Thank you so much, Jonathan and Dana.
And good morning, everybody, community members and members of the media.
Last night, the mayor of our city stood before protesters and lectured them to find, quote unquote, love and humanity.
Then she went on immediately before the TV cameras to staunchly defend the brutal, abusive, violent, inhumane actions of Seattle police over the last several days, including against children and including an officer kneeling on a protester's neck neck in the same manner, ominously reminiscent of what happened to George Floyd.
We're here this morning with community leaders, along with people who have lost loved ones to police violence in recent years in Seattle, to make it clear to the mayor and to the entire political establishment that we are demanding a fundamental change.
We are done listening to the speeches of establishment politicians and watching them shed crocodile tears while at the same time enabling a militarized police to brutally repress community protests.
Video footage since Saturday has repeatedly revealed that the police are the ones instigating the violence and that, in fact, these seem to be not spontaneous eruptions from the police, but they seem to be coming prepared with instructions to orchestrate violence, including repeated practices and patterns of repression and violence with officers wearing riot gear and carrying tear gas spray canisters.
We demand action, and we clearly cannot rely on the political establishment to fight racism.
Beyond the well-crafted statements and now tears from local Democrats lie decades of inaction, bloated police budgets, and the damning records of democratic governors, mayors, and city councils.
in city after city who hold power and where police brutality and violence is an ongoing feature of life in low-income neighborhoods.
We should be clear that we will need to continue building this protest movement to win change led by young people and independent of establishment politicians or leaders or leaders tied to the establishment.
We should expand the struggle to include broader mobilizations for coordinated mass days of action that involve youth, communities of color, and the wider working class, including the labor movement, rank and file, that demand fundamental change and an end to the systematic use of violence.
The outrage on the streets in multiple cities represents the deep community anger about police violence on top of the profound and longstanding suffering caused by the political establishment's failure to meet the basic needs of working people before and during this crisis.
in the context of a whole system of militarized racist policing that brutalizes communities of color, that protects property, not people, arrests union workers on picket lines while protecting billionaire-run corporations, and treats peaceful protesters, even children, as enemies to be overcome with brute force and chemical weapons.
No, this is not just a few protests.
It is an uprising, an uprising to demand fundamental change.
We're fortunate to have with us this morning the leadership of the Seattle King County chapter of the NAACP as they unveil their community letter demanding that the mayor withdraw her request to remove the police department from federal oversight.
The police department was placed under federal oversight in 2012 after a US Department of Justice investigation following the police killing of John T. Williams, a Native American artist who was shot by a Seattle police officer while he was crossing a street on Lower Capitol Hill.
The investigation found that the department routinely used an unconstitutional level of force and practiced racist policing against communities of color.
And we should note that this consent decree with the Department of Justice was itself a result of community organizing and grassroots demands.
In the decades since John T. Williams was killed, while the police and political establishment claimed that reform was taking place, Seattle police killed another 29 people.
I will repeat that.
29 people have been killed by the police since 2011. Between that deadly fact and the events of this past week, it is eminently clear that the Seattle Police Department needs more oversight, not less.
In just the last four days, people have filed more than 14,000 complaints of police abuse in Seattle.
This includes police pepper-spraying a young girl, punching a person on the ground who was being arrested, placing a knee on the necks of people who had been arrested, covering up badge numbers, pepper-spraying peaceful protesters, and even breaking store windows.
It is shocking to think that anyone in the political establishment can claim with a straight face that the Seattle police are serving the needs of the people.
And it is particularly galling that Mayor Durkan has joined with the Trump Department of Justice in calling for an end to federal oversight.
I am proud to be able to join with the NAACP in their demand to the mayor.
And I invite Caroline Riley Payne, the president of the Seattle King County NAACP to speak next.
After that, we will hear from grassroots community leaders and family members of people who have been killed by Seattle police.
And then of course, we will welcome questions from the media.
So please welcome and good morning, Ms. Riley Payne.
Good morning.
Thank you very much.
The time to meet anger with action is now.
Justice for George Floyd and the other black lives lost to police brutality means holding police departments accountable for the role in terrorizing our neighborhoods and dismantling the system that penetrates racism, domestic terrorism, and unjust policing.
We need a lot of things, but one of the most important is sweeping police reform federal legislation that mandates a zero tolerance approach.
The Seattle King County stands in opposition.
to the city of Seattle and the Department of Justice motion to release the Seattle Department for the remaining consent decree oversight by termination of the sustainment plan.
We joined with other community organizations and the office of the Councilman Sawant asking that the court deny that motion.
The Seattle...
NAACP condemns the premature motion to end the dissent decree and its police accountability oversight.
The city's motion fails to address the specific concerns to ensure that a police accountability, excuse me, is met.
Additionally, the city makes several motions and we reject them all.
The sent decree must stay in place.
We welcome the mayor's call to sit down with the community leaders to outline a plan.
We saw her stand on the steps, we saw her talk to the community that was there, but we, the community demand that she come and talk to us.
We decide who our community leaders are.
So we are waiting and we invite the mayor and the police chief to come and sit down with us because we can't help you with the plan.
We will not stand by while our brothers and sisters continue to get killed and do nothing.
The time for action is now.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Riley-Payne.
I could not agree more.
The time for action is now.
I also stand with the NAACP in demanding that there is federal legislation mandating sweeping reforms throughout the nation.
And I also support the community in telling Mayor Durkin that the community decides who its leaders are.
The establishment politicians don't get to decide that.
I'm also unveiling a letter today myself from my office that I will be sending to all council members.
I call on them to join me in demanding that the mayor withdraw her request to remove federal court oversight.
And I urge the council members to sign on to this letter alongside me and send it to the mayor jointly as a council.
The choice for the city council is clear.
You can align with the police, with Mayor Durkin, and the city's Democratic Party establishment that has allowed this police violence to occur over the last decade, or you can stand with the community, with working people, with people of color, and with the marginalized.
