had no impact on crime. 

Meanwhile, LAPD announced they will be letting their contract with Flock Safety expire. As 404 Media reported, “Notably, the decision came after an audit of ALPR technology found that, in a two-month period, the LAPD had improperly “investigated” 161 people whose cars were flagged as stolen in the LAPD’s ALPR system but were not actually stolen.” Here is that audit. 

Last week, the Renton City Council voted to continue to pause their use of Flock Safety stationary license plate readers in the city. However, they voted to resume use of in-vehicle license plate readers (these readers are from Axon, not Flock). It became clear during the councilmember discussion that in practice, the in-vehicle license plate readers will also not be used at present since they are not compliant with the new state law regulating the use of license plate readers (the same issue faced by the City of Seattle). While a technical fix might be possible to resume use of the Axon in-vehicle license plate readers, it is unclear if and when that will happen. 

Recent Headlines:

SPD police chief loses his cool Read More »

Seattle budget season is oh so political

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Seattle News:

It’s been a busy week, and I have three new stories to talk about. 

First off, I wrote about Seattle’s proposed surveillance expansion for The Urbanist, which would give SPD access to 365 SDOT cameras as well as permission to purchase many more cameras to place in three more areas of the city. That the City is trying to push forward with this plan right now, given what’s happening at the federal level, is particularly concerning. 

The public safety committee will be discussing this expansion again (and voting on it)  on Tuesday, August 12 at 9:30am. There will be the opportunity to give public comment at the beginning of this meeting. 

Next up, as I reported at The Urbanist, the Seattle Shield Initiative passed this week, which means Seattleites will be voting on the B&O tax restructure in November. While the council watered the proposal down, it passed with an unanimous vote, which is something I wouldn’t have expected as recently as a month ago. The fact that Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck was able to get this passed in time to be put on the ballot in spite of not having any strong allies on the council is notable. It seems like having Mayor Bruce Harrell on board helped to smooth the way. 

The city received another revenue forecast this week, which was a bit less bad than the one in April. However, the Office of Economic and Revenue Forecasts’ interim director Jan Duras said it’s likely the next revenue forecast, due in October, will be worse.  

This is interesting maneuvering on the part of Harrell, who now gets to base his proposed budget, due at the end of September, on a better forecast than is likely to be true by the time the council actually has to pass the budget. Since his budget team is assuming the Seattle Shield Initiative will pass in their formation of the budget, it’s possible he won’t have to make many unpopular cuts in his proposed budget before the election at the beginning of the November. 

This also means the council will be left with the football when it comes time to grapple with any necessary budget cuts later in October, should the revenue forecast worsen. 

It seems like Harrell might not be overly eager to introduce the public safety sales tax hike after all. If the City doesn’t need the revenue to bridge a deficit gap, he can play it safe with public opinion and postpone implementing such a regressive tax. Even if a councilmember decides to go for it, it will leave Harrell with clean hands.

Councilmember Rinck was also able to add $300,000 to the city’s supplementary budget this week to pay for legal defense for unaccompanied children facing detention and deportation. This money was taken from underspend from Seattle’s much criticized SCORE jail contract. Councilmembers Rob Saka and Martiza Rivera were the sole “no” votes.

My third piece, at Bolts Magazine, covers the renewal of Seattle’s democracy voucher program this week. The City is supposed to convene a workgroup in early 2026 to look into possible improvements to the program, including strategies to better deal with independent expenditures in local races. This will be an opportunity for stakeholders to participate in figuring out what’s next for the program. I’ll also be very interested to see how the combination of democracy vouchers and ranked choice voting in 2027 pans out. 

More Seattle news:

We had a primary! Progressives in Seattle did very well. There is a ton of analysis available to read, none of which I am going to link to. My observation, for what it’s worth, is that many more people appear to pay attention to national news than to local news, so I tend to think the Trump effect is one of the main factors at play here. 

As I was writing this, the news dropped that Katie Wilson, who is running against Harrell for mayor, has broken 50% of the primary vote. Wilson is more than 15,000 votes ahead of Harrell at this time. 

The next consent decree hearing has been set for Wednesday, September 3. This could be the last hearing of Seattle’s consent decree. 

Seattle is paying $3 million to settle the lawsuit brought by SPD’s Deanne Nolette, who alleged wage, job and gender discrimination. She also alleged that former Chief Adrian Diaz had retaliated against her since she had also been up for the Chief job, and that he “has a history of misogyny.” 

Housekeeping:

I’ll be out on vacation the next few weeks, but never fear, I’ll be back at it before the end of the month. Close followers of local news know that the fall tends to be a particularly busy time, and this year should be no exception. 

Recent Headlines:

 

Seattle budget season is oh so political Read More »

Seattle Mayor’s Race Remains a Dead Heat in Polling

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Seattle and King County News:

First off, I took a closer look at the upcoming Seattle City Attorney election, with a particular focus on incumbent Ann Davison’s signature policies, for Bolts Magazine.

For The Urbanist, I wrote about the nuisance property and graffiti legislation recently passed by the Seattle City Council, as well as Council President Sara Nelson’s proposal to allocate some of a not-yet-proposed sales tax bump to pay for addiction treatment. I also gave an update on how Donald Trump’s recently passed budget reconciliation package, which includes large cuts to Medicaid (Apple Care) and SNAP, will impact Washingtonians, and how Seattle and King County are responding to the current national funding and policy threats.

We have a primary election coming up next Tuesday, August 5, which means it’s time for some new polls. The two frontrunners for Seattle Mayor, Bruce Harrell and Katie Wilson, are still statistically tied. In the Seattle City Attorney’s race, incumbent Davison is ahead, closely followed by Erika Evans. 

