Seattle City Council Public Safety Committee 6/24/2025

to order it's 9 33 a.m june 24 2025 i'm robert kettle chair of the public safety committee will the committee clerk please call the roll chair hollingsworth here sorry council member uh council member moore uh excused council president nelson present uh council member soccer here chair kettle here i'm sorry the chair there are four members present

Thank you.

And in addition, we have Council Member Rink join us, welcome.

Not on the committee, but as always, welcome to join.

If there is no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing, seeing, no objection, the agenda is adopted.

For chair comment today, I wanted to note that we're basically at the 18 months part of this term of the majority of the council.

And it's really important because this also marks the 18th month of our efforts to address our public safety challenges.

We have a mission that focuses on the need to create a safe base in our city.

And we have a vision that seeks, for example, to have time where our children can ride safely on our buses.

And we noted that with King County Metro at the last meeting.

Or have businesses not have the need for private security.

And we have a plan that acknowledges a common thread across all these public safety challenges and the permissive environment that has been allowed to grow in our city.

This plan, our strategic framework plan, has six pillars.

Pillar one is SBD staffing.

And we've seen improvements across the board.

A year and a half ago, I said to the men and women of Seattle Police Department, give us one year.

If you're looking to transfer, if you're looking to retire, give us one year.

And in that year, under the leadership of the Council President with the Governance Accountability and Economic Development Committee, we have our recruitment and retention bills.

And we have our lateral recruit bonus bills coming through.

Through our Select Labor Committee, we have our SPOG interim agreement.

And I would argue even more importantly has been the leadership of the council and this committee in this area.

It's about showing up at roll calls.

It's about being there.

It's about engaging at community meetings.

It's really important with particularly those with SPD.

Oftentimes I've been told that I'm cheerleading or some of us are cheerleading.

It's not about cheerleading.

This is about supporting and being there and showing leadership.

That's different.

And I think that's a very important point.

So I thank my colleagues on the city council for doing so.

Pillar two was ordinances.

We have new or renewed ordinances.

Soda, which in fact is having a difference on the ground.

Soap.

Our street racing bill, and we just had recently our after hours establishment bill.

We have updated ordinances like less lethal weapons, crowd management.

Our chief of police investigation ordinance had to be updated.

And today we're looking at the chronic nuisance property bill and looking to update that.

Pillar three, vacant buildings and lots.

We passed our number one bill, and not by accident, it was with the fire department, dangerous building abatement.

From June to June, we have demolished 41 buildings that are a public safety threat to our communities, or remodeled 34 to make them safer for our communities, for a total of 75 buildings abated.

Throughout the whole of 24 and 25, the numbers are 67, 37 for a total of 104 buildings that have been made safe for our communities, either being demolished or remodeled to one degree or another.

I should also add we pass fire code in support of the fire department.

Pillar four, graffiti.

Again, think about the permissive environment.

Today, we have our graffiti bill.

And there's other efforts on graffiti here in the council and elsewhere.

And it's really about, and we have also done this through the budget process.

And I'd like to thank Mr. Jackson and the graffiti team on the executive side, and plus the efforts on the budget process.

And we need this to be a complete all-hands effort.

Pillar 5, public health.

We did have our EMS levy that we passed last time.

But it's our support for care and then also groups like LEAD and part of that interface between public safety and public health.

Because as I said many times, we cannot succeed in public safety if we don't also succeed in public health.

And then pillar six was to engage in a one Seattle way with King County and Washington State.

And our two meetings from now on the 22nd of July will be a King County day, and we'll have more on that coming up.

Separate from the plan, but kind of underlying everything, is the idea of technology, particularly with our SBD staffing challenges.

On this front, our bills include the Real Time Crime Center and CCTV, Automatic License Plate Reader, ALPR, and just recently, last time, Star Chase.

These bills are making a difference.

You're gonna find during the course of July and between now and this recess, how these bills, how these systems are coming online and are making a difference for our efforts to create a safer city.

And our efforts have also been documented in our consent decree resolution.

Actually before going to that, I wanted to give a shout out to council member Hollingsworth because we also had some other technology pieces like call you and the hostage throw phone that were done through the parks, public utilities and technology committee.

I almost forgot that, but thank you.

Also wanted to note our efforts have also been documented in our consent decree resolution.

Thank you, Vice Chair Saka.

And we also took a stand on the defund pledge.

It's important now to bring all these bills up, the fact that what we've done, but it's also important that we show that we're working with the executive because key is to put these bills into operation.

And it takes time, the budget process and the like, but it's happening and it takes time.

And it takes time for these things to have effect on the ground.

And we're doing that.

This is the challenge that we have.

We have this transition, this bridge that we have to go from in terms of our public safety posture of yesterday, today, and then tomorrow.

I've mentioned thanking my colleagues on the council, particularly here on the committee, but I also want to say that we've been engaging both on the judicial side with City Attorney Davison, but also the executive with Mayor Harold.

This has been absolutely a team effort.

And coming back to the council, it's really important here, like having our vice chair who's on top of public safety challenges to include transit safety, but also our council president, as I mentioned earlier, and the other members as they come through, plus all those that are not on the committee that are working hard, like Councilmember Rivera.

Trust me, in District 4, there's a lot of challenges, and she's engaged 110%.

But I did want to thank at the end, just to close to your comment, Councilmember Moore, who is a member of the committee.

And I want to thank her for her efforts.

SOPEN was a very key piece of legislation, stay out of areas of prostitution.

