With a slate of new members promising stronger support for police and law and order, the Seattle City Council’s public safety committee will take on some of the most important work at City Hall this year. Tuesday, the newly elected chair of the new-look council committee will present his vision for the legislative team
District 7’s Bob Kettle will convene his first meeting of the committee Tuesday morning with overviews of the city’s public safety resources including the Seattle Police Department and Seattle Fire. Kettle will also present his vision for the committee based around what is office says will be “6 Pillars addressing the Permissive Environment.”
According to the presentation, the “permissive environment” is defined as “the underlying factors behind crime tied to the lack of deterring structures that allow people to endanger themselves and our city.”
Kettle’s pillars, in order, are 1) police staffing, 2) “legal tools,” 3) closing unsecured buildings, 4) graffiti remediation, 5) public health, and 6) collaboration with the county and state.
The full Public Safety Vision presentation is below.
As far as the pillars go, the city is already a leg up on number four. CHS reported here on a federal appeals court ruling that opens the way for the city to fully crack down on tagging and graffiti.
Number one will be a doozy. Council President Sara Nelson has said approval of a new contract with the Seattle Police Officers Guild union is an opportunity for the council to repair holes in the city’s public safety system torn open by the previous council.
District 3’s rookie city council member will also hold her committee’s first meeting this week. Joy Hollingsworth chairs a catch-all committee including leading legislative efforts around public utilities, technology, and the city’s parks and recreation department. The Parks, Public Utilities, and Technology Committee meets for the first time Wednesday afternoon.
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These six pillars sound like a strategy of furiously bailing out water from a sinking boat rather than trying to find and fix the underlying leak.
We’re going to “harden defenses” on vacant buildings and construction projects? This is a sisyphean task that will create more barriers to affordable housing and redevelopment, further exacerbating the issue.
How sis you get that out of closing unsecured vacant buildings? These are the houses and buildings that are vacant. The structures that are structurally dangerous that people squat in, catch fire and sometimes die in should be secured for everyone’s safety. It has nothing to do with housing other than maybe encouraging the owners to tear them down and replace them with housing.
Although there is certainly merit in securing these buildings/worksites, are these the main driver of the crime and despair on our streets?
No, that would be drugs.
See, the thing is that it’s a very small amount of people that are experiencing homelessness, not exactly a swarm of people looking for unclosed vacant buildings. When people are desperate, they will go to extremes to find shelter (e.g., migrants crossing the Atlantic on a rudder, camping next to a highway, sleeping in abandoned tunnels). The current strategies push people experiencing homelessness and other issues further into the voids, and farther from solutions…
Some stats for you. Recently 63 people were displaced due to an adjacent vacant building catching fire occupied by squatters. 5 people died in a building fire due to the vacant building being structurally unsound, in another case (not is Seattle) 70 people including 7 children dies in a vacant building fire. There have been more than 75 vacant building fires in Seattle over the last 2 years including up to now which puts neighbors, firefighters and more importantly those occupying them at high risk for serious injury or death. I understand the need for shelter but it has to be safe shelter.
I agree that we need safe shelter and housing… The last 2 years SFD has had 50,000+ fire calls, 600+ structural fires (vacant buildings accounting for ~1 in 10), 3000+ rubish fires, and nearly 2,000 encampment responses. I’m just saying that focusing on the vacant buildings is focusing on the symptoms and not the cause, and public safety would be better served if we actually worked to house people experiencing homelessness rather than treating them like vermin.
I agree but I don’t think keeping them out of dangerous structures is treating them like vermin. I think allowing drug use and sleeping on streets is however. If we are serious about the issue we need to strongly enforce drug laws and build affordable housing but we won’t build our way out of homelessness so we need to look at how to get people back on their feet so they can work, afford their own place and not feel like they are worthless.
We have laws and fine structures in place for securing vacant structures, this does nothing new other than reframe how to think about it as “promoting permissive environment”. A proactive solution might be to actually understand why buildings are sitting vacant so long and working to streamline that process so that there is less time for existing security requirements to break down and be breached, while hopefully having the win-win impact of increasing the rate of new housing. This is pure virtue signalling to the crowd that will cheer at the short-term bandaid “cleanup” that will be done before World Cup games that prioritizes immediate cosmetic fixes over true meaningful policies.
No I think you stated the intent. By going after the owners of these vacant structures they are enforcing the laws on the books. This will force the owners to do one of three things. Secure it so it doesn’t put people at risk, tear it down, or develop it. Many sit vacant because there is a tax break to do so, it’s called dark space. Many companies use this write off. There may be another reason which is that the building dept makes it hard to get permits. That could certainly be streamlined but until the owners of these structures have some pressure on them they are likely to do nothing. It’s maddening that they sit there vacant rather than serving a purpose.
Your point makes very little sense… If the goal is to reduce the amount of buildings and time that buildings are vacant, and therefore more vulnerable, this does nothing to directly address it, and approaching from the need/cost to secure buildings is a very backwards way of doing it. The alternative would be to directly help the public that is facing homelessness, which would in turn help alleviate all of these other issues rather than react to them….
