Seattle City Council Gender Equity, Safe Communities, New Americans & Education Committee 12/14/18

All right.

Is this working?

No, it's not.

No.

Is it on?

It's amplifying?

Okay.

Good morning.

Today is Friday, December 14th.

It is 9.30 a.m.

This is a special meeting of the Gender Equity, Safe Communities, New Americans in Education Committee.

I'm Council Member Lorena Gonzalez, chair of this committee, and joining me at the table is my colleague, Council Member Rob Johnson.

Thank you so much for being here this morning.

There are...

13 items on today's agenda we're going to consider 11 appointments to the family's education preschool and promise levy oversight committee Which is being established following the successful passage of Seattle's proposition 1 yay And the crowd goes wild just kidding So I want to thank the Seattle voters once again for their ongoing support of the city's investments in the space of education and educational support.

We will then consider Council Bill 119431, which is an ordinance related to an interlocal agreement between the Seattle Fire Department and other jurisdictions with King County.

And then our last item is a briefing and update on the work of the Office of Police Accountability.

So, as usual, we start all of our meetings with a period of public comment.

We don't have anybody signed up for public comment.

Is there anyone in the audience who wanted to offer public comment but didn't have an opportunity to sign up?

seeing no one rushing to the microphone, we will go ahead and close out the public comment period and we will go ahead and begin with the items of business on our agenda.

So if you are a nominee to the Levy Oversight Committee, I'm gonna invite you to start making your way up while Cody reads items one through 11 into the record.

Agenda items 1 through 11, appointments 1214 through 1224. Appointment of Mackenzie Chase, Aaron Acuno, and Rachel Stewart for a term to December 31st, 2019. Appointment of Stephen Blanford, Stephan Blanford, excuse me, Nicole Grant, Kimberly Walker, and Greg Wong, all for a term to December 31st, 2020. And the appointment of Phyllis Campano, Trish DeZico, and Mackenzie Chase, sorry, and Donald Felder, as well as Constance Rice, all for a term to December 31st, 2021, all for briefing, discussion, and possible vote.

Great, thank you.

And then you guys all have little name plates, if you can make sure they're facing us, so we can keep track of everybody, that'd be awesome.

So welcome, everybody.

Thank you so much for making the time to join us in committee today.

We typically ask that all people who are being considered for the first time for an appointment to one of our commissions join us at committee to make sure that the public understands who you are and that we all have an opportunity to meet each other.

I will go ahead and begin today's meeting with just going around and having introductions.

Just give us your name, and then, Director Chappelle, you're going to lead us through some introductory remarks, I believe.

Okay, great.

So, let's go around and start with introductions, starting with you.

I'm Duane Chappelle, Director of Education and Early Learning.

Dr. Stephan Blandfort.

Kimberly Walker.

Greg Wong.

Rachel Stewart.

Donald Felder.

Trish Malines-Dizico.

Mackenzie Chase.

Great.

And I see Phyllis is coming up to the table, so we'll give her a moment to settle in and join us.

But why don't you go ahead and get started, Director Chappelle.

OK.

I would like to, first of all, say hello to you two and good morning.

And I am here, actually, to be nominating these appointed individuals to serve on the Department of Education and Early Learning's Levy Oversight Committee.

and this committee that will oversee the Families in Education and Preschool and Promise Levy.

I wanna take a step back and thank you all for everything that you guys did and your hard work for getting and supporting this FEPP Levy passage.

So, a little bit into our nominees.

We worked really hard to make sure that the nominees today that are sitting here met the criteria of the ordinance, and these nominees all have the professional, personal, and research experience associated with the growth and development of the children, including the student academic achievement and post-secondary job opportunities.

All of these amazing individuals represent the organizations and communities, excuse me, that are impacted by our levy investments, including Parent Teacher Association, labor, community-based organizations, and cultural and language-based organizations as well.

All of these nominees also have experience either working or they represent the historically underserved groups that we serve here in our amazing city of Seattle.

As you all know that in addition to the citizen members, the ordinance for the FEP, the Families and Education in Preschool and Promise Levy, also appoints the mayor, which is the chair of the city council's committee, with the oversight of education programs, but it also appoints the superintendent of Seattle School District and a member of the Seattle School Board and the last, member that it appoints is the Chancellor of the Seattle Colleges.

So what I'm gonna do now, I'm gonna just take a step back and I'll start by reading a little bio of each of the nominees and I'll start with the first one.

We'll start with Mackenzie Chase.

McKenzie is the Government Relations Manager for Save the Children Action Network.

McKenzie works to expand across, excuse me, access to high-quality early education and care for children in Washington throughout our state and local advocacy.

McKenzie has been an advocate for early learning, especially the Seattle Preschool Program.

Do you want me to go through all of them?

Why don't we go through all of them, and then we'll circle back with sort of a broad question for folks to be able to answer.

Okay.

Next, I will introduce Mrs. Erin Okuno.

Erin Okuno is the Executive Director of the Southeast education coalition known as CSEC.

And CSEC is a coalition of community-based organizations, schools, educators, and community leaders, parents, caregivers, and also concerned Southeast Seattle residents who are working to improve education for all children, especially those in Southeast Seattle and those far away from opportunities.

Erin has been a strong partner to the city education efforts.

Erin has also served on advisory board that guided the development of the Seattle Preschool Program and served on the Families and Education Levy Oversight Committee previously.

Erin also brings a focus of racial equity and inclusion of community voice to her work.

She has also been an incredible asset to DEEL and as a community partner and advisor.

The next individual I will speak to is Ms. Rachel Stewart.

Rachel has served institutions of higher education since 2001, and during that time, Rachel has sought to increase access to opportunities for marginalized groups by leveraging campus resources to benefit the campus and community.

Rachel currently works in a leadership position at the Seattle Housing Authority.

And Rachel formerly worked as the Deputy Director for Seattle University Community, excuse me, Center for Community Engagement.

In Rachel's previous role at Seattle University, she led the planning and implementation of Seattle, of the Seattle Youth Initiative, excuse me, Seattle University Youth Initiative.

Rachel's role in the implementation of the youth initiative was to provide strategic advice and leadership for building, sustaining, and organizing community partnerships.

Much of Rachel's work revolved around connecting grassroots with treetops and just creating a space for the paradigm shift in community development.

Rachel was instrumental also in fostering a growing sense of trust between the university and the residents of neighborhoods south of the campus.

Rachel also served on the Families and Education Oversight Committee, so welcome, Rachel.

The next individual I will speak to is Dr. Stephan Blanford.

Dr. Blanford holds a Master's degree in Public Administration from the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance.

Dr. Blanford also owns or holds a doctorate in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies from the College of Education, both from the University of Washington as well.

Dr. Blanford has led several education and youth development nonprofit organizations, and currently serves as a board of directors for United Way King County.

In addition to this, Dr. Blanford was elected to the Seattle School Board in 2013 with a historic margin of victory.

And he advocated for policies and practices that balance academic excellence as well as equity.

So I would like to welcome you to Dr. Blanford.

Next is Nicole Grant.

I know she's not here, but I'm gonna read about her anyways.

Nicole Grant is the Executive Secretary and Treasurer of the Martin Luther King County Labor Council in Seattle.

Prior to accepting this position in 2015, Ms. Grant was the Executive Director of Certified Electrical Workers of Washington from 2009 to 2015. And Ms. Grant also held the position of Statewide Political Coordinator of the Washington State Association of Electrical Workers from 2010 to 2015. Ms. Grant is currently a journeyman, wireman in IBEW Local 46. Ms. Grant also has served on various boards and committees that include, but are not limited to, the Washington State Labor Council and the Washington State Labor Council Diversity Committee.

So we're looking for Nicole to bring a strong voice of labor and job access to our Levy Oversight Committee.

