Good afternoon, everybody.
Thank you so much for being here at the YWCA.
I am honored and just incredibly excited about all of us being here today, especially with these incredible, fabulous, talented, lovely women.
I'm standing to my right and my left.
As you may or may not know, my name is Maria Chavez Wilcox.
I am the first person of color as a woman to be leading the YWCA of Seattle-Kingston-Homish County.
which will be 125 years old next year.
And our mission is eliminating racism and empowering women and girls, which is why this legislation just hits to the heart of our domestic violence programs and us being able to protect our women that are the most underprivileged in this community.
70% of them are women of color and over 50% of them show up to our front doors throughout both counties homeless.
and in a desperate situation.
So I'd really like to welcome, and I'd like you to welcome, Mayor Jenny Durkan and our new chief, Carmen Best, to be with us this afternoon.
Just to tell you a little bit about what the YWCA does in this area, we offer free and confidential advocacy support, direct programming, and supportive services to domestic violence women throughout the city and throughout the county.
And we also really focus on talking about the fact that they are survivors.
They are survivors of domestic violence.
They are not victims.
Just to give you a couple of facts that I'm sure you may or may not be aware of, last year, according to the Seattle Times, nearly 1,300 children died in this community from gunshot wounds.
1,300 children.
And there was an estimated 150,000 adults that were storing a firearm.
at the time.
That's astounding.
And this legislation will make a lot of that stop.
And that's why we're incredibly, incredibly supportive of it.
In addition to that, we would like to thank you on behalf of the YWCA and our entire community for your support in supporting this legislation.
Thank you, Mayor Durkin.
Thank you, Chief Best, for passing the safe storage legislation.
and being able to really stop some of these negative statistics from hurting those that are the underserved and that are being hurt each and every day.
This will make a significant, significant difference and is an amazing step forward.
So thank you so much and I will pass it on to the real pros up here and take it from there.
Thank you for being here.
Thank you.
Don't you run away.
Uh-uh.
You come right by us.
We're in your house.
I want to thank you, Maria, and I want to thank everyone who works here at the Y or who's worked through programs at the Y.
It's just a tremendous amount of good that you do for our community, and it's day in, day out, year after year, and it makes this enormous difference, so thank you so much for everything you do.
I also want to thank some of the people that I see here today, Moms Demand Action, the Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Center, the Public Health Seattle-King County, the Washington State Survivor Team, I have Audrey and Lan of HSD who've been so great in working with us.
Robert, thank you for all your work.
Renee Hopkins for all you do as well.
To Edie and my policy team, this has been a real effort among others.
But we take such an important step forward today to protect our communities from gun violence.
In Seattle, we refuse to deny that there is a crisis of gun violence in our country and in our communities.
We refuse to accept this as the new normal.
Despite the sacrifices of our first responders, we know that parts of our city do not feel safe and that too many people are taken by gun violence.
We also know that unsecured, irresponsibly stored guns help fuel the crisis of gun violence in Seattle and in our country.
Irresponsibly stored guns are more likely to be used in shootings, fall into the hands of dangerous people like domestic abusers, and be used in suicides.
That's one reason we are taking urgent action in Seattle to make our communities safer.
and to save lives.
That's what this is about, saving lives.
In July, I signed the city's new responsible storage legislation into law.
And now we're following through on the rulemaking process that defines what qualifies as responsible storage in the city of Seattle.
These new rules we are announcing today will go into effect February 13, 2019. to allow for a robust education campaign and engagement with communities and public comment.
I also want to thank Daniel Dunn from the law firm of ORIC, who has partnered with every town for gun safety to defend us in case of any lawsuit that is brought against the city as a result of this litigation.
And I want to be clear on that.
While we cannot stop people from filing litigation, I am very confident that this law and these rules will be upheld as an appropriate exercise of jurisdiction by the City of Seattle.
We are continuing our efforts also on our extreme risk protection orders.
They empower family members and law enforcement to ensure that a person experiencing a mental health crisis doesn't have easy access to guns.
How common sense is that, that a person experiencing a mental health crisis doesn't have access to guns?
Since going into effect, we have taken 65 guns out of the hands of someone who shouldn't have those guns using that law.
