Scenes from the @SerranoforAG clips
Another election season has brought a Republican candidate to Seattle’s Capitol Hill seeking to shake up their race to lead Washington by scoring political points on the neighborhood’s streets.
This year, the candidate didn’t inadvertently create a punchline struggling to find a cup of coffee on Capitol HIll. Pete Serrano, the GOP candidate for Washington Attorney General pitted against Democrat Nick Brown, had a local guide.
The race between Serrano and Brown comes down to major differences in issues like gun control where the Republican has challenged state law including Washington’s ban on high-capacity magazines.
But Serrano this week posted social media videos showing a recent neighborhood tour highlighting Capitol Hill’s struggles with homelessness, drug addiction, and public safety including a clip making the rounds where he and neighborhood business owner and community activist Rachael Savage talk about the dangers of riding public transit.
“I think it’s bad for society for people to walk down and ignore it. It’s bad enough… oof…,” Savage begins, trailing off as they arrive at the Capitol Hill Station main Broadway entrance.
“Alright, do you not want to go down?,” Serrano asks.
“Well, I’m with you guys, but I uh… I feel…”
“If you’re not comfortable, we don’t have to go. We can turn around,” Serrano offers as the camera zooms in on a Black man seated on a bench inside the station.
“No, I’ll go with you guys. It’s good. You need to see this,” Savage says as they begin their descent.
If you’re this hesitant to ride public transportation in Seattle, then we have some serious work to do. No one should feel uncomfortable or scared on our multi-million dollar light rail system. #RestorePublicSafety #ChangeWashingtonNow pic.twitter.com/wV1SZLa1z5
— Pete Serrano (@SerranoforAG) September 29, 2024
The tour included the station’s platform where Capitol Hill restaurant worker Corey Bellett was stabbed and killed in an altercation in May.
“If you’re this hesitant to ride public transportation in Seattle, then we have some serious work to do,” Serrano would later write about the visit. “No one should feel uncomfortable or scared on our multi-million dollar light rail system.”
The focus on fear and crime in the neighborhood has brought criticism of Serrano — and of Savage for the negative representation of her own neighborhood. Someone posted a meme image of a “Bohemian Lady Scared of Cities” Halloween costume package featuring Savage’s picture in response.
Savage has operated “metaphysical boutique” The Vajra on Broadway for decades — CHS talked with Savage here in 2014 on the store’s 25th anniversary — but recently increased her efforts around neighborhood activism and public safety with her Savage Citizens campaign including efforts to stop the Downtown Emergency Service Center from developing a new 120-unit “supportive housing” apartment building on Belmont for formerly homeless individuals with permanent disability including mental illness, substance abuse, chronic health issues, “or other conditions that create multiple and serious ongoing barriers to housing stability.”
The strip of properties planned for the new housing and services facility is a few blocks west of the new Capitol Hill Stay out of Drug Area approved by the Seattle City Council.
Savage’s campaign also calls on leaders like Donald Trump and Kamala Harris to “Save Our City With US Military Assistance.” “Capitol Hill already has over three hundred people housed in multiple buildings that operate on this model variously called Housing First, Permanent Supportive Housing or Low Barrier Housing,” the campaign reads “Our streets are in chaos. We have done enough.”
Savage says she will run for mayor if progress isn’t made on these goals.
“Non-partisan solutions are needed for the epidemic of severe addiction and severe untreated mental illness harming our city neighborhoods,” Savage said about the tour with Serrano and the online response. “Name calling doesn’t do anything. Labels don’t do anything. Time to move beyond the status quo and treat the epidemic with urgency.”
The Serrano tour debate about Capitol Hill’s street and transit safety comes as the neighborhood is in the middle of the city’s 2024 reckoning between progressive candidates and candidates who have taken more centrist, sometimes, more Republican positions. The race for the City Council’s citywide Position 8 will be another flashpoint in the border skirmishes between Seattle’s progressive and centrist leaders.