And a recent poll on Washington Governor Bob Ferguson’s job performance found that only 32% of voters think he’s been doing an “excellent” or “good” job during his first six months. 

We also have a new Seattle councilmember, the returning Debora Juarez, who has been appointed to fill Cathy Moore’s empty D5 seat. That seat will not be up for election until November of 2026. 

Coming up this week, we have a select budget committee meeting tomorrow morning with a possible vote on the Seattle Shield Initiative, which has picked up a whopping 17 proposed amendments. Then on Thursday morning, there will be a special public safety committee meeting to discuss the proposed expansion of CCTV cameras to three new locations, which will cost over $1 million. The updates would also allow SPD to view and record footage from SDOT traffic management cameras.

Guy Oron recently published a great piece about the ballooning settlements the City of Seattle has had to pay related to SPD actions. He includes some illustrative graphs as well, and I recommend taking a look. Overall, the City spent nearly twice the amount it had budgeted over the last ten years (2014-2024) on SPD settlements etc. The most recent figure: in 2024 the City spent $15.1 million on police litigation. 

The Urbanist has a piece from Carolyn Bick documenting the poor public record practices of the Office of the Inspector General (OIG). 

The Seattle City Attorney’s Office is still refusing to allow Seattle Municipal Court (SMC) Judge Pooja Vaddadi to hear domestic violence and DUI cases. SMC Judge Damon Shadid vigorously criticized this decision in open court earlier this month.

The King County Prosecutor’s Office has paused youth felony diversion due to a limited analysis that showed a recidivism rate of 53% for youth being referred to Restorative Community Pathways for felonies. Some of these cases will instead be referred to court-supervised diversion programs, but these programs are currently lacking in capacity and also lack other benefits provided by community-based programs. An audit of Restorative Community Pathways is due later this summer. 

Last week, a meeting of Seattle’s housing and human services committee was unable to convene due to a lack of quorum after both Nelson and Councilmember Rob Saka didn’t show up. Nelson apparently gave a day’s notice about her absence, and Saka was reportedly in his office at City Hall at the time of the meeting. 

As a result, the committee was unable to vote on many appointments that would finally fill the City’s renters commission, which former committee chair Cathy Moore appears to have deliberately let languish as she pursued the idea of including landlords in a body meant to advocate for renter rights. The committee was also supposed to report on accepting $16 million in federal HUD grants. 

Neither Nelson or Saka has given much explanation for what happened. If they deliberately skipped the meeting in order to thwart the renters commission appointments, doing so would be an undemocratic act, the seriousness of which is only magnified by the active erosion of democracy right now at the federal level.

The committee’s business is now supposed to be heard at the full City Council meeting later today, when the renters commission vacancies will hopefully finally be filled. 

Recent Headlines:

Seattle Mayor’s Race Remains a Dead Heat in Polling Read More »

We’re thinking about the Seattle budget early this year

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Seattle News:

First off, we have some new revenue possibilities on the table for Seattle, one of which is progressive and one of which is decidedly not. 

Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck introduced a B&O tax proposal that would bring in an additional $90 million of revenue every year. Should the city council pass the proposal, it will be brought before voters to decide this November. 

There have been some changes to the legislation since my reporting above. Most importantly, there will no longer be a specific spending plan that will be hammered out at the beginning of next year. Instead, the legislation outlines specific investment areas that are allowable uses for the new revenue being generated by the B&O tax restructure. Up to $30 million of the proceeds will be available to use to address potential federal funding reductions within specific categories, while the rest will be used to backfill certain investment areas within the general fund. 

You can take a look at the following presentations for more information:

One big thing to note from the first presentation: Last year, we forecast a 2027 budget deficit of $89 million. However, that number has gotten markedly worse and now stands at $233 million. That is for just 2027’s budget. Depending on how economic conditions develop, that number could continue to go up.

2025’s original deficit, dealt with during budget season last fall, stood around $250 million or so. Harrell chose to address it by reallocating JumpStart payroll tax proceeds away from its spending plan buckets to instead backfill the general fund. It is not clear whether that fix will work a second time to balance 2027’s budget, especially without largely eroding the intended JumpStart investments. 

Following the above presentations, Councilmember Bob Kettle stated he didn’t like how new revenue being passed is given buckets of investment areas for which it can be used. On Bluesky, I explained that often new revenue streams are dedicated to specific investment areas in order to avoid all new funding being used for purposes such as the police department, homeless sweeps, and pet projects of current electeds. Providing funding buckets focuses investment on urgent needs and/or long-term needs (such as affordable housing), meaning those investments don’t have to compete with other funding priorities. Especially with a voter-approved initiative, it’s important to give voters a clear idea of what investments they’re voting to support. 

Council President Sara Nelson also announced this week that should the council implement the state-allowed 0.1% “public safety” sales tax, up to 25% of the collected funds may be spent on “evidence-based treatment” for addiction. Don’t get too excited, though. Up to 25% is less than $9 million, and Nelson provides a long list of initiatives that she says the $9 million would support: a much longer list than $9 million could be realistically expected to pay for. 

PubliCola also expressed skepticism of the announcement, given that at the related press conference, Nelson was “flanked by a much larger contingent of allies from “treatment first” groups.”

Finally, a sales tax is a very regressive tax. We can already expect to see a sales tax increase of 0.2% in King County next year, and this would increase that to 0.3% within Seattle.

The Seattle Public Schools (SPS) school board met this week, but they decided not to take up their moratorium on police officers in Seattle public schools until later this summer. In the meantime, The Urbanist published an op-ed written by SPS students expressing the desire to keep police out of schools. 

The public safety committee heard again from SPD Chief Shon Barnes last week, followed by a full council vote on his confirmation as chief on Tuesday. 