I find the idea that lifting the consent decree is actually going to lead to more accountability, as is being made by some leaders and council members now recently, to be disingenuous and deeply troubling.
We believe the events of the last few days have renewedly demonstrated how far the Seattle Police Department has to go to be reformed to the standards that could permit a termination of the consent decree.
While we don't believe that the consent decree is sufficient by itself in the absence of further substantial reform, lifting the consent decree points dangerously away from a direction of reform.
The consent decree has provided much needed attention to ongoing systematic police violence in Seattle, which continues to plague black and brown communities.
And the decree itself was won, as I said, due to powerful grassroots momentum.
To remove that scrutiny, particularly at this moment when so many of our constituents have experienced police brutality and a number of community organizations oppose removing it, it would be completely counterproductive and shocking, and it would send a terrible message to the public and would undermine efforts to address those deeply rooted issues.
And therefore, I welcome our next speaker, Katrina Johnson, who is a family member of Charlene Lyles, who was brutally killed by Seattle police three years ago.
Welcome, Katrina.
Good morning.
So over the last week or so, I've been terribly pained by the public statements from our mayor and our city attorney regarding being allies for police accountability, knowing good and well that they are actually not.
If you are for police accountability, then I suggest you withdraw the lawsuit to roll back reforms to King County's inquest process and let our family get the answers that we've been waiting for for nearly three years into what happened to Charlena Lyles.
Families have waited far too long and you're standing up there grandstanding in front of everyone, making it seem like you are progressive and that this would not happen in our city.
I was terribly pained by hearing Carmen Best talk about what's happening in Minneapolis with George Floyd, but not addressing the very harms that are happening in her backyard.
That is unacceptable.
People are dying on her watch and none of those families have any answers as to what happened to their loved one.
Why did it happen?
And what are you going to do different?
And then last night watching live feeds and downtown Seattle is looking like Iraq.
There are people out there peacefully protesting.
and the police moved in and tear gassed them and rubber bulleted those folks, unprovoked, and it's unacceptable, and something needs to change.
And I am sick and tired of you tokenizing folks in the movement, calling them community leaders, and you're not going into real, you're not asking real community leaders to stand up because we would not stand with you for the shenanigans that you are currently doing.
And to see you cry about the looting and the vandalism when kids are being pepper sprayed in the face and people are being tear gassed, it's completely absurd.
And I demand a change.
Thank you so much, Ms. Johnson.
And I could not agree more with what she just said.
Charlene Elias's family deserves answers.
And my council office stands with Katrina and other family members and friends of Charlene.
And as Katrina said, the community opposes the shenanigans of the mayor and the establishment.
And the hypocrisy of the politicians is not lost on us.
The community and my office has been calling on the mayor and the city council on that note to immediately launch an independent community-led investigation into Seattle Police Department conduct at the Justice for George Floyd protests since Saturday.
We've seen it wasn't just Saturday.
We saw what happened on Capitol Hill on Monday.
Officers who taped over their badge identification badges and those who engage in excessive use of force, brutality against protesters or other misconduct need to be disciplined or fired.
We do not accept for one moment Chief Best or Mayor Durkin's explanation that the hiding of a police officer's identity in this manner is some sort of ceremonial act.
This is providing cover for police brutality and it is lying to black and brown communities and it is disgraceful.
My office launched a petition Sunday night demanding this independent investigation just two days ago, and already we have over 4,000 signatures.
Let's note, as I introduce our next speaker, Nikita Oliver, more than one out of every four general fund dollars in the city's budget goes to the police department.
And that is shameful when you consider the scale of desperate, unmet human and social needs in our city.
And my office considers it our moral and political duty to join with the community members who are demanding that the Seattle Police Department budget be cut in half with the money to be reallocated to provide housing, food, childcare, and other basic human needs, especially in communities that are struggling under the double blows of the COVID recession and the ingrained institutional racism.
These funds, alongside raising progressive revenues through the Amazon tax, should be used to fund COVID-19 relief and to stop all budget cuts to social services and all austerity.
And so I invite community leader, community organizer, artist, and attorney, Ms. Nikita Oliver, to speak next.
Welcome.
Good morning.
Thank you, Council Member Sawant, and thank you, Katrina, for sharing your heart.
In 2013, I was 26 years old and was in the streets of Seattle in November and December protesting alongside other young black organizers calling on our city and our county to be accountable for the harm, the pain, the murder that the King County Sheriff and Seattle Police Department have continued to perpetuate upon our communities.
It is nearly 10 years later, and I am 34 years old, and I find myself in the exact same position again.
And when I speak to my elders, they talk about having been in that position when they were in their 20s and 30s, and their elders talked about being in the same position in their 20s and 30s, and the ways in which a white supremacist system has continued to police our communities and our bodies and our actions and our continued fight to free ourselves from that.
A lot of people ask, what can we do?
And one of the major demands of our movement right now is to defund and demilitarize the police.
I'm sure many of you have seen the live streams from protesters where Seattle Police Department is unleashing flashbangs, mace, tear gas.
They're running into protesters with their bikes.
They have very large sticks.
They're wearing riot gear.
And to be frank, this is no different than what I experienced in 2013. In fact, it feels like it's worse.
And so the only option is to begin to defund and demilitarize, but defunding is not enough.
We call for right now a 50% defund of the Seattle Police Department, and we demand that those dollars be invested in community-based alternatives to incarceration, community-based alternatives for public safety.
We have many models in our community that are being developed by groups like the Rainier Beach Action Coalition with the Corner Greeters.
We have many programs like Community Passageways, Creative Justice, Choose 180 that are all doing significant work to transform not just the criminal punishment system, but the entire system, which includes police, which includes the ways in which they over-police our communities, and often this resulting in the deaths of Black peoples.
