Public Safety Committee - Special Meeting 4/24/2026

Good morning.

The Public Safety Committee meeting will come to order.

It's 9.34 a.m.

April 24, 2026. I'm Robert Kettle, chair of the Public Safety Committee.

Will the committee clerk please call the roll?

Councilmember Reyes?

Councilmember Lin?

Yes, here.

Councilmember Rivera?

Council Member Saka?

Here.

Chair Kettle?

Here.

Chair, there are three members present.

Thank you.

Good morning, everyone.

This morning we'll start with a chair comment, and the chair comment will be focused on the start with a recent article in the Seattle Times talking about Little Saigon.

The title of it is Amid Seattle's Neglect.

The recent Seattle Times article with a title that gets to the point immediately is focused on neighborhoods and the people who live there and business trying to survive there.

Starting with the stat of 518 drug-related incidents across the city over the past month, that point, it should be noted, that this number could be reached in a single night, definitely over a weekend, in most of the impacted neighborhoods, like 12th Jackson and King, 3rd Pike and Pine, 3rd and Blanchard, 2nd and Lenora, and others.

These neighborhoods are impacted all across seven districts, and they're all well-known.

And in fact, the data that's behind that has been used as the basis of legislation.

and so is the point that once you have a drug market, then you also have a stolen goods market and more.

In the article in Seattle Times, it was noted that it's becoming an embarrassment for the city, says Ms. Tanya Nguyen, and it is.

And so are our efforts over the past decade to tackle this challenge.

The observation made in the article, talking about King County Sheriff's Office and SPD officers on the scene, is a problem in and of itself.

But it also has major second and third order effects, ripple effects, that impact other pieces as well.

And it's a problem.

It's a problem having officers there with people noticing these residents, these business owners, seeing an officer when this activity is happening, but nothing's being done.

We should be mindful of that.

To Mr. Gary Lee's observation, it is spot on when he speaks to the psyche of Seattle and the point that we're too lenient.

The issue here really is hitting the idea of accountability.

And this is in companion with compassion.

And further, to Mr. Dennis Chin's point, we need to give voice to Little Saigon.

I invite everybody to go down there.

I've been there many times, most recently on a walk with Councilmember Lin, echoing Mr. Chin's comments, that we need to give voice to Little Saigon, to the CID neighborhoods, but also Pioneer Square, Downtown, Belltown, Central District, Lake City, again, all across our city.

To Ms. Nguyen's comment that we're about you know, losing interest.

I would say that we are not losing interest in you and your neighborhood.

This goes to some of the work that we're doing here today and over the next couple of months and it builds on the work that I've been doing with our colleagues to include Councilmember Lin.

And to the point that the city has not done anything, in one sense she's correct.

Little Saigon is not improved.

Why is that?

We do, however, have efforts ongoing.

And to close on the article, I wanted to highlight one sentence towards the end.

But it is alarming how little effect it seems to have.

I think it's important for us as a council and us as a city to reflect on that one sentence.

But it is alarming how little effect it seems to have.

Because again, these neighborhoods, to include Little Saigon, are suffering.

I point to the idea that we as a city, we as a city government definitely, are of two minds.

And this is a problem.

There is a lack of balance with the singular focus on our neighbors in crisis, and we should have that focus, and we should lead with that focus with compassion.

But there's not a companion focus on our neighborhoods that are also in crisis.

We need to understand that our neighborhoods are in crisis, as noted in the article with Little Saigon.

There is a lack of leadership that is sustained with an element of follow-up and follow-through.

This is a problem.

There's a lack of implementation at times by the executive and sometimes by the judicial branch of ordinances passed into law.

This kind of goes to the two minds point again.

We're sending mixed signals.

We're not following through.

We're not following up.

Noted that there's a lack of accountability to match the compassion in our efforts.

It is so important, so often I've said that we need to lead with compassion for our neighbors in crisis, but we also have the wisdom to look out for our neighborhoods, for our communities, all the various types of communities.

It could be a neighborhood, but it could also be LGBTQ plus community, which is also suffering.

There's also a lack of integration on one hand of public safety, the traditional public safety pieces, with, on the other hand, public health, housing, and human services.

That scene is so important to understand and the choke points and the hiccups that occur there, which then leads to no success and the fact that we don't get any changes.

So the two minds, basically the idea of being of two minds leads to a certain paralysis or different efforts that essentially cancel each other out.

And so then we don't make the progress.

And then we are where we are, as noted, with how little effect it seems to have.

Moving, though, forward is, and I'm reminded of a general I work for once said that, don't bring me problems, bring me solutions.

In working the public safety problem set, we've created a strategic framework plan for the committee and by extension the council.

We've made strong progress in the last term on many fronts, but not enough for our impacted neighborhoods.

That lack of progress means that we need to do further.

We need to look at what we've done and what can we do differently.

So we've updated the strategic framework plan for a safer Seattle with one pillar updated to reflect the need to work on creating a functional criminal justice system There's so many areas here that it is not working.

And this concludes diversion.

But then there's also two other new pillars.

One is gun violence, prevention and reduction, and community safety more broadly, which is gonna be a subject of our agenda item today.

but secondly, as I noted somewhat, addressing the scene between public safety, public health, housing, and human services.

These two pillars are key in terms of moving forward.

Today we're having a hearing about community violence intervention, going to the first pillar mentioned.

But moving forward, we need to work the second new pillar and dress the seam that we have in order to really make meaningful success in areas like Little Saigon.

First is dressing the seam means addressing alternative response.

This is primarily focused, but not solely, on care enabling an ordinance.

And this is something that we're working right now with various stakeholders.

We need to improve alternative response to get better outcomes for places like Little Saigon.

We also need to address the drug markets, which means many actions need to be taken to include looking at the public drug use and possession ordinance.

The ordinance has been a failure in itself, but also in its implementation.

We must bring clarity.

Clarity is so key.

This goes back to the King County's sheriffs and the SPD officers and the whole functional criminal justice system.

And it also helps address of the two minds problem mindset that we have in our city.

We also need to work forward on our neighborhood engagement and mitigation plan.

I spoke with the staff director yesterday on this.

This is a key point to create partnership between the city, between service providers, and then also the neighborhoods.

This is so important.

So at the end of the day, we must take action working with stakeholders to address the point of it's alarming to how little effect it seems to have.

We need to work together.

We need to have all the stakeholders to hit that last sentence.

from Mr. Westneap.

And I just wanted to close by saying to Ms. Tanya Nguyen of Chu Min Tofu, which I haven't been, and I would love to go, Council Member Lin, to say I'm sorry.

And we're going to work harder here at the committee, here on the council, in combination with the executive and the city attorney, to see how we can better affect and create a safer neighborhood for Little Saigon.

Colleagues, that's my chair comment for today.

Normally, I go right into the next piece of our agenda, but given the fact of this article and the issue related to Little Saigon, Councilmember Lin, I just wanted to offer a point to it, an addendum, if you will, to the chair comment.

Yeah, thank you so much, Chair Kettle.

Thank you all for being here.

Thank you for going on the public safety walk.

And we did start on North Beacon Hill, and there's a strong connection between Little Saigon and North Beacon Hill.

It's basically one sort of, unfortunately, kind of ecosystem of where we see a lot of drug use in the black market in Little Saigon.

And we have some neighbors here who we will hear from today from North Beacon Hill.

And we had a town hall this week with hundreds of neighbors speaking about the very real impacts to the neighborhood.