The public safety committee also heard about new legislation that would fine graffiti taggers $1000 per piece of graffiti (Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison’s latest foray into policy making) and an amendment related legislation on chronic nuisance properties that would expand the CIty’s power to hold businesses responsible for illegal activities that don’t take place on their premises. You can read more about both of these pieces of legislation over at PubliCola.

The Families, Education, Preschool, and Promise (FEPP) levy will be on the ballot this November. In addition to the levy providing new investments in student mental health and school safety, which could include money going to SPD, PubliCola reported that the levy will shift funding for 30 programs that are currently supported by the general fund, the JumpStart payroll tax, and the sweetened beverage tax. This adds up to almost $50 million per year. Yikes! 

In the last edition, I reported about an AI pilot being tested by the City Budget Office and Central Staff. Last week we also heard about an AI pilot that began this spring to improve the City’s permitting process.

Lastly, ‘tis the season for endorsements, and The Stranger just came out with their Seattle mayoral endorsement for Katie Wilson. 

Upcoming local events:

There are several upcoming events in Seattle I’d like to call to your attention.

First, on Monday, July 7 at 7pm, there will be a crisis care center townhall at Vermillion to discuss the new proposed site of a crisis care center in Capitol Hill. 

Second, The Burner will be holding a candidate forum on Thursday, July 10 at 6:30pm at the First Baptist Church in Capitol Hill. Present will be three candidates for Seattle City Attorney, three of the four candidates for the City Council D2 seat, and three of the mayoral candidates, including the aforementioned Katie Wilson. 

The Stranger will be hosting their usual candidate forum on Thursday, July 24 at 7:30pm at Neumos. 

Finally, the Mayor’s Office will be hosting “Safer Seattle Community Forums” this summer in each council district, for which you need to RSVP to save a spot. District 2’s forum will be on Thursday, July 10, at Rainier Community Center from 6-7:30 PM. District 4’s forum will be at the Magnuson Community Center on July 15 from 6-7:30 PM. None of the other dates have been announced. 

WA State News:

The Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council released a new forecast, which estimates that WA State will have a $720 million budget deficit over the next four years. Governor Bob Ferguson said he doesn’t anticipate having to call a special legislative session in response to this news. 

“As we begin preparing to draft my first budget, OFM has already communicated to agencies that they need to look for additional savings,” Ferguson said. 

In other words, look for Ferguson to be pushing more austerity in the coming months. 

Recent Headlines:

We’re thinking about the Seattle budget early this year Read More »

SPD wants to stop calling its surveillance program a “pilot” 3 weeks after implementation

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We have more news than usual in this edition because I took a vacation, and then it’s taken a long time to catch up from being on vacation. So let’s get to it!

Surveillance News:

First off, I have a new story out this week about the expansion of Flock license plate readers (ALPRs) in WA state…and how the data is being used to assist ICE/DHS and search for people who have received abortions. I received a tip last week about an audit of the King County Housing Authority’s Flock data that shows it’s likely been accessed for both purposes. I know this is a somewhat technical story, but in my opinion it’s also one of the bigger stories I’ve reported on. 

In important and actionable news, SPD has proposed material updates to its SIRs on CCTV cameras and its real time crime center. You might remember that these cameras and the crime center went live on May 20th of this year. SPD asked for permission to stop calling this program a “pilot” three weeks after everything went live. I don’t know about you, but when I think pilot, I don’t think three weeks of testing is sufficient. 

SPD is asking to add more CCTV cameras to the network in three NEW locations:

  1. Areas around Lumen and T-Mobile Field, including parts of the southern portions of Pioneer Square. 
  2. Areas surrounding Garfield High School between S Jackson St. to the South, E Cherry St. to the North, 20th Ave. S to the West, and MLK Jr. Way to the East.
  3. The Capitol Hill Nightlife District – E Union St. to the South, E Pine St. to the North, Broadway to the West, and 12th Ave. to the East. In addition, Neagle Pl. between E Pine and E Denny Way.

SPD is also asking to integrate SDOT’s traffic-monitoring cameras into its real time crime center, expanding its surveillance scope yet again.

Comments on the two surveillance impact reports (SIRs) for these changes are due on Monday, June 23. To comment on the addition of more CCTV cameras and making the surveillance program permanent after 21 days, click here. To comment on the addition of SDOT traffic cameras to the real time crime center, click here. 

In other surveillance news, the Seattle City Council approved Starchase for SPD use. Washington State Patrol has started using cell phone data to predict where people will practice unsafe driving habits, such as speeding and texting while driving, to increase patrols in those areas. Florida Highway Patrol appears to be taking advantage of Flock’s database to hunt immigrants, and law enforcement agencies in southern California have been breaking the law and sharing license plate reader data with out-of-state and federal agencies.

And when it comes to data privacy, I’d be remiss not to highlight reporting that federal Medicare and Medicaid data, including immigration status of patients, has been shared with the Department of Homeland Security. As the Seattle Times wrote, “The shared information includes protected health data from every Apple Health enrollee in Washington, state officials said, totaling about 1.7 million people. Among them are tens of thousands of immigrants, including undocumented immigrants and lawful permanent residents, who receive state-covered health services.”

Seattle News:

The big news as I was leaving on vacation at the beginning of the month was that Cathy Moore is resigning from Seattle City Council. Her last day will be July 7, and the council will be appointing a replacement to serve until the November 2026 election. Applications for the appointment will be open July 2 through July 9, with a public forum scheduled for July 21 and a final council vote scheduled for July 28. 

The tentative budget season calendar has been released, with Harrell’s budget proposal expected on Tuesday, September 23 and a final vote expected on November 21. That final vote is scheduled a little earlier than usual because the general election results are expected to be certified on November 25, meaning Councilmember Mark Solomon will be replaced by whoever wins the D2 general election. 