Next, we have Miss Kimberly Walker.

Miss Kimberly Walker is the Senior Manager for Partnerships and Collaboration at SOAR.

Her experiences span from early learning to gerontology, correct?

And with a heartfelt commitment to the needs of her families, Kimberly's mission is to connect with and empower communities to uplift their voice and lead the change they wanna see.

Kimberly's educational background includes a Bachelor's of Arts in Advertising from Washington State University, and a Master's of Social Work with an emphasis on policy and administration in K-12 School of Social Work from the University of Washington.

So welcome, Ms. Kimberly.

Next, I would like to introduce Mr. Greg Wong.

Greg Wong serves as legal counsel to a diverse group of public, private, and not-for-profit clients.

Greg specializes in complex issues, often ones that impact people's lives in the Pacific Northwest.

As a litigator and appellate attorney, Greg has been successful in trial courts, courts of appeals, and the Supreme Court.

Greg also provides strategic and general counsel in numerous areas, including education policy and laws, elections and initiative issues, constitutional law, legislation, and public policy, private and public partnerships as well.

The Families and Education Rights Privacy Act, we also know that as FERPA, and last, Washington Public Records Act.

So among other matters, Greg has also assisted us in the city of Seattle with our preschool program.

Greg successively challenged the constitutionality of the two-thirds initiative.

He drafted and litigated several ballot measures and advised several collective impact coalitions involving school districts.

and nonprofits working together to improve educational outcomes.

Greg has been a tremendous asset to DEEL and previously served on the Levy Oversight Committee.

So we'd like to welcome you to and welcome you back, Mr. Wong.

Next is Miss Phyllis Campano.

Phyllis Campano began teaching in Washington State as a special education teacher in 2001. Prior to teaching, Phyllis worked for a non-profit company in Massachusetts as director of homes for adults with a developmental and medical challenge.

Phyllis changed career paths to teaching by becoming a certified occupational therapist, focusing on children with autism and young adults with traumatic brain injuries.

As a member of the technical assistance team, Phyllis is recognized by her peers for her expertise in special education practices and law.

Phyllis has a substantial experience and experience with bargaining contracts.

Phyllis was also elected as the vice president of the SCA Seattle Education Association in 2012. And Phyllis is currently serving as the president of SCA for Seattle Public Schools.

So we'd like to welcome you to Phyllis.

Next, we would like to speak to Trish DeZico, I said it correctly, right?

DeZico, excuse me.

Dr. Trish, she co-founded the Taft Academy, and Taft is Technology Access Foundation, in 1996, after spending 15 years as a developer, designer, and manager in the high-tech industry.

During her career, she saw very little change in the high-tech industry.

and women and people of color remain grossly underrepresented.

So after careful and lots of research, Trish traced the roots of the problem to the lack of access to rigorous, relevant technology training in our public schools, particularly those in traditionally underserved communities of color.

Trish has led the growth of TAF, Technology Access Foundation, into a statewide leader in STEM education, operating TAF Academy, increasing the number of teachers of color through the Martinez Fellowship, and partnering with public schools to transform them into academic environments that will promote the highest level of student learning.

So we would like to also welcome you.

And next, we would like to welcome Dr. Donald Felder.

Dr. Felder spent 30 years with Seattle Public Schools as a teacher, principal, and with KC Family Programs, managed services for vulnerable families for 10 years.

Broadly, this period represents 40 years of experience in education.

social work, mental health, and coaching.

Specifically, Dr. Felder groomed small schools to educate all students while championing children's services throughout Martin Luther King County.

His leadership helped to positively transform the lives of thousands of students in alternative education programs that continue to this day.

To help students thrive, Dr. Felder left a legacy that underscores his consistency in leadership, and for his tenacious protecting the interests of children and families.

Dr. Felder is also respected for his unparalleled history in Seattle Public Schools, which includes high ethical standards, honesty, and commitment.

Throughout his career, Dr. Felder proved his ability to lead by implementing numerous strategies for diverse and challenging situations.

He also has an affinity to promote the best outcomes for marginalized young people.

And we would like to welcome you too.

And our last nominee, they were not able to be present today, but it is Dr. Constance Rice.

Dr. Constance Rice is the president of the Very Strategic Group, a consulting firm for executive coaching and collaborative solutions.

Dr. Rice was formerly the Senior Executive Fellow for Casey Family Programs, the nation's largest operating foundation focused on safely reducing the need for foster care, and building communities of hope for children and families across America.

She was also the Managing Director for Knowledge Management for Casey Family Programs, and that team provided subject matter content for strategic consultants working in 50 states and jurisdictions.

Information includes, but is not limited to, child protection, policy, immigration, best practice, education, employment, housing, mental health, and kinship care.

And currently, Dr. Rice is actually the University of Washington Board of Regents Presidents.

So over her career, she's been a tireless advocate for our communities, and we would like to welcome Dr. Rice as well.

So that concludes everyone that we're introducing today.

I just wanted to make sure nobody else showed up.

Thank you for that.

Thank you, Director Chappelle.

I know that was a mouthful, but we have a lot of appointments to consider today because it's very exciting to have the new entity created pursuant to the ordinance that was adopted by the voters.

And so this is really an opportunity for us to Hit the ground running by having as close to full membership as we can of the levy oversight committee I think we have one position that still remains vacant.

That will be a mayoral Nomination that will come to the committee.

Hopefully after the new year.

I'm looking at Austin.

He's shaking his he's nodding.

Yes so this this So the levy oversight committee is going to be spending a lot of time over the next couple of months really digging into the hard work of developing an implementation plan and priorities for investments and programmatic investments as it relates to the revenue that we anticipate receiving to be able to fund the concepts of the levy that was approved by the voters All of us at this table will be spending a lot of time together really digging into this really critically important work throughout the full spectrum of the education system, which is really exciting.

Our last families in education levy oversight committee was really focused primarily on preschool and K through 12 and now we will have the full spectrum of investments to be made along the full education system, which is really thrilling and exciting.

So I'm happy to have all of you here and all of you willing to dedicate your time to the important work of making sure that we are accountable to the voters and more importantly that we are accountable to the children that we have signed up to support and ensure their success.

So thank you so much for your willingness to serve.

So let's go ahead and get started.

I will go in the order that you all appear on the agenda.

And I'm just going to ask the general question of why you want to serve and what perspective or priorities you hope to Come to bear as we kick off the process of developing the implementation plan in conjunction with Staff over a deal.

So Mackenzie, you're up first and then Councilmember Johnson, please feel free to interject at any point

Great.

So I'm interested in serving on the committee because we've been, my organization has been involved in this process from the beginning of the design of the new levy.

I'm really excited to see preschool formally folded in.

I'm an early learning advocate and I am committed to making sure that the preschool investments that you guys included in the levy and the voters supported are realized to their full extent.

I want to make sure we have that ambitious ramp up of programs while also making sure that we're, actually maintaining high quality and serving the needs of children, their families, and educators.

Excited to make sure that happens as well as the new early learning components, the vouchers for children and families experiencing homelessness in the child care mentorship programs as well.

And of course, doing that while balancing the entire education continuum that's represented in this levy.

Really important.

Any follow-up work there?

We've been hearing a lot lately, it's not news to folks who are parents of young children that there is a really deep need for childcare and I think that this is our way of being able to contribute to addressing at least part of that deep need and crisis and sort of the lack of affordable childcare in our in our city, and I think what I appreciate about SCAN is that you all have a statewide perspective as well, and I think that that is gonna be really helpful in a legislative session that is coming up in 2019 in terms of figuring out how we can borrow from your expertise to figure out how we can complement, how we can have some legislative efforts to complement the investments we're making in the early learning childcare preschool space.