But it is a failure of our multiple levels of government, the drug crisis, along with the mental health crisis and homelessness.

And I've heard the mayor's office speak a lot about how Our unhoused neighbors who also are suffering from mental health are extremely vulnerable and we see how they are being targeted by drug dealers and other criminal elements and that is not acceptable.

We lose hundreds of lives to overdose.

Thousands of lives are being destroyed.

Those families are being destroyed.

We look at gun violence, and there is a relationship to our gun violence with the drug dealing and criminal elements that go along there, and I'm excited for today's presentation.

But if we had that many people dying from gun violence, if we had that many people dying from car violence, I think we would be acting much more quickly.

I'm not sure why, for some reason, overdose deaths don't, even though they are orders a magnitude larger aren't getting the same attention and there are clearly not only impacts to those who are suffering in the streets and dealing with addiction but to our neighborhoods, to our businesses and we absolutely need to act with urgency.

I look forward to working with you all and with our partners and just want to make sure that as we do so that we also focus on North Beacon Hill which again is part of the entire ecosystem there with Little Saigon.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Councilmember Lin.

Okay, end of chair comment and the addendum.

Again, thank you.

Moving to the agenda, I'm removing agenda item one, Seattle neighborhood impact framework presentation, and it will be featured instead in the June committee meeting for a number of reasons.

To include, we're gonna have some quorum challenges soon.

So with that change, if there's no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing and seeing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

Okay.

Moving on to public comment.

We will now open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comment should relate to items on today's agenda within the purview of the committee.

Claire, how many speakers are signed up for today?

Currently we have 13 public commenters signed up.

Ten in person, three remote.

Okay.

Each speaker will have two minutes and we'll start with the in-persons.

Can you please read the public comment instructions?

The public comment period will be moderated in the following manner.

The public comment period is up to 60 minutes.

Speakers will be called in the order in which they're registered.

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of their time.

Speakers mics will be muted if they do not and their comments within the allotted time to allow us to call on the next speaker.

The public comment period is now open and we'll begin with the first speaker on the list.

The first in-person speaker is Jeff Silverman to be followed by Castile Hightower.

Hello.

My name is Jeff Silverman, and I'm here again to talk with you about a large-scale disaster drill.

I have an important story to tell you.

I want to emphasize that although I am the captain of the Haller Lake Emergency Hub, I am speaking solely for myself and not for the hubs or for Seattle ACS.

A requirement for membership in the ACS is to take some FEMA classes, and in the process of going through ICS 200C on page 33, there is an interesting story.

Emergency communications at the Pentagon site proved challenging on September 11, 2001. Radio communications amongst the emergency responders quickly became overloaded.

Those communication problems persisted throughout rescue operations.

There was a need to record the identification number and location of each piece of equipment on the Pentagon grounds.

Radio communications could not be employed to perform this task.

Arlington County Fire Department Captain Jeff Liebold used foot messengers to inventory on-site units.

He sent two firefighters on foot to record the identification number and location of each piece of equipment on the Pentagon grounds because radio communications could not be employed to perform this task.

foot messengers often proved to be the most reliable means of communication during the initial rescue efforts.

Fortunately, they had a lot of people.

According to the Arlington County After Action Report, fire and rescue organizations should establish plans for alternate means of communication during mass casualty incidents.

A number of methods can be employed, including foot messengers.

What is the lesson for us here in Seattle 25 years later?

Scale matters.

We have a city of three quarters of a million people.

I have done a number of hub drills.

I anticipate that by their natures, the hubs are going to perform admirably because they are small and they operate autonomously.

But the EOC to gather the essential elements of information, the EEIs, that NIMS calls out for at scale.

I've had some email message with Rebecca Dunn, but nothing substantial has come back to me.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Castile Hightower.

My name is Castile Hightower and my brother Herbert Hightower Jr. was murdered by Seattle police while experiencing a mental health crisis.

I have fought for resources for families impacted by police violence since 2020 because I know what it feels like to struggle for support while navigating one of the most traumatic times of your life.

Since my brother's killing, police brutality has continued to rise.

And what happens to these victims?

They are left to pick up the pieces with zero government support while the officers are placed on paid administrative leave with our tax dollars and often given slaps on the wrist by the OPA.

Enough is enough.

Seattle police needs to be held accountable and resources for victims of police violence need to be created.

It is morally reprehensible to refuse to provide any support to people harmed by city employees well before any investigations are concluded and in some cases before they've even begun.

It treats victims and families as if they are guilty until proven innocent while the officer who caused the harm is treated as if they are innocent until proven guilty.

We've already presented our demands in a timeline to create direct support that is inclusive of victim voices and provides transparency, but continue to be stonewalled.

If you are not willing to commit to these demands, are you at the very least willing to pass a resolution to commit to creating a permanent independent office dedicated to providing resources, the victims of police violence and their families?

Council member Lynn.

Is that a yes or a no?

Councilmember Kettle?

Yes or no?

Public comment is an opportunity for everybody to speak.

Councilmember Saka?

Yes or no?

Next up we have Lucky Jordan to be followed by Scott Buzzard.

The taller one's probably better.

The US policing and judicial systems are puppet shows where rich people pay to pull the strings and hire the police to do their dirty work.

These systems are sold to us as punitive justice systems which dole out punishment befitting the so-called crime.

Even if they were actually a punitive justice system, we know punitive justice is not effective.

Michelle Alexander put it best in the new Jim Crow, prisons manufacture crime.

It is time to move beyond punitive justice.

And let us skip over restorative justice as well, which also dissenters victims and only restores an already inequitable system.

What is restorative justice for someone who's killed by the police?

There is no way to restore a life.

It is time for transformative justice, which can only come by centering victims and giving them power.

You all have a chance to do that by supporting the affected persons program.

City Council has a duty to honor the council budget actions passed in 2023 and 2024, which explicitly committed $100,000 from the city's general fund to, and I quote from the CBAs, convene members of the community who are survivors of police violence in Seattle or are immediate family members of individuals killed by police in Seattle to create recommendations about how the city can support them.

and that creation and content of these recommendations will be led and finalized by these community members independent of city employees.

It is unacceptable that after survivors of police violence had fought for years to get these CBAs passed, the former mayor and the OPA blocked these funds from being used as intended and no work group comprised of survivors of police violence was ever convened.

Next up, we have Scott Buzzard to be followed by Craig Thompson.

I'm Scott Buzzard with the American Party of Labor.

We are here today to demand that city council and the city of Seattle as a whole to use the city's budget not for increasing surveillance and militarization against working class communities, but to use this money for helping the people affected by police violence that you play a direct role in.

Through the continued exchange of tactics with the IDF that you voted to continue in 2021, the leniency that has been shown to violent criminals that operate our police force, and the overall lack of commitment to anti-surveillance against working class poor communities, you have shown you will take the side of child beating anti-social police officers over your own community 10 times out of 10. For example, Larry Longley, your public outreach or poet chief beat a 12 year old girl in 2013. Your public liaison that should be a safe and approachable member of the community is a serial child beater.

What restitution did this little girl get?

A measly check and lifetime trauma?

While Larry gets to be posted on Instagram and lauded by your public accounts and PR, victims have to live in silence for the fear of another city council approved beating.

They have to live knowing that the state will do anything in its power to subjugate its own citizens.