There are two public hearings for the budget, one on October 7 and one on November 6. The one on November 6 seems a bit tenuous, since the public will only have 48 hours (at most) to review Budget Chair Dan Strauss’s balancing package, and then councilmember amendments are due at noon the very next day. Such a tight turnaround makes it seem unlikely that anything new councilmembers hear during the second public hearing could make it into a proposed amendment unless something similar were already in the works. 

Interim Budget Director Dan Eder also presented to council, saying there is currently a $150 million budget deficit for 2026. That could well get worse, depending on the economy and actions of the federal government. Departments supported by General Fund and JumpStart dollars have been asked to suggest 8% departmental cuts for 2026, except for homelessness and public safety-related departments, which have been asked to suggest 2% cuts. Interestingly the Seattle City Attorney’s Office has been asked to suggest 8% worth of cuts, about which Council President Sara Nelson wasn’t happy. 

One topic of interest that came up was Councilmember Bob Kettle asking if the City is looking into using AI in order to improve city operations. Eder replied that the city budget office and Central Staff started working on this at the end of last year, considering using AI as a tool to compare and contrast some of the support departments as a pilot project to see how efficient the City’s staffing and budgets are for various duties that are common among peer cities. Eder couldn’t share more about a potential timeframe for this effort. 

Interim SPD Chief Shon Barnes is in the process of receiving his council confirmation. You can read his council confirmation packet and his answers to councilmember questions. There’s some interesting stuff in there! He presented before the public safety committee on June 10, making headlines when he said he expected to be jailed under the Trump administration. 

However, later that same day SPD used pepper spray on protesters at the downtown federal building when protesters were trying to prevent ICE from removing immigrants from the building. 

Against the backdrop of the $150 million 2026 Seattle budget deficit discussed above, Barnes has decided to spend $1.38 million annually to hire five new SPD high level staffers from outside the department, including a second deputy chief, another assistant chief, a chief of staff, a chief communications officer, and executive director of crime and community harm reduction. Whew! Thanks to PubliCola for their reporting on this pricey decision.

SPD will also be spending $30,000 for a department-wide training on stratified policing, about which I’ve written here. 

Former SPD Chief Adrian Diaz is suing the City and Mayor Harrell, alleging wrongful termination, retaliation, and wage theft, among other charges. PubliCola and KUOW also received new records about the investigation that led to Diaz’s termination, showing that involved officers feared retaliation (this was also included in the original write-up of the investigation). 

Finally, I interviewed Jeanie Chunn, who is running for the D2 city council seat. 

King County and WA State News:

I wrote a piece last week giving a rundown of the newly released 2024 data for King County’s Health through Housing initiative, which provides permanent supportive and emergency housing. 

The Washington state Supreme Court finally weighed in on caseload standards for public defenders. The new caseload limits take effect on January 1, 2026 and should be implemented as soon as possible, within 10 years. I can’t overstate what a big deal this decision is, and I hope I’ll have time to write a full piece about it sooner rather than later. 

Over at The Stranger, Marcus Harrison Green sat down with state attorney general Nick Brown in an interview that is well worth the read. 

Finally, Jeff Asher ponders why the US murder rate might be falling so much this year, and I want to share his conclusions: “With all of those caveats in mind, when I think about the main factors behind declining murder, a strong investment in communities from private and public sources after the shock of the pandemic stands out as a major cause. There is a wide array of types of support that I would put into the “community investment” basket, including jobs, infrastructure, and programming, but it could be summed up as “we spent a lot of money everywhere on stuff.””

Recent Headlines:

 

SPD wants to stop calling its surveillance program a “pilot” 3 weeks after implementation Read More »

Yes, surveillance technology IS helping ICE and allowing law enforcement to hunt abortion seekers

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Seattle News:

First up, I published an article this week on the debate over bringing police officers back to Seattle Public Schools…and the related debate as to whether the forthcoming FEPP levy should help pay for it. The next school board meeting to discuss the district’s proposal around police in schools, including a potential new Memorandum of Understanding between the district and SPD, will take place on Wednesday, June 4 at 4:15pm at the John Stanford Center. There will be a rally ahead of time at 3:45pm. 

Meanwhile, the City Council’s Select Committee on the FEPP Levy met on Thursday morning and discussed many possible amendments. Several councilmembers signaled that they would like to see police back in schools. 

There has been lots of concern over what data ICE may be accessing in its quest to deport people. Recent record requests show that data collected from Flock’s license plate readers has been shared with ICE for immigration purposes. Uncovered data also shows police in Texas used Flock data to perform a nationwide search for a person who had an abortion. 

Many local municipalities are giving information to ICE in return for funding from the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP). The United States government has collected the DNA from 133,000 migrant children and stores the data in a criminal database.

Locally, Mountlake Terrace City Council is deciding next week whether they should sign onto purchasing Flock’s surveillance services as well. One can only hope someone shares the news of Flock’s data being used to assist ICE and hunt down people who received abortions with the councilmembers prior to the vote on June 5.

The Northwest Progressive Institute released a couple of widely discussed polls this week and last week. One poll showed the mayoral race, and Katie Wilson’s candidacy in particular, is more competitive than some people assumed. Another poll showed how unpopular Seattle’s elected officials currently are. 

Perhaps recognizing the especial unpopularity of the recent proposal to weaken the city council’s Code of Ethics, Councilmember Cathy Moore announced this morning that she withdrew the bill. However, she signaled that she might well revisit the issue again in the future.  

There were a few great investigative pieces this week. Real Change discovered that both SPD and the FBI used confidential informants during the George Floyd protests of 2020. The FBI was also conducting surveillance during that period. As the article says, “Technologies used by the FBI to surveil Seattle protesters could be seen as a way to circumvent Seattle’s surveillance ordinance if the output of that surveillance was fed directly to SPD.”