Here’s the whole Capitol Hill walk around with WA Attorney General Candidate Pete Serrano. Non-partisan solutions are needed for the epidemic of severe addiction and severe untreated mental illness harming our city neighborhoods. Name calling doesn’t do anything. Labels don’t do… https://t.co/XkaSqDx0Ov
— Savage Citizens (@savagecitizens) September 30, 2024
In the statewide AG race, it’s not clear how many votes Serrano hopes to win here by taking a swipe at Capitol Hill or if all the energy is hoped to land with voters outside the city who sill harbor resentment over the “Defund SPD” movement and CHOP.
For the candidate, the Capitol Hill videos are a cheaper way to score points than Senate candidate Tiffany Smiley’s 2022 commercial in which the Republican challenger to Democratic incumbent Patty Murray complained there was “so much crime that you can’t even get a cup of coffee from the hometown shop on Capitol Hill,” after Starbucks shuttered its E Olive Way shop. That obviously “green screened” ad was easily laughed off and countered — Sen. Murray only had to stop around the corner at nearby indie Analog Coffee on her way to easy victory over Smiley.
There’s no word yet from Brown’s camp on any planned Capitol Hill tour to counter Serrano.
King County Elections says ballots for November’s General Election will be mailed the week of October 14th with drop boxes opening on Thursday, October 17th. The election is Tuesday, November 5th.
UPDATE 10/2/2024: Serrano has responded to our report with an explanation of his tour and promise of more from his visit to the neighborhood to come. “Crime is increasing at an alarming rate throughout our state, and every community is uniquely impacted,” Serrano says. “It is important for me to hear the voices of our people and to help tell the stories we hear throughout the state.”
For the record, CHS contacted both campaigns but did not hear back before publication.
I’m glad our video on Capitol Hill is getting the attention it deserves. Most people know that I have been in the streets talking to Washingtonians for months, so our walk through Capitol Hill wasn’t new. I have been to 3rd and Pike, 12th and Jackson, Aurora Ave, Chinatown, and Spokane numerous times at the request of concerned citizens who simply want to know how a new Attorney General can address our crime and fentanyl epidemics. Our tour through Capitol Hill was unique in that we were guided by a local business woman who has become so frustrated with the failed policies of Jay Inslee and Bob Ferguson that she reached out to me and my opponent for help. I showed up to listen and learn. My opponent did not. Crime is increasing at an alarming rate throughout our state, and every community is uniquely impacted. It is important for me to hear the voices of our people and to help tell the stories we hear throughout the state. While this is sometimes uncomfortable for many, these conversations are crucial to improving safety in our cities and beyond. I will not be dissuaded from engaging with the public, nor will I waiver in my commitment to the people. In the coming days, we will be releasing another video with
who tells his story of getting hooked on fentanyl in his small apartment building in the heart of Capitol Hill. His story is both inspiring and educational, and I hope everyone will watch it with the same love and compassion as all the rest. I wasn’t asked for comment for this CHS article before publication, so I hope this post serves to fill in any gaps. I am always willing to listen, discuss, and learn. Always for We the People, Pete
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I believe we have a huge public safety issue, but this video does a poor job highlighting the actual issues we face as a city.
I don’t know why that lady is scared of a black guy sitting on a bench. There’s so many legitimately scary lunatics we let roam the streets that actually are a danger to the rest of us.
Scary does not equate to threatening. Violence is rare. This is a lack of understanding of mental health issues and the abysmal national emotional health policies traced all the way back to the Reagan years that dumped those in need on to the streets rather than provide proper support and facilities.
But but but…Her hands were steepled. That is a sign of a higher being.
Don’t forget that the ACLU also had a hand in dumping those in need onto the streets and out of mental institutions.
And that the idea to release people from mental institutions into community-based halfway houses / support facilities goes back to JFK who signed the first law doing it…
They aint cutting propaganda to woo people, they are cutting it to affirm people who already believe. I really hope we don’t see one of our regulars actually insist there is something very alarming about this simply because the focus is their focus, damn the composition.
It’s clearly for publicity. It was a great commercial!
Yes exactly. I was there. Rachael was not afraid of a random guy on a bench but reacting to the idea of going down on the platform and experiencing some fear based on five years incidents in around and on the light rail.
TIL: Republican AG candidate doesn’t know the difference between a “multi-million” and “multi-billion” dollar investment.
I think nitpicking on a clear mis-statement doesn’t really add to the discussion.