Another example, this past Sunday SPD violently dogpiled a man next to me and knelt on his neck choking him as three officers pepper sprayed him in the face while he was subdued on the ground.

What was his crime?

Protesting the very same violence that is used against Palestinian children and families for the past 80 years that the SPD is molded by.

This pattern of oppressive violence will only continue to create more victims if left unchecked and fettering as you city council have chosen to do so.

You must create resources for those like the 12 year old girl your public officer chose to violently attack.

And you must create resources for those exercising their right to protest against injustice.

SPD has given themselves the authority to act without regard for human life and the authority to beat whoever criticizes them as well as they did with a teenager this weekend while they threatened to tear gas families and children.

democracy and their role as civil servants.

It's time to reign these state-approved criminals in with tangible resources and a timeline for those resources becoming available to the public for victims of your choices, City Council.

How many more need to be brutalized by your officers before it is too much?

How many more 12-year-olds?

Thank you.

How many more children must be bloodied by chosen apathy, City Council?

You have the power to help your citizens, but instead SPD receives its largest budget yet.

Cameras still watch poor people and protesters are beat like

Next up, we have Craig Thompson to be followed by Genevieve Courtney.

Hi, I'm Craig Thompson.

First, I'd like to thank Councilmember Lynn for working so hard to put together a public safety hearing on Beacon Hill two nights ago.

That drew between 250 and 300 people, making it one of the largest community meetings in Seattle's recent history.

I'm here to offer a solution that touches on much of what we've been hearing from other people so far as well.

and that is we need to have a more accountable city government that addresses many, many public safety issues for the city.

For the last 12 years, the city has pursued policies that haven't really worked very well.

I know from working with the Nichols and McGinn administrations that what is needed in what is called the jungle, North Beacon Hill, Little Saigon, is an interagency task force that includes City of Seattle, King County, and state resources.

It's not only law enforcement, but it is also outreach and public service.

And that must be accountable to the community, and it must involve the community as well.

Now, there's a tendency of saying, we can't do this now.

We have to study this problem.

Well, I think we've studied these problems for long enough and that there are actually things that we can do today that will help move this forward.

One of the things that we do need, however, is a single point of program management that is responsible not only to the issues that I have and that my community has, but also the issues that we've just heard described by other people who are so concerned with police accountability.

We all know that we need to move forward in a positive and constructive way that will make a difference for all of us, for the city, for every family, for every person who needs police help, and that that help is as responsive as public services to help the least fortunate among us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, Genevieve Courtney.

Hi, I'm also here from North Beacon Hill.

We had a public safety meeting on Wednesday night, as said, with about 200 attendants.

Although there were a few activists that came with specific agenda items, the far majority were people who live within 1,000 feet of the location with concerns that they've seen in their neighborhood.

The neighborhood has greatly deteriorated over the last nine months as the city has decided to power wash Little Saigon twice a day and have literally pushed the narcotics use up into our neighborhood, yet somehow have not fixed Little Saigon at all.

I ask the city to please stop power washing Little Saigon.

This is not working.

You have only spread out the problem and into our neighborhood and right onto the front door of a childcare center that is publicly funded and of a senior housing and affordable housing community.

I have seen people smoking fentanyl right on the air intake of the childcare center where my daughter goes to school.

I have watched a man just last week with a gun dealing drugs right in front of the childcare center.

I have, my husband has been assaulted on our street just in the last week.

I have, my husband has delivered Narcan to a woman on our street within the last three weeks.

This is urgent.

We need your help now.

On Wednesday, multiple neighbors told powerful firsthand accounts about how they were helped by being arrested and put into forced programs that helped them with their narcotics usage.

I hear that people say police don't work, but we have heard from firsthand accounts from neighbors that they actually did help them and they did work.

I ask, just like Craig Thompson here, please create an interagency task force to help our neighborhood.

The first tiny homes go to people in our neighborhood.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Julie Rawls, MD, to be followed by Howard Gale.

Hi, I'm Julie Rawls, and I'm from the CID, and I talk to Gary Lee pretty much every month at our public safety forum.

And I came today in particular to apologize.

I read the Seattle Times article yesterday.

It kind of flipped out at what Gary said, because he's kind of implying that 12th and Jackson stays a problem because SPD just isn't enforcing the law.

So y'all got a letter from me and I got a letter back from Gary saying he was misquoted and that we're kind of on the same page, that SPD isn't the limiting factor, it's actually more county.

And people think, oh, we'll just pick him up, take him to jail, end his story.

What's going to happen at jail?

They get booked and then they get released, and we really want our officers who have huge other calls to handle to take hours to book one person.

So just want to share that for one.

That whole problem as a group from the CID, I don't think enough of us are really going to county because I think that's where we might find solutions, particularly the Public Health Department should have already been on this.

It's almost like there is no public health presence, period, in this county, and I'd like to help work on that.

Sorry if it's funny, not funny, but I thought all these problems, and it was so great to finally see the sidewalks being power washed, and things kind of cleared out at 3rd Street, and then they cleared out in Little Saigon, and now I find out it just went to another neighborhood.

None of us have the solution, but I think having an interagency task force is a fantastic idea, and understand this is city, county, state, federal.

We all have to work together, and I have more to say, but my time is up.

I will be back.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Howard Gale to be followed by JC.

Good morning, Howard Gale.

At the March 17th meeting of the City Council Committee, Committee Chair Kettle stated that SPD policy and guidance requires, quote, confirming that it is a federal law enforcement officer and Again, quoting, "...as part of that process, essentially get a basic understanding of the probable cause that was behind the arrest. This is what they are doing, and the directive says that." The actual policy is opposed to what's possibly aspirational statements that are more in line with what the 36 District Democrats have been calling for.

is explained and documented by Chief Barnes on March 5th, where it says an officer will attempt to validate the status of individuals that appear to be officers when safe and feasible.

That's very different from mandating that they confirm, number one.

And number two, there is nothing in any policy or statement from the police about ascertaining probable cause.

This is an extreme concern because just two days ago, the new SPOG president, Kent Liu, very much speaking on behalf of SPD officers and claiming that Chief Barnes' statements are only political and can be disregarded, said, so you remember years ago, you remember Charlottesville incident.

That protest, that riot, that demonstration came to Seattle.

So we had a group that started, I think, in Westlake.

It was our job to police and not take a side.

Why?

Because there's a flashpoint.

They're going to get at it physically.

That's not safe for either side.

How is this ICE controversy any different?

Comparing ICE and what they're doing to the racist violence in Charlottesville is just bizarre.

This situation we face now, this is a failure of the city to clearly require Seattle police take an active role in protecting people's constitutional rights and protections.

and has left us in a situation where Seattle's leaders over-promise what's actually gonna happen, but Seattle's police promise something very, very different.

Again, what 36 District Dems have called for is for this council in this city to protect people's Fourth Amendment rights.

Thank you.

Okay, with the exception of the bootlicking pedo protector white man on this committee, everyone else on it has ancestors who struggled against genocide, labor exploitation, oppression, lynchings, and other forms of state-sanctioned violence.

On Sunday, we saw state-sanctioned violence yet again on community members exercising their First Amendment rights to speak.

speak out against an act of genocide that has slaughtered over 100,000 people, including more than 25,000 kids.

We demand justice and accountability for community members who were violently brutalized by SPD officers who kneeled on their necks and pepper sprayed in the face a person who was already pinned down.

Already pinned down.