We also demand that the city do significant work around the housing affordability crisis We saw this weekend that the mayor was able to put very quickly and to effect multiple emergency orders to try to pacify the protests, the valid, righteous anger of many people in the streets, but has not responded to our housing affordability and homelessness crisis.
Defunding the police will quickly free up funds to ensure that we can make sure that we respond to the needs of our most marginalized communities.
It cannot be a one-time thing.
It cannot be a cut simply because we're in the midst of COVID.
It needs to be a cut that is long-time standing, and we need to demilitarize the police.
There is absolutely no reason for police officers to be marching through the street with military-grade equipment.
They are not in the military.
They are not military personnel.
They are not trained as military is trained.
And on that note, I would also say I don't necessarily support the U.S. military.
Most importantly, what we want to see is a response to the needs of community that actually promotes public safety, that actually promotes the building of wealth and black communities.
And in that regard, I lift up the Africatown Community Land Trust.
and demand that the city and the county also begin to make strides to address gentrification, which has ripped from the hands of many black community members, our sustainability and our homes.
And we know that when people are affected economically, when there is mass poverty in a community, it only promotes more struggle, more pain, and the criminalizing of the things that we have to do to survive.
So in regards to defunding the police, we call for a broad set of investments that are developed by trusted, accountable community leaders.
Yesterday, the mayor said that those who typically are leading these things, quote unquote, were not there.
And she picked two folks who I would say almost no one in our community actually knows as the people who would negotiate on behalf of black community regarding how we address police accountability and police brutality.
Now, this is not to say anything about those two folks, but it is to call out the mayor for purposely picking a strategy that would dismantle and pacify our protests, but also not reflect the work of so many of our well-established black community members, and it is disrespectful.
So those are our demands, defund the police, invest in community-based strategies, and we also demand the release of all protesters still being held in jail.
Thank you.
Thank you so much, Ms. Oliver.
As Nikita explained, it's extremely crucial that community members are demanding the defunding and demilitarizing of the police and that restorative justice programs that community members themselves have launched and led on be funded, not to mention the urgent funding needed to address the housing affordability crisis from the funds freed by defunding the police, and also that this cannot be a one-time cut, that it has to be a long-term change.
Next, we are fortunate to have Mr. Jason Fuhrer, who is our next speaker.
We thank him for joining us.
Mr. Fuhrer is the father of Sean Fuhrer, who was killed by Seattle police just five weeks ago today.
Jason, all of us at the press conference and everyone in my office and my organization, Socialist Alternative, joins you in mourning the loss of your son.
Welcome.
Thank you so much.
I have been totally crushed by what happened to my son.
And I joined Ms. Johnson in the frustration of the police chief's press conferences where she only mentions George Floyd and doesn't say anything about the fact that they just murdered my son.
My son, he was my friend.
He was my children's brother.
My family has just been so crushed by this.
And it just adds insult to injury that every time I turn it on to see what she has to say, she doesn't say anything about any of the people that Seattle police have killed.
And I don't understand.
her refusal to acknowledge this.
It's on video.
You murdered my son with my grandbaby in his arms.
He could not have been any threat to you whatsoever.
And you shot him in the head.
And you don't even want to talk about that.
And the officer that did it is on paid leave sitting at home.
with no charges on anybody.
And I demand that the people that did this, they gave the order.
I feel like it was a murder hunt from the start.
And I demand that the person that gave the order to shoot my son and the person that pulled the trigger be charged.
and justice for all the other families that have been affected by the police like this.
They're killing people's children.
These are people's brothers.
And these are people's parents.
And they're targeting them.
people that are not being a threat whatsoever to them.
If someone's running from you, obviously he's scared, trying to flee for his life.
My son had his child and I know my son.
He had his child in his arms because he was scared and he was like, if I have my baby, they're not gonna kill me.
And they still did it.
And my grandchild was covered in blood.
from my son at the scene, and as young as she is, she may still be traumatized from this incident.
I know I will be traumatized.
I know that all my sons are traumatized.
His mother is traumatized.
My brother, his kids, the whole family.
Sean was the life of our family.
He always had a smile.
He always knew when somebody was feeling down, he could just sense it.
He'd say, you know, what's wrong?
And pick you up.
When we had his service over a thousand people came and every one of those people shed tears for my son because everyone had their lives have been touched by Sean.
He had something special.
I don't know what it was, but he was just a bright, nothing could take to pull him down and get him down.
And, you know, He helped so many people stay up emotionally.
And they robbed us of that.
And for the police chief not to acknowledge that and to do nothing but try to dehumanize my son, It's horrible.
It's horrible.
And I just want justice for my son.
And I want every family that's been affected in this way by the police to get justice and people to be accountable for their actions.
So much, Mr. Fuhrer.
We really value your contribution in this press conference.
Despite, I can imagine how hard this must have been for you.
And absolutely, as you said, your family and every family of Charlie's family, every family that has been impacted by Seattle police murders deserves answers and deserves justice.
It is striking as Jason said, the hypocrisy of the local political establishment including Mayor Durkin where they're shedding tears on George Floyd but refusing to acknowledge the murders of our community members right here in Seattle, who have been, which the murders that have taken place under their watch and with their approval.
And my office also stands and demand it stands with Sean peers family and demanding that both the officer who pulled the trigger and those who gave the orders should be brought to justice.
This was a crime, and it deserves a punishment before inviting.
Reverend Ying, who is our next speaker, I wanted to announce that my office will be hosting a public meeting on June 9 at 6pm to discuss the way forward for our movement because it's very clear from all the points that Nikita and Jason and Caroline and Katrina have made that we cannot rely on the establishment to address these problems.
So it is up to us to organize our own independent grassroots movement and discuss how we can win our specific demands of independent investigation into the police brutality during the protests.
In the last week, demanding justice for the families who have lost their loved ones in police murders, defunding the police and cutting the police budget in half, and rejecting austerity and demanding full funding for social programs through raising progressive revenues, especially including housing affordability.
So please join us June 9th, 6 p.m.
