King County youth jail

Seattle City Council considers undoing more of the work of their predecessors

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This time their focus is on the JumpStart spending plan, participatory budgeting, and less lethal weapon legislation.

Seattle News:

First off, this week Judge James Robart held his annual hearing to determine the status of Seattle’s consent decree. I wrote about it in detail here. Of note, the Mayor’s Office just transmitted new legislation to the City Council that would replace the less lethal weapons ordinances passed in 2020 and 2021 in response to SPD’s violence during the George Floyd protests. 

This new legislation would remove the personal right of action from people harmed from less lethal weapons, allow mutual aid partners (law enforcement agencies other than SPD who come into Seattle to help out) to use less lethal weapons, and leave it up to the discretion of SPD policy as to which particular less lethal weapons they can use. It complies with the state law about the proper use of tear gas and adds a few additional restrictions. 

During the consent decree hearing, Judge Robart praised the OIG, their work, and their independence. But a recent article in The Urbanist questioned that very independence, as an OIG-planned audit on policies of use of SPD mutual aid was ultimately downgraded to a short review.

This week the Seattle City Council has started their budget issue identification meetings. You can look at presentations about JumpStart, HSD (memo), the Unified Care Team, and Participatory Budgeting (memo), among others. Presentations on SPD, the CARE team, Seattle Fire Department (SFD), and the City Attorney’s Office (LAW) will be given on Monday.

I’ll be writing more about the newly proposed JumpStart legislation soon, but in a nutshell, the new legislation would add the General Fund as an approved use of JumpStart funds (along with the original purposes of affordable housing, Green New Deal, equitable development, and small business, and newly added student mental health). Further, the legislation would do away with any percentage mandates for each category. In practice, what this means is that in future, the Mayor and/or Council could use 100% of JumpStart dollars for General Fund purposes.

For participatory budgeting, the public voted on six different projects that are to receive $27.3 million worth of funding. During this budgeting season, the Council needs to pass legislation to implement the program and allow the funds to be appropriated to the relevant departments. Otherwise, the projects won’t go forward as planned.  

You can read my live tweets of this meeting here. Councilmembers expressed concerns that the chosen projects do not obviously benefit Black communities as much as they think they should. They expressed particular confusion over the presence of the CARE alternative response team expansion as one of the projects, apparently forgetting that one of the reasons advocates originally wanted alternative 911 response was to limit the interactions of BIPOC community members with the police, especially given SPD’s history of biased policing. 

On the other hand, some councilmembers expressed the need to fulfill commitments made to community since 2020. To go back now on projects that the community voted on in a City-approved process would be quite a bold decision that would likely lead to the erosion of community trust. 

However, councilmembers did ask about the possibility of only funding some of the projects voted for by community. Budget Chair Strauss suggested the possibility of adding funds to include more dollars for projects that would benefit communities of color. 

During the HSD presentation, councilmembers had some questions about the $2 million allocated for commercial sexual exploitation interventions. There was a suggestion that the 5 proposed new staff positions within HSD to support survivors and interventions was perhaps too many, although having one position to coordinate the work could be of value. There was interest in instead giving a larger proportion of the money to community-based organizations.

Councilmembers also had a lot of questions about the $4.25 million investment in school-based violence intervention services, the proposal for which originated with the Mayor’s Office’s plans for the $20 million for student mental health passed last year through a tiny increase to the JumpStart tax. A lot of details about these services remain to be decided by HSD, which gave certain councilmembers some pause, even while they all agreed that gun violence in schools is an issue of utmost importance. 

There was also some confusion about the difference between this new program and the Seattle Community Safety Initiative (SCSI) that began in 2020. One of the key differences between the two programs is that the SCSI is community and neighborhood based, while the new program is school-based, with violence intervention specialists and case managers imbedded within 11 chosen target schools. Another key difference is that the focus of the SCSI is more towards response, while the focus of the new school program is more about prevention and interruption, meaning the goal is to stop the violence before it happens whenever possible.

King County News:

King County is also going through their budget cycle. While they usually pass a biennium budget, this time around they are passing a budget for the single year of 2025. 

This week they held their second budget panel on public safety, where the King County Sheriff Office (KCSO) gave a presentation about their budget priorities. KCSO now has 71 vacancies, down from a high of 120 vacancies in the summer of 2022. 

The committee then went through a list of several questions they had from last week’s meeting. You can download the informational packet about various budget questions they were considering here. 

One issue that stood out was that the Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention (DAJD) is planning a gap analysis to better understand the gaps of service faced by juveniles having longer stays in the youth jail. The youth jail was originally designed to be for short term detention only, but the recent trend has been for youth to experience much longer stays at the site. However, this DAJD analysis isn’t due until later next year to be addressed in the 2026-2027 budget, even though these kids have already been suffering and this problem has already been identified for some time. Councilmember Jorge Baròn said he would work with the DAJD to try to move up that timeline because as it stands, any actual action to improve the situation wouldn’t take place until well into 2026. 

Also being considered is the increased funding need of the Department of Public Defense (DPD) given the bar association’s newly adopted standards for public defenders that is reducing the caseloads of attorneys. This drop of allowable caseloads will mean the need for more attorneys to cover the same number of cases. 

The Stranger recently interviewed newly appointed interim director of the DPD, Matt Sanders, who talks about the current public defender crisis in the state of Washington and how you can weigh in as the state Supreme Court considers the matter. 

Recent Headlines:

 

Seattle City Council considers undoing more of the work of their predecessors Read More »

Harrell’s proposed budget might lead to permanent defunding of affordable housing

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Seattle News:

The big news this week is Mayor Bruce Harrell’s proposed 2025-2026 budget. Here is an overview from the Budget Director of the proposed budget, along with a list of summary and related articles:

In the proposed budget, Harrell moved MORE than the amount of the deficit from the Jumpstart tax fund to cover that deficit. (For those who want figures, he’s transferring $287 million from Jumpstart to the General Fund, and his Budget Director is now saying the deficit for 2025 is around $250 million.) 

This means significantly LESS money for affordable housing, the Green New Deal, small business support, and the Equitable Development Initiative, which Jumpstart is supposed to fund. 

He also cut many programs and 159 positions, 76 of which are currently filled. This means 76 layoffs.