Here, Mr. Kettle, can you look at the pictures here and see the state violence?

Justice begins with amends, and amends includes resources for victims.

So honor your ancestors who struggled to fight for the rights and civil liberties that we enjoy today and create an effective persons program.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up we have Yvette Dinesh to be followed by Jennifer Bogu.

Good afternoon, I'm back.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberties and justice for all.

I came in today in response to the article also in the Seattle Times yesterday.

and I'm also saying that what Danny Westnett said in his column, one of the things he said is that what's been happening for five years in Little Saigon would not be allowed for five hours in Madrona.

which is, that's another conversation.

I'm also disappointed in Mayor Wilson in that in the same newspaper edition yesterday that she was able to solve the problem with the number eight Metro West route on Capitol Hill within three months of being in office, but yet she cannot come up with any viable solutions to the chaos over the 12th and Jackson.

I take that route, the number seven, twice every week to come down to city council meetings and that corner is a hot mess.

For real, for real.

It just makes my skin crawl.

So one of the solutions I would like to see in the meantime is we've got funds to do this.

Paid security 24-7 at 12th and Jackson.

Perhaps using that vacant lot right there across the street at 3rd and James and Cherry as a temporary staging area to get those off of 12th and Jackson and someplace else to go.

And I'm also...

Let's see here.

80% of those in encampments refuse shelter.

Somehow we gotta figure out what it is they want to get them to get out of the encampments and lease into a safer place.

And also regarding funding for programs like that or helping is to audit those organizations that are getting funding to help the homeless and see whether or not they're doing what they're getting paid to do.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jennifer, you're up.

And then last in-person will be Gabriel Diaz.

Gabriel Diaz.

Hello?

Okay, my thing is that American Indian born and raised on the call of the Indian Reservation.

My people come up missing and murdered more than any, no, than every other race on the planet at the highest rates.

And I'm sick and tired.

I moved to Seattle back in 1999 and I have been I was killed, almost murdered by black, whites, and Hispanics, and none of these people were held accountable for the violence they did against me or my people.

I was raped at the age of 15 by illegal Mexican, and that's my cousin's baby dad, and he was not held accountable, and I believe that a lot of illegals that cross the Mexican border are in fact come here to commit more crimes because they're already committing a crime as they cross the border.

I lived in Mexico as an illegal and they don't want American Indians in Mexico.

So my thing is, why are they allowed to be here when us Native Americans are not allowed to live as illegals in their land?

But on the greatest point of the reason I'm here is because of my people.

My people are being murdered at the highest rate.

My daughter, who is half black and half native, her father raped me and nothing happened to him, not just because he is black.

A couple days ago, I got attacked on the bus by African Americans.

Not only these African Americans who commit crimes against me are held accountable because they're Black and I'm Native.

Cops, when it comes to me, they don't hold anybody accountable.

They always want to put me in jail, even if I defend myself.

So I believe that Seattle has a problem with American Indian people.

I see Hispanics and African Americans going up in Chiefs Health Club, selling .

and they're selling dope on 12th and Jackson and nobody's doing nothing about it.

Thank you.

Gabriel Diaz?

Sorry.

Hey folks, my name is Gabriel Diaz and I'm a survivor of police violence.

Now I've talked a lot about that day as it happened, but in perspective I don't even talk about very much, it's a little hard.

That gets missed a lot is what happens the day after.

I woke up with about four hours of sleep at 9 a.m.

because I had to spend most of my night in the hospital, and it feels like I got hit by a truck.

The sun is too bright because I have a really nice concussion, and as I move to shield my eyes from the sun, I reminded of the pain in my ribs, because not only did I take multiple shots to the head while fully restrained, I also took multiple rib shots hard enough to make even breathing laborious.

I have a doctor's note, so I don't have to work, but every hour away from work is more and more money out of me and my wife's pocket and away from basic resources, so I have to question how long I can actually be out of work, how long I can actually take time to make sure I get the healing I need before I am unable to afford my rent.

I finally heard back about my friends who were missing that day.

They did get arrested.

We just didn't know their birth names.

And charges that were completely falsified.

And I forced myself out of bed because as much as I'm hurting bone deep, I know those people did not get the care they need, did not get the treatment or the help they need while they're in there.

So I forced myself out of bed.

As I drive, I saw a SPD car behind me, and I started to pull over, and I started uncontrollably sobbing.

I sat there for 15 minutes on the side of the road just sobbing at the sight of an SPD officer.

My friends are released because, as usual, they had no probable cause to arrest 95% of the people that got grabbed.

My friends pitched to go to Cal Anderson to celebrate, but my body heard that, like, let's go jump in a volcano to celebrate, and I can't breathe.

As I sat there, I was so alone and so scared.

I know if I'm out more than a couple days, I won't be able to pay my rent this month.

I don't have a therapist right now, and I can barely function.

and I barely have any idea of how to report what happened to me.

But I'm the sole provider, so I have to make money.

I want nobody to experience what I had to experience again, so that's why I'm working with these magnificent people to fight for an office for people who have been hurt or been damaged by the people that were sworn to protect them.

We need an office for victims of police violence today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Bennett Hazelton.

Good morning, counsel.

I hadn't planned to sign up to speak, but I feel like somebody should respond to the remarks that were given by the speaker before the previous speaker.

Regardless of the victimization that anybody has personally experienced themselves, I do not feel it's right for anybody to come up here and start slagging off on members of specific races and demographics and blaming them for a crime.

In particular, undocumented immigrants actually commit fewer crimes per capita than people who are actually born here.

But quite apart from that, apart from the per capita statistics, I do not think it's okay for anybody to come up here and talk about, oh, you know, the group of blacks that attacked me on the bus or whatever the fuck she was saying.

Sorry.

But, you know, that's wrong.

I mean, regardless of the person's own racial identity and regardless of what they may have been through, that's wrong.

and probably a lot of people here were appalled and wanted to come up and say something, but under the public comment rules that they've already talked, they can't come up and talk again.

and I believe her absolutely as far as the victimization that she's been subject to do herself and I do not believe that makes it okay what she said but there's a difference between justification and cause and effect.

I don't believe that makes it okay but I'm sure that had something to do with her ending up in the place that she's at now and I hope that people who are at risk of going down that path in the future.

We need more care and more intervention to save people from ending up in a place of hate like that.

And even for the people who are already there, it's not too late to reach out to them.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Last in-person speaker is M.

Smith.

Yeah, my name's M.

Smith.

I'm a member of Labor Militant.

I'm here to speak in favor of the affected persons program.

We need an office to provide resources for families of victims of police brutality.

And we don't need another committee.

We don't need another study.

It's been years that this has been going on.

We need this now.

Funeral costs, average funeral costs in this country are $8,500.

The average medical cost for someone affected by violence is $45,000 for hospitalization or $5,000 for an emergency department visit.

Victims and their families, this shouldn't just be about providing resources.

This should be full compensation for medical bills, travel, burial and funeral expenses, mental health care, housing, loss of wages, child care, attorney and investigator fees.

It is fucking expensive when you're brutalized by the police, when you're a victim of violence or a family member of someone who's affected by this.

Right now, Mayor Wilson and the Democrats on the city council are threatening to cut public services, but the Democrats on this council have increased the Seattle police budget by $123 million just over the past five years.

This fund and all of these cuts that are being planned to public services, these should be paid out of a cut of the Seattle Police Department.