Absolutely, there's a lot of complex systems, and anything you do in one area has an impact on another area, so we have to be very, very thoughtful about how we march forward to serving more families in ways that work for them, while still being mindful that it needs to work for educators and providers, and some positive progress causes a challenge in another area, and we just have to keep moving all the pieces and thinking in a systems way.

great.

Thanks, Mackenzie.

Thank you.

Anything else for Mackenzie?

All right.

We're going to keep going down the line here.

So, Erin, you are next.

So just share with us a little bit more about why you want to be on the Levy Oversight Committee and what priorities you hope to be able to advocate for in the implementation process.

The priorities that I'm most interested in is making sure that the investments are working to close opportunity and achievement gaps across the age spectrum.

So this is really exciting to be able to start with early learning, preschool, and all the way up to college.

And the investment really should be aimed at ways that supports families as well as families of color and students of color and educators to reach that goal.

So.

Great.

Anything for Erin?

We're all very familiar with Erin and her work, so I don't want to signal to the audience that we don't have probing questions for you.

We've been working with you for a while on these issues and appreciate your ongoing commitment to continue to serve in this capacity.

Next person is Rachel.

So, Rachel, you want to walk us through, again, what do you hope to be able to bring to bear in terms of your priorities and sort of from where you sit in the higher education world What do you think the Levy Oversight Committee could benefit?

Good morning, everyone.

Of greatest concern for me is ensuring that families who have children at all ages are able to be stable, not only in their housing and in access to employment, but also in such a way that they're able to take advantage of the investments that are being provided from the levy.

What I'm seeing from my seat before previously at the university and now also at Seattle Housing Authority is how important it is for young people to be able to access services where they are and in such a way that it's responsive to their particular needs.

Children and families are able to succeed in reaching their goals when they know that the resources that they depend upon are not in conflict with one another and that they can make choices on a regular basis that open doors for them.

So that'll be my focus and I look forward to being able to ensure that the investments that we make in young people in pre-K through 12 are realized as they're exiting and going into a post-secondary space.

That's wonderful, thank you.

Okay, next is Dr. Blanford, same question.

I also am excited to be on the committee.

I actually served on the committee when I was a school board director and back then was really troubled by the large racially based opportunity gaps that were in place.

And the most recent data of Seattle Public Schools demonstrates that the gaps have gotten larger over the last five years.

Each year the gap has gotten a little bit larger.

to the point that we are now the fifth largest, we have the fifth largest opportunity gap of any school district in the nation.

And it strikes me that in a community that is as wealthy and as committed to public education as Seattle is, and is generous supporting a levy that most cities don't have, that we still continue to have those large gaps.

And so I was really pleased to see that the levy is focused on early learning on K-12 and now the promise of two years of college for all Seattle Public Schools graduates.

There's a lot of educational research that shows that the articulation points for each one of those sections or where you actually lose students of color And so trying to make sure that we have alignment and we're very thoughtful about kids moving from early learning into K-12, kids moving from K-12 into higher ed, I think will demonstrate a lot of positive effect and help to resolve some of the issues that we've seen systemically over those last five years.

Great, thank you so much.

Okay, going through the list here of who's here and who isn't.

So I think it's, right.

So we're going to go with Greg.

Yeah, Greg, you're next.

It's me.

Thank you.

It is an honor to serve on this committee, and I appreciate being asked to renew that commitment.

You know, the why I do this actually is something that doesn't show up in the bio that gets read, right?

That nice professional, Alec.

accolades, which is I grew up here, low income, very poor in Seattle, went to Seattle schools, K through 12, and I saw the difference that my education made as compared to my peers and my friends, my neighbors, who aren't able to sit at this table today.

And I went and I became a teacher, and I taught in a low-income area.

And I now have three kids in Seattle schools, in Title I schools in the South End.

And that's really, to me, the why.

Because we have to remember that this is really about the kids, and we can get kind of caught up in policy and what kind of theoretically makes the most sense.

But if it's not actually having an impact on the kids, then it's not money well spent, in my opinion.

And so what I'm looking for in the levy is I look to push the city to always make sure that our impact is real, that we are actually being effective and efficient in the use of our dollars.

We owe that not only to the taxpayers who voted yes, but we also owe it to all the kids.

And so that's why I'm honored and excited to help further with the new levy.

Thanks, Greg.

And I really appreciate your willingness to continue to serve, I think, You've been engaged in the levy oversight work for several, several, several years, and I appreciate your willingness to continue to help us out in this capacity, because I think you bring a really unique perspective.

to the work of the Levy Oversight Committee.

So thanks again for your willingness to serve.

Thank you.

And then, Ms. Walker, we're going to double back.

I accidentally skipped over you as I was shuffling through these papers.

So why don't we go ahead and give you also an opportunity to share with us why you want to be on the Levy Oversight Committee and what you hope to be able to prioritize.

Sure.

I find it an honor to always serve community, my community and other communities, first and foremost.

But secondly, to be able to take the voice of the community and make sure it's heard and that is taken into consideration.

And then even when possible, bringing them to the table to be heard further.

Working in early learning to opportunity use.

So I say the P of prenatal.

to 24 plus, it's super important to provide opportunities for families to be, to grow, to feel safe and to thrive and not to just survive.

And so I'm really interested in making sure that we can provide those opportunities.

Thank you, Ms. Walker, really appreciate it.

Yes.

Ms. Walker, to say that you've got an impressive resume would be an understatement.

And I'd be remiss if I didn't let this opportunity go past.

I've got a 7-year-old at home who firmly believes someday she will win The Voice or American Idol or something like that.

And your resume suggests that you've got similar aspirations as the one and only Pullman Idol.

So I can't let this opportunity go past about understanding a little bit more about the Pullman Idol, because it's not something I've heard from our chair before, who's a WASU graduate.

So I wonder if you might sing a few bars for us about what the Pullman Idol is.

Like, do you actually want her to sing a few bars?

No, no, that's just a colloquialism that I use here.

You're more than welcome to, by all means.

You might need some warm-up, but please.

Well, you know, Washington State University was having a rough basketball season.

And so they needed something a little extra to bring people in to watch the games.

We were it.

So I competed for three months.

I think we had about 20, 25 folks who were competing.

And so we would sing at halftime.

And at the end, I won.

And they haven't done it since.

I'm the only one.

Go Cougs.

Thanks for bringing it up.

All right.

Let's go ahead and continue on.

So, Phyllis, you are next.

Again, why do you want to be on the Libby Oversight Committee and what do you hope to be able to prioritize with this new set of investments throughout this continuum?

Well, is this close enough?

So thank you for including the voice of an educator in this important work.

I've been involved in the city levy since the beginning of the preschool.

I was on the original exploration trip with Boston and New Jersey.

I went to my hometown.

And to watch the work that has been done over the years is pretty exciting, and to watch the groups coming together, the community, the school district, and the city come together to work for all of our students.

Seattle Public Schools has over 4,000 homeless students, and I think it's important that it's not just the school that works on those issues, that it's the economy and the housing and the city, too, that come together.

And as Seattle Education Association, we've made racial justice one of our priorities.

We have made our own Center for Race and Equity where we educate and bring forward our educators of color to put them in leadership.

And we are working hard to get more educators of color in the system.

And while we're doing that, how do we educate the educators now that are white to work with our kids of color?

So I'm super excited for all this work and to bring all of that in and then, as Greg said, bring it to our students.

And those are really important components of closing the opportunity gap.

All the literature that I've seen talks about how students achieve at a greater rate academically when their educators come from the communities or similar communities as they do.

So when our teacher workforce reflects the diversity both culturally and linguistically of the student population, then the academic literature talks about how students are much more likely to and do in fact achieve at a higher rate.