I think you’re missing the point of my post. This doesn’t cost the city, this costs the derelict property owners. SFD said in their address to the new council the problem is the time it takes to get a permit and some owners aren’t engaged. It doesn’t cost much for the city to speed up the permit process and to engage with the property owners to do something about their property or face fines. I’d like to see them fine them, that money could be used to help the homeless. This won’t take a dime away from any money the city wants to invest in new housing, drug treatment, mental health care etc that would help the homeless. If anything the additional revenue from the fines and the hopeful sale and/or development of these properties to living space would likely help.
The previous “progressive” council has already created a vacant building monitoring program that includes fines for offending properties, those fines are happening now, I don’t know why you speak about it like it isn’t already happening…
https://www.seattle.gov/sdci/codes/common-code-questions/vacant-buildings
I’m guessing it’s probably at best a break even policy as it does actually cost the city to run a program like this, unless you want to continue living in fantasyland and make ridiculous comments
This is the legislation we are talking about. And no it doesn’t cost anything if you are actually enforcing the fines which hasn’t been the case.
According to the City, so far this year there have been 29 vacant building fires that have resulted in three deaths. Last year at this time, there had only been 19 vacant building fires.
The City sent a statement from Seattle Fire Chief Harold Scoggins, who is in support of the proposed legislation:
“Fires in vacant buildings can present some of the most dangerous conditions for responding firefighters. The risks are often too great, leaving us to fight these fires defensively. We welcome the Mayor’s efforts to strengthen requirements that may prevent fires in vacant structures and provides a quicker path towards demolition or refurbishment.”
The proposed legislation would:
Strengthen the standards for securing vacant buildings by requiring solid core doors, stronger throw deadbolts, and, in some cases, polycarbonate sheets rather than plywood.Require vacant buildings to be kept free of graffiti.Require any building that receives a notice of violation to enter the vacant building monitoring program, rather than just those buildings that fail to correct notice of violation by the compliance deadline.Simplify the process for police and fire referrals to vacant building monitoring.Authorize the Seattle Department of Construction & Inspections (SDCI) to file a property lien to collect unpaid vacant building monitoring fees and abatement costs
All of the things you have described will cost money, mostly in personnel to look over properties and documents, unless you think there are city employees just sitting around on their hands waiting for this work…
Vacant buildings generally don’t catch fire by themselves. I don’t think it’s a sudden rise in shoddy doors/locks that have led to this problem. We’ve seen a significant increase in vacant building fires shortly after a significant increase in fires under and near WSDOT property that led to widespread sweeps and increased security in those areas…
We keep kicking the can down the road and pointing the finger at other departments and jurisdictions, blaming “permissive environments”, with most of the outrage directed at the outcomes while largely ignoring the basic need of housing and public safety of our neighbors.
We should focus on upstream solutions like stopping the massive inflow of drug addicts moving here from across the country and region to the land of abundant drugs, free apartments, and no consequences. Seattle needs a citywide camping ban, zero tolerance for public drug use, and a program to get people back home to family/community support networks.
“…land of abundant drugs, free apartments, and no consequences.” I live in the middle of this so called depravity. Nope, N/A.
Yup. Disappointing to see no explicit mention of a crackdown on open drug sales and use.
Reality???
Ya got me fooled.
get people back home to family/community support networks. That and not tolerating drug use were almost the exact words the head of a homeless charity used when I sat down with him to learn about the mistakes Seattle was making. If people are going to have hope for success in getting out of homelessness and beat addiction they are far more better off in the communities they came from where they have personal connections.
A lot of people on the streets have long since burned their bridges to those “family/community support networks” — or were burned BY them (especially if they’re LGBT). Hence there’s nothing to send them “back” to.
This is such a blind, ideological response. While there is a small fraction that fits this narrative, the vast majority are drug addicts that have warn out there welcome everywhere else. So it is better that they be wards of Seattle than go back home? Seattle residents should spend $100k per year per person to babysit while they destroy everything they touch and chase every last small business out of town then die in the streets? We have the highest rate of urban campers and overdose death per capita of anywhere in the country. The “progressive”, “harm reduction” enabling approach has been a disaster. Let’s give the new council a chance to right the ship.
LOL – The irony of you putting these two sentences in this order is probably lost on you, but thanks for the chuckle even if you didn’t intend it.
Thing is, you were apparently trying to make a counter-point to CKathes’ factual claim that many homeless do not have these options, but the only point you actually supported was that you think people in those circumstances have “limited value” (that you Daniel Auderer?).
As you’re helpfully demonstrating, the most overwhelming barrier to actually helping the unhoused is the apparent inability of many Americans to let go of the just world fallacy and pre-judgements of human worth & value.
Yes they have but statistics show they have a far better chance at success with support structures which could be friends, family, people familiar with them that when they can rebuild relationships with vs be lost in a large city with no connections.
So there’d be no more homelessness if the homeless would just go home?
And are the free apartments in the room with us now?
If this isn’t a joke, it’s doomed to failure. It’s not like this hasn’t been expressed elsewhere for decades. This a political appeasement move. Commenters here should eat this up.
Of course more cops is number 1. People already forget jet raids? Why TF do we want more of that?