And in reporting at The Urbanist, it appears that the City was trying to bury an independent report on allegations raised against the OPA and OIG about obtaining and disclosing a protester’s private medical records. According to the Urbanist, the report found that Andrew Myerberg, who was the head of the OPA at the time and now works for the Mayor’s Office, “improperly disclosed the protester’s private medical information, and improperly interpreted the meaning of those medical records, despite not being trained to do so. Improper disclosure means that Myerberg violated state medical privacy laws, and therefore violated City policy.”

However, Jeremy Racca, who works as Mayor Bruce Harrell’s chief of staff and general counsel, in consultation with Pacifica Law Group, LLC, as outside counsel, formed a second opinion that actually what Myerberg did was fine.

Finally, SPD delivered its quarterly sworn staffing, overtime, and performance metrics report to city council this week. SPD is estimating it will need an additional $6.8 million to $10 million by the end of the year to pay for all the extra police officers they are hiring. 911 call response times have gone down because last year CARE and SPD had a project to re-prioritize call types, which moved a bunch of Priority 1 call types down to Priority 2. 

Recent Headlines:

Yes, surveillance technology IS helping ICE and allowing law enforcement to hunt abortion seekers Read More »

Seattle City Council votes in favor of unavoidable advertising in public spaces and weakening their own ethics code

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Seattle News:

Let’s start by talking about a couple of my recent pieces. First, I covered SPD asking to obtain StarChase GPS surveillance technology. Noteworthy in this piece is the public safety committee meeting during which this technology was discussed, in which SPD Captain James Britt said he didn’t know something that would be very difficult not to know if you were in fact in charge of the project of obtaining the StarChase technology for SPD. 

Second, I covered the recent community safety town hall led by Councilmember Rob Saka to address gun violence in the High Point, Snake Hill, and North Delridge neighborhoods. Aside from no city official advocating for investment in gun violence prevention programs in these neighborhoods, there is also an open question about why it’s been taking Seattle City Light so long to repair streetlights in High Point compared to other, wealthier neighborhoods. 

Earlier this afternoon the Council met to discuss the proposal to weaken their ethics rules and the proposal to install advertising kiosks in several Seattle neighborhoods, including downtown, Ballard, and West Seattle. 

The advertising kiosk resolution passed its committee vote 5-0 (committee members are Councilmembers Nelson, Kettle, Hollingsworth, Rivera, and Solomon). 

The ethics legislation passed its committee vote with Rivera and Solomon voting in favor, and Nelson, Kettle, and Hollingsworth abstaining. It will receive a full council vote on Tuesday, June 3 at 2pm. 

Mayor Bruce Harrell has announced his intention to confirm SPD Chief Shon Barnes in his role as police chief, at the same time as Barnes published an op-ed in The Seattle Times about “Seattle-Centric policing.” 

Meanwhile SPD has just committed to spending almost $6 million for yet another ad recruitment campaign.

DivestSPD published an important look at falling crime in Seattle in 2024 and thus far in 2025. Here is a relevant excerpt:

“Crime was way down in 2024 and continues to fall in 2025. Most folks consider that a good thing — unless they’re operating a protection racket that manufactures consent for raises by scaring the public with sensational crime stories. SPOG has been so bereft of good material that it has resorted to using “This is Seattle” to comment on incidents in other cities. According to the Seattle crime dashboard, the violent and property crime rates in 2024 were both lower than in 2018, when SPD had 400 more officers. These trends are continuing in 2025.” 

In June, Seattle will be launching a new “ambassador” program in the CID similar to that already in place in downtown, funded by $500,000 from the city and $500,000 from the Asian American Foundation over two years, with three ambassadors patrolling the area from 2-10pm.

Harrell also announced Seattle’s “summer safety strategy,” which includes limiting many park hours from 4am to 10:30pm and installing a gate at the beloved Gas Works Park, as well as increasing SPD patrols.

There is controversy over King County’s proposal to site one of the five new crisis care centers in Capitol Hill on Broadway and Union. Many residents and businesses signed a letter opposing the location. The proposal should go in front of the King County Council sometime this summer for approval. 

Earlier this year, a King County inquest was held about the SPD killing of Iosia Faletogo at the end of 2018. Howard Gale wrote that this “marked the first time in history an inquest juror found that an SPD officer engaged in criminal conduct.” He also details the biases and confusion built into the county’s inquest process. 

The Urbanist also reported that Inspector General Lisa Judge, who runs Seattle’s Office of the Inspector General, appears to have been paying for private parking with City funds. 

WA State News:

In better news: in 2024, Washington State reported the largest decline in drug overdose deaths in almost a decade, a 12% drop from 2023. Even so, nearly 3,200 Washingtonians still died from an overdose in 2024. Nationwide, overdose deaths dropped 27%. 

Governor Bob Ferguson finally signed the state’s operating budget this week. Here is a list of his vetoes, which are much less extensive than feared but do include programs like a study comparing domestic violence intervention models, an association to coordinate opioid treatment and prevention services, a nonprofit that operates a teen case management and housing connections support program, and grants to entities that provide digital navigator services, devices, and subscriptions, among many others. These changes remove $25 million from the state’s budget, which is a drop in the bucket compared to the total being spent. 

Ferguson also signed the bill that requires Washingtonians to get a permit in order to buy a gun and a bill that gives unemployment benefits to striking workers.

Ferguson signed the bill providing $100 million for a grant program to hire more police officers. It allows the grant funds to be used for other purposes besides hiring more police, including peer counselors, behavioral health co-responders, crisis intervention training, and community assistance programs. 

The legislature did not address the crowding issue at Green Hill School juvenile detention center: “While a new facility opening this year in Aberdeen could offer some relief, the failure to pass significant legislation on the issue means Green Hill is on track to continue housing dozens more people than it is designed to safely hold.” 