Through a combination of defunding affordable housing and other Jumpstart prioritizing, cutting city programs, and planning for layoffs, he was able to fund some new priorities in the proposed budget, many of which center around public safety.

SPD’s budget is increasing by 16%, or $62 million, in 2025, standing at $457 million. It now constitutes 26% of the entire General Fund. The department’s “ghost cop” positions are maintained, and 30 more civilian positions are added, including 7 new civilian investigators, 2 new special parking enforcement officer positions, and 21 new Real Time Crime Center analysts, 12 to begin in 2025 and the remainder to begin in 2026.

SPD emphasis patrols in the new SODA and SOAP zones will receive an additional $10 million. Almost $4 million are allocated for the surveillance technology pilot that includes RTCC software and CCTV cameras, compared to $1.5 million allocated for this purpose in the 2024 budget.

Seattle will be spending almost $3 million for beds at the SCORE jail in Des Moines, as well as an additional $2 million for more beds in the King County Jail. 

The Unified Care Team that performs the city’s encampment sweeps will be receiving an additional $3.19 million and will be conducting sweeps on weekends.

There will also be legislation transmitted to the council to make permanent the city’s ability to use the Jumpstart payroll tax funds to pay for General Fund priorities however it chooses. Were this change to be made permanent, in future years it could lead to even further defunding of affordable housing, Green New Deal, small business support, and the Equitable Development Initiative. 

The next opportunity to give public comment on the budget is on Wednesday, October 16 starting at 5pm. Budget Chair Dan Strauss has said everyone planning to speak at that particular hearing will receive two minutes to speak. (During most of the public comment periods, if there are enough speakers present, time will be cut to one minute or even 30 seconds.)

If you want a break from thinking about the budget, you can read my article on the new surveillance technology approved by the public safety committee this week. A final vote on the new technologies–CCTV cameras and RTCC software–is expected on Tuesday, October 8 at 2pm.

Other News:

King County Executive Dow Constantine announced the county’s proposed budget this week. Some investments include: 

  • $7.9 million to maintain the Regional Peacekeepers Collective’s work to prevent gun violence
  • $2.3 million for 13 new juvenile detention officers at the Patricia H. Clark Children and Family Justice Center, otherwise known as the youth jail; two new juvenile probation counselors; and additional community programs and transition navigators for youth in and exiting detention
  • $1.725 million for installing “jump barriers” and replacing bunks at the King County Jail to make it harder to commit suicide
  • $56 million to support affordable housing projects within a half mile of a transit station

Marcus Harrison Green wrote (his first?) column at The Stranger in defense of closing the youth jail. Here’s a little taste:

“Instead of blaming a strategy to diminish incarceration that has not been fully implemented, fully funded, or fully committed to, you’d think he and other King County Council Members might be the first to admonish and blame our current system, which is still heavily focused on a carceral approach that has resulted in a 61% rise in juvenile bookings last year, and the same percentage rise in bookings so far this year—returning us to the incarceration levels of 2019.”

Tacoma’s police chief was suddenly placed on leave earlier this week, and in a bizarre turn, the city is refusing to answer any questions about it. 

Recent Headlines:

 

Harrell’s proposed budget might lead to permanent defunding of affordable housing Read More »

How the democratic process in Seattle is being undermined by the City Attorney’s Office

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There hasn’t been a huge amount of news as we all recover from the long weekend, but let’s look at what we’ve got this week.

Seattle News:

This weekend there was follow-up on a story I wrote last March about Seattle Municipal Court Judge Pooja Vaddadi. If you remember, the City Attorney’s Office (CAO) announced they would file an affidavit of prejudice against Vaddadi on all criminal cases going forward. Six months later, this tactic to prevent Vaddadi from hearing criminal cases is ongoing. 

Now Judge Vaddadi, recently returned from maternity leave, has published an op-ed in The Stranger sharing her perspective on this unprecedented step on the part of Davison. 

In her own words: “This behavior has a significantly negative impact on the Court and our democratic process. If prosecutors can effectively nullify a sitting judge this way, we do not have real elections. To my knowledge, this is the first time in Washington history that a prosecutor has made it so a particular judge will never hear any criminal cases.”

Vaddadi claims every detail named in the memo written by then-Criminal Division Chief Natalie Walton-Anderson, who now works for the Mayor’s Office as the Director of Public Safety, is false, and many of its false claims, even were they true, do not reflect the bias of which Vaddadi has been accused. Neither Vaddadi nor any reporter has been able to obtain the details for the cases cited in the memo. Vaddadi is blunt in her op-ed: “The CAO has failed to provide any evidence of this case simply because it does not exist.”

The memo in question was circulated only a few weeks after Vaddadi had disqualified a prosecuting attorney from a case due to a “potential ethics and evidentiary issue,” the only decision made by Vaddadi that the city has appealed. Her decision was later held up by the Superior Court. 

As budget season quickly approaches, it is also relevant to point out that not only do these blanket affidavits undermine the democratic process of electing judges in Seattle, they are also costing the city additional money, as it now needs to hire pro tem judges to cover the cases Vaddadi is not able to hear. 

In other news, Seattle kids returned to school on Wednesday, and there is a report that on the first day of school, an SPD officer sat in Garfield’s parking lot most of the day. Two security guards were also observed patrolling, and some members of Community Passageways were present at lunchtime. 

King County News:

Following the King County Council’s vote last week to support a non-binding motion to keep its youth jail (The Judge Patricia H. Clark Children and Family Justice Center) open, The Stranger reported on how Councilmember Girmay Zahilay’s vote in favor of this motion seems to contradict his 2019 platform to “dismantle our current youth prison model.” The article speculates that Zahilay might have chosen to vote in this way due to a desire to become the next King County Executive; if he’s preparing for a run next year, he might benefit from distancing himself from the “radical” left. 

However, Zahilay  told The Stranger that his position on youth incarceration hasn’t actually changed that much, and that the community groups that helped him develop his platform back in 2019 were in favor of his amendments to the recent motion, which was originally put forward by Councilmember Reagan Dunn. 

Current Executive Dow Constantine, on the other hand, is sticking with his decision made in 2020 to work towards closing the youth jail. He told The Stranger, “The youth justice system does not produce the outcomes we all want, which are safe communities and healthy kids.”