So I really appreciate SEA's continued commitment and the educators continued commitment to really sort of figuring out and grappling with the realities of what that means in terms of our existing workforce and the needs of the future workforce of educators within the K through 12 system.

So thank you for lifting up that work in today's committee.

I know that there's a lot more work that needs to be done in that regard and I look forward to being able to support that ongoing work by educators.

And then the other thing you brought up that we haven't had an opportunity to talk a lot about is that this set of levy investments for the first time in the history of the city will be investing significant dollars towards students and their families who are experiencing homelessness.

I'm really, I personally am really excited about that new line of business, if you will, for us.

And I think it'll be one of those areas that we'll have an opportunity as a levy oversight committee to really dig into to evaluate how to make those dollars have the greatest impact with the least amount of bureaucracy available and sort of thinking about how to leverage other, leveraging other partnerships within the system.

through, for example, Best Start for Kids, for example, in terms of how do we create the most flexibility around that significant number of dollars.

I think it's about a total of $7 million over the life of the levy.

They'll be invested specifically towards the needs of students experiencing homelessness, and I'm really excited about that.

brainstorming with a collective group around how do we best implement those dollars to get to people who need it the most and as quickly and as seamlessly as we can possibly make that occur.

So I'll be interested to hear from everybody, from your perspectives on how we can accomplish that.

All right.

Anything else you'd like to add to that?

All right.

Okay, I think it's Dr. DeZico?

No, just Trish.

Just Trish.

I usually in council chambers at council table where you're surrounded by lawyers of which I am one as well And I think this is the first time we've been I've heard the term doc I've heard the title doctor as much as I've had today So all of you are now doctors to me Congratulations All right, Trish, same question.

Why do you want to serve and what do you hope to be able to prioritize?

About eight or nine years ago, TAF received a levy allocation for three years for our after school program in middle school.

And we felt that it was so poorly run that we turned down the last two years and decided not to serve.

I want to help with the operations of the levy, how it's tied to learning, how it's tied to creating a culture that fosters learning, that's one side.

And then the other side, now that it's going to getting students into college, how do we actually prepare them for college?

That's really where my expertise lies.

You know, we spend a lot of time in the state talking about the opportunity scholarship and signing kids up in middle school, but there's not a lot of effort to get them academically ready and get their habits of mind ready to get them through high school and on to college.

So that's really what my focus would be.

That's great.

That's an important perspective because obviously we want to make sure that we aren't making it too cumbersome for organizations who work in this space to be able to actually leverage dollars that we have available to them.

So I'll be excited to hear more from you as we continue through the implementation plan to make sure that the RFP process and everything else is, again, seamless to make sure that we're having the greatest impact.

I mean, I think the tracking of the outcomes, not the academic outcomes, but everything else is more important because all those other things lead to the academic outcomes.

I think the last levy tied too much of the activity of the nonprofits that were getting the levy to how they can directly impact in the classroom.

But I would say most of them.

couldn't really point to that, but that doesn't mean that they were not a good thing for the schools that they were supporting.

So really looking deeply at that to make sure that they're effective and can remain effective.

And that we have a holistic view of what we're measuring and why we're measuring it.

Exactly.

Challenge of attribution.

It's like who's responsible for student success.

Yes.

All right.

Thank you, Trish.

I appreciate it.

Okay, Dr. Felder, I think I got that one correctly.

Again, same question, why do you want to serve and what do you hope to be able to prioritize?

First, I'd like to say joy.

And secondly, I would say the reason that I'm choosing to participate because it's an honor.

Thirdly, I'd like to say that I seem to thrive when I'm around smart people.

And so having the opportunity to serve with the individuals who are sitting around this table means that there's a possibility of something getting done.

What I bring is a perspective of why so many of our children don't learn.

What I bring is a perspective of why our systems that are involved in this work sometimes don't work together.

What I bring to this work is a commitment to the children who often fail in our systems.

And what I also bring is a network of folks who have common concerns about the focus of this levy committee.

So my thought is, given that I was once upon a time a public school student, one of Seattle Public School students who barely got by, Given that I was a teacher in Seattle Public Schools, who worked with children who often had difficulty finding their place in society, and given that I've had children come through Seattle Public Schools, I think I'm familiar with how the operation occurs.

And given that body of knowledge, and once again, just knowing how well people are, are well focused in this area.

Um, I just think that we're on this verge of opportunity to make some breakthroughs.

And with breakthroughs, we then have opportunities to really understand the strategies, the practices that make a difference for our children.

Uh, we really then have the opportunity to, to validate some of our, our work.

so that guesswork about how we educate our children vanish, disappears.

And that we, as a city, are committed to making sure that every child has the opportunity to not only survive, but to thrive.

Well said.

Thank you.

That is our last nominee that is present with us today.

So if there are no other questions from my colleague or comments,

Just a brief comment.

Yes of course.

I just want to say how grateful I am to all of you for being willing to serve as somebody who's got three little kids in Seattle Public Schools right now.

whose aunt is the head secretary at Ingram High School and about to retire after more than 30 years of serving the school district.

My mom is one of six.

All of them have their teaching certificate.

I've got about 21st cousins.

About half of them are educators or teachers all up and down the West Coast.

I feel really committed to the collaborative work between the city and the school district around how we can continue to make sure that all of our students, particularly students of color, thrive in our school district.

Using levy funds to make sure that we close those achievement and opportunity gaps is going to be really critical to the success.

So we really, as a council, value your time, energy, and commitment to that mission and can't say thank you enough for your willingness to serve.

Thank you.

Dr. Chappelle, would you like to make any closing remarks?

Sure.

I'd like to also thank you all for signing up to take this journey along with us.

And I know it's going to be an amazing it's going to be an amazing journey.

But the reality is.

I'm just really thriving and waiting or should I say I'm waiting to get us all together so we can start making sure that our investments are going to be moving the needle and closing opportunity gaps so we could be doing what's best for our Seattle kids and families.

So appreciate you guys for stepping up and I look forward to.

supporting this committee along the way.

And thank you.

Thank you both again for giving us an opportunity just to be here today.

Of course.

And then, Director Chappelle, do you want to talk a little bit about what we can expect next once we have the appointments confirmed by the full council, which will occur this Monday?

What do you expect to occur next in terms of convening us and sort of the first set of sort of work product that you expect from the Levy Oversight Committee.

So right now the plan is for us to all, once the appointments are confirmed, we're looking at trying to convene in, I think it's going to be the second Tuesday of January, but we're going to be emailing everyone out like the calendar for the year because it might occur on the second Tuesday, but we're going to change the date to make sure that we have a Seattle Public Schools board member and superintendent available at the meetings.

I think there was a date conflict in the past.

So that will be the first thing we'll be convening.

And around the first convening, what we'll be looking at, we're trying to put it together now, but we're looking at giving everyone an opportunity to put their eyes on the FEP, where we are with the families and education and preschool and promise like implementation plan.

Because the reality is we're all going to have to make sure that is prepared for us to bring it to council.

And I can't think of the date.

I feel like it's end of January-ish, February, somewhere around there.

So those are the first two things that we're gonna be doing.

Great.

Okay.

Look forward to that.

And we will go ahead and move forward here.

So I move that the committee recommend the city council confirm appointments 1-2-1-4 through 1-2-2-4.

Second.

Okay.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

and there are no nos and no abstentions.

So the committee will recommend that the city council confirm appointments 12-14 through 12-24 with a unanimous vote of recommendation by this committee.

I am now going to move to suspend the council rules to allow these appointments to be considered by the city council this Monday, December 17th, 2018. Second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

There are no nos, no abstentions, so that motion passes and these appointments will be considered.

This Monday, December 17th, 2018, you all are not required to attend full council on Monday.

You are more than welcome to attend if you wish, but you're not required to attend.