Brian Heywood has filed five new state-wide initiatives this spring. He wants to limit annual property tax increases to 0.5% and for all property to be valued at 50 percent of its true and fair value in money and assessed on that basis; he wants more money for homeschooling and private schools at the cost of public education; he wants to ban trans girls from school sports; and he wants to restore the parents’ bill of rights that was amended during the legislative session. What a laundry list of conservative ideas!

Recent Headlines:

Seattle City Council votes in favor of unavoidable advertising in public spaces and weakening their own ethics code Read More »

We’re all waiting to find out exactly how austere the new WA state budget will be

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Seattle News:

Last week I dived into the recent Seattle Auditor’s Office report on gun violence patterns in Seattle for The Urbanist.

At the public safety committee meeting on April 8, Chief Innovation Officer Andrew Myerberg presented on the search for a new Office of Police Accountability (OPA) director. The search committee consists of Councilmember Bob Kettle, SPD Assistant Chief Tyrone Davis, CPC co-chair Joel Merkel, and Lisa Daugaard, the co-executive director of PDA. The first consideration date for candidates is today, 4/25, interviews of finalists will be all day 5/16, and meetings with stakeholders (the three police accountability bodies and SPD) will be on 5/22. 

Mayor Bruce Harrell expects to announce his hiring decision sometime in early June. As with the most recent police chief search, there is no public engagement scheduled around this hiring decision. 

There will be a special public safety committee meeting on Tuesday, April 29 to discuss Seattle’s police accountability system, including moving forward with the appointment of Eci Ameh as Executive Director of the Seattle Community Police Commission (CPC).

As has been previously reported by Guy Oron in Real Change, homeless encampment sweeps have escalated a large amount during Harrell’s tenure as mayor. And now The Seattle Times is even reporting on the story, writing, “To hide from the city’s escalating pace of encampment removals, homeless people say they are hiding deeper in the woods, where assaults, overdoses and emergencies can go unnoticed. Some say they’ve given up on setting up a tent altogether, leaving them less visible but more vulnerable to the elements and predators.”

Seattle has also lost 130 shelter spaces since 2022. Existing spaces are full (95%, which accounts for time spent in turnover). 

PubliCola reported that there have only been five SOAP orders issued since the law was passed more than seven months ago. Four of the five orders were against men who were indigent (making less than $24,000/year or showing they can’t afford an attorney). 

PubliCola also provides important context: “At a time of mass deportations and crackdowns on even legal immigrants, it’s also noteworthy that, according to public defenders, most of the men who get busted for patronizing street sex workers are immigrants. White men have more discreet ways of buying sex, and they’re more likely to be represented by private attorneys, rather than overworked public defenders.”

Meanwhile, in an Urbanist op-ed, Nathan Rouse, who is a candidate for Seattle City Attorney, comes out strong against cash bail for nonviolent misdemeanors. It’s worth reading what he has to say, and he includes many links for those interested in learning more. I’m curious what his opponents think about bail reform and whether this will be an issue on which the candidates differ. 

King County/WA State News:

My latest article is out at The Urbanist today, looking at the intersection between what’s going on with the state budget right now and how that will impact King County, with a particular focus on the bill that would have lifted the property tax revenue growth cap and the bill that would allow municipalities to raise the sales tax 0.1% as an additional “public safety” tax. 

In a letter delivered today, King County Councilmembers Girmay Zahilay and Rod Dembowski ask Executive Shannon Braddock to propose this new sales tax. Last I heard, neither councilmember had signed the letter to Ferguson asking for him to reconsider his resistance to the property tax cap lift. 

It should be an exciting few days in Olympia as this legislative session is slated to end this Sunday, April 27. A few news tidbits in the meantime: the bill to create a permit-to-purchase program for guns has been passed by both chambers and will become law if Ferguson signs it. It looks like the Senate might be creating the wealth tax “test balloon” that Ferguson indicated might be acceptable to him. And Senate Democrats have proposed a 55% cut to abortion access funding in the state, right at a time when medical agencies providing these services are under severe attack from the federal government. The House Democrats have preserved this funding, and we’ll find out soon if they prevail in this matter. 

King County’s 2024 Point in Time Count was released this week, saying 16,868 people experienced homelessness on any given night in 2024. This is 26% higher than in 2022. Homelessness continues to disproportionately affect communities of color, including Black, Indigenous, and Hispanic people. 

There are more than two people per every shelter space in King County, and in North King County, this number is much worse at 9.6 people per bed. You can read more about it at PubliCola.

Meanwhile, PubliCola also reported that the current state budget cuts funds for former Governor Jay Inslee’s right-of-way program, which resolves encampments on state-owned rights of way through extensive outreach. 

National News:

Jeff Asher, a nationally recognized crime data analyst, released an essay announcing that crime is down down down. His own words: “All we can say with certainty is that major crime — as counted by the FBI — almost certainly declined quite a lot in the first quarter of 2025. These would be record levels of decline for most crime types if they held up for the full year.”

I’ll add my usual disclaimer about taking crime data with at least some salt.

Recent Headlines:

 

We’re all waiting to find out exactly how austere the new WA state budget will be Read More »

Turmoil continues at SPD; WA State legislators search for new revenue to bridge a huge deficit

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Seattle News:

First of all, my interview with Seattle City Attorney candidate Erika Evans is now out. This race is shaping up to be very competitive, with three candidates challenging incumbent Ann Davison. I think one of the big challenges of the race will be for the three candidates, who are united in their criticism of Davison, to distinguish themselves from one another. 

I also had a piece out about SPD and an email that recently came to light. In mid-January, SPD COO Brian Maxey wrote to the head of the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission, calling the department “increasingly unstable” and referencing “chaos.” I also take a look at all the recent lawsuits coming out of SPD and how SPD complaint systems are potentially being weaponized.