It will very likely still, because we are still in the pandemic, be an online public meeting, and I will be inviting community organizations to co-sponsor the meeting alongside us, and we will hope to have community leaders and rank-and-file activists speaking there and giving us their ideas on how we can build this movement.
So I would like to invite now Reverend Angela Ying, who is senior pastor at Bethany United Church of Christ on Beacon Hill.
Our church serves as home for multiple community organizations fighting for racial and economic justice.
Welcome, Angela.
Thank you.
Good morning.
I am the Reverend Angela Ying as leader of Communities of Faith working for racial, economic, gender, and climate justice.
It is clear that systemic racism continues to apparently endlessly devastate our children, our youth, our neighborhoods, our communities.
As you've heard from community leaders earlier, our people respond with outrage, pain, protest, and heartbreak, not asking for but demanding a change.
We must not delude ourselves that the suppression that has been attempted for decade after decade will work.
The mass movement for change is growing and the people will not be quelled.
George Floyd, Charlene Alliles, Sean Fjord should still be alive, as should over 200 disproportionately black and brown brothers and sisters in Washington State.
who have been killed by the police since 2005. Because of the need for police accountability, a consent decree was put in place in 2012 after police killed our First Nations brother, John T. Williams, crossing the street.
The consent decree needs to remain so in our city until the change that is needed is won.
Our people do not need tear gas, flash grenades, rubber bullets, curfew orders, or the National Guard or US military called out on our peaceful people.
Our people deserve to breathe, to get a knee off our necks, and to have real actions of justice and love in order to keep us all alive and free to thrive.
We do not need empty words and staged photo ops where an unopened Bible is used as a prop.
No one should have to live in fear of being targeted, harassed, and murdered by the police.
No one.
For we believe in love your neighbor as yourself.
And in the Torah, you shall not kill.
And in the Quran, God loves those who are fair and just, who do good and who judge in equity.
As you've heard from others, institutionalized racism has allowed racial profiling, excessive use of deadly force, and mass incarceration for far too many years here in our city and around the country.
At the rate this city is moving, it will take far too many more years to dismantle with many more people murdered.
How long?
How long?
In these challenging times, we the people in our communities and our children require the consent decree and to defund and demilitarize the police.
The people in our communities require the consent decree for all lives cannot matter until our black and brown people and our children's lives matter.
We stand opposed to the removal of the consent decree in our city.
We stand to defund and demilitarize the police so that our children and our children's children can live.
Let us use these unprecedented times for good and let our people live.
Thank you.
Thank you for those important and inspiring words, Reverend Ying.
We stand with you on those words.
Before inviting our next speaker, Brother Willard Jimerson, I wanted to share that today at noon, Seattle school students are leading a walkout protesting police violence by walking out to sidewalks and street corners holding up signs and chanting for an end to police violence and to policing in schools.
They are standing up against the policing in our schools and the racist police violence in our streets and our homes.
After the murder of George Floyd and many other Black people across the country, including in Seattle, students have had enough.
I urge students and allies of all ages to come out and support these students, courageous students, at noon today.
And I congratulate the students and the organizing groups who are leading this grassroots efforts.
And to recognize them, I would just like to quickly read out some of the names.
Mario Fali Bayamonte from Nathan Hale High School.
Angelina Riley, Rainier Beach High School, Washington Building Leaders of Change, Foster High School Black Students Union, Black and Brown Minds Matter, Rainier Beach Black Students Union, Natalia McConnell from Mercer Middle School, Ava Bonney from Rainier Beach High School, Baye Felder from Orca K-8, Rand Shannon from Nathan Hale.
So it's my pleasure now to invite Brother Willard Jimerson, who is a leader in the Muslim community and is the executive director of United Better Thinking and is a community facilitator for King County Zero Youth Detention.
Welcome, Brother Willard.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I appreciate everybody on this platform for providing your wonderful insight and your, man, my heart really goes out to everybody, man, for their loss.
You know, and even though I don't know Mr. Furr myself, personally, my son and your son were very close.
Shadid, he said he would just drop your son off not too far from his situation.
And so, man, the ripple effects is right here in my home.
And also my little cousin Malik Williams, the way he was assassinated with 86 rounds.
paraplegic and didn't want to die.
And so that's one of the things I want to highlight here is when we're talking about police accountability, we're talking about creating an equitable system that gives account to everybody's life, right?
All these deaths are preventable.
They didn't have to occur.
And because systems are in place that do not highlight the humanity of certain people, certain communities, it's essentially, this system is essentially for us, black and brown communities, it's no different than a henchman.
As I stated before, you know, there's an open indictment on being black and on being brown in this country, and it's been that way for quite some time.
And our current system is set up in such a way where if we do not do something quick and swift, We cannot ensure that we won't have a tragedy today.
We cannot ensure that.
And just to be real, just to call out our political leaders such as Jenny Durkan, right now there's blood on your hands.
We just got to call it for what it is.
There's blood on your hands.
There's blood on the hands of SPD.
If we are not doing anything to transform and to provide a transformation and a reform to our current system, there's gonna be continued blood on the hands of SPD, there's gonna be continued blood on the hands of those who are in political position of power that can do something, but ultimately cares not to do anything.
And because of that, there's essentially a death sentence that I'm underneath, every black and brown body is underneath, White King, Nikita, We don't know.
Honestly, we, we, we, um, this morning and many of us is prepared to be on this platform.
Um, but the reality is in the back of our mind and somewhere in the back of our, in the distance of our reality, we could be prepared for our funerals.
Right.
And if we don't change something, pretty much all those investments we're talking about that should be going towards development, those investments would pretty much be dumped into, uh, cutting down trees for our obituaries.
So what do you want to make an investment for towards a healthier and wholesome future for everyone?
One that allows us to be a lot more human in our humanity, one that allows us to see the humanity in other folks.
