Mayor Bruce Harrell’s efforts to address public safety concerns and ongoing gun violence across the city will focus on Capitol Hill and the Central District as his administration will host the next in a series of public forums next week at Garfield High School.

Tuesday night’s meeting will bring Harrell and city public safety leaders to the 23rd Ave campus that has found itself in the middle of the city’s ongoing struggles with gun violence. This week brought the latest incident near the campus as a shooter reported firing from an SUV sunroof opened fire on another vehicle as students unloaded from a nearby Metro bus and ran for cover on the nearby campus. There were no reported injuries.

The mayor will come to Garfield as he prepares to release what his office says will be a new plan to manage the city’s public safety responses.

The One Seattle Safety Framework will include new efforts to “reduce gun violence and other violent crime” with “evidence-based solutions and enforcement strategies,” and faster, more effective responses to to 9-1-1 calls by “hiring more officers and diversifying response options.”

The mayor’s office says the framework will extend beyond traditional policing with efforts to address “the root causes and impacts of violence by investing in community-based solutions and upstream interventions” as well as a prioritization of “public health and trauma-informed approach to reduce overdoses, reduce violence, and better support victims and survivors.” Harrell’s plan will also call for better coordination across city departments to reduce “duplication and inefficiencies” and will include priorities around “accountability systems.”

CHS reported here on the start of Harrell’s public safety forum tour earlier this year. The forums come as the city has been touting the early success of its Community Assisted Response and Engagement department. In September, CHS reported on the launch of what Harrell called Seattle’s “third public safety department.” The small, $1.5 million pilot program is hoped to help be the start of bigger changes to how the city responds to mental health and drug crisis 911 calls.

The meetings also come amid efforts to increase hiring and secure a new agreement with the Seattle Police Officers Guild union. While Harrell has called for the city to boost pay and make SPD a more desirable place to work for officers, the new deal is also hoped to include critical changes to SPD’s accountability systems.

“We are trying to find solutions to to major social issues in our in our society. We have homelessness that we’re dealing with, drug addiction, alcohol addiction, trauma, post-traumatic stress,” SPD Chief Adrian Diaz says in a video promoting the new initiatives to boost his ranks while also spending more on police alternatives. “But, really, is that what you want your police Department to be doing? I want people that are specialized in those services to be able to do that work that frees up some of our officers to really handle some of the criminal activity that is going on in our community.”

Next week’s forum at Garfield will include Harrell and city officials making opening addresses followed by “interactive input sessions for participants.” “Community members will rotate in small groups to engage directly with City leaders and provide input informing action and policy priorities,” the city says.

The discussion will likely include Harrell’s hopes to pilot ShotSpotter, an acoustic gun location system, in parts of Seattle.

Gun violence around 23rd Ave and Garfield will surely be a topic of discussion but other District 3 hot spots will be on the table including the challenged areas around the west side of Cal Anderson Park and Broadway and Pike.

Drug dealing, assaults, vandalism, and challenges with camping and homelessness in the core of Capitol Hill are also set to be discussed Friday as District 3 Seattle City Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth is touring the neighborhood to with East Precinct, business, and community representatives in advance of Harrell’s push on the One Seattle Safety Framework.

Hollingsworth figured prominently in the mayor’s first public safety forum session in March.

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