People want to talk like SPD is here to help but they still electing Mike Solan to represent them. SPD is telling us loud and.clear.tney won’t change and we just keep not listening.
SPD is down about 500 cops compared to 5 years ago, and police staffing here is way below comparable cities. It is OBVIOUS that we need to hire more cops to ensure public safety and to get the 911 response time back to reasonable levels.
This City Council’s approach is a breath of fresh air.
Sure we need more people doing things to help. But SPD are not those people. They keep showing us they don’t want to be those people. Why do people think adding more of them will change how they think and act?
SPD keeps saying they have a shortage of officers, but yet they always have enough officers for intimidation of LGBTQ+ people in bars, and have plenty of officers for elaborate prostitution stings that only entrap non-English speakers into misdemeanors.
There are plenty of examples of SPD officers taking their sweet time (stopping for an extended coffee break, or hanging out at SPOG headquarters) rather than responding to high priority calls like domestic violence or shootings.
Don’t believe SPD’s propaganda. They aren’t interested in public safety. They’re interested in padding their paychecks.
You obviously have no idea what it’s like being an officer. I encourage you to join the force and learn what it’s like and be a positive change.
I don’t need to be a police officer to know that positive change doesn’t happen by adding more people into a toxic, corrupt and dysfunctional organization.
One bad apple spoils the barrel. In SPD’s case, the barrel has been spoiled by bad apple after bad apple who never get removed and end up getting promoted or elected to union leadership. Who would want to work in that environment?
They been quiet quitting since George Floyd and even before that. We don’t worship them. We expect accountability. When they are criminals, we call them out. They don’t like that because it paints them all with the same brush. True…But why are the police completely incapable of policing themselves? Why do they need federal oversight? As a 0351 USMC I know I can’t gas the enemy. It’s against the Geneva convention. The cops LOVED that shit. Any kind of gas or chemical. Use tasers as torture devices. General brutality. None of it gets reported. It 100% will be lied about. Cops never leave the scene w/o getting the story straight.
I’ve have had many run ins with the cops. Been brutalized in front of my kids while complying to a search and being cuffed. Once I was cuffed the fun started and my kids came unglued. My wife died just weeks prior. Yeah…And the lies and excuses that followed didn’t save them. It was at the main entrance of Walmart. In front of my 4 kids. Walmart security is verrry overzealous as well. Yeah, they all got what was comin to them.
I have stories like that for days. Hauled in for a “bad sense of humor” and released 2 hours later w/o being booked. Anything to disrupt my life. Live in a small town and that’s what you’ll get. Live in a big town and you’ll get a lot more of the same.
More money never made a person a better person.
Care to provide evidence for these “plenty of examples” you cite?
Just some recent Office of Police Accountability cases:
2022OPA-0331 Domestic violence call. Officers were 8 minutes away, but went to the precinct first, then decided the apartment was too difficult to enter without getting out of their car, then left after two minutes to get dinner without speaking to the victim.
2023OPA-0081 Domestic violence call. Officers stayed at Starbucks for 40 minutes while dispatch notified them multiple times.
2023OPA-0135 Shooting at the Showbox in SODO. Cops at SPOG headquarters in SODO (4 minutes from scene) said they would respond to call, but stayed at SPOG headquarters for 20 minutes, and then likely sped at twice the speed limit to the scene where the suspect and victim had both already left. Officers involved were paid $211k and $315k that year.
I’m really confused as to what your narrative is here…are these your commentaries on actual incidents or??…???
Naw…We need the cops to do their jobs. Based on job performance? There’s NO WAY they get a raise.
Honestly, yeah. I WANT to believe SPD is serious about improving their public image & getting back to actually like…helping the city…but their insistence on hanging onto the SPOG goons tips their hand, unfortunately. At this point, I’ll believe it when I see it, and I’m not holding my breath on that one…
Public health is less of a priority than… graffiti mitigation? It’s laughable to pretend graffiti is one of the major problems in this city when we have so much housing insecurity and so many people in need of addiction treatment. Pretty clear this is about cosmetic fixes rather than meaningful change.
When you wake up to graffiti on your house or business or car, what do you do? How do you feel it affects you and those around you?
It’s a nuisance, not mass human suffering. Graffiti can usually be cleaned up and painted over. It bothers me and those around me way less then the fact that people have to use the street as a public toilet and can’t get basic needs met.
Not sure what cops have to do with solving housing issues or drug addiction. Of course, graffiti is a less serious issue than, say, violent crime, but it is still an issue which affects our quality of life, and costs a lot of money for private business and the City to clean up. We can walk and chew gum at the same time.
This priority list isn’t coming from the SPD, it’s coming from the city.
If “Public Safety” is the goal?
Then why is the word “public” #5?
lol, is no one here familiar with the concept of pillars? Pillars all bear equal weight and it’s not a sorted priority list people
The only thing graffiti mitigation is a pillar of is Brucie’s election campaign.
I don’t think it’s exactly a sorted list, but I don’t think Kettle meant graffiti remediation and police staffing are equally important either.
“6 Pillars addressing the Permissive Environment” sounds unfortunately like a Chinese Communist Party slogan.