You can just watch it on Seattle Channel if you're so inclined.

Okay.

And just in closing, just before you go, I wanted to just give a really quick thank you to a couple of staff over at Diehl who have been really helpful in helping my office coordinate the appointment packets and going through the process.

I know it was sort of a dash to the finish line there, so I want to thank Delisha Phillips and Austin Miller for their assistance in helping us out to make sure that we had all the I's dotted and the T's crossed in time for us to make sure that this process occurred so that we were ready to go right after the new year to do the important substantive work.

So thanks to Austin and Delisha for all their wonderful work in the background to get us here.

If I may, today happens to be the day that my office throws our annual open house.

It's scheduled to go from 9.30 to 11. As I stay out here at committee, if any of you want to go hang out with my wife and my staff and all the other people that are hanging out at the open house, just go around the corner.

We've got bagels and donuts and coffee and tea.

I'm sure they'd love to see you all.

And at some point, I'll disappear from this table and come and join you.

So you're more than welcome, if you've got a couple of minutes, come and hang out.

So thank you all so much.

We're gonna go ahead and move it to our next agenda item.

Thanks for being with us.

All right, Cody, can you go ahead and read the second, or I guess the 12th agenda item into the record?

12, council bill 119431, an ordinance relating to the Seattle Fire Department authorizing the fire chief to execute and administer an interlocal agreement on behalf of the city of Seattle for briefing discussion and possible votes.

All right, so we have folks joining us at the table, and we'll go ahead and get started in a minute.

So let's do a round of introductions, and then Greg, did you want to make some introductory remarks, or you just want to hand it over directly to Chief?

Sure, I can tee it up.

Okay, let's do introductions first, and then you can tee it up.

All right, Greg Doss, Council Central Staff.

Harold Scoggins, Fire Chief.

All right, so council bill one one nine four three one As Cody said would allow the fire department to execute and administer and in a local agreement with 29 agencies fire agencies operating throughout King County and and to provide automatic emergency response services under certain circumstances.

So the fire department, as Chief Scoggins will tell you in just a minute, does a similar effort with mutual aid with fire agencies around King County.

This ILA would supersede that agreement or those agreements and provide automatic aid that is through the dispatch system.

So he'll talk a little bit more about that and the difference between mutual aid and automatic aid.

Absolutely, good morning.

So the King County Fire Chiefs, we've been working on this for about two years now, and the goals are simple.

We have a number of different agreements out there between the different agencies that have evolved over time, and there's not much consistency.

And our goal was to develop consistency since we were going to be responding into each other's jurisdictions.

And some of our focuses were simple.

Renumbering the agencies in the county so we wouldn't have duplicate rigs at the same incident, which is a safety issue.

Ensuring that we all had an agreed upon level of training.

So if firefighters from another agency coming to Seattle, the expectation would be they would be trained to a certain level, just as if we went to another agency.

We would all operate under the incident command system in the same way.

We also have taken the time to shore up and build 30 model procedures in King County that allow our operations to be very similar so when we move across jurisdictional boundaries, we all operate in the same manner.

So there's a lot of advantages here.

The mutual aid system is still in effect It's everything 12 hours or greater and this is to get us to that 12 hour window This is from that zero to 12 hour window.

For example, we had the lumberyard fire several weeks ago We had two-thirds of the Seattle Fire Department at that fire we actually called in through mutual aid Bellevue Mercer Island Renton and and one other department, I think it was Puget Sound or Tukwila, to actually cover our stations because we were all at that fire.

So, and that's under the mutual aid plan.

Our goal is, in this agreement, the first two hours, we get help coming.

After that, we start hiring back our personnel.

So at 12 hours, everyone's going home, or it's gotten so big that we need more mutual aid resources.

So this is to ensure we have similar training, shore up the numbering issue and to make sure we're operating the same way out in the field.

No exchange of funds or resources, but this will guide us to training together, doing more together, and making sure that we're operating on the same page.

Great.

Any questions?

Seems very self-explanatory.

I just have a couple of follow-up questions, essentially a couple of follow-up questions, really related to sort of the financial impacts and the fiscal realities of how this mutual aid agreement plays out.

And so the first question is really around some of the definitions related to the drawing down of resources and the limited and predefined circumstances which are clearly defined in the in the ILA that is attached to the bill and sort of want to get a sense from you about in terms of implementing the concepts related to the mutual aid ILA What do you anticipate in terms of how those terms will be interpreted by the fire department and any sort of partner agencies under sort of the construct of this particular proposal?

Because we have so many different agencies in the county that are so many different sizes drawdown means One thing to Seattle versus another thing to Bellevue for example, but this is not for the day-to-day Responses and calls this isn't for those those EMS, those aid calls, unless some extreme circumstance is happening in your community.

If there's a large two, three, or four alarm fire in Shoreline that's taken all of their resources, then our goal would be to get there to help them run those day-to-day calls because at one event, We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

We are not going to do that.

So do you expect that the terms of this particular mutual aid agreement will impact the sort of volume of calls that the department is currently handling?

And if so, how?

by how much?

I don't.

I don't think it's gonna impact our day-to-day call load, call volume.

Zone 1, which are really the north and the east side fire departments, they already have agreements that they're crossing boundaries every day, and when you're a smaller agency, you have to do that to run those calls.

The same thing in Zone 3, which is the south end of the county.

So they already have those agreements that they're crossing boundaries every day.

If you only have two or three stations, you can't put a full alarm on a fire.

So you have to have those agreements.

We don't have that same construct.

As a matter of fact, on the east and the west side, we have water.

So we're only going really north or south or across I-90 or 520, and that doesn't happen day to day.

So it has to be a significant event.

For example, there was a heavy rescue several months ago in Bellevue, and they made the request to mutual aid for our technical rescue teams.

I'm very proud that we have one of the, best technical rescue teams in the nation.

They've been all over the country serving, so they were able to go over to Bellevue and help.

Those type of requests could come in.

Okay, great.

And I know how much you love data.

Yes.

So I'm assuming that you are envisioning an opportunity to track and record responses that would be under the scope of this ILA.

Is that accurate?

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

I think that's a good point.

And I appreciate that.

That is, that's sort of underlying my concern here and my line of questioning is that I want to make sure that it's a real mutual aid agreement and not a sort of workaround in terms of the contract for Seattle Fire Department services that would be treated differently and compensated differently.

So I appreciate your commitment to continuing to track that data.

And if you would be so kind as to keep my office and Greg posted on whether or not there are upticks that are not anticipated or were not anticipated when, you know, as a result of today's action, I would really appreciate that.

We'll do.

OK, thanks.

Any questions?

All right.

Did I get everything, Greg?

All right.

So I will move that the committee recommend the City Council pass Council Bill 119431. Second.

All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Committee, there are no nos, no abstentions.

The committee will recommend that the City Council confirm, excuse me, the City Council pass Council Bill 119431 with a unanimous vote of this committee.

Now move to suspend the council rules to allow this council bill to be considered by the City Council this Monday December 17th 2018 second all those in favor say aye There are no no's no abstentions.

So this bill will be considered on This Monday December 17th 2018 by the full council All right.

Is that it?

Okay.

Thanks all And I think yeah

We heard there's an open house.

Yeah, there's an open house.

You all should go check it out.

Unless you are agenda item 13, which Cody is going to read into the record.

And if you are here to present on the last agenda item, please join us at the table.

Agenda item 13, Office of Police Accountability, updates and innovations for briefing and discussion.

Great.

Welcome, everyone.

Hi.

So we'll let you all settle in, and then who's going to drive the PowerPoint?

That was the question.

That's what we're debating, Council Member.

Yeah.

They just moved as far away from you as they possibly could.

I know.

This is what happens in our office, right?

All right.