And if we do not get behind a real measure of account when it comes to police accountability, then I'm just going to be honest, we all should just be hard as hit, because that's essentially what the current system is set up to do is not to protect particular systems or the interests of particular people.
So I just wanted to lay that out there.
And once again, to you, Mr. Furr, man, my heart goes out, man, you know, to that young man.
And I know, you know, the mother, the grandmother, to that, man, it's difficult.
And I'm carrying conversations on a backhand, you know, in text messages and trying to rectify, you know, hostility.
And so, man, my heart goes out to you and Katrina and everyone on this platform.
And we need to do something totally different than what we currently see.
And we're in hopes that Jenny Durkan and others will step up and do us right.
Thank you.
Sorry, I was on mute.
I thank you, Brother Willard, for all the moving words.
And as you said, all these deaths were preventable.
I just wanted to let members of the media know, while we invite our next speaker, Kay Wiking Garrett, I wanted to let members of the media know that the letter that I mentioned, the sign-on letter, has been sent from my office to all councilmembers.
And I wanted to publicly let everyone know that I invite conversations from councilmembers on this letter.
If they have any proposed amendments, I am happy to consider them.
I, of course, prefer public conversations as opposed to private conversations because I want public scrutiny on elected officials.
And I also have in my letter have said to the council members that I urge them to talk to community organizations like the NAACP and all the other community representatives as we have had on our panel today so that they can understand why they are opposing lifting the consent decree among the other demands that the community has.
So I urge community members to sign up for public comment today at today's committee meeting, because that's where I'll be introducing this letter, and demand that council stand against the mayor and maintain the consent decree, because clearly the police department has a long way to go.
So it's my pleasure to invite now Kay Wiking Garrett as president and CEO of Africatown Community Land Trust, who has been playing a leading role in fighting gentrification and the displacement of the African-American community from Seattle.
Please welcome.
Thank you and good morning.
I stand here to really state our solidarity with the families and to really state our intention that we will continue to stand and fight to get the knee of Jim Crow apartheid off of our neck in the Central District, Africatown, in the South End, in Seattle, and in Martin Luther King Jr.
County.
We should not have Jim Crow apartheid.
in Martin Luther King County, in Chief Seattle City.
That is unacceptable, and we will continue to address that.
We know that in this society, the police developed from the slave patrols and have continued to maintain that disposition in targeting particularly black men to terrorize and enforce a second class citizenship and violate their human rights to this day, as we have heard and witnessed.
Police terrorism goes hand in hand with weed and seed, gentrification, and predatory development.
And we know, again, there is selective enforcement and application of excess force, which often, too often results in murder.
We have seen the police peacefully apprehend mass murderers of innocent black people in churches.
We have seen the police de-escalate standoffs with white militia groups in Oregon.
We have seen them de-escalate situations of white men armed with firearms storming into state legislative buildings and not ended in violence.
and actually even no arrests.
More police and really more people with weapons of violence, license to kill and poor conflict resolution skills is not what makes our community safer.
That's not what makes Laura Hearst and Broadmoor more safe.
It's actually the sustainable economics and other institutions and services and resources that allow quality of life that makes those communities more safe.
So we're here to definitely say that the consent stand in unity, to say the consent decree should not be lifted.
It actually should be strengthened.
It needs to be significantly strengthened, because even with the consent decree in place, we are still seeing the unnecessary murders of people in our community.
Police serving as judge, jury, and executioner.
That is not acceptable.
We are also saying that we need a stop to the police terrorizing and violating the human rights of people peacefully assembling to express their First Amendment rights as well.
And we want justice.
We're calling for justice as people are recognizing injustice and police murders across the nation.
Again, there are just right here in our own backyard, many unresolved instances of the police, again, serving as judge, jury, and executioner, and murdering people unnecessarily.
And those families still have not received justice.
And so if the mayor is expressing some desire for justice somewhere else, she should really start in her own backyard.
They say charity begins at home.
And so we are looking at how do we come out of this COVID first and now this situation with a new normal that's rooted in equity and How do we have communities that are not being over policed, right?
Because people are being suppressed into a lower economic conditions and opportunities by forces of institutionalized racism and systematic exclusion over generations.
So we demand a call for a moratorium on predatory development.
a transfer of city-owned land and property and the access to the capital to develop the affordable housing and economic development opportunities to allow our community to grow and thrive in place.
And again, we 100 percent are supportive of redistribution of budget that is allocated to ineffective, expensive police, particularly in the time of budget crisis, to more effective community-led equitable development and community safety strategies, many of which have been piloted in this city already and proven to be effective and now just need to be scaled up to have greater impact.
You've heard some of those initiatives mentioned before, and we have the opportunity and the resources, and we will continue to fight to make Seattle and Martin Luther King County a leader in the nation and not allow Jim Crow apartheid to continue to persist and to dehumanize us here in this city and in this county and in this state.
Thank you.
Thank you, Brother Viking.
As you said, more police and more people with weapons of violence is not what makes our community safer.
Addressing economic inequality and injustice, providing affordable housing, living wage jobs, and community programs is what will make our city better.
And I also agree that the consent decree should be maintained, as I said before, and as you said, and that that is not sufficient.
We need far-reaching reforms well beyond what is possible through the framework of the consent decree.
And it is extremely troubling that some leaders and politicians are claiming that lifting the consent decree is what's needed.
We need community-led equitable development, affordable housing, and community initiatives to be funded.
We know the mayor is preparing an austerity budget.
That's happening because tax revenues in 2020 are going to plummet because Seattle relies on a regressive tax system that burdens working people.
And so working people are losing jobs in huge numbers in this historic crisis of capitalism that we are in now.
Mathematically, it will mean that the budgets in cities and states are cratering.
So we are expecting anything up to $300 million shortfall in the city budget.
Mayor Durkin, I'm sure, will be announcing harsh austerity measures.
She is not going to be announcing cutting the police budget in half, but she will be announcing harsh cuts to social programs, perhaps in the next week or so.