As the narrative of increasing youth crime begins to spread both locally and elsewhere in the nation, The Stranger provides an important counterpoint by looking at local case referral numbers: juvenile crime at present seems about on par with pre-pandemic numbers. Bookings into the youth jail are now also about on par with pre-pandemic numbers. Both these numbers had dropped in 2020 due to the pandemic.

The main difference between pre-pandemic and now appears to be that youth are more likely to be using guns, which is a strong argument in favor of investing more heavily in the County’s  gun violence prevention programs that are perennially underfunded. 

King County’s budget season begins at the same time as Seattle’s, with Constantine’s proposed budget dropping on September 24 and council budget briefings beginning on September 25. 

While King County usually does a biennial budget, for this budget cycle they will only be preparing a budget for 2025 in order to avoid budget season overlapping with elections for county offices. Voters recently approved elections at the county level to move to even years, which means those elected for office in 2023 and 2025 will only serve three-year terms. Four-year terms will resume beginning for those elected in 2026. 

Recent Headlines:

 

How the democratic process in Seattle is being undermined by the City Attorney’s Office Read More »

Criticism of the Council’s new proposed drug and sex work laws continues

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Happy Seattle City Council recess! Let’s take a look at what’s been going on the last few weeks.

Seattle’s proposed SODA/SOAP laws:

Perhaps the biggest local public safety story of the past two weeks has been the proposed SODA and SOAP legislation. You can read my summary and analysis of the two bills over at The Urbanist. 

KUOW reported on the differences in crime rates on Aurora in Shoreline as opposed to Seattle:

“[Jim Hammond] pointed to the 8-foot-wide sidewalks, and medians planted with trees, which he said can prevent collisions and provide more safety for pedestrians. These and other upgrades took twelve years and cost $140 million dollars. But Hammond believes they do more to deter prostitution and other types of disorder than the city’s criminal penalties.

“Environments matter,” he said. “If it looks well cared for, and you know people are going to continue to care for it, it just has a different effect on the behavior people are going to engage in in that space.””

The South Seattle Emerald ran an opinion piece discussing the harm caused by a video Councilmember Cathy Moore screened at an open city council committee meeting that showed sex workers walking up and down Aurora Avenue without their consent.

PubliCola did an analysis showing that focusing on “johns” or sex buyers has not historically reduced sex work taking place on Aurora and has a disproportionate impact on Black and Latino men. It also found from court data that SOAP orders were rarely enforced against men. The article quotes Gordon Hill, deputy director at the King County Department of Public Defense as saying, “I think what this law does is going to be incredibly disproportionate. It’s going to be people with immigration challenges, it’s going to be poor people, it’s going to be people of color. So the degree to which it works at all is only going to [exacerbate] the inequities in our criminal legal system.”

Overall there has been a lot of resistance to the proposed SOAP bill. Less featured in articles has been the similar SODA bill that targets downtown and CID drug users. But this bill also has concerning ramifications, as I explain in my article:

“The SODA bill would make it much easier for the City Attorney’s office to criminalize poverty and substance abuse disorder. As it stands now, when someone is arrested for public drug use, their drug use must be proven in court. This requires sending samples to the Washington State Patrol Crime Laboratory, which is currently backed up. But if someone is put under a SODA order, they can later be arrested for violating that order, and their drug use never has to be proven in order for them to be convicted of a gross misdemeanor.”

The Martin Luther King Jr. County Labor Council just adopted a resolution against both these pieces of legislation. 

The public safety committee will take up these two bills again on Tuesday, September 10. 

Other Seattle News:

I also had a piece in The Urbanist about the newly announced school safety plan for the 2024-2025 school year. 

Here are the investments being made:

  • $5.6 million for additional school-based mental health counselors and a health coordinator totaling 42 new positions (City of Seattle)
  • $2.4 million for telehealth therapy services (City of Seattle)
  • $4.25 million for violence interruption programs in partnership with community-based organizations, including safe passage programs, new violence intervention specialists working directly out of focus schools, individual case management for those students most likely to experience gun violence, and a new family resource fund. (City of Seattle)
  • $2.3 million for increasing staffing on the safety and security team, including hiring an executive director of student and community safety, and school infrastructure such as cameras, perimeter fencing and gate improvements, and classroom door lock enhancements (Seattle Public Schools)

The city’s $12.25 million investment is all coming from the tiny increase in the JumpStart payroll tax passed by the city council during last year’s budget deliberations. However, both the Mayor and the Council declined to spend the full $20 million amount available this year in spite of students’ urgent requests for further assistance. It will be interesting to see if the full $20 million amount is included in Mayor Bruce Harrell’s proposed budget coming out on September 24.

The Community Police Commission (CPC) continues to implode. PubliCola announced on August 23 that the CPC had hired an acting director to fill in for current Director Cali Ellis, who is on administrative leave. Then, less than a week later, PubliCola reported that the new acting director is already leaving for a new position.

Former SPD Chief Adrian Diaz is still classified as Police Chief three months after his removal from the position and is still being paid more than $28,000 per month. Interim Chief Sue Rahr is also being paid, and the total annual compensation for keeping both Chiefs on the books would be almost $700,000. It’s enough to make one wonder how concerned City Hall really is about the upcoming budget deficit.

The new city council continues to receive high levels of criticism for behavior opponents characterize as “undemocratic.” 

The Stranger ran down many of the issues, flubs, and concerning choices coming out of the council so far this year:

“After the City’s unofficial legislative session ended this month, it doesn’t look like the council pleasantly surprised any of their progressive constituents. Instead, the council steamrolled them, stifled them, betrayed them, belittled them, and arrested them–all in the service of a wealthier, older, and whiter Seattle. The only pleasant surprise came in the form of the body’s incompetence and fragility, which delayed some of its most egregious attacks on working people and the poor.”

And an op-ed in The South Seattle Emerald states:

”Policy disagreements can be intense, but we expect our civic leaders to avoid making it personal and focus on legislating. Despite their repeated commitments and pledges of “good governance,” this does not appear to be a core value of the current council majority.”

King County News

The King County Council has been having an interesting week when it comes to youth detention. The Law & Justice committee was slated to once more discuss their legislation changing definitions of what constitutes “solitary confinement” for youth. However, they chose to defer that discussion to allow for feedback from the Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention (DAJD). King County will soon enter their budget season, meaning if they don’t hold a special meeting, the council committee won’t be able to take up this work until after a new budget has been approved later in the fall.