So let's start with introductions for the record, and then, Andrew, you can dig into the presentation.

So Andrew Meyerberg, Director of the Office of Police Accountability.

Anne Buttersworth, Compliance Policy and Research Manager for OPA.

Monique Guevara, Policy Analyst at OPA.

All right.

Great.

Take it away, Andrew.

So thank you so much for having us here.

We're excited to present.

I wanted to do a little bit more in-depth introduction for Anne and Monique, if that's OK, council member.

Sure.

So Anne came to us about a year ago.

I was one of my first hires at OPA.

We stole her from the CPC, which was very exciting for us.

Anne has been driving our policy work at OPA, which has really become a huge part of what we do.

And this presentation was one of her creations.

So thanks, Anne, for your hard work.

And Monique was one of our more recent hires.

Monique just graduated from the Evans School, and we're incredibly excited to have her as a policy analyst at OPA.

There's a lot more people I'd like to thank, but Monique and Ann, you'll have to do it for now.

There will be plenty of opportunities for you to bring everybody in, so I'm excited that you all are here, and I know we're a little overdue on having this presentation, so I'm excited about being able to have it now.

So what we thought we would do is to really break this presentation up into three parts.

First, where we were, so looking at some of the data from 2017 in our last annual report.

Second, where we are now, some of our focuses and what we've been doing this year.

And then where we're going, so what we're looking to accomplish in 2019. We can't and we're not going to cover everything in this presentation obviously, but we just want to give you some highlights just so you know what we've been working on and what we're really excited about.

So first, where we've been this last year.

So as you can see, we received around 1,300, 1,325 contacts last year in 2017. And the reason we're using 2017 is that we haven't yet finalized our 2018 data.

So at the end of the year, we'll do that, and then we'll do our annual report for 2018 and hopefully come back to you.

Do you expect that we'll get that 2018 annual report in the first quarter?

So, yeah.

We're aiming for March 1.

Okay, great.

So then we will take that into consideration in terms of our committee work plan so we can maybe work now to save a committee date for 2018 to have you all come back and be prepared to present on 2018 annual.

That's good.

Time in March would be great.

So just to be clear, what a contact means is that anytime someone reaches out to OPA through any mechanism, right?

So it could be emails, phone calls, someone coming into our office.

So as you can see, contacts spiked in 2015 and are right now lower in 2017 than they have been in the last two years.

We don't necessarily know what that means or what it says, but it's an interesting statistic in our minds.

Is there a way to analyze or evaluate why there was an uptick?

I mean, there's always a way to look at it and to analyze it.

As far as 2015, I think we would have to look back to historic data, and I guess we could, I guess I'd be more interested in why we're down as opposed to why we're up, why we were up.

But I think it's something we could look into.

We've talked internally about, you know, not just doing our annual reports, but being more research focused, more innovation focused.

So that could be an area that we look at and an area that we try to analyze, particularly if it's of interest to the committee.

So not all contacts become an investigation.

So as you can see from 2017, about 34% were investigated.

And what that ends up being is, number-wise, about 435 cases were investigated last year.

That number is also a little bit misleading because virtually all contacts have an intake investigation.

And what that means is it's a 30-day mini investigation to figure out what are we looking at, what are the allegations, who are the named employees, right?

So really, I would say close to 1,000 cases are investigated even though only a third of the overall contacts go to full investigation.

Okay, next slide.

So in 2017, 29% of cases had at least one sustained finding.

So, and as you can see, 18% of cases had all allegations sustained.

That's higher than it has been in the past.

But again, it's totally dependent on the cases that we saw, a number of different factors.

And if that was something the council was interested in, we could look at that as well.

Andrew, on that one, can you maybe just for folks who might be watching at home or online, can you just quickly explain what it means when you say sustained?

So just to give kind of a global look, so the 435 cases that we investigate, every investigation is investigated currently by a sergeant.

We'll talk about civilianization at the end of the presentation.

But they complete their investigation.

They submit it to the Office of Inspector General.

The Office of Inspector General reviews it to make sure it's thorough, objective, and timely.

And then it comes to me for findings.

So every case, I read the case file, I look at the video, I look at whatever reports I need to look at, the interviews, and then I write up what's called a director certification memo.

So in that memo, what I'm doing is I'm looking at every allegation one by one and I'm analyzing them to see, well, what's the conduct at issue and did it violate policy or not?

If I find that the officer violated policy, I can issue what's called a sustained finding.

If I find that there's no violation or that there was a violation, but perhaps it's better addressed by training, I can issue what's called a not sustained finding.

So there's five general categories of not sustained.

We have unfounded, lawful and proper, inconclusive training referral, which is to say, maybe there was a violation, but I think training and counseling is the appropriate result, and a management action.

And we're going to talk about management actions a little bit later, but the management action is the ability for me to say, maybe there was a violation, but it was caused by a flaw in the policy, or a flaw in the training, or maybe there is no policy in training and there should be.

And I've really taken advantage, I think with Anne's help, of the management actions, and it's been a big part of the work that we've done in this last year.

And so just to be really clear that the graph that you're showing isn't showing the potential divergence between your recommendations and the chief's ultimate decision to either

I'll say so I Became interim director in July of 2017. So I've been in the job for about a year and a half in that time I've been reversed four times by Once by chief O'Toole on three times by chief best so I would say looking at the percentage of cases that I've written up I've probably written close to 200 sustained cases.

So, you know, obviously those are the cases that make the news and that there's this disagreement, but the disagreement is largely healthy, I think.

And it's a very low percentage of the cases that are sustained.

You know, in a high 90% of cases, the chief and the chain of command is agreeing with OPA's recommended findings.

Great.

And that's, those are data points that your office continues to track.

Yes.

Yeah, absolutely.

So whenever the chief disagrees, and this is something that we worked into the accountability legislation, is whenever the chief disagrees with OPA, she has to write a letter to you, to other council members, to the mayor, to the city attorney, OIG, and the CPC, right?

So it's really important to keep that transparency.

And obviously we would, when we put our cases out on our website, the closed case summaries, we'll note in the closed case summaries, this was a case in which the chief disagreed and thus the case was reversed.

Great, perfect segue to the next section of the presentation.

Yes.

So over the last year, I mean, really the bread and butter of what OPA does is always going to be our investigations, right?

I mean, that is our, as you can see on the next slide, I mean, that is really the core part of our vision and mission, right, is we're purposed to safeguard that culture of accountability within the department by conducting investigations that, when necessary, hold officers accountable.

Two other big elements of what we've done, and I talked about this a little bit before, has been our policy work, expanding our reach and the work that we've been doing with policy, but also innovation and trying out new things.

A big focus for us has been communication and transparency.

One of the things that we've seen systemically in the last year is that there just simply isn't a lot of communication within the department.

And it's not necessarily a department-centric thing.

You know, OPA had been doing it too, right?

I don't think we were doing a great job historically about messaging out what we're doing and why, right?

So rank-and-file officers and even community members can say, okay, you reached this decision.

Why did you reach that decision, right?

What were the facts that formed the basis, right?

How do we give rules of the road for officers to say, okay, what did I do wrong and how do I fix it going forward?

So what we started to do was we created something that we call the case and policy update.

So this is an email that's sent out to officers every two weeks.

And it's an opt-in email and officers can sign up if they want to.

We've had really great feedback and that's one of the...

the responses we had from an officer.

We reach right now around 200 officers and supervisors have signed up for this list.

And basically what we do is, and I believe you have a sample in your materials, is what we do is we have, we talk through a case or two, high profile cases, and we talk through some policy recommendations that we've issued.

I think the one that you have, Council Member, that was in your package, we included the letter that we wrote in response to your request about the contract.

You know, one of the things we talked about in this last case and policy update email was we had cases, for example, where officers were, a couple cases, where officers were pulling people over the threshold of the door, right?