The revenue report for the end of 2024 was released this week, and it contained bad news about the JumpStart payroll expense tax, which collected $47 million less in 2024 than forecasts had predicted. It is important to note, however, that the tax still brought in more money in 2024 than it did in 2023 (by $45 million.) 

This underscores the dangers of using the JumpStart tax to backfill the general fund as opposed to using it to fund affordable housing, investments which can more easily be adjusted to match whatever revenues are produced by this more volatile funding source.  

Last week, Councilmember Cathy Moore decided to direct $1 million in City funding for survivors of commercial sexual exploitation to The More We Love, bypassing a competitive bidding process that had been expected by other providers in the region.

As PubliCola reports, “Representatives from existing Black-led groups that work with survivors said that by giving $1 million to a white-led group that has not previously held a contract to work with CSE survivors, the city is ignoring and undermining the expertise of organizations that focus on Black and brown survivors, who make up a disproportionate number of people in the commercial sex trade.”

And also, “Many of the organizational leaders who spoke to PubliCola said they felt the city had not only wasted their time but violated their trust.”

Finally, Councilmember Rob Saka’s resolution denouncing the defund movement passed a full council vote this week. Councilmembers Alexis Mercedes Rinck, Cathy Moore, and Dan Strauss were not present for the vote. 

In order to clear up any confusion, this ordinance was not necessary to end Seattle’s consent decree. In addition, it does not provide a complete assessment of all the reasons behind SPD’s attrition in recent years, which mirrors that of other police departments across the country. DivestSPD brought up the point that many police officers hired in the 1990s by COPS grants started reaching retirement age in the past ten years. In addition, some officers left due to Covid vaccine mandates. 

PubliCola does an excellent job covering some of what was said about this ordinance on Tuesday.

That this resolution would be a top matter of council business over the last few weeks appears to demonstrate a lack of urgency on the part of certain councilmembers when it comes to the rolling impacts of federal-level decisions made during that same time period. 

Next week I’ll be covering the latest news of local impacts due to the decisions of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk. This week, committees from both the King County Council and the Seattle City Council received more information about what’s happening on the ground right now. 

King County News:

As one of his last acts as King County Executive, Dow Constantine nominated Matt Sanders, who is currently acting as the interim director of the King County Department of Public Defense, to continue as the permanent director. The King County Council will vote on whether to confirm this nomination sometime in the next few months. 

SEIU 925, the union that represents public defenders and other legal professionals in the department, opposes this nomination, PubliCola reported. PubliCola writes: “Rank and file union members have expressed concerns about Sanders, saying his management style has contributed to low morale and high turnover at the agency.” 

The union prefers Snohomish County public defense department director Jason Schwartz for the position.

This week the King County Council appointed Deputy County Executive Shannon Braddock to serve as acting County Executive following the departure of Dow Constantine for Sound Transit. Braddock indicated interest in AI implementation during her brief tenure as County Executive, even though this is a policy area about which she said, “I am not a technology expert. I don’t know these things.” 

Another death has been reported at the SCORE jail this week, marking at least 11 deaths that have taken place inside the jail in a 2-year period. PubliCola has been untiring in its coverage of this local deadly jail, even though “Rivera was the only one of 45 city leaders from the six cities that own SCORE who agreed to speak to PubliCola about conditions at the jail.” (Rivera is a councilmember from Renton.) 

As Andy Engelson, the reporter covering this story, told me on Bluesky, “The only time SCORE has answered questions from one of the 6 cities that own it, there were just 12 minutes for questions and no time for public comment.” 

WA State News:

Yesterday I had a piece out that covers the discussions around the state’s operating budget, which will need to be finalized before the end of the month. There are many progressive revenue options on the table for the House and Senate to discuss. Complicating matters, Governor Bob Ferguson has indicated he will veto any budget that implements the so-called “wealth tax” or that doesn’t have $100 million over two years for police hiring grants. 

Apparently state Democrats are now looking for alternate taxes to make up the difference in revenue that would have been provided by a new wealth tax. Options include other business taxes and changing the capital gains tax. Many of the taxes under discussion, however, bring in relatively small amounts of revenue compared to the wealth tax, which was estimated to provide between $2.4 and $4 billion annually beginning in fiscal year 2027. 

The state legislative session is scheduled to end on April 27.

Recent Headlines:

Turmoil continues at SPD; WA State legislators search for new revenue to bridge a huge deficit Read More »

Toxic work environments reported at both the Washington governor’s office and the Seattle mayor’s office

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Seattle News:

First off, let’s catch up on last week’s public safety committee meeting, which featured a presentation about the CARE alternative response team from CARE Chief Amy Barden. 

As of last week, the CARE teams are responding city-wide, 10 hours a day, seven days a week. Thus far they have answered 1,648 calls, of which 30-40% is giving someone a ride. Barden mentioned that the CARE department, which currently consists of the CARE alternative responders and 911 dispatch, needs more administrative support in order to grow. 

However, CARE is currently limited by the SPOG MOU to an upper limit of 24 responders, which is not enough to meet the current demand of calls, let alone an expansion that would grant more coverage across the city 24/7. HB 1816, which I reported on last month, might have rectified this issue, but unfortunately it didn’t receive a floor vote last week so is effectively dead. 

It is unclear to me if the previous MOU with SPOG has done enough to establish the CARE team’s body of work for them to expand without further bargaining, as I have heard different answers to this question, which hinges on how the MOU is interpreted.

 It is also unclear to me if there is any other avenue beyond further bargaining with SPOG to move the CARE team away from dual dispatch so they’re able to respond to calls without police being present. It is very clear at this point that doing so would be safe (a fact we already knew from the data from alternative response teams doing similar work in other cities). Barden says some SPD sergeants feel comfortable clearing CARE teams to answer calls alone over radio channels, while others do not. 