The King County Council also passed a non-binding resolution proposed by Councilmember Reagan Dunn committing to keep the Patricia Clark Children and Family Justice Center open. This is in opposition to Executive Dow Constantine’s 2020 commitment to close the youth jail, a promise he postponed earlier this year. All councilmembers voted in favor of the resolution except Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda, who was absent.

As PubliCola reported: “As of today, there are 59 young people, from 12 to 18 years old, incarcerated at the youth jail, with another 48 on electronic home detention; 61 percent of them are Black.”

King County Metro reported on their highest one-day total ridership in the last four years. About safety, they said: “Security incidents in 2023 were down 12% from 2019 (before the pandemic) and down 22% from the peak in 2020. Drug-related incidents in April 2024 were down 55% from April 2023.”

Recent Headlines:

 

Criticism of the Council’s new proposed drug and sex work laws continues Read More »

Seattle City Council to decide whether to keep promise to students

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Seattle News:

Interim SPD Chief Sue Rahr announced she decided to fire Officer Daniel Auderer, who infamously laughed and mocked the death of student Jaahnavi Kandula last year. 

At this week’s public safety committee meeting, councilmembers unanimously voted to confirm Amy Smith as permanent Chief of the CARE department. Her confirmation will now move forward for a full vote from Council. 

Also at the meeting, Rahr gave a presentation about her first two months as interim police Chief, focusing on staffing, technology, accountability, and criminal justice partners. She mentioned SPD would need additional funds for their new proposed Real Time Crime Center (RTCC) software. She spoke of the need to differentiate between minor and major misconduct in the service of changing SPD’s culture because of how slow the OPA is to process cases. She also wants to make the officer entrance exam “much more low barrier and faster” and spoke about the department still being 400 officers down. 

I wrote more about Rahr’s decision to fire Dave and her remarks at the public safety committee meeting in an article for The Urbanist, coming out soon, so keep an eye open for that!

Following this presentation was a discussion led by City Attorney Ann Davison, Rahr, and Smith about the criminal justice ecosystem. As Publicola reported, “members of the Seattle City Council outdid each other calling for more police, more jail, and harsher punishments for people, like those who sell drugs, who “need to be contained,” as Councilmember Bob Kettle put it.”

There were also a few fact checks necessary for statements made by Rahr during her brief tenure. Axios reported that Rahr issued a directive this month explaining that a 2021 state law doesn’t prevent police from questioning juvenile witnesses after saying the law was impeding SPD’s investigation of the June 6 shooting at Garfield High School. PubliCola clarified that in spite of a statement by Rahr on Tuesday that “it takes multiple convictions of firearms laws before juveniles are held in detention and held accountable,” juveniles are in fact held in detention for firearms offenses, even without a conviction. Whether they are held in detention is at the discretion of the judges.

Mayor Bruce Harrell announced some new public safety investments in his proposed mid-year supplemental budget, including an additional $800,000 for police recruitment marketing.

Harrell also announced the new SCORE jail pilot program that will allow Seattle to send a limited number of misdemeanor offenders to the Des Moines jail, which has an unusually high inmate death rate. The agreement would authorize Seattle’s use of at least 20 beds at the facility at a cost of between $1.5 million to $3 million. The legislation will need to be approved by the Council before being enacted.

Less than a week before this announcement, Department of Public Defense Director Anita Khandelwal withdrew from the stakeholdering process around this new pilot, saying it didn’t feel like anything she said in those meetings would have any impact on the decision-making process. Khandelwal raised several concerns about the city contracting with SCORE in this way.

A day after the SCORE pilot was announced, the news broke that the King County Jail is lifting some of its booking restrictions for people arrested in a specific geographical zone called the Downtown Activation Zone, which includes parts of downtown, the CID, and Belltown. It will accept bookings for some simple misdemeanors such as public drug use and possession. Thus far it doesn’t appear this change will impact Harrell’s decision to contract with SCORE, which could be used to book people who are arrested for misdemeanors outside of the designated zone. 

Tensions between the city of Seattle and King County continue to grow, with Executive Dow Constantine pushing back against Davison’s claim that the King County Jail booking restrictions are compromising public safety in Seattle, reported by The Seattle Times:

“In a message to Metropolitan King County Council members, sent on behalf of Constantine Wednesday, Penny Lipsou, director of council relations, said Davison’s claims are misguided. The jail makes exceptions to booking restrictions when there is a compelling reason, the message said, and Davison’s office has been ineffective at making those arguments in court.

“Rather than attacking the jail (and in past months, the judges), she should first get her own shop in order,” the message said.

The message goes on to invite Seattle to cancel its contract with the county for jail space.”

The invitation for Seattle to cancel the jail contract is particularly spicy, perhaps reflecting the growing frustration between the two municipalities. The message also mentions that the County is currently subsidizing misdemeanor bookings, meaning Seattle is already not paying their full cost.

Following up on last week’s news, Pierce County will not be charging SPD Deputy Police Chief Eric Barden in a domestic violence criminal case. Barden is still at least temporarily on Pierce County’s Brady list and currently being investigated by the OPA for allegedly asking a Pierce County deputy to lie on a police report.

Gun Violence Initiative:

King County recently kicked off their 100 Days of Action against gun violence, and Councilmember Girmay Zahilay introduced $1 million of funding in the county’s supplemental budget to assist in developing a comprehensive strategic plan for combating gun violence. I wrote about this over at The Urbanist, as well as giving an update on the $20 million allocated in Seattle’s budget process last year for student mental health. (Spoiler: Mayor Bruce Harrell only wants to invest half of it this year.)

Councilmember Tammy Morales pushed back on the plan to only spend half the allocated money on youth mental health, suggesting the council contract directly with schools and community organizations on programs that would help youth in the city thrive, including investing in free third spaces, skill building, jobs and apprenticeships. The council will have to decide whether to pursue this investment strategy when they vote on amendments to the supplemental budget in early August. 

King County News:

King County recently won a $450,000 federal grant to improve youth outcomes and expand alternatives for secure detention in King County. Next month, the King County Council will be considering legislation introduced by Councilmember Reagan Dunn that would declare their intention to keep the youth detention center open. Meanwhile, the youth jail is already understaffed, and the recent move to halt intakes at two of the major long-term state-run youth detention facilities is likely to add more pressure to the population of King County’s youth jail, which isn’t designed for longer-term stays.