We should take that $123 million and put it towards health care, housing, education, and this office that's needed to provide this compensation for families of victims of police violence.

The Democrats on this council have done nothing.

It's not just this issue.

They've done nothing to stop ICE.

They've done nothing to solve the affordability crisis.

They've done nothing to address police violence in this city.

We need to bring these issues together.

And to everyone in this room, I urge everyone to come out on May 5th at 2 p.m.

for the full city council meeting on that day to pack the city hall room and demand action from the Democrats on the city council.

Thank you.

We'll be transitioning to the remote public comments.

First up is going to be Amari Davis.

Amari, a reminder to press star six.

Yeah, can you hear me?

Yep, go ahead, Amari.

Okay, great.

Yeah, thanks.

My name's Amari.

My pronouns are they, them.

I'm also here to speak on behalf of or here for the affected people by police violence.

As we exit Black Maternal Health Week, we are left to see Black mothers still crying over the bodies of their dead sons, buried in the ground with bullet holes in their chest put there by the Seattle Police Department.

Does your imagination for Black motherhood extend beyond the hands of your police force?

In 2024, SPD saw a 16% increase in budget, cutting funding for affordable housing and social services throughout the county.

Does your imagination for Black life extend beyond the pockets of the thugs who take it from them?

In 2025, SPD saw an overspending in budget by 96% with no demands for accountability and further pushes to more budgeting for the recklessness.

Does your imagination for Black sustainability extend beyond the carelessness of your state's spending habits?

In this meeting, we have noted the quote-unquote crime coming from neighborhoods as an embarrassment to the city.

The real embarrassment is the death rates of Black families in this city by the hands of the very state embarrassed by the crime that it creates.

With no support for families, they are left to survive in a city that gives them nothing but grief.

Your neighborhoods are in crisis because the Seattle Police State Sub-Department, unaccountable and able to carry out any level of violence that feels good to them, have become the very root of the crime problem, quote unquote, in Seattle.

Black families have implored, demanded, and damn near begged for funds, the support, and the compassion, quote unquote, you so willingly give and speak to others to them, yet nothing their way has come.

It is long past time that you take the money from the hands of the thugs who aspire to murder us and into the community that is suffering at your hands.

I want to say thank you to the folks that have spoken, that have been affected and violated by the police state thugs in this.

And I also want to thank the white women and the Democrats in the room that prove time and time again that they will always side with state and police violence.

as it protects their identity, their whiteness, and their money.

Have a good day.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Wendy Yim.

Hi, my name is Wendy Yem.

Thanks for listening, council members.

I live two blocks from Virginia Mason's Bailey-Boucher shelter operated by Virginia Mason.

I have to laugh when I hear your outrage at $13 million unaccounted by KCHRA because you act as though this sum is all that has been wasted when the real loss are the dollars that have been accounted for by all city and county housing agencies who routinely fail to provide meaningful treatment and services.

This includes not only KCHRA, but also Seattle Human Services, DCHS, the Office of Housing, and probably others.

Bailey Boucher alone is receiving around $10 million just this year, and it's clear that no one at any of the agencies funding them are reviewing their contracts and shoddy performance reporting.

Not only does Bailey Boucher break their contracts, but their Good Neighbor agreement is useless.

Councilmember Kettle, your NEMP, which is not legally enforceable, will suffer the same fate.

You plan yet another flavor of housing authority run through the mayor's office when multiple housing entities are already wasting and misappropriating not just 13 million, but billions of dollars that are supposedly accounted for.

This shows that you do not understand day-to-day operations of shelters and their contracts.

The existing contracts with all agencies are weak, lucrative, and incentivize fraud and underperformance by our shelter operators.

I know because I've read them.

They are structured to indemnify those profiting from homelessness like Lehigh and Virginia Mason.

The contracts ensure city and county employees are rewarded for overlooking them and contain no protections for the communities that host shelters.

Council member Kettle, please start by fixing the contracts for existing shelters and change the fundamental contract structure before implementing yet another ill-conceived and unenforceable mechanism in the form of a SNIF and the accompanying NEMP.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And last up, we have David Haynes.

Hi, David Ains.

Despite all the audit verifications of corruption, failed policies, and recidivism for felons, the six-figure salaries for community passageways and other gun violence preventions continue to get paid, yet most of them shook down City Hall during the George Floyd protest, and Mayor Durkin shifted $120 million away from the police and gave it to a whole bunch of people who claimed expert at alternative policing, community safety, street safety and all this.

Yet, Seattle is repeating all the failed policies of exempting drug pushers from jail and tainting the racist lens of government that looks through and it's because the city attorney is the one who's tempting fate.

She has informed the police chief that she's repeating the same bad policies of Pete Holmes that she used to work for that she lobbied along with Andrew Lewis to convince him to not punish or prosecute any drug crimes that are in the misdemeanor category.

And yet we know for a fact that you can destroy people's lives daily and ruin the pursuits of happiness and implode society under 3.5 grams and never be scrutinized by the cops, never be questioned by the cops.

And yet we know that Bruce Harrell was In fact, the original council member who voted to exempt drug pushers from jail and shift the paradigm away from improving the war on drugs, we now have all these people getting rich running interference for criminals and paying gun-toting gangsters to relocate if they don't retaliate and paying them to not rob people.

And yet we see a whole list of corrupt nonprofits who are making $380,000 a year acting like an expert in gun violence prevention.

or $250,000, and yet there's no scrutiny other than a half-assed audit that verified the corruption, yet there's still no action taken almost two years later.

They're still getting around to thinking about doing a little bit more and then talking about taking the money away, but yet when it comes to the effective policies, you all are failing at public safety miserably.

You still have doubled down.

Thank you.

Okay, public comment period has expired.

I want to thank everyone for coming out.

And for those that were here related to Mr. Hightower, thank you for being here.

I do have a picture of Mr. Hightower.

The family of the deceased is what I mean.

So Ms. Hightower, thank you for being here on behalf of the family.

I just wanted to note we will have on May 12th a committee meeting with our accountability partners.

Two agenda items, one is going to be related to the Cal Anderson protests here, the report, the review on that, which goes somewhat to some of these pieces that were discussed, and then the general having the three accountability partners here to speak to the issues.

On the council budget action, I don't have anything on that.

but we can check into that issue because I do not have any insight on there.

And some of the other pieces that were brought up really go to the seam.

I really appreciate the point that we can do all we can do on public safety, but if the state's not doing its part in mental health, if the county's not doing its part in public health, then essentially we're running to stand still.

and for those, we are recruitment and retention, we are bringing on with our, we didn't lower the standards for our testing for incoming to SPD as though some called for that.

We maintained the higher standard test and we're working to bring on great representatives of our community to serve our community.

And for the members of Little Saigon, thank you for being here.

I agree we don't need a study.

We've been working this.

We can move forward.

And the challenge is, even with a task force, we still have the of two minds problem where we have different elements that lead to paralysis or actions that essentially cancel each other out.

but we'll continue to work those issues.

So thank you for coming.

We will now proceed to our items of business.

Members of the public are encouraged to either submit written public comment on sign-up cards available at the podium or email the council at council at seattle.gov.

We'll now move on to our first item of business.

Will the clerk please read agenda item one, two, but now the first, into the record.

Agenda, item two, opportunities to strengthen Seattle's community violence intervention ecosystem.

Thank you.

Ms. Risco, will you join us at the table, please?