In order to do that, you have to have a search warrant or an exception from the search warrant requirement, right?

But officers, for some reason, weren't understanding that.

And I think the problem was that they weren't receiving enough training on search and seizure law, right?

At the academy, they got the training, and then post-BALEA, they got the training, but there wasn't a lot of in-service training, particularly for updates in the law.

So we sent this out so that officers could see, this is what we're seeing, don't do this, and here's the case law.

Again, you know, fixing the problem, not letting it perpetuate.

Because I think this does more than giving an officer a day off, right?

We're systemically fixing the problem so it doesn't happen again.

Right.

Great.

And how long have you been doing this?

How long have you been doing the case and policy update?

So we've done three, so about a month and a half.

So every two weeks it goes out.

And how do officers know to sign up for it?

Because I know it's an opt-in, so how do they know?

Great question.

So the next two slides will discuss this.

So two things.

We just did, maybe you can jump to the next slide, Anne.

We just did nine two and a half hour presentations for all the sergeants in the department.

So at each one of those presentations, we gave the sign up list to say, please sign up.

We also, I've gone to every second watch roll call, some of the third watch roll calls.

And at that roll call, I also asked the officers, do you want to sign up?

And they sign up.

It's word of mouth too.

Officers email us pretty regularly and say, could you please put us on the list?

They're forwarding it to each other as well.

And also, I think sergeants are using these as talking points for roll calls.

So the more people that see it, the more people want it.

And I think that's, it's organically growing.

I mean, obviously, from my perspective, I would love for everyone to be on it, and I think maybe we'll get there.

But I think it's more important that they want to get it, and they want to op in, if that makes sense.

This was a big, big project for Ann and for me in the last couple months.

We had been talking about this when I first came on to OPA, about having OPA go to the sergeants, who are those frontline supervisors, and explain to them kind of what we do and why, so that they can communicate that to their people.

But to also say to the sergeants, like, here's some of the innovations that we're trying to put in place.

Here are the flaws that we see with the system, and this is what we're trying to do to fix it, right?

And also saying to sergeants, like, these are our baseline expectations for you out in the field, right?

What we very much believe needs to happen is that we need to start reverting minor misconduct back to the chain of command, right?

That was recognized in the consent decree.

It was recognized in the accountability ordinance.

It's overdue, right?

But the caveat is the sergeants have to show us that they can do it.

And they have to be willing to do it.

And I think that they are.

So this was really a way for us to reach out to the sergeants to say to them, you know, we want to be in this regard your ally, not your adversary, right?

We want to help you.

And we will be a source of information.

And, you know, we all want the same thing, right?

We want this to be the best police department in the country.

How do we get there?

So.

I think this is really an important part of, you know, What has been missing in the past?

You know, one of the things that I think is going to be critically important over the next several years is we're not, you know, not only in the context of full and effective compliance with the consent decree, but sort of the ongoing iterative work that is accountability is our supervisors and sort of how are we holding supervisors accountable to our expectations around the accountability system?

is I think a really important aspect of ultimately achieving meaningful cultural change within the police department that I think is going to yield huge results for us as a community and as a police department if we're able to do it well.

I mean, I couldn't agree with you more.

I mean, I think what we've seen, I mean, I think I can speak for Anne and Monique, I think what we've seen fundamentally is really, I mean, you need that culture of accountability, right?

But you also need a culture of supervision and a culture of communication, right?

And this is really what we're trying to push out.

And the way we've done it is to be, and I use this term, and Anna Monique will probably strangle me, but is to be more carrot and less stick, right?

To, you know, when we're going to have, there are cases, and it happens when mistakes are made, but there's serious mistakes and there's consequences to actions, right?

But for this, helping sergeants grow to become better supervisors, to support that growth, right, and to understand that, that reverting the minor conflict reviews back to them is gonna, there's gonna be some growing pains, right?

But to teach and counsel and train as opposed to punishing for these supervisors.

Because I think empowering them, you're absolutely right, that's what's gonna make us take that next step to the next level.

And I think you saw it in your packets as a summary of all the survey feedback that we got from those trainings and some comments that really were phenomenal.

We were shocked at how many people actually filled out the survey, gave the comments, and gave positive feedback saying, wow, we have not had this kind of transparency in a decade.

I can't believe you're coming here to talk to us.

Thank you so much.

We really appreciate hearing from you.

So it was a great indicator that we were on the right track.

Yeah, it was 37% conveyed thanks and or applauded the presentation.

25% requested additional communication or training from OPA.

24% said other SPD personnel should see the presentation.

And 10% had a specific idea or question related to OPA processes.

So I thought those are great results.

And the more we can get that out there is helpful.

Yeah and I think the next step is and one of the the comments that we saw the most was people saying you know we we really want you this shouldn't just be a sergeant's training it should be a captain and lieutenant's training too.

So I think hopefully we'll be able to roll that out to the entire department just so we're all on the same page.

So, the next way in which we've trying to, which we're trying to convey more communication and transparency is through roll calls.

So, I've been going, trying to go to every roll call.

I've started with all second watch.

So, you know, as for people that don't know, the shifts are first watch, second watch, third watch.

Second watch starts at around 11 o'clock and goes till around 7 or 8 o'clock and then third watch is the night shift and then first watch is the early morning shift into the late morning.

So, these are about 30 minute presentations and usually there's around 15 officers or so at each presentation.

So, really what I'm trying to do there is to, again, you know, Be that one person that will come into their precincts and answer whatever questions they have.

And just to let them know that at OPA, we don't have secrets.

I'm not gonna talk about open cases, but besides that, everything we do is public.

Everything we do is available.

There's no questions that are difficult that we won't answer.

And I think that they've shown an appreciation.

It's been difficult at times because their people are angry and frustrated.

But at the same time, it's intensely valuable, I think, to have these communications and to show, you know, I'm a human being, they're human beings, and to stop othering each other, because I think that happens a lot in policing in general.

So this is what I was saying before about management action recommendations.

We very much believe that this is one of the most important things that we do.

It is our ability to issue recommendations to change policies and training.

We've been very active in this regard, much more active, I think, than any of my predecessors.

And perhaps it's because, you know, I was a lawyer for the department and for others in the past and familiar with these areas.

But I really do think, you know, systemically changing what we do and why we do it, the best way to do it is to change the policy, to change the training.

And if they, we need to have policies and training to do that.

So a couple of examples here, community caretaking.

As you may, as I'm sure you're aware, Council Member, there is an exception from the warrant requirement in Washington State for community care taking, but there is no exception within SPD policy, right?

So, it creates this odd scenario where officers could be acting consistent with law, but not consistent with policy, right?

Why is that?

And I don't think there, I think it's inadvertent, right?

So, we recommended, please change that.

We had some cases where officers were following ambulances and turning off their ICV.

And they were doing it because once the person was in the ambulance, they were never going to interact with them again, or at least not interact with them in a recordable space because they were being taken into the hospital and they're not allowed to record in the hospital.

So the officers were saying, well, I'm not transporting them personally.

I'm never going to see them again.

So why do I need to record?

So it just, but it was inconsistent with the plain language of the policy.

So we said, you know, please fix the policy.

And they did.

High risk vehicle stops, I think you're probably aware of this too.

A high risk vehicle stop is where a an individual in a vehicle is suspected of committing a felony or another serious offense, and they are ordered out at gunpoint, handcuffed, and put in the back of a patrol car.

It's a Terry stop, but it's one of the most invasive Terry stops you can possibly have.

So from OPA's perspective, we would like there to be a policy surrounding this, right?

So we recommended that they- And there isn't one currently.

There's not a policy around it.

So our perspective was to say, well, It's not an arrest, you don't need probable cause, you just need reasonable suspicion, right?