Barden is adamant that public safety in Seattle would improve if she were able to send the best first response. At the council meeting, she cited the NICJR report on 911 calls in Seattle, saying that the study said 80% of calls had nothing to do with criminal behavior or law enforcement and that only 6% of calls had some kind of criminal implication. She also emphasized how much money the City would save by dispatching the CARE teams more often.

Some councilmembers were very critical of Barden’s efforts thus far, saying she isn’t doing enough. They didn’t all seem cognizant of the barriers erected by the SPOG MOU, in spite of the fact that several journalists have covered this issue, and at some length. 

Some councilmembers seemed to be unaware that many services have been perennially underfunded and not scaled up to the level of need. Happily, PubliCola covered this, writing, “One thing Barden didn’t bring up explicitly is that the CARE Team can only refer to services that are available, and that those services—including long-term treatment, case management, housing, and even basic detox—are not as ample and widely available as council members repeatedly suggested. Nor is it a great use of resources to send people through inadequate light-touch services again and again, Barden noted.”

Councilmember Martiza Rivera asked why Barden hasn’t taken on the role of coordinating services for folks in need, including with community-based organizations, which she said is directly in the CARE department mandate. Barden said that Senior Deputy Mayor Tim Burgess hasn’t given her license to take on that aspect of the department’s work yet because he thinks she lacks capacity. 

Two more interesting things of note from this meeting: Barden said SPD put together a work group last year to reassign call types. The results of this work are that in February of 2025, 911 received 50% fewer Priority 1 calls than in February of 2024. 

Secondly, Councilmember Cathy Moore, who was perhaps the most adamant in repeating how many services are already available for people in need, stated her interest in increasing involuntary confinement. “Your civil liberties do you no good if you’re dead,” Moore said.

I hope that, especially in these times, we can see the dangerous slippery slope to which that argument leads. I have written before about how when it comes to people’s rights around involuntary confinement in Washington State, amendments have chipped away at the original robust law, making it easier to force involuntary treatment on vulnerable people. And at a time when Americans’ civil rights are under direct and robust attack, Moore’s words perhaps do not land the way she intended. 

The Mayor’s Office held a press conference this week to celebrate the expansion of the CARE teams city-wide.

In other news, there has been a second SODA order issued, this time in the CID. However, Davison says there have actually been three SODA orders and one pending SOAP order. She says the reason these aren’t being used more often is a combination of police officer training taking time and judges not granting these orders as part of their rulings.

Late last Friday, KUOW broke the news of former Senior Deputy Mayor Monisha Harrell, also the niece of Mayor Bruce Harrell, speaking out about the toxic working environment of the Mayor’s Office. As KUOW reported, “She describes the mayor’s office as being a dog-eat-dog environment where white male advisors vied for power and influence. She said her experience, as a high-level woman ignored by the mayor and his lieutenants, is not unique at City Hall.”

The article continues, “KUOW spoke with six other women with ties to the mayor’s office who supported Monisha Harrell’s account of a boys’ club environment where women were condescended to and shut out of important meetings, even though their roles would suggest they be included.”

Tying into the above story, PubliCola reported on several women who have decided to come forward in the wake of a mayoral staffer being accused of sexual assault. The King County Prosecutor’s Office has not yet made a charging decision in this case, but several women have come forward to tell their own stories about their interactions with former external affairs director Pedro Gomez, which appear to illustrate a pattern of behavior that involves Gomez making promises to help women professionally while bragging about his influence, plying them with large amounts of alcohol that they feel pressured to accept, and then making sexual advances and/or trying to get them to a private location. 

It is worthwhile to read both of the above articles in their entirety. 

Washington State News:

Washington State Senate and House Democrats plan to release their budget proposals on Monday, March 24. 

The news from this week’s updated state revenue estimate was not good. While the state is expected to bring in $54.4 million more than expected in the 2023-2025 biennium, it is expected to bring in almost $900 million less in 2025-2029, leading to a total further deficit of $845 million. This is on top of the already existing deficit that Governor Bob Ferguson most recently estimated at $15 billion over the next four years. 

Senate Democrat budget leaders just released their 2025 revenue proposal, which is admirably ambitious, given the scope of financial problems confronting the state. I will be writing at more length about this soon, but in addition to one version of a wealth tax and a state-level Jumpstart-like tax, the package does include lifting the 1% annual cap from property tax increases, which would give King County a fighting chance to eventually recover from their current tough budget situation. 

Meanwhile, Ferguson’s office has been undergoing quite a shakeup. Last week, his legislative director Joyce Bruce quit, following the recent resignation of his deputy legislative director Shawn Lewis, which raised troubling questions about the working environment at the governor’s office and left it short-staffed in the middle of a challenging legislative session. 

This week, top Ferguson aide Mike Webb, who had worked for Ferguson since at least 2012, resigned with this statement: “I deeply regret that the allegations of a hostile work environment have created an unhelpful distraction that impacts the team’s ability to do their work, as well as my ability to be effective in the near term. To be blunt, given the stakes of the work ahead, I cannot stomach that.”

Ferguson is expected to retool his administration in the wake of these resignations, and some state lawmakers are hoping for a re-set. 

Ferguson is also garnering criticism from state workers over his proposal to furlough government workers one day a month to save money. However, it is unlikely that state Democrats would support this proposal. 

Finally, if you’re wondering why universal health care for Washington State is not on the agenda for this legislative session, The Stranger writes about what happened to the proposed bills. 

Recent Headlines:

Election Season: 

Toxic work environments reported at both the Washington governor’s office and the Seattle mayor’s office Read More »