Recent Headlines:

 

Seattle City Council to decide whether to keep promise to students Read More »

Former SPD Chief Diaz remains in the news

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We’re playing a little bit of catch up, so in this issue we’ll review the news from the first half of July.

Seattle News:

The City Auditor’s Office released a report last week on how the city should optimally respond to overdoses and crime: namely, by implementing a place-based approach to addressing the fentanyl crisis. It suggests measures like activating sidewalks, SPD investigating fatal overdoses, doing more in line with the Rainier Beach: A Beautiful Safe Place for Youth project, and using evidence-based approaches to drug use like medications, harm reduction, and recovery housing and wrap-around services.

Four female SPD police officers have filed a lawsuit against the city and SPD, alleging a pattern of sexual and racial discrimination, harassment, and a hostile work environment, specifically naming former Chief Adrian Diaz and Lieutenant John O’Neill. They had originally filed a tort claim but are now seeking a jury trial. They say “recent revelations by the former police chief are “inconsequential” to the case.”

According to payroll documents, Diaz is still listed as “chief of police” making a salary of $338,000 per year while he remains on personal leave. His successor, interim Chief Sue Rahr, is making $349,000 a year. 

A profile piece in The Seattle Times reported that Rahr “made two demands of Burgess: First, that she’d be paid like a permanent chief, even though her tenure would likely only last for six months; and second, that neither Burgess nor Harrell nor the City Council would dictate how she ran the place. She must be free to hire and fire.”

A request for help: former SPD Chief Adrian Diaz threatened to sue PubliCola and journalist Erica C. Barnett about an article covering his interview with Jason Rantz in which he came out as gay. As a result, PubliCola has incurred significant legal fees. PubliCola is one of the foremost local news publications in our region, and I encourage you to donate to help them pay their legal fees if you can afford to do so. As Barnett wrote, “If public officials can silence journalists by threatening them with baseless lawsuits, it isn’t just one publication that’s vulnerable—it’s any journalist who makes powerful public figures mad by reporting on them, providing analysis, and holding them accountable.”

The three police accountability partners–the Office of Police Accountability (OPA), the Office of the Inspector General (OIG), and the Community Police Commission (CPC), gave their mid-year reports to City Council last week.

An anonymous letter to the city council, written by a whistleblower from within the OPA, alleges that the OPA and OIG deliberately ignored complaints of harassment and workplace discrimination against former Chief Adrian Diaz. 

The vice president of SPOG, Daniel Auderer, who was taped joking about the death of Jaahnavi Kandula last year, had his Loudermill hearing with interim SPD Chief Sue Rahr last Wednesday. Rahr has 21 days from that date to decide what discipline he will be receiving.

Pierce County prosecutors are deciding whether to charge SPD’s Deputy Chief Eric Barden for domestic violence. They are also looking into the serious allegation that Barden asked a Pierce County deputy to include false information in a police report, relating to a different domestic violence incident. Barden has been provisionally added to the Brady list, and after an internal investigation by SPD, Pierce County will decide whether he will remain on the list. The Seattle Times reports that “the court documents reveal a bitter back-and-forth breakup between Barden and the woman, with allegations of abuse on both sides.” 

Seattle appears to be pushing forward with a deal with the SCORE jail in Des Moines, so expect more news about this later in the summer. 

King County and Washington State News:

I don’t think I can put it any better than King5’s headline: Washington sees overall decrease in 2023 crimes despite worst officer staffing rate in US. 

Washington decided to suspend intakes at two juvenile rehabilitation facilities: Echo Glen’s Children’s Center and Green Hill School. Instead of entering these facilities, children will be held at county facilities until population numbers drop. We can expect to see this decision have impacts at the King County youth jail, as the facility is already at pre-pandemic population and suffering from understaffing. The youth jail was not designed with extended stays in mind and has already come under fire for over-using solitary confinement to deal with its staffing woes. 

On Friday, forty-three men over age 21 were transferred from Green Hill to adult prisons. In May, the King County Department of Public Defense filed a petition that conditions of confinement at Green Hill had reached the point of being “unconstitutionally cruel.” According to Washington State law, the forty-three men should have been held in juvenile detention facilities (such as Green Hill) until age 25. Columbia Legal Services sued the state department back in 2022 for unlawfully transferring three men without due process and are currently looking at their options for enforcing the settlement agreement. 

Last week King County and Seattle announced the beginning of their 100 Days of Action against gun violence. King County has pledged $1.6 million to be spent during the 100 days on community-based violence intervention programs and the Harborview hospital-based intervention program. King County Councilmember Girmay Zahilay announced a proposal to allocate $1 million for a longer-term gun violence prevention strategy; this legislation will be voted on by the King County Council on Tuesday. More on this from me soon.

Recent Headlines:

Former SPD Chief Diaz remains in the news Read More »

SPD Expects More Separations than Hires for Another Year, in Spite of Huge Raises

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Seattle News:

First off, my piece on gun violence, student mental health, and the debate on whether student resource officers should return to Seattle schools was published in The Urbanist this week. The Seattle Times also ran an interesting piece reviewing ideas for improving safety in schools.

Last Friday Councilmember Cathy Moore asked interim SPD Chief Sue Rahr to place two members of SPD command staff currently under criminal investigation on leave: Assistant Chief Tyrone Davis and Deputy Chief Eric Barden. Davis is under investigation for alleged sexual assault and Barden is under investigation for alleged domestic violence. As King 5 reported: “Multiple law enforcement experts who spoke with KING 5 called it unusual for an officer under criminal investigation not to be placed on leave.” However, Rahr has said she hasn’t seen substantiated evidence to justify placing either man on leave at this time.

SPD has announced it will end the year with a net loss of officers once again. So far this year, SPD has experienced 40 departures and hired 15 new officers. Their revised projection says there will be 918 deployable officers at the end of 2024. 

Harrell’s office released an interesting statement to KOMO regarding this news: “It is incredibly disappointing that the PSCSC concluded that [the] Public Safety Test (PST) is not a valid exam option for the City of Seattle and did not complete an independent validation study to determine if another entry-level exam would meet our needs and maintain high standards. The PSCSC report indicates that PST declined to participate in their review, yet the PSCSC report also concludes that the PST test is flawed despite this information gap and despite PST expressing interest in partnering with Seattle. We reject PSCSC’s unsubstantiated conclusions.”