And of course, we stand with the community, my office stands with the community in rejecting those cuts.
Instead, we need to grow progressive revenues by taxing Amazon and other pandemic profiteers to fund our basic needs.
And we need to cut the police budget in half, defund and demilitarize the police, direct money towards human needs.
We need transit to be funded, not tear gas and chemical weapons.
We need housing for people, not more police bunkers.
We need childcare, not enlarged stockpiles of rubber bullets.
We need restorative justice, not the prison industrial complex.
So our speakers have all had a chance to speak.
I welcome questions or comments from the media.
Please feel free to direct your questions to the incredible panel that we have together with us today.
This is an excellent opportunity for the media to learn and hear from community leaders themselves.
Thank you, and I welcome the media for questions.
And Jonathan, will you help facilitate these questions from the media so we can start working on that?
I certainly will.
Certainly will.
Please, if you do have a question for the speakers, raise your hand.
Looks like we have a question from Omari Salisbury.
Give me a second to unmute you.
One moment, please.
I'm on this conference call on the TV.
I'm doing a press conference.
Go ahead, Omari.
Yeah, hello.
Good morning.
So I had a.
I had a question for council members to want directly here is, um, and what, and I'm sorry, I missed some of it.
I was just a lot going on this morning, but what is exactly, if anything, is are the steps or approach that you're wanting to take to get a specific level of accountability, especially around these on these protests.
The last few days I've lost my voice it's been it's been heated out there.
But, um, you know, I heard you talk about the last part here and defunding the police and a few other things that are people speak about the police decree, where it's, how is all of this going to tie into accountability of what we're all seeing.
How's what we're seeing right now in front of our eyes going to find to.
your plan that you propose for accountability around the police in the city.
I also don't want to forget that the state police have been here for several days and the state police have as well been involved in all these police actions.
Yes, thank you for that question Omari and also before I respond to that Please allow me to congratulate you and thank you on the important work that you and other members of the independent media have done to provide truth to our Seattle community.
And in fact, the video that you were able to provide from Monday's protest was extremely enlightening.
And I really encourage everybody in the community to watch this.
We will be sharing that from our social media as well, because it clearly shows the video itself speaks the story, nobody else has to tell the story in words, that it's really the police that are instigating this violence and also that it's not something that's happening incidentally.
It seems like they come there with instructions and they're fully donned in riot gear and equipped with tear gas canisters and so on.
So as far as the demands we're making, as you know, we are demanding an independent community led investigation into the police misconduct and all these George Floyd protests, and we are demanding that out of that investigation.
officers who are responsible for misconduct, including taping over your badge identification, not to mention engaging in violence and brutality, be disciplined or fired.
We are also, as community members have said today, demanding the defunding of the police by half and demilitarizing it, that they should not have military gear.
But I also agree with Nikita, of course, we don't trust the military apparatus either.
We are demanding an elected community oversight board with full powers over the police, including hiring, firing, subpoena powers, and determining policies, procedures, and practices.
And all of this is, of course, connected to the question of austerity itself.
And that's why the demand for defunding the police by half also goes along with rejecting austerity to our social programs.
And we oppose the extracting of the cost of the recession.
from the backs of the same working people and marginalized communities who are already impacted for decades.
But long story short, we're not going to win any of this if we put our trust in the establishment.
That is why this panel of speakers and the young people who are protesting out there so courageously is so important, because unless we build our own independent movements, we are not going to achieve anything.
We can't put this trust in the same establishment that got us here in the first place.
It's as simple as that, that failed logic.
And so that's why my office is standing with the community and will be fighting alongside the community to win this.
And whether we win any of this or not will depend on the balance of power.
Are we able to overcome the entrenched establishment and the collusion between the political establishment and the police officers guild?
And on that, I think we also need the labor movement to stand with us.
And I wanted to, again, commend the rank and file community members in the labor movement and the progressive leaders in the labor movement who stood with me in the no vote.
I was a sole no vote on the police contract two years ago.
And sadly, at that time, some leaders in the labor movement ended up taking the wrong position.
I welcome them and urge them to take the correct position today, because an injury to one is an injury to all.
We need the labor movement on the front lines with us, like bus driver Adam Birch, who is a member of the Minneapolis Bus Drivers Union, who said he refuses to bus protesters to jail.
And following that, the Amalgamated Transit Union International, the Minneapolis teachers, Minneapolis nurses, all of them have stood with protesters.
We need that kind of solidarity in our community from all walks of life among working people.
And having said that, I also welcome community members to respond and give their own views on any of the questions, including this one.
For any of the speakers, who wish to respond, you can either unmute yourself, or if you are unable to do that, then just raise your hand and I will unmute you.
It looks like, though, we have also raised hand from Trayana Holiday.
So let me get her on.
And while I'm doing that, if any of the panelists wish to speak, please go ahead.
Okay, go ahead.
Okay, thank you so much for opening it up for community members to speak.
Shama, I really appreciate your leadership here and all of the community members and all of the organizers of this.
Thank you, all of the speakers, thank you.
I wanted to actually uplift and add to this discussion to everyone who is on the fact that we need change is evident.
And I definitely wanted to say, I had to add to this, if we don't all wake up to Derrick Bell's term of racial realism, this change will not take place.
Racial realism indicates that the incremental changes that we feel may be happening towards equality are actually never going to occur with the system we have in place.
It isn't set up for incremental growth, for all of us to have the same privileges that have existed for white people in this country.
The white privilege gap is real, and the fact that people of the global majority really have had to suffer a lot in this country to try to get those same privileges is atrocious.
I want to bring that to the discussion.
We have to recognize that the way this system is built, it isn't built for incremental growth.
So we must change the system.
Thank you.
Jonathan, are you moderating?
Yes, we have a question from Simone Alicea.
Simone, let me bring you in.
Just a moment, please.
OK, go ahead, Simone.