So, not even, you know, and I think we're sensitive to saying you can't set up a rule for every scenario, right?

Because it's so fact specific, right?

But generally, when are we using it?

Why are we using it?

And we had a really great dialogue with the department about this and about next steps.

So the next part is kind of where we're going.

And really I think where we're going is system collaboration.

And what I mean by that is, you know, you know, the real cores of the accountability legislation was to create this system of collaboration, right, was to have a scenario where SPD, OIG, CPC, and OPA were all working together, right, sometimes not agreeing, sometimes being critical of each other's work, but being those checks on each other and also being those collaborators with each other.

And here's some of the work that we've been doing.

As you may be aware, the CPC, I believe you are aware, the CPC had created a task force to look at The Serious and Deadly Force investigation and the changes that are stemming from I-940, OPA's been part of that and really working closely with the CPC and OIG to try to drive that process and come up with a scenario that really works for Seattle.

So we're really excited about the progress that's been made there.

We've been working very closely with SPD on really two crucial policy areas.

First is the reporting of misconduct, and that's kind of a general term, but really what we mean is when misconduct should be reported to OPA, right?

What are we doing with the cases that are clearly unsubstantiated or frivolous, right?

Empowering the supervisors to take more accountability, creating more supervisor-led mechanisms, but at the same time, and I know you're interested in data, at the same time, creating modules within Blue Team and IA Pro, which are the department data systems, to document each and every incident, right?

So if a supervisor is going to analyze or investigate a minor misconduct, you've got to create a Blue Team module.

It's got to be sortable.

You know, it has to be documented, because we want to know, obviously, if it's your fourth professionalism, you're, you know, even your third professionalism, we're going to want to see it.

You may need to have a different conversation.

Use of force too.

We were working very closely with the department in creating edits to the use of force policy.

That was a really collaborative effort.

It's now with the judge.

And I believe the judge just approved.

He approved it.

Right.

Oh, okay.

So hopefully.

It should be rolled out in early March.

Or I'm sorry, early January.

Yeah.

So that'll be a huge, I think, step forward again for the city.

Great.

We've been collaborating with the OIG and Lisa Judge about setting up some items for their work plan.

They just took the first suggestions from the accountability partners.

You know, Lisa.

And they'll be with us, I think, in January to present to us their proposed work plan.

And they've been doing, you know, getting this office up and running.

You know, it's been, they've been doing really a great job.

So we're excited to partner with them.

We've now transitioned our cases, our investigations and classifications to the OIG, so they're now reviewing those.

So it's exciting.

You know, we're really moving forward.

And then lastly, we've been having our quarterly accountability partners meetings that were anticipated by the accountability legislation.

We've had two thus far.

And again, they've been very productive.

And even beyond those two, Fed Lopez and Lisa Judge and I do meet periodically just to keep that conversation going.

So one of the big, another big area of focus for us, and I know this is an area of focus for you, Council Member, is going to be the mediation program.

You know, we need to improve this program, and we've really started the process of rethinking everything that we're doing.

And really with all of our work at OPA, you know, we've done things for a certain way for the last eight years or ten years, right?

And I think it's time we're rethinking policing, right?

The paradigm of policing, I think.

So why not rethink OPA too?

So this is a big part.

Like how do we do this better?

So, Monique and one of our communication specialists, whom we'll talk about a little bit later, Geneva Taylor, are working together to do this work.

So, what are we currently doing?

Is it working?

I think it's probably working okay.

You know, what are the national best practices?

Let's get feedback from from you from the CPC OIG SPD about how we could do it better and then relaunch our program and that's gonna be a focus for us this upcoming year.

That's great.

Yeah, I think there's a lot of power to the mediation program if if we can get it, right and In the past I don't I I don't have You know favorable opinions of the mediation program because it it required folks to give up fundamental rights if mediation failed.

And I also had a lot of concerns that officers who were volunteering for the mediation program weren't doing so in good faith.

So I think we've been able to fix those particular issues through the accountability legislation.

And my hope is that we'll have a much more robust mediation program that is meaningful to the process of coming up to, you know, finding some sort of solution to an issue that doesn't need to go to the full-blown investigative process.

And I think part of the relaunching also has to be, there's a marketing component too, right?

In that we need to market it both to the community and to the police.

Because sometimes I just think we haven't done a good job, and again this is not OPA's fault necessarily, but communicating out the benefits of mediation.

You know, perhaps the officers just didn't know I mean, it can be really great, it can be really valuable, it can be really impactful, and it's on us to communicate that out.

It's on us to sell it, I think, to the various stakeholders that we have.

So, civilianization, this is another huge part of the accountability ordinance and something we've been really focusing on.

We were incredibly excited at the time Monique was hired.

We also hired our three community engagement specialists.

So, we were really deliberate as to who we were hiring.

We wanted people that had complementary skills but would challenge each other.

So, we hired Geneva Taylor who I just mentioned.

She has, she comes from the Rainier Valley area.

experienced with restorative justice and mediation, so we really thought that she would be great to help us rework our mediation program.

We hired Enrique Gonzalez from the CPC and the Defender Association, and Enrique obviously understands systems as well as anyone and understands how we've gotten to the place that we are here and is working closely on our social media and how we're going to expand our reach to people.

We also hired Jennifer Tippins, and Jennifer came actually from a consulting background, but consulting with cities and in the community.

And she's been excellent at, you know, doing things like this, taking data, synthesizing data, making it easy to digest.

So together, I think those three people are going to be a really great team.

We're trying to be as organic as we can with them developing their community engagement plan.

We're in the midst of doing it as we speak and supervising them.

And they're together working to say how are we going to communicate and what are we communicating, both internally and externally.

So we're really, really excited about them.

And does that bring you to being fully staffed in the community engagement?

It does.

We hired Mark Gerba as our Investigations Advisor, so that's Civilian Investigative Supervisor.

Mark came to us from the Chicago Civilian Office of Police Accountability where he was the first Deputy Administrator of the office.

Mark has deep, deep investigations experience.

I'm excited because he's going to help me write, which has been overwhelming for me.

But it's great to have Mark on board and to start that.

And Mark has started already.

Mark has started.

So we, under the accountability ordinance, we interpret that we are required to civilianize totally supervisors by May 2019. So that's our goal.

But we're trying to do so, and I think this is the advice that you would have given us, is to do so as deliberately as we can and as carefully as we can.

We want the right people.

It's important to get it right.

The next step for us will be, I mean, we're going to continue to hire those supervisors, but the next step for us will be the investigators.

So, as you're aware, the SPA contract allows us to civilianize two investigators.

We're working on that PDQ right now.

We'll do the job description next, and we'll send it to your office like we did with the supervisors.

And I think realistically, I think within the next three months, we'll try to get our first one on board.

Awesome.

And so that'll bring civilianization.

What's the percentage mix at this point?

So right now, we have nine sworn sergeants that work for us.

25 total staff.

25 total, right.

It's about 60-40.

OK, 60% civilianized, 40% sworn.

Yeah.

So I think, you know, we're still mapping out budget, obviously.

You know, in my perfect world, I would add the sibling investigators without necessarily eliminating the sergeants because our caseloads are so high.

But it's really going to depend on how we can work it for budget and what we have resource-wise.

Okay.

We'll keep us posted on that.

Yeah.

So that's all we had.

I thought if there's any questions you have for us, we're happy to answer.

I think I asked the questions.

as we went through the presentation.

So thank you so much for making time to come and present on these issues.

Looking forward to having you all back in March to talk about the 2018 year and eventually we'll sort of also create the space for you all to present on a little bit more granular detail in terms of what your work plan will be for 2018. Thank you so much.

Okay, so thank you all for being with us.

That is the last item on our agenda, so we are adjourned.

you