Colleagues, for the interests of time, and I recognize we do have some corn challenges, we'll run through the briefing and leave questions for the end.

So good morning, Ms. Briscoe.

Thank you for joining us.

Will you please introduce yourself for the record?

Devita Briscoe.

Yes.

Okay.

And start your presentation.

Our clerk will ensure that the slides are coming up for you.

I'm Devita Briscoe.

I previously served under Mayor Harrell as the gun violence prevention liaison.

Some of my work is grounded in lived experience, have a background in serving several capacities in criminal justice reform, public safety capacities, and also police accountability.

So I'm here today just to serve in a role as giving some guidance to the council as far as community violence intervention and as a strategic guidance on what that could look like in Seattle.

Thank you.

So today's briefing is, we're gonna just kind of guide this today on a shared understanding on what CVI is.

I'm also gonna kind of walk through what the current landscape is in Seattle.

and I'm also going to kind of identify what the gaps are here in our city and then also kind of look at what it looks like or we're going to ground it in what it looks like across the nation.

Thank you.

When we talk about serious violence in cities, it's important to understand that it's not random.

It's very concentrated.

It's concentrated amongst a small number of individuals, groups, and in neighborhoods.

and amongst social networks and cycles of retaliation.

We also see that law enforcement has a role, but they're...

The role of our community violence interventionists are, when it's trauma related and when it's also driven by these social networks, that's the role that where our community violence intervention specialists kind of play a role where it's complementary to police.

and especially when it's clustered in some of these smaller neighborhoods.

So it's not so much to replace law enforcement, but to serve as a complement to law enforcement.

Next slide.

So I want to say a public safety approach as well.

I mean public health approach as well.

Because this violence is so concentrated, it's also predictable.

So you'll see where it says 60% of gun violence is predicted through like a social network analysis.

and then we have 40% of those who are shot or killed or injured again within five years.

These are real statistics and you have like less than 2 or 3% in every city.

They're responsible for like about 80%.

And so because it's so predictable, that means it's also the most preventable form of violence or gun violence, I should say.

And so that's why this form of community violence intervention is it has to be very targeted to this group because we can predict who most likely will be shot or who will become a victim.

And so this strategy or these evidence-based strategies around community violence intervention is the most preventable, and some of these approaches are the best solutions that we're seeing across the nation, is what most cities are using this approach.

I kind of say it's an emerging field, but it's been around forever.

Recently in the last, I would say, two to three years, I've been really starting to perfect more of the approaches across the city, across the nation, where we're seeing more cities adopt some of these best practices and really starting to put more of a budget towards evidence-based strategies.

Next slide.

I'm just going to give a definition.

So it's a comprehensive set of strategies.

It's a public health approach that addresses the root causes.

Now, I say proximate causes as well as root causes.

And proximate causes are some of those things that drive.

So it could be a beef in a neighborhood, an argument with another person, a gang rivalry, drug-related response.

and sometimes we're looking at root causes and often saying those are underlying causes.

That's your long-term strategy, but your immediate strategy is your proximate causes.

So your CVI, they're addressing those proximate causes that are going to try to prevent some of those retaliatory responses right away.

That's the immediate.

So I say proximate causes as well as the long-term responses, which are the root causes.

So it's proximate and root causes of violence and focus on interrupting cycles of violence, preventing retaliatory acts and promoting positive community change using a network of community-based organizations.

So I would say coordinating amongst I'd also say it's a city-led approach as well, and you're coordinating with community-based organizations.

So I would have to say that the city is a governance structure, and it's a CVI ecosystem.

So it's not individual programs, which is where I'm finding the gaps, is that we're funding individual programs and buying programs, so to speak.

But this is a CVI ecosystem.

and to provide adequate funding, and you wanna make that sustainable.

So, on the next slide.

And then the ecosystem, again, a city-led strategy, and you have these wraparound services, and you wanna focus on the highest risk, which includes your street outreach.

Your street outreach intervention is gonna be your core services of your ecosystem, and you're addressing violence in real time.

You're also doing mediation and it's your public health approach with your public safety coordination.

And it's a data informed targeting and response.

And so it's what you're going to provide, you're providing the structure for this entire ecosystem.

And this is what's going to sustain violence over time on a citywide level.

Next slide, sorry.

So in Seattle, we're doing the right things.

We have the right partners who are committed to doing this work.

I guess what we're lacking would be the governance structure, but also be the oversight.

And we have organizations and partners that are operating in silos.

and so we're lacking the data and integration and the governance structure and coordinating across agencies.

So that is the part that we're, that's where the largest gaps are.

And again, I think that's what we'll have more sustained where we're able to have systems level increases in where we want to see that more sustained outcomes.

So we have a lot of strengths where we can build from.

We've seen some significant reductions in 2024 and in 2025, where we saw the first half of 2025 declined 41%, and firearm homicides declined by 29%.

there was a top 10 city, we were in the top 10 on the National Violence Prevention Index in 2023, and that did not measure individual programs, that measured Seattle's readiness for CVI infrastructure.

And so that, and they actually, they measured all, the whole country, the whole nation.

And so we were in the top 10 for that.

So that was a pretty good measure there.

We also have our existing hospital-based violence intervention that is very committed to this work as well.

Seattle is very invested in that.

and then the outcomes that we have from SYVPI in the early 2010s.

And so we have that to build from.

And then we also have good partnerships on a national level for technical assistance with Cities United, National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform, Everytown for Gun Safety.

So we have all of these national organizations that are available and ready to make a commitment to provide technical assistance support to our providers and to help to build that infrastructure for CVI governance and to support our partnerships that are on the ground and also cross-agency coordination.

Okay, no, go ahead.

And then on a national level, we look to, I look to like New York City as a, kind of what they've done there.

They've integrated across neighborhoods response, accountability, and neighborhood presence and visibility.

and they actually have the best model that we've seen, but you've also seen it in Newark and Wisconsin and in Oakland.

There's a few other cities that kind of have the governance infrastructure and data management infrastructure and some of these other efforts where you're seeing sustainable that's been effective.

But the crisis management system in New York is probably the most, because they have a bigger, bigger system.

And again, it's not to look to them as far as like a program or a model to take from, to implement here.

It's just to kind of see how they built the system and to, not to take it from there, but people are not like taking models and building them.

They're just looking at what other cities have done and then they're taking some of those pieces and customizing it to their city.

Then also what we've seen in cities that have been successful is the capacity.

They're building these specific capacities, and that's leadership, the leadership capacity, data-informed approaches, and then also your ability to collaborate across agencies, and then building the infrastructure to manage and to sustain the reductions over time.

Next slide.

And to professionalize the workforce.

Now this is the key part, I think that's most important as well, is sometimes our workforce on the ground, they're doing the work and their credibility is great, but their credibility also needs structure.

So that means their standard operating procedures, that means their training, that means the workforce is building their legitimacy, not just with their rapport with the community, but it also means that they're following protocols.

It means that, and that's what it looks like across the board.

It looks the same way in West Seattle that it looks in Rainier Beach.

that they're all following the same protocols, all the same training, and we're looking at that training over time, and we're assessing that training all the time, just the same way you look at the fire, you look at, you know, these are first responders, and we're holding them to the standards of regular first responders, like anyone else.

So this is, I think, is a, we're gonna, I'm thinking, to professionalize that workforce, in a way that they're treated as first responders in the same way as any other first responder.

Next slide.

And this is the coordinated ecosystem where you have your prevention, intervention, stabilization.