That helps those people in crisis.
It helps the families.
It helps the communities.
Guns and gender-based violence are often a tragic and deadly mix.
We know that easy access to guns and gender-based violence often end up deadly.
In the United States, women are 11 times, 11 times more likely to be murdered with guns than women in other high-income countries.
And when a women's abuser has access to guns, it is five times more likely the woman will die.
For women in King County, and this is really a shocking statistic, 30% of all homicides of women are classified domestic violence.
30%.
That's compared to 4% of men.
We know too often that victims of gender-based violence and survivors, including fatal gun violence, are disproportionately women of color, LGBTQ, immigrants and refugees, and people with disabilities.
So in addition to announcing our regulations today, we will also be announcing that we will be having over $6 million in awards to services for survivors of gender-based violence.
Excellent.
And with these investments, the City of Seattle will continue to help provide critical services to the survivors of gender-based violence and tell all survivors in the city, we are there for you, we will support you, and we will protect you.
I want to thank City Attorney Pete Holmes and Chief of Police Carmen Best for their tireless work to ensure the safety of the City of Seattle.
I also want to thank Councilmember Lorena Gonzalez, who could not be here, for sponsoring and shepherding through this legislation, but also for the actions she's taken throughout her career to protect people.
I also want to thank the incredible advocates.
who have advocated for common sense protections.
And without them, we would not be here today.
So I want to thank you all for the work you do and will continue to do.
Now I want to turn it over to our fantastic and fellow avid Storm fan, our Chief of Police, Carmen Best.
That's great.
Yes, go Storm.
So I'll be brief, but thank you for having me here today.
I'm really glad to follow up the comments of the mayor.
She made some really poignant comments.
When we launched, when she launched the gun legislation back at the Garfield Community Center, she said at that, if you remember, Mayor, you said, use common sense.
Lock it up.
It's really simple.
So I'm going to start with that.
Use common sense.
Lock it up.
Very easy.
You know, officers have seen the devastating impact of unsecured guns.
It is all of our responsibility, and especially mine as chief, to ensure that the safety of our community is at the forefront, and the safety of our officers as well.
We know that unsecured guns are commonly stolen during break-ins and burglaries, only to be used in violent crimes at a later date.
The evidence is clear.
Safe storage can prevent tragic loss of life and help our communities stay safe.
You heard the statistics earlier, but it is important that we ensure firearms are safely stored and it is the responsibility of every gun owner to do so.
Our overarching goal is to spread the word and to ensure that people know what type of container that they need to safely store the guns as well.
It is really important that we continue to support this legislation in every way that we can.
And we'll continue to work tirelessly with other agencies and our communities to reduce gun violence.
So far this year, we have taken 995 guns off the streets in Seattle.
995 guns.
That's nearly 17% increase from last year.
There is nothing more important than the safety and the health of our community.
I myself have a safe gun storage container in my home and it is just a responsible thing to do and I would expect that everyone would take personal responsibility in the safety of the community.
Thanks.
We'll take some questions if there's any.
I guess, Madam Mayor, I guess my question would be, you know, it is September.
Why does it take so long?
I think you were saying that this doesn't really, the rules don't go into effect until February.
Under the rulemaking, we have to allow enough time for public comment.
We also want to make sure that we engage the public.
We have a very strong education program.
The best result that we have out of this law is that we never have to enforce it.
The best result is that we don't have to enforce it, that we give people enough time to get the right storage for their guns, to educate them about how important it is, and to understand this does not interfere at all with a person's constitutional right to own guns.
Not at all.
And I was very heartened that even former Attorney General Rob McKenna, who was the gubernatorial candidate for the Republicans, acknowledged that he thinks this law will withstand challenge.
Because we were very careful to really respect what the restrictions on cities are.
We are not interfering with possession or use or ownership.
What we're doing is saying, if you leave it, lock it.
If you leave it, lock it up.
It's common sense.
It's easy.
It'll be better for the community.
So we're very confident that the regulations will stand up.
And we want to make sure that we take the time we need to hear from the public, to get it right, but to also educate and to give people the opportunity to get those containers that will be legal under the law so they can keep their guns safe.
All right, thank you very much for coming.