Good call out on the weird zoom of the guy doing nothing more than what appears to be sitting on a bench eating. Creeps
but you see, this is the existential terror of living on Capitol Hill now if you’re an eccentric artsy-projecting white geriatric.
I’m an “eccentric artsy-projecting white geriatric” resident of Capitol Hill and I ride Seattle public transit nearly every day, have since 2014. Ms. Savage needs to do less pearl clutching. It isn’t a good look.
That said, there are legitimate questions about the proposed Belmont Emergency Services building. Capitol Hill clearly needs supportive housing. The questions are what will the staffing levels be and why does the city always insist on concentrating these services on Capitol Hill?
In the last year DESC has had two murders of residents in their building on Eastlake. In the Seattle Times, residents complained that “security cameras go unrepaired for months at a time and residents aren’t provided with supportive services.” I think the neighbors would like these kinds of concerns addressed before construction starts.
Omg what a baby. This dude is literally standing in front of $3000+/month apartments. An average midwestern dive bar would have this man in tears.
TIL that if an apartment is expensive it’s impossible for there to be criminals and derelicts in front of it.
Make sure we don’t vote for Pete or Andrea Suarez. Both are republican Tiffany Smileys in sheep clothing, or something. Both suck ass.
Capitol Hill shoulders an unequalled homeless and social burden, resist the Belmont Emergency Services building.
It doesn’t surprise me that Republicans would use the Capitol Hill drug sh*tshow resulting from failed progressive policies as campaign commercial fodder or that a longtime Broadway business owner that watched the business district collapse under the weight of “harm reduction” drug policies and de-policing would be fed up and scared. I am sure she has had some close calls with individuals in meth psychosis with weapons over the years like many of us have. These types of stories should lead to self-reflection rather ridicule.
“Failed progressive policies.”
I see you here posting here all the time and always, always pushing “progressive” as an epithet.
It’s really gross, and it’s also really obvious that you have an IV in your veins pumping in uncut right wing propaganda.
Enough. Progressive isn’t an epithet. Your attempt to make it toxic has failed. And, anyway, Seattle’s policies aren’t progressive in any real sense of the term.
No need to respond, btw: nothing you say can, or should, be taken seriously. I just am here to point out the gross work you’re trying to do here so as to neutralize it; I’ve no interest in interacting with you in any sustained way.
Your views, by the way, are as terrible and they are comprehensively wrong.
Reality looks in a mirror for self reflection and blames Progressive Policies for the visage staring back vacantly.
You do reserve some remarkable rights to yourself. I salute your balls, if not your mind.
If anything, it’s the faux performative “progressiveness” of Savage that is the problem, embracing asian religion and culture for profit, but seeing a black neighbor in a public space as a threat. Seeing the issues we’re facing and forming a NIMBY group with no actual solutions, just scapegoating and kicking the issue down the road.
None of this is happening.
Rachael Savage has introduced thousands of people to the simple ideas of intuition and meditation over 27 years. The longevity says there is a demand. Period. These cartoon ideas of only _______ fill in the blank can sell something that came from _______. Absurd. America creates beautiful hybrids. She adds to the neighborhood by working her ass off to stay in business.
Rachael was not afraid of the man on the bench in the video. The fear was of going down to the platform after five years of not knowing if there is going to be security or if you are going to be sharing the platform with late stage drug addicts or severely mentally ill people. There is a reason the Governor of NY was forced to send the National Guard to NYC to secure subway platforms this spring. It’s ok if you are not fearful. You are a man. Please think before criticizing your neighbours for reasonable fear in the face of poor security.
Savage Citizens is proposing an actual solution. A combination of solutions that WA had fully implemented in the past and some new ideas to account for the strength of fentanyl. There is no scapegoating in it. Cities need a level of security to be stable. Drug tolerant housing of the type the DESC wants to bring more of is the underlying cause of the, new since 2020, drug market on North Broadway. Late stage addicts need to be separated from the alcohol and drugs. That is why there are so many treatment centers away from cities. We need treatment away from cities to rebuild Seattle with peaceful safe streets. The severely addicted and the severely mentally ill and civilised cities cannot coexist. Our ancestors understood this. We can fuck around for another ten years and end up like San Francisco. Or we can build our own jail and our own treatment centers and get on with it. Think about it. That’s why we are doing this. Not because we want to spend our lives cleaning up the mess from the dismantling of these two systems that no city can survive without.