And again, intervention would be you're going to interrupt the cycles of violence.

Stabilization is your victim and your family support.

And first of all, first is your intervention.

It's going to be your street outreach, your mediation.

Your outreach workers are going to be able to provide that.

Your victim support maybe would be recovery, Getting your victims to support services, which I feel like need a lot of support here in Seattle, could be improved tremendously.

Prevention would be, of course, doing more mentoring and support.

And again, I wouldn't say mentoring, but I would say more of anything that's related to gun violence specifically and to this small group.

populations, so not just your broad programming, not broad violence prevention programming, but what is related specifically to this population.

and then your re-entry opportunity pathways are going to be, again, for your more high risk, so that would be your legal support, that would be life coaching, that would be transitional employment, things like that.

Your governance structure, that would be the oversight, so that would be an Office of Gun Violence, Office of Violence Prevention, and then also your data support.

They have data dashboards.

Any way that you can track and sustain your accountability measures over time and how you would track your outcomes.

And so that kind of comes in that bracket there.

And your workforce and your infrastructure.

Community trust is also your branding and your visibility.

How much the community is recognizing your community partners.

and the rapport that they're building in those hotspot areas.

How much are they recognized by the partnerships?

Are they walking the streets?

And are they recognized by the community?

And are they trusted in those areas by the community?

Are the neighbors in the post-shooting, are they checking in with the neighbors?

Things like that.

So the neighborhood stabilization.

Okay, next slide.

Where's Seattle aligned?

So again, we're aligned around the public health framing.

We all get it when we're talking about the approach that we want to make.

Our partnerships, as far as the community partnerships, we're aligned there.

And then a hospital-based intervention.

We are strong in our approach with Harborview.

Where we're lagging is in the oversight and the governance structure and then our institutional infrastructure and providing the coordination and the oversight and how we're gonna approach that coordination between the partnerships and making the connection between those partnerships to support, to give it the support around all of those partnerships and over the oversight.

and so, next slide.

And then again, this was the New York example that I was just explaining and what they've done across neighborhoods where they have the accountability and the visibility and then how they are, they go beyond just counting incidents and shootings.

Again, it's like the dosage of their presence.

They're doing more than just just numbers of shootings that they're decreasing.

So their approach is more of presence, and they're counting more than just other...

The way that they're capturing their data, they've approached it different ways.

Their accountability is...

branded vehicles, their uniforms, and they have neighborhood hubs.

So in every neighborhood, there is actually a physical space.

So the city invests in, like, let's say an old firehouse, and they revamp that firehouse to have a physical location where the people in that neighborhood can actually go in.

That's one thing that I noticed when I was able to do a site visit there, is that every borough in New York has an actual physical space in every neighborhood where they're able to go in and to have programming, meet with a case manager, search for a job or do a healing circle, whatnot.

Okay, next slide.

and there's investment on the federal, state and local level.

It's not so much if the funding exists, it's to make sure that the funding is aligned so that it's supporting the work and to ensure that it's not so that there's not fragmented on the ground, so that it's all, ensure that it's all aligned.

Again, I think earlier in the year, some of that funding was cut on a federal level, but I believe they're probably still trying to see if they could, see if they can get that money back.

I'm not quite sure.

Still in the works.

So every city doesn't do this all in one phase.

They kind of do this in phases.

And so the first thing they do is they kind of do the planning, and they do it in first they kind of do the planning, they do the infrastructure, they build out the system, and then they do a pilot.

they evaluate that pilot and then the last part is that they scale what works and then they scale it from there.

and this is the phase.

Phase one will be what the council would be funding.

And again, that would be, this briefing would be what's happening on a national scale.

Seattle will be an assessment of what Seattle's CVI ecosystem is.

And then number three will be the Office of Violence Prevention, the framework or the governance structure of what that is and then also a budget and the implementation phase.

I think that's it.

Next slide.

I think that's it.

Thank you, Ms. Briscoe.

Any questions?

Yes, thank you, Ms. Briscoe.

There you go.

So thank you very much.

I think this briefing is important.

in the sense of what we've been talking about.

We've been talking about alternative response.

We've been talking about these different pieces.

So this is a good way to kick off and really identify some of the issues that we have.

So I appreciate you coming here.

Normally I go to my Vice Chair, but Council Member Lin may be going remote or we may be done at that point, but I just wanted to skip normal protocol.

Sorry, Vice Chair, and go to Council Member Lin if you had any questions.

Thank you so much, Chair, and thank you, Vice Chair Saka.

Just kind of more of a statement, observation, and then I'm going to transition to remote.

I'll be listening in here in a little bit.

Really appreciate the presentation.

Super helpful.

And youth gun violence in particular, District 2, Southeast Seattle, Rainier Beach, but not just Rainier Beach.

We've got it in Rainier Vista.

Certainly, it's an urgent priority.

And I have weekly meetings down at Rainier Beach.

It's an online meeting with all the principals and community passageways and SPD.

and other community partners.

And it's a really helpful meeting.

And I do think that we're doing a lot of good work.

And I do think you talk about the themes, about the need for collaboration, and what I saw on your slides sort of lines up with what I'm observing a lot in terms of we're doing a lot of good work, but it's the silos, it's the lack of collaboration, it's the lack of the city sort of stepping into this, being more proactive is what I witnessed.

And part of this gets back to what I think the difficult discussion we're having in the city around police accountability and sort of the role of police.

And I think, you know, we have this sort of binary discussion around policing, right?

It's either yes policing or no policing.

and I think what we all want is policing with accountability.

And if we can work on that, because when there's harm in the community that goes unaddressed, whether it's from violence in the community or whether it's from police violence, when it goes unaddressed, it sort of festers, right?

And central to this work, What I think has been a little bit missing is the collaboration between our community partners and the city and SPD.

And part of that is because of this difficult sort of a community conversation we're having.

And so how do we build that trust?

How do we build that relationship?

I see it because I'm on these weekly calls between our community partners and SPD.

But I think that that is a central part.

I feel like we were doing, I don't have the same history that you do in this work, but I feel like we were doing good work.

and I feel like the 2020 reconciling that we had, the hard conversations we had, the defund movement sort of, basically we're like, okay, we're gonna hand off our funding to our community partners and we're gonna be hands off.

and that can't be we have to work in partnership is what I'm hearing and what I see.

And I think that that's where we're starting on that path again, but I think we have a lot of progress.

So anyway, happy to hear your reaction to that, but I just want to kind of share those observations.

Yeah, even in this work, legitimacy in the police force is kind of like, people don't know this, but that actually drives homicides when you don't have legitimacy.

So it's very important, and it's connected.

And so what I would encourage is not so much a partnership, but a healthy coexistence.

And I think people have often thought that they can solve gun violence without the police.

And I keep saying that's not gonna happen.

Who is gonna get your guns off the streets?

Who is gonna do your investigations?

And who's gonna clear your homicides?

And if you don't clear homicides, people are gonna constantly try to solve gun violence on their own.

So you want people to at least be able to think that they could trust if they don't want to solve it on their own.

So at some point, I don't want to call it a partnership.

I want to just say a healthy coexistence so that if we have our violence interruption teams showing up at those homicide scenes, they know who they are and they know how they're trained, what their role is and what the officer's role is.

If they're there, they're going to say, well, who are these guys and why are they here at my crime scene?

So they have to be co-trained so that they know who they are, they're able to identify them.