Hi, thank you.
Simone Aliseo with KNKX Public Radio.
Council Member Sawant, you mentioned early in your comments alluding to some critiques of the consent decree and maybe why some of the debate around it.
My understanding of those criticisms has to do with this idea that despite having the consent decree and despite having court oversight, Seattle still doesn't have robust civilian oversight of police.
And so I'm just wondering if you can address that more specifically, or if anyone else on the call can address that more specifically, and whether, in addition to making demands of the executive and the police department, if the court is part of that.
Thank you, Simone.
I'm happy to answer that.
But before I do, I wanted to welcome community members to respond to that, and then I will follow them.
Okay, in the absence of any others wanting to respond to the question, I will go ahead and respond.
I believe it's, as I said, I'm extremely troubled by this position being taken by some politicians and also some leaders who are tied to the establishment and that lifting the consent decree is the direction to go in.
And I find it disingenuous or at best naive to think that the reason reforms haven't happened is because of the consent decree.
Let's keep in mind the consent decree was won as a result of grassroots organizing with native and black and brown communities leading on that effort and demanding change.
And it was the result of that that we had this investigation and then the consent decree.
And so I believe it is important that elected officials really check in with community leaders and members.
We are doing this press conference because dozens of community organizations and thousands of community members are demanding that the consent decree not be lifted.
Now, while we don't believe that the consent decree is sufficient by itself in the absence of further substantial reform, as Waiking and others have said, lifting the consent decree points dangerously away from a direction of reform.
because the consent decree has provided much needed attention to the ongoing police violence and systematic violence, which continues to occur.
And to remove that scrutiny at this moment, I mean, I find it stunning that the demand to remove this scrutiny, particularly at this moment, when we are seeing police brutality happening live in front of our eyes, And the kind of actions that are being taken, and as Omari said, it's also the state police, it would be completely counterproductive and shocking, in my view, to do this at this moment.
It would send a terrible message to the public, and it will really undermine efforts to address these deep-rooted issues.
And as far as why change has not happened, it is not because of or despite the consent decree.
It is because we have not had the kind of movement that we need to overcome the opposition of the establishment.
Because the democratic city establishment, and this is not just in Seattle, this has happened in every city.
that it has been an obstacle to change because it stands alongside the police department and the police officers' guild and is opposed to any kind of change.
It has been an obstacle to change.
Regardless of the words and rhetoric that politicians have used, they have been an obstacle to that change.
And otherwise, you do not have an explanation for why I was the only council member who voted against a police contract that rolled back accountability, the hard-fought-for and modest accountability measures that were won, and in the face of an entire community saying that city council should vote no on it.
I mean, there's no other explanation for that.
It's not about the decree or in any way related to the decree.
It is about the fact that the establishment politicians, including those who consider themselves progressive or call themselves progressive, not having the courage to stand with the community and taking issue with the police officers' guilt.
That's what's happening here.
And so what we need is a mass fighting organized movement to demand this kind of change.
And as part of that movement, we are demanding that the consent decree not be lifted.
And at the end of the day, I will say all of this also again – once again, to me, it's a demonstration of why we cannot rely on establishment politicians and that working people and our communities need our own political organizations and our own parties.
MR PALMIERI.
Next up, we have Dan Beekman from The Seattle Times with a question.
Dan, you should be unmuted.
Can you hear me.
Hello.
Yes, we can hear you.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Sorry about that.
This is a question for any of the panelists.
As regards to the funding the police department.
I know some of you mentioned the need to demilitarize and there could be cuts there.
Are there any other specific.
units or programs or parts of the department that you think should be, you want to zero in on that should be first on the chopping block, so to speak.
I would note we have had a few panelists who've had to leave for other meetings.
Those remaining panelists, Please feel free to weigh in by unmuting yourself.
I'll go ahead and share.
I'm Reverend Angela Yang.
I'm Senior Pastor at Bethany United Church of Christ.
We have church campus partners, Black Power Epicenter Cooperative, the Youth Undoing Institutionalized Racism, Nurturing Roots, Got Green, WeWa, and Freedom School, all led by people of color communities.
And as Nikita Oliver, Y. Keane, and others have said, Creative Justice, and there's whole host of programs and economic need in our communities that could be used for good.
We know that too often as we've seen and we've witnessed Sean Fuhr's father Jason heartbreak and also family members of Charlene Lyles.
I mean, right here in our city, along with the family members of John T. Williams, having to experience the death of deep loved ones.
And it's not just one individual.
It impacts an entire family.
It impacts entire communities and neighborhoods.
Our ministry and our reach from the south end all the way through, as others have shared, in Martin Luther King County, demand change.
And by even thinking about removing the consent decree, when actually, as others have said, we need a consent decree and we need it stronger, is important.
huge amounts of economic need in our communities, especially for people of color.
We have huge amounts of need for housing and affordable housing.
And even given our pandemic, the health and public need is great.
We have joblessness and we have loss of income and it's impacting the black and brown community most of all.
So to be able to use the funding for good is huge.
It's beginning to realize that the city can talk to communities and community leaders and faith leaders and union leaders and labor leaders and Shama Sawant's office and others to make a difference is what needs to happen.
No, we do not need more violence.
We do not need more military.
We do not need more funding for the police that have already killed our children and our children's children.
And so other panelists can share that, but the key piece in response to you Daniel, thank you.
is to realize that the change is important so that our people and our communities can not only stay alive, but thrive.
Thank you, Reverend Angela.
Wyking, do you want to add as well to the answer?
Yes.
And this is...
First, I just want to say that police, As a solution to social issues is proven just by the numbers to be very, very inefficient ineffective and expensive right and so that needs to be really taken into account, particularly in a time when you know there's.
budgetary restraints is what we're, you know, told due to the fact that the tax system is set up to not have everyone pay a fair share into the system.
So we need, you know, definitely for those that are benefiting the most from the environment to put more into it.