This statement appears to exhibit a fundamental misunderstanding of the report PSCSC released last week, which stated that PST asked not to be considered as a testing vendor for Seattle. Furthermore, the PST did participate in some preliminary parts of the review.. And the reasons why the PSCSC recommends against the PST test are clear-cut: a different custom PST test would have to be developed for SPD specifically, which would mean officer candidates would still not be able to submit the results of the same PST they would be taking for smaller jurisdictions. In addition, there are significant legal difficulties with Seattle offering two different tests with such different pass rates. 

That being said, Public Safety Chair Bob Kettle is also upset about the PSCSC report, beginning this week’s public safety committee meeting with remarks about “misleading media reports” regarding the council’s attempts to replace the current police entrance exam with a different exam with a higher pass rate. As reported by PubliCola, “Kettle said he liked the idea of ranking applicants by their test scores and hiring only highly ranked applicants, but added that the city no longer has that luxury because the previous council drove down police applications.”

PubliCola goes on to point out the lower staffing at police departments is a nationwide trend. The Seattle community needs to consider whether we are willing to significantly lower standards for police officers because of this trend.

At the public safety committee meeting this week, councilmembers also discussed Seattle waterways safety and City Attorney Ann Davison’s proposed legislation instituting a $500 fine for street racing.

In legal news, Auburn officer Jeffrey Nelson was found guilty of murder and assault for shooting Jesse Sarey. He is the first police officer in Washington state to be found guilty of murder for on-duty actions. And the city of Seattle must pay $680,000 to four people arrested for writing chalk graffiti onto temporary concrete barricades outside SPD’s Western Precinct. As PubliCola reported:

 ““Based on the evidence presented at trial, the jury found the defendants arrested and booked the plaintiffs because of the content or viewpoint of their speech,” an attorney for the four plaintiffs, Braden Pence, said in a statement. “We hope this verdict will be a warning and a lesson to police officers and other government officials across the country who violate the First Amendment—that they are and will be held accountable when they arrest and jail people for protected speech.””

On Wednesday, Mayor Bruce Harrell announced the CARE pilot program of dual dispatch alternative response will expand, with plans to hire 18 new responders and 3 supervisors. This expansion is being partially paid for by a federal grant. More on this soon. 

Erica C. Barnett of PubliCola wrote about how the new council hasn’t passed a single substantial piece of legislation since taking office at the beginning of January. 

King County and Washington State News:

King County’s Law and Justice committee met on Wednesday to discuss Councilmember Reagan Dunn’s motion declaring the King County Council’s intention to maintain operations at the county’s youth jail. Councilmember Jorge Barón proposed a striking amendment that states the King County Council intends to maintain operations of the youth jail until viable alternatives become operational, supports priorities that emerged from the Care & Closure work, and supports continued engagement with Executive Dow Constantine around this work. 

The committee didn’t have three votes to move anything forward. Councilmember Dunn opposed the motion to table, but Councilmember Claudia Balducci said it was important to be deliberate. Councilmembers Balducci, Barón, and Dembowski voted to table this discussion until the next meeting. 

Also at the meeting, the Office of Law Enforcement (OLEO) presented on their 2023 annual report.

After being rolled out almost two years ago, Washington State’s 988 is answering 91% of calls received. This is slightly better than the national average of 88%.

Recent Headlines:

SPD Expects More Separations than Hires for Another Year, in Spite of Huge Raises Read More »

Seattle City Council Pushed for Easier Police Officer Entrance Exam that the Company Doesn’t Even Want to Provide

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Seattle News:

Seattle City Council voted to pass the expansion of license plate readers (ALPRs). Currently installed in 11 of SPD’s vehicles, the expansion will lead to 360 of SPD’s vehicles having ALPRs. This vote took place in spite of the fact that 3 of the 9 councilmembers were not present at the meeting. Councilmember Cathy Moore asked for a delay of the vote but received no support from her colleagues. It sounds like she intends to abandon her legislation limiting data retention to 48 hours due to the opposition for this data security  measure from the majority of the Council. 

In spite of a few amendments, and without a 48-hour retention limitation, privacy concerns with this expansion still abound, especially for those seeking reproductive or gender-affirming healthcare and undocumented immigrants. At the council meeting, Councilmember Bob Kettle apparently stated that folks are not coming to Washington State for abortions, a statement that is patently untrue.

The Public Safety Civil Service Commission (PSCSC) released their report on police officer entrance exams this week. The recommendation about the test remains the same, that Seattle should continue to use the NTN test as opposed to the PST test (that has a significantly higher pass rate). Of particular note, PST asked to not be considered as a testing vendor for Seattle. 

It is also clear that even if PST was willing to work with Seattle (which they are not), their standard test used by smaller agencies in the region would be inappropriate for SPD, and a new test would need to be developed. This would mean that law enforcement applicants would still have to take a separate test to be considered as an SPD officer, which defeats the stated purpose for switching tests. There are also significant legal difficulties involved with Seattle offering both the NTN and PST tests, which would prevent candidates from being ranked equitably and fairly based on their test results, especially given the large difference in pass rate between the tests (NTN has a 73% pass rate while PST has a 90% pass rate). 

Why the City Council spent so much time pushing for a test that the provider doesn’t even want to provide is an interesting question, particularly given the glaring problems with SPD’s backgrounding process that have come to light over the past several months due to the case of Officer Kevin Dave. PubliCola has now reported that Dave, who struck and killed Jaahnavi Kandula last year, did not have a valid Washington State driver’s license at the time of the collision. 

Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison announced legislation that would bring Seattle into line with new state law around the definition of street racing. However, her legislation would also institute a $500 fine, which is not required by state law. This legislation will be discussed at the public safety committee meeting this coming Tuesday.

Deputy central staff director Aly Pennucci will be leaving the city after 11 years, to become one of two deputy county executives in Whatcom County. Following Julie Dingley’s departure as director of the city’s budget office, this feels like a painful brain drain before the city has to grapple with the 2025 budget deficit. Readers will remember that Esther Handy was also removed earlier this year from her position as head of Central Staff.

PubliCola reported on the hiring of a new head of the Council’s communications office, Brad Harwood, who has an interesting political past, including being quoted as a spokesperson for the state Republican party.