I mean you can clearly watch the video and see her reaction, which is why the cameraman zoomed in on the man.
Jail is just an expensive form of housing at the end of the line… We’re literally just talking about defunding our police department’s mounted horse unit, please explain how we have explored any modern options on the policing and jailing end of things?!?
You’re such a joke, please just pitch in and actually try to help and not spew useless garbage rhetoric!
Joe – Housing First done properly is the best strategy. Take a look at the history: https://www.huduser.gov/portal/periodicals/em/spring-summer-23/highlight2.html
Let’s all advocate for properly staffed and serviced Permanent Supportive Housing!!
Capitol Hill is a great neighborhood for this housing – it is extremely walkable with lots of transit and access to groceries, etc.
There is plenty of Permanent Supportive Housing located throughout Seattle’s other neighborhoods, too (including South Lake Union, Interbay, in the south end, etc).
The reality is that there is no one-size-fits-all solution that will work for everyone. Yes, we need way more facilities offering treatment. Yes, we need way more PSH options. Yes, we need way more enhanced shelter options.
Oh, and I’m a woman in my mid 50s who does not have a car and uses public transit all the time. It’s not scary. Hearing of the instances of violence IS scary, I don’t argue that. Honestly I’m more scared of being hit by a car as a pedestrian, tho.
*Geriatric eccentric reacts adversely to seeing a black person eating chips on a bench*
You: “I’m sure there’s a legit reason she’s like that”
White lady terrified that Black people exist! Of course, her South Asian-themed “Vajra” shop was already a hint that she might have some weird racial hangups.
Also LOL at her calling for “non-partisan” help by running to the Republican AG candidate.
You seem to be the one with weird racial hangups.
We have invited all the current candidates to come visit Capitol Hill and let us know what they can do to help. We are waiting and will work with anyone.
I would never in a million years expect a Republican to eliminate urban crime any better than a Progressive, since they depend on its existence to scare people into voting for them. Republicans like Vance have shown what their response to issues in their states is. Just ask the people of Springfield. However, Progressives do themselves no favors by mocking those who raise these concerns or denying their experiences. You only need to be assaulted by strangers a few times in the same neighborhood before the difference between unsettling and threatening becomes pretty difficult to recognize. I’ve lived in this neighborhood for decades. Only since COVID have I had to change my behavior out of safety concerns.
I love the zoom on the dude just sitting on a bench. Real scary stuff.
I ride the lightrail daily from Capitol Hill to the Symphony station.I am 68 years old. Security is a mixed bag; most of them stand on Broadway & John looking at their cell phones. The worst problem in the Hill station is the filth. Tagging, urine & feces in the elevators, sticky benches… I don’t feel unsafe, I just feel grossed out.
Respect.
Ok, and I ride the light rail every day and was chased down the steps at 6:30am on my way to the airport by a guy wielding a metal bar screaming he was going to kill me. I’ve also had my boob grabbed by a complete stranger. People’s experiences are different. The person above is lucky.
Love her pre-emptive inclusion of “Name-calling doesn’t do anything,” knowing how many people are going to call her a whackjob after this (myself included, tbh). I used to occasionally shop at Vajra, now that I know who’s behind it, I’ll probably stick with Circle in the Square in the U-District….
And just like that, I’m no longer a customer at Vajra.
…or rebel saints mediation society.
Newsflash – the Attorney General may defend state laws that address criminality, but they don’t set policy and the work is more geared toward advising and defending state agencies (like it’s a big law firm and the state is its client) and consumer protection. This is just pandering imo
Savage says “name-calling doesn’t do anything” and I’m inclined to agree, but Savage Citizen’s stated policy proposal is calling for what would effectively be a military occupation. If that’s her alternative, I’ll stick with harsh language, thanks.
This is false. We have never proposed a military occupation. The military can help with the epidemic by building detox and hospital facilities and staffing those hospitals. They may be able to help with jail staffing. That is a simple use of the emergency powers. We are very far down and need help from the state and federal government. We believe the federal money that comes from the HUD Housing First Policies is harming the neighborhood.