We have some of the richest people on planet earth here.
So the wealth is here.
and maybe they don't understand that this is a very, from a business analysis perspective, this is a very poor solution to these issues, right?
And so police don't solve the root issues.
The prisons are very expensive.
Prisons is actually subsidized housing, right?
It's subsidized housing, it's subsidized food, but it's a poor model.
It's more expensive to house someone in jail and you have People are not being productive.
The jail guards are not being productive.
You have all this money going into really negative, nonproductive activity versus providing someone with housing, affordable housing.
proper training, the culturally responsive mental health, if that's an issue, which oftentimes it is due to the trauma that has been inflicted upon our communities through all of the institutions through our experience here.
There are proven, again, effective.
You know, it's already been, you know, data has shown, you know, a dollar into prevention saves $7 in punitive approaches to addressing crime.
So that should, that needs to be elevated, right?
This is not just a this or that, which one do we do?
There's definitely far more benefits to investing in providing people with the things that they need to grow and realize their potential as human beings versus putting them in a system that consistently brings out the worst in them, right?
It does not provide for any positive transformation for the most part, and it's very costly.
So again, redirecting funds into specific things that have already been proven, community-led equitable development, the equitable development initiative has already been piloted.
Many of the community-led, culturally responsive interventions and prevention strategies have already been piloted by the community programs that are under-resourced.
So another thing, if you look at the education levy, most of the money that is allocated to impact problems in our communities go to organizations that are not rooted in our communities and not accountable to our communities.
And so really you have another form of exploitation of our suffering or disenfranchisement, just like the prison industrial complex, you have a nonprofit industrial complex.
And so this is another area where resources need to be redistributed to community-led, self-determined, and community-accountable, effective solutions.
OK, Chama is, I think, going to respond to Dan Beekman's question.
Then we have one more question before we close out.
Yes, just to add to all the points made by Brother Viking, I just wanted to say, how much money is the Seattle Police Department spending on, and the city, you know, using taxpayer money, regressive, from regressive sources, spending on riot gear, flashbang grenades, pepper spray, mace, tear gas canisters, All of these are by definition destructive equipment.
They are meant to unleash violence.
There is nothing good about them.
How much money is the city spending on that?
Does Mayor Durkin have an answer for that?
How many health care workers could get fully funded personal protective equipment to fight this pandemic if all that money was directed towards PPE rather than destructive equipment?
And then as Viking was alluding to really what we need is a massive expansion of social housing, we need to end gentrification, we need union jobs with priority hire and training.
We need to fight for Green New Deal programs.
And that is why, you know, these are not abstract questions.
The city's, the city establishment's legal excuses are done because the governor has amended his proclamation.
So now the question is, is the city council actually going to do the right thing, you know, and attach action to their rhetoric and their tears that we have seen this week, and actually going to pass a strong tax on Amazon and big businesses so that we can fund housing jobs and the green new deal.
That is what it comes down to.
And in closing, I will say, as Malcolm X said, you cannot have capitalism without racism.
And as our community members were also alluding to, By its very nature, this system, capitalism, is racist and oppressive because its goal is to maintain this deep inequality, which itself requires this kind of policing, police force, and violence, and military.
And that's why we not only need to build mass movements for these far-reaching reforms, but we need to fight for a different system itself.
We need to give people housing in their communities and give them jobs in their communities.
Each one of these developments is millions of dollars.
We need to remove obstacles for black contractors and black workers to be on these projects instead of giving them housing in prisons in other communities and creating economic development, other communities and giving them jobs in prison.
Let's get them to work.
and get them housed and building their community where they have a vested stake and ownership in the community.
We are moving towards a place, exacerbated apartheid in Seattle, Martin Luther King County, where black people and many others will not own anything, will not have any equity.
How many buildings do black people own in downtown Seattle?
And William Brose, who was one of the pioneers of the Central District, was a developer and a hotelier and restaurateur in 1880s.
And we don't have any black developers developing anything downtown Seattle.
So why should we not at least be developing in the communities that we have called home for almost 140 years?
That is totally inequitable.
And so this is why we're calling for equity now and ending Jim Crow apartheid in Seattle and Martin Luther King Jr.
County.
Thank you.
Thank you, White King.
Our last question comes from Paul.
Hi, my name is Paulie Giulianotti.
I'm a member of Next Steps Washington, which was founded by Annalisa and Fred Thomas, parents of the late Leonard Thomas.
My question is for Council Member Shama Sawant.
Council Member, can you please speak to the timing of the filing of the City and Department of Justice motion, which has occurred during the current labor contract negotiations between the city and SPOG and why that is important because those contract negotiations are also currently in the black box phase behind closed doors.
Thank you.
I think that's a very important point made by Paul here that the timing is not coincidental.
Actually, the timing is very much related to this whole process that has been happening where the police contract two years ago was approved despite community opposition.
And now that contract is up for renewal.
And right now the discussions are happening.
But, you know, I should clarify, as a rank-and-file member of the labor movement, I absolutely support and will doggedly fight for the rights of labor unions to bargain their own contracts with their own members leading this.
But at the same time, we have to recognize that with the police department having the power and the ability to be used and unleashed by the establishment to wreak havoc on community members and other union members in our community, it raises the question of is an injury to one and injury to all.
So from that standpoint of accountability, absolutely, I think the timing is quite disturbing.
But regardless, we are saying that we are absolutely opposed to lifting the consent decree.
And also, I think the timing also points to the disingenuity of this argument that somehow lifting this consent decree is going to be a good thing.
I mean, there's just no, I have not seen any basis for making that argument, and I find it quite troubling.
Thank you very much, and thank you, everybody, for participating.
We will, for the media, be sending out a copy of the NAACP letter, as well as the letter that Councilmember Sawant has sent other councilmembers this morning.
We will send that out through Council Communications to all the media who are here and other media as well.
And thank everybody for their time.
this morning.
This concludes our press conference.