Former Senior Deputy Mayor (and niece to Mayor Bruce Harrell) Monisha Harrell was pulled over for a traffic stop on Sunday, June 16 that she called “frightening”, because of her car having a license plate cover:

“Harrell, who is Black, said the stop was a clear example of the kind of racial profiling the Seattle Police Department pledged to reduce in 2022, when the department adopted a new policy barring police stops for some minor violations, including missing registration stickers and obscured license tabs.

“Despite the gestures SPD has made toward ending racial profiling, Harrell said, it seems like nothing has changed. “We just went through this whole [process of asking], can we do things to minimize unnecessary stops … because it increases the rate of violence between people and law enforcement,” she said. “Sandra Bland,” the Texas woman who died in a jail cell in 2015 after police pulled her over for a minor traffic violation, “was not that long ago. … I get ‘two steps forward, one step back,’ but I cannot explain to you how far back this goes.””

Data collected by SPD themselves shows they continue to struggle with racial disparity in their stops and frisks, with Black and Indigenous community members five times to seven times more likely to get stopped and six times to seven times more likely to be frisked than White community members. 1 out of every 20 Terry stops conducted by SPD is unconstitutional.  

Former SPD Chief Adrian Diaz came out as gay this week in an interview with conservative talk show host Jason Rantz. He appears to be using this news as a defense against allegations against him of sexual harassment, discrimination, and creating a hostile work environment for Black and women officers. He is also now up for a job as Chief of Police in Austin, Texas.

But as PubliCola reported this week, “several current and former Seattle Police Department officers say Diaz established a “dictatorship” at the department in which officers who speak out against the chief and an inner circle of leadership have been demoted or subject to retaliatory investigations.” It is important to note that this behavior, in addition to the previously stated allegations, is not impossible just because a person is gay.

After the recent shooting and death of a student at Garfield High School, there are discussions about whether school resources officers (SROs) should be put back into Seattle schools. One parent wrote an op-ed in The Stranger about the poor experience her son had with Garfield’s SRO back before they were removed from schools in 2020.

Jail News:

Another person in custody at the SCORE jail in Des Moines died on May 9, PubliCola reported. This is the 6th death since March 2023 and the second death in the last two months. This is a very high rate of deaths for a jail, and particularly concerning given ongoing discussions in Seattle to contract with SCORE.

Crosscut reported on the “grim conditions” at the Patricia H. Clark Children & Family Justice Center–the King County youth jail. Staffing shortages there continue to impact youths’ access to programming, including educational programs and enrichment sessions. Youth go long periods without visitors (including attorneys) and are worried about the quality of their drinking water. As I reported in February, this youth jail was originally slated to be closed by 2025, but Executive Dow Constantine has since walked back this commitment, saying it will now be closed by 2028 at the earliest. 

Recent Headlines:

Seattle City Council Pushed for Easier Police Officer Entrance Exam that the Company Doesn’t Even Want to Provide Read More »

A Disappointing SPOG Contract, Ignoring Community’s Interest in Accountabilty, Takes Another Step Forward

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Seattle News:

Mayor Bruce Harrell announced legislation to move forward the new SPOG contract, previously discussed here. The new agreement, which gives SPOG members a total retroactive pay raise of 23%, only covers up until the end of 2023, which makes it “partial.” Negotiations for the 2024 contract are ongoing and currently in mediation. It is worth noting that if mediation fails, the next step would be to go to interest arbitration, the decision of which would be binding for both parties. 

For the most starry-eyed perspective of what this contract accomplishes, you can read the city’s press release, but it’s important to remember that this new contract does not even meet the minimum bar of achieving the 2017 Accountability Ordinance. Many advocates would like to see accountability pushed beyond an ordinance passed 7 years ago. The contract needs to be passed by City Council in order to be finalized.

I wrote a piece covering the current conversation related to SPD police officer recruitment and standards. I cover Councilmember Sara Nelson’s legislation asking to switch the officer candidate entrance exam, concerns with SPD’s backgrounding, and SPD cultural problems, including the recently filed tort claim by four female SPD officers alleging sexual harassment and discrimination. I also point out that Mayor Bruce Harrell’s recent move to hire an independent investigation firm to look into these charges comes an entire 7 months after the 30×30 report was released that uncovered these issues, and only after three separate law suits and tort claims that all allege sexual discrimination. 

The Stranger reported that “Council Member Tanya Woo let it slip last night that Public Safety Chair Bob Kettle and the City Attorney are “looking into possibly taking away the contract with King County and trying to have a contract with SCORE, private jails…” While SCORE isn’t technically a private jail, it does have serious safety concerns and would be more costly than the King County Jail, which Seattle currently uses. Whether private jails are also being looked into or Woo simply misspoke is unclear. 

In a strange display at Monday’s Council Briefing, Councilmember Cathy Moore appeared to be close to a temper tantrum over alleged uncollegial conduct from colleague Councilmember Tammy Morales after Moore voted against Morales’s Connected Communities legislation last week. The legislation would have made it easier to build more affordable housing in the city. You can watch her speech here. Thus far no journalist has been able to uncover any evidence that Morales actually said anything inflammatory. While this doesn’t have anything to do with public safety per say, it is a glimpse into a Council that continues to say bizarre things and occasionally throw facts to the wind. 

As we prepare for budget discussions this fall, it’s important to have an understanding of where the large ($240 million and growing) deficit came from. A new five-year analysis shows that around 79% of budget growth during that time came from keeping up with inflation, including increasing wages for city workers. New and expanded programs supported by the JumpStart tax accounted for 19%. 

As The Seattle Times reported, other budgetary issues have included increased legal claims against the city (much stemming from SPD’s behavior in 2020), increasing insurance costs, and costly technology upgrades.

SPD Officer Daniel Auderer, Vice President of SPOG whose claim to fame is laughing at Jaahnavi Kandula’s death, will be representing SPD at a national traffic safety conference in August in Washington DC. Taxpayers will undoubtedly be footing the expense for this trip.

Payments for the retroactive pay raise for the Coalition of City Unions, previously thought to be delayed until fall, will be given in July instead. The timeline of retroactive pay for SPOG members won’t be decided until after the City Council vote on the new contract.