Chaz/Chop or roll in the National Guard – can we have something sensible in-between? I don’t want to walk the gauntlet between Roy and Union, and I don’t want to roll tanks and round up people. Is it not possible for something that makes sense?
There is and that is what Seattle needs to find. Other cities (not all before some chime in) are making progress on homelessness and crime and nationally crime has decreased signficantly but not in Seattle. For all the talk of public safety, police alternatives, homelessness response, housing first, and harm reduction we haven’t made progress on any of these issues. IMO we need far more well trained police who behave properly, we need beat cops, we need treatment on demand, and we need to make it harder to use and deal drugs and there is no way housing first will work so let’s take that off the table as a solution but continue to build as much as possible because we need it.
Good points on finding a workable middle path.
Yes.
We are proposing a middle path. We are not and have never suggested the national guard in the streets.
We have suggested:
Proactive policing.
Arrest people for crimes.
Divert them to long term addiction treatment if the crime is non-violent.
Use the construction and medical staffing capabilities of the military to build temporary detox and addiction and mental health treatment facilities while we fund and build long term treatment centers.
Expand and strengthen involuntary commitment laws like other states have done to care for the severely mentally ill.
Build as much housing as possible for people who need it due to economic reasons.
Hope that helps clarify. Our intent is to create a new solution.
Thank you
Please reread your own site where it is suggested that the National Guard/Military could assist the police department for law enforcement, to staff jails, and to provide assistance for ‘temporary’ housing to address detox and mental health facilities. Your language is squishy and nonsensical causing more harm in the effort to create a healthy, well managed city, where everyone can thrive. Savage Citizens is actively creating more harmful diversion amongst community members.
The website and their tacky merch feels more like a college prank than a community organization… I think we may be in a snake eating it’s tail scenario here, but those that are eager to engage in this group are those that are looking for quick and easy solutions that are not their problem. The vague plan to call in the military to come fix things in a very “Deus ex Machina” vibe that is meant to make people feel at ease without really thinking about if or how that might work.
Savage has owned her shop for decades but is only now looking to make solutions in the area? Also, how can you be for additional housing and treatment but also opposing new housing with treatment included. The fancy drawings of some creepy field somewhere that she wants everyone she’s afraid of sent to look kind of nice, but I’m guessing there’s more effort spent on that then actually making those buildings. Also, who is paying for that (these drawings, and eventually the land and buildings)!
You all are a bunch of clowns, please just stop it with this garbage and just pitch in and try to help out with the problem’s we all are dealing with related to two major recessions and a global pandemic that has absolutely wrecked most of society, but even moreso those with little to no stability, especially when many of the facilities and services were downsized during covid despite the demand skyrocketing.
Election season is the spookiest of them all.
This lady is such an idiot
Speaking as a 33 year cap hill resident I say that although Rachels reaction to the guy at the light rail station was simply uncalled for, when I think back to how this neighborhood was10 to 15 years ago compared to now I am fine with trying something more drastic to clean up and make safer the place I live. If that would mean electing a republican as AG I’m fine with that at this point.
The entire council is centrist to right wing DINOs… what are you talking about… we need to scrap this crap and focus on getting poor people money, housing, and healthcare. Not jail beds for being poor.
The AG does not have the ability to impact much when it comes to homelessness. . .
Agree! Nick Brown seems like a smart and capable candidate, but I think it would be “business as usual” if he is elected as AG. We need a new, fresh approach and that’s why I will vote for Pete Serrano.
In the past ~5 years, since pandemic and since BLM, Capitol Hill street crime has increased. I’ve lived here decades, I see it daily walking around. If that makes me a “Republican” to some of you come-latelys, then I am a Republican. A never-Trumper Republican to be sure. But notice how just wanting a safe and vibrant street scene these days makes one capable of being accused of right wingerism. That’s how far our Progressive Left has slid out of the mainstream. The 2021 and 2023 elections show that as well, people running on Public Safety won a majority over people running on various forms of Progressivism.
The problem is people like you point the finger at themselves as a solution because you are conservative. Nobody jails more people per capita than America. The highest levels of crime are in Red states by in large. Reagans war on drugs was a major fail. Trump killed a border deal. They give tax breaks to the super wealthy. Shred the safety net. Tell women what to do with their body. Bibles in schools. No separation of church and state…
Fact is this…Conservatives have an over inflated view of themselves.