If they're there to assess that situation and they're there to stop a retaliation, they're going to be deployed to those scenes.

They're going to be deployed to the hospital.

So everybody has to be familiar with who's doing what and why they're there.

So that's why I think it's important for our gun violence reduction unit to know who our community partners are, who's doing that work, and for them to have some form of communication on a weekly basis.

Not that our community partners are giving them information, but they can be saying, hey, these are the guys on our radar.

Maybe, you know, We're not going to be making any arrests on these guys, but maybe they're causing a lot of problems that you guys can talk to these guys or whatever.

I don't know what that communication will look like, but at some point there has to be, like I said, a healthy coexistence to help.

My thing is getting ahead of the shootings, not responding to them.

That's the role, is that they get ahead of it.

Can I say one more thing, Chair?

Of course.

Thank you so much.

And thank you for that.

And a couple more points.

I really appreciated the discussion around having professionalization and standardization.

I do think this work has been around long enough.

There are best practices.

And talking about accountability, we all need accountability.

We need accountability from our partners, from our police, from ourselves.

But a couple other points, just the need to solve crimes and murders, I think not only for the victims' families to have that, it obviously does not bring the loved one back, but it is a critical piece.

But when they go unsolved, when this harm goes unaddressed, that does result in an increased likelihood of further gun violence if we don't have resolutions.

And so I don't want to overlook the importance of, and of course, we absolutely want to prevent it in the first place, including preventing any retaliation.

So thank you again, and thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Councilmember Lin, and thank you for staying a bit longer.

I appreciate it.

And please go on your phone, at least for a bit.

And I appreciate your comments.

One of the things I wanted to note is that police and accountability is important, and the alternative response.

And I see it with two pieces.

One, the city government piece of alternative response, and then the community piece.

So we have two layers of alternative response.

And I think it's important for all three elements to have accountability.

And I know there's a lot of mentioning.

You mentioned SPD multiple times.

But as you look at different documents, and this will be part of my question, like where's care and because again we cannot be so solely focused all the time on SPD and I think for success it is to right size that role and then in the context of the overall architecture which is something that I've been doing since 2020 first in the community role and then obviously now in this role too Alright, sorry Vice-Chair, I normally go to you first but Councilmember Lin is going to be shipped to his phone and that would have been awkward and so over to you Vice-Chair.

No worries, thank you Chair.

I just wanted to quickly thank Ms. Briscoe for joining us today, sharing your insights.

I really appreciate this work and clearly some opportunities for our city and frankly our broader region, but thank you.

Okay.

Thanks, Vice-Chair.

All right.

I'll basically make an observation from your slides.

You know, on slide six, you note in a bullet multiple CVI-related investments operating without shared governance or executive ownership.

This goes to the current state, the fragmented CVI landscape.

You know, as I go through the when you talk about national trends.

A main bullet was focused on governance and infrastructure.

Next slide, you know, what successful cities build is political governance and public sector leadership.

See, there's a trend coming here.

The next slide on slide 10, you know, credible messengers are most effective when supported by clear practice governance.

Then in the ecosystem on page 11, again, the main piece is governance data.

I like the footstomp data for a second.

And accountability, keyword.

And then where Seattle aligns and lags.

Lagging, executive ownership, practice governance.

Slide 12. And then you just walk through the briefing.

And you hit these points.

And here's the thing.

And this is something that's been frustrating to me for a while.

So I really appreciate this opportunity.

And we're going to have other types of briefings and meetings on this topic, because it's very important.

It's part of, again, this alternative response.

And the different layers of alternative response.

The government, city government, and also the community driven.

You had a bullet that said community driven.

And that part is really important.

We have some of the pieces here, but it's about making it happen.

And I have the care enabling ordinance in my hand right now.

And it says, number six, create a new initiative to integrate cities' violence intervention programs using research and evidence-based strategies to reduce violence, including identifying specific and measurable outcomes.

This initiative will focus initially on gun violence prevention interventions, community-based intervention programs, including violence interrupters, youth-focused programs, which is something the Council President has been really pushing.

Use evidence-based safety, public safety strategies to ensure, to measure program success and develop future solutions.

You just have to move from fragmentation to building the system and oversight.

The government structure.

But here we are in 2026.

That's what other cities are doing.

And it's here.

And here we are in 2026, a year ago.

it wasn't in my committee, it was in the governance committee, which I was vice chairing at the time, is the city auditor's report with the four recommendations related to better understand and address current gun violence patterns in Seattle.

Recommendation number one and two, it says, the recommendation one was about reporting, getting the data pieces, which are so important.

But two, the mayor's office should provide an update to Seattle City Council on community assisted, basically the care department's ordinance mandated new initiative.

Here we are, 11 months later.

And so colleagues, members of the public, the pieces are there.

It's about executing.

It's about leadership.

And in my role, I have some responsibilities here, but this is the reason why we're having the meeting and we're gonna have some follow-up meetings, is that there's different pieces to this, but clearly there's one area that we can do a lot of work pretty quick.

And so for those that know my committee, I use these briefings for two things.

Well, three things.

Inform, you know, work specific legislation maybe, and work the budget.

And so again, we already have it in ordinance.

We already have a city auditors report on it.

So it's pretty straightforward.

So this is something that I want to work with the mayor's public safety advisor lead on and her whole team.

And in addition, with my colleagues and the various stakeholders, of which clearly year one, but others as well, to work these pieces.

And then it can help the neighborhoods like Little Saigon and North Beacon Hill, very important to note that.

What we've been seeing just recently in Belltown, drug deal went bad, talk about drug, the person died.

We have these gun violence issues in in downtown, Third Pike and Pine, Belltown at different locations, obviously in Pioneer Square.

Some of this goes to overnight establishments, but when we work that piece.

But this is another area that we need to work, and I think we have opportunities here.

And so your briefing, I don't know how many slides I noted, five or six.

It's quite clear what we need to do, colleagues.

And there's other work to be done, too.

I'm talking about some of the specific pieces that we can do, and I think we can do relatively quickly, in addition to some of the more broader pieces, which goes to the of two minds issue that we have in our city, where we're kind of stuck between these competing thoughts and emphasis.

But you know what?

I think if we talk, like you can hear differences between Council Member Lynn and I when we talk about this, but you know what?

There's a whole lot of overlap.

And that overlap is where we can get work done.

And so colleagues, with that kind of concluding statement.

I just wanted to say- Well, speaking of data, what you were saying is what I just recently found out is even with the data informed approaches that helps you to figure out what your priority neighborhoods are.

And actually I just learned Beacon Hill, which I'm surprised has come up on the list.

I'm really surprised about that, but that's what I've learned.

Well, if you do a public safety walkabout with two council members here in the dais, you're not surprised.

and particularly when it's backed up by public commenters.

Trust me, the data pieces are there.

And like I mentioned in my chair's comment talking about the article from Seattle Times, because we worked it with other pieces of legislation.

And we work with the data scientists, both in SPD and the city attorney's office.

We work with the mayor's office, previous, or the SPD, the city attorney's office, our office.

These things are known.

It's about executing.

It's about implementing.

just to re-foot stomp my chair comment.

Okay, with that, we have reached the end of today's meeting agenda.

If there's any further business to come before the committee, before we adjourn, except for to wish Councilmember safe travels to University of Washington, you know, the U District.

And hearing and seeing no further business to come before the committee, we are adjourned.