SPD has ended its use of the experimental BolaWrap, a lasso-like device that they touted for using in situations where people in crisis had knives. In a report, SPD reported using the device only 3 times in 2023, and in one of these incidents the technology failed spectacularly. As The Stranger reports:

“In 2021, the City agreed to restore more than $4 million for SPD’s discretionary spending fund in part based on the justification that SPD needed the money to invest in BolaWrap technology. The decision seemed rooted in the idea that new technologies can stop police violence. But cops often ignore less-lethal options in favor of their guns. In the SPD cases where they killed Caver, Hayden, and Charleena Lyles, no officer used the less lethal tools that SPD already equipped them with, such as Tasers, pepper spray, a baton, or a shield. Still, the City thought the BolaWrap, already a ridiculous concept for a device, would suddenly do the trick.”

King County News:

I wrote an article describing the new guaranteed basic income (GBI) program run by the Workforce Development Council of Seattle-King County, starting in fall of 2022. While this program benefited people from many walks of life, I focused my article on two examples of folks receiving the GBI benefit who were justice-impacted and readjusting to life outside of prison. GBI programs like these continue to show large benefits, both for their recipients and for society as a whole. 

If you’re interested in the work around recommendations regarding the King County youth jail, there will be an informational webinar on Thursday, May 23 from 6-7pm. The Care & Closure Advisory Committee is also reconvening to discuss their two recommendations that were not unanimous: the proposed respite and receiving center and short-term respite housing. Their first meeting will be on Monday, June 3rd at 4pm.

Recent Headlines:

A Disappointing SPOG Contract, Ignoring Community’s Interest in Accountabilty, Takes Another Step Forward Read More »

A Day in the Life of Seattle City Council

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A Day in the Life of Seattle City Council:

The day: Thursday, April 25, 2024

In the morning, Councilmember Martiza Rivera led the Librairies, Education, and Neighborhoods committee meeting, where she blamed the recently announced rotating library closings and reduced hours on the benefits librarians won in their most recent contract. The expense of ebooks were also mentioned as a culprit. Downplayed was the impact of this year’s hiring freeze.

In the afternoon, Council President Sara Nelson led the Governance, Accountability, and Economic Development committee meeting. During public comment, a commenter brought attention to a possible conflict of interest Nelson has with the new gig worker minimum wage rollback legislation, and she interrupted him, attempting to derail his request for her to recuse herself by asking which item on the agenda he was referencing. (It was obvious which item he was referencing.)

During the discussion on the police officer recruitment bill, Nelson brought up the overwhelming nature of climate change, saying because there is no magical solution to climate change, we do nothing. But apparently hiring new police officers is not tough like climate change, hence this new bill, which seems unlikely to have a strong impact on hiring numbers, although it will give the Council someone to yell at if numbers don’t get better of their own accord. 

In the evening, two councilmembers held town halls in their district: Robert Kettle in District 7 and Cathy Moore in District 5. Kettle had friends Council President Sara Nelson and Councilmember Tanya Woo in tow. 

At Kettle’s event, he once again stated his belief that the SPD is the best police force in the nation. A few hours later, the news broke that four more women officers at SPD have filed a tort claim alleging sexual harassment and sexual discrimination by Chief Adrian Diaz, Lt. John O’Neil, and human resource manager Rebecca McKechnie. This is the third suit brought against the SPD for gender discrimination in the last six months. Meanwhile, SPD has been under a federal consent decree for twelve years and the new proposed SPOG contract does not make the accountability changes the presiding judge has indicated he wanted to see before fully ending the decree. And this is the best police force in the nation?

Worse yet, when asked whether the city has ever discussed bringing in the National Guard for “the most dire parts of this community,” Nelson said, “The short answer is yes.” She referenced Gavin Newsom calling in the National Guard in San Francisco. 

Meanwhile, at Moore’s event, she announced she’ll be introducing legislation reinstating the old law against “prostitution loitering” that was unanimously repealed by the Council back in 2020. Yes, even Alex Pedersen voted to repeal this law. 

As PubliCola reports, “The council repealed the laws against prostitution loitering and drug loitering after the Seattle Reentry Workgroup, established to come up with recommendations to help formerly incarcerated people reenter their communities, recommended repealing both laws on the grounds that they disproportionately harm people of color and amount to “criminalization of poverty.””

Moore says she hopes the law will allow officers to approach prostitutes, look for diversion opportunities, and see if they’re being trafficked or not. It is not clear whether this law is actually needed in order for officers to do these things.

Moore also said she’d be voting to approve the new SPOG contract that gives 23% raises to police officers while making few improvements to accountability.

Other News:

The first SPD killing of the year happened last week. 

The King County Law and Justice committee met this Tuesday to discuss the Superior Court’s Jury Participation and Diversity Report and to hear from the Auditor’s Office on the audit they recently performed on the Judge Patricia H. Clark Children and Family Justice Center (CCFJC), otherwise known as the youth jail. They also got an update on implementation of recommendations for all criminal legal system audits since 2020. 

The main findings from the audit on the youth jail were that while the facility was designed for short stays of 30 days or less in mind, most of the youth now held in the jail are staying for longer. 84% of youth have stays of more than 30 days, more than half are there for at least 3 months, and about a third are there for six months. The youth are housed in the CCFJC while waiting for the resolution of their cases.

This is a problem because the facility is not designed with ample green spaces, a big enough gymnasium, and flexible programming space, all of which are needed if youth are staying there longer. Youth staying longer tend to have greater needs as well, and CCFJC doesn’t offer all the appropriate programming. Longer stays in the youth jail have also been shown to increase recidivism. 

The other issue uncovered by the audit was the impact of staff shortages on the care of the youth staying at the facility, as well as on staff morale. Staff shortages lead to modified staffing schedules, which means more time the youth are spending in their cells. During a normal schedule, a youth will spend 11-13 hours in their cell, whereas they will spend at least 14.5 hours in their cell during a modified schedule. 

There have been times when educational class time has been so shortened teachers have worried about meeting state educational requirements. Short staffing can also cause recreation programs to be canceled and make it difficult for youth to meet with mental health counselors. Both teachers and juvenile detention officers end up being stretched thin. 

Right now 79 out of 91 total positions for juvenile detention officer are filled. The low staffing point thus far was in March of 2023, when there were only 68 juvenile detention officers. 

Recent Headlines:

A Day in the Life of Seattle City Council Read More »