Your whole bag is whining about progressives in some kind of identity politics way where there’s nothing in this world that isn’t their fault exclusively despite never even sniffing the power you think they have, and losing power you think they have right in front of your face. Officially Republican or Embarrassed Conservative In Hostile Territory, you never leave a comment without foisting blame on a nebulous non cohesive ideological moniker.
“More jails” has never worked. Ever.
Very well-said!
LOL
Scared to go into the light rail station? OMG. How come gays and drag queens can go there all day long but brave “tough” hetero politicians are too afraid. That station is used heavily. What a political hack joke.
I, like one of the other posters, have been threatened with “I will kill you” by a mentally ill man while down on the platform with no other person or security present. Thankfully it remained a verbal threat with physical posturing, but that is not the point, is it? Hoards of people does not assure you protection; I was accosted in a similar way at a busy University bus stop and no one helped; everyone just spread further away from the situation. People are often scared to intervene. Occasionally a brave soul will. And hoping for security personnel presence when it is happening to you is unreliable at best. But security/police will never be the answer; only needed for now due to our current way of not helping those demonstrating violent or threatening behavior in public because we want to be “humane” (what a laugh) to the population. The issue is all over Seattle and I’ve had way too many experiences with it to feel safe. We certainly shouldn’t go back to “throw everyone in jail” but there does need to be a required treatment pathway that is humane (permanent quality housing w full attached services) while also recognizing when someone is not safe in public, they aren’t allowed to be there like our current stance is. How is this way humane for anyone, addict/mentally ill or otherwise?
Sorry..”I will kill you” is a cry for help. Normally it’s asking for money. Early in the morning I see security everywhere. Also, there’s always someone monitoring on camera.
I have heard people screaming “I’ll kill you!”. Lunging at people with a longgg kitchen knife. Several people shot within 3 blocks of my apartment above Walgreens on Broadway and Pine. Two were right blow my window. One just the other day made 2.
I’m sorry that you are someone that accepts this as tolerable city living. I don’t want to accept people being shot on my block as normal and part of normal existence. I am a resident of the area that witnessed someone being stabbed in a densely packed public space. This isn’t something that I’ll ever consider normal and excuse as typical. I hope for a better living experience for you at your apartment complex because no one should have to hear assaults occurring that frequently near them. It has to be a gross and human hardening experience.
“I’m sorry that you are someone that accepts this as tolerable city living.”
I don’t accept it.
Yes.
The GOP has done us all the great favor of so drastically simplifying American politics that all the details can simply be ignored. They ceased to matter somewhere in the wake of Reagan, and now the only reason I can think of to pay any attention to most of it is the most dysfunctional imaginable masochism.
I’m a 65 year old gay man. I will suck the scum from a dead Republican’s [rectum] until is rotten head collapses before I will I will vote for a live one. It’s that simple. If it’s “R”, the answer is an emphatic no.
If this sounds irresponsible, consider an example. The only thing Harris can do to lose my vote between now and November is die. I assume this is true of every sane, decent American who doesn’t wish to live in a neofeudal corporate hellhole run by a senile, psychotic monster whose only possible positive contribution to the human race would be to die of old age in prison.
See? Simple. Broadway is irrelevant. Seattle is incidental. Ditto small businesses, the person I saw die in front of my barber’s last month, the guy lying unconscious in a puddle of his own urine whose pulse I took this morning, and all the rest. There is now only one thing to consider when voting in the U.S. There are D’s, the occasional I, and a slow, painful death with no meaning or dignity whatsoever. In 21st century America, very few ballots contain any real choice.
The Tri-Cities, of course, remain free of crime and drugs.
My wife and three people I know had to close there businesses in Broadway do to safety issues.
Yes. Would like to talk. Please contact me at http://www.savagecitizens.com
Not surprising. I don’t walk on Broadway any more if I can help it. If I’m going to, say, the QFC, I go to the nearest cross street, then walk the last half block to the entrance quickly. Going home I get off Broadway as fast as possible.
Rachel Savage is a disgusting human being. A Grifter of the highest order. Whatever will get her and her funky outfits in front of people I guess.