And her support for all the bills and all but one voted for in terms of the efforts that we do with very mindful and relevant amendments oftentimes.

And so I just wanted to thank Council Member Moore for her efforts.

for public safety, particularly up north with the north precinct or district, but really the whole of Seattle.

So with that said, with today's chair comment, we'll now open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comments should relate to items on today's agenda or within a purview of this committee.

Clerk, how many speakers are signed up today?

Currently we have two in-person speakers signed up and eight remote.

Okay, we'll start with in person, two minutes.

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

The public comment period is up to 60 minutes.

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

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

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

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

The first in-person speaker is Erin Goodman.

Good morning.

I'm Erin Goodman, Executive Director of the Soto Business Improvement Area, and I think this is my second meeting of this committee in a row, and I think that speaks to exactly what you were just saying.

There's a lot happening in this committee, and I just want to thank you for your attention to some really important issues.

I came here today to say my support for the nuisance property ordinance that's on the board, because as I spoke to you last week in a letter, we deal with illegally operated nightclubs.

But a lot of the activity that's impactful from there is not happening inside the club.

It's what's happening outside.

And while we did have a homicide in one of our clubs, we have had over 500 shots fired in the last three years around clubs.

80 shots at the one over by T-Mobile Park.

50 shots in front of Supernova.

50 shots over there.

It is a significant impact.

but they're not inside the club.

I sent you a video that shows the significant pedestrian and vehicle safety issues that happen outside of these establishments.

Additionally, what I did not share with you at the time was the impacts to neighboring property businesses, you know, from folks hanging out on their property and leaving garbage, graffiti, and all of that.

So strongly support the expansion of this bill to support the nightlife.

I also couldn't stand up here and not plug the graffiti bill, which is a major issue.

in Soto as well.

And also all of this needs to be supported by our police department and confirming a permanent chief is very important to having police departments.

So I get to talk on all three.

So thank you guys and have a good day.

Thank you, Ms. Goodman.

Steve Rubestella.

All is nice maybe 50,000 feet, but I'm speaking from the street level, and we still have major problems.

Now, my understanding is there's less than 10 detectives in Seattle right now.

Assaults are pretty much ignored.

hope physical assaults, hope sexual assaults or not.

I know at one time it required a minor before something was gonna actually be done.

And I'd like to get an idea when police services are gonna be restored to the masses.

And as a member of the masses, I'd like to tell you that they have been withdrawn for a longer period of time than many wars All governments have been put together in countries, and Seattle is still waiting.

My hope is we will not be waiting forever.

We could use some of the special squads back, handle things like burglary, car prowls, sexual assault, these little minor things where you're usually dealing with the same people over and over again.

And it really helps when you have these squads who know their constituents.

They know who is the usual suspects.

When they got a 90% chance it's one of five people, that makes investigation a whole lot easier.

And Seattle has always had problems in certain zones of the city, and we never were.

leave it to Beaver completely, but Seattle has so much difference from when I was young.

And I think we can do so much better and still be a major league city.

I really hope that the chief, new chief, will have some self-correcting mechanisms.

In days of old, you could call the chief's office and get a lot of help.

No more.

Thank you.

The first remote speaker is Howard Gale.

Please press star six when you hear the prompt, you have been unmuted.

Good morning, Howard Gale.

Today you will consider the confirmation of Sean Barnes as chief of police.

In response to questions from council members, Chief Barnes stated the SPD, quote, hold itself accountable through many systems of critical self analysis such as the force investigation team, the force review board, and our ongoing commitment to analyzing performance to achieve better outcomes." Yet, just three months ago, we witnessed SPD's brutal killing of Urban CA at the West Seattle Police Precinct, the 14th similar SPD killing in less than 14 years of a person in crisis with an edged or no weapon in their hand. In every one of these 14 cases, All of Seattle's accountability systems determined or accepted these killings to be, quote, lawful and proper. Yet in countries like Britain and Japan, police resolve these incidents without killing the person in crisis. I'd like to focus on Chief Barnes' statement that in protest, quote, protecting people first and property second is sound thinking in this regard. If so, then Chief Barnes must publicly explain what he will have his officers do when, as we have seen recently in Los Angeles and all over the country, Federal agents egregiously violate people's Fourth Amendment rights enshrined in the U.S. and Washington state constitutions, providing protections against unreasonable search and seizures and the need for warrants or probable cause in targeting individuals for search or detainment. Will Chief Barnes have SPD officers, instead of enforcing laws protecting property, have them act to protect people against the far greater crimes involving Fourth Amendment violations, illegal search and seizure, and the complete denial of rights in due process? Will Chief Farnes have officers demand the identity of federal agents, demand to see warrants or evidence of probable cause, record the interactions, and obtain the names of people subject to these abuses? Chief Farnes, we do not need performative statements from the police chief about theoretically being arrested by federal agents. We need our police chief to give clear direction to his officers to actively protect the rights of people in Seattle so they do not get illegally seized and disappeared themselves.

Thank you, Mr. Gale.

Next up, we have Alice Lockhart.

Good morning, committee.

My name is Alice Lockhart.

I live in District 5, unfortunately for me, right there in the soap zone.

And by unfortunate, I mean those cameras, not the prostitute who have never done me any harm.

But moving on to Council Bill 121006, yes, it's, you know, certainly going to be unequally enforced and therefore on a moral basis, I object to that.

But what I really expect and what I expect this will resonate at least equally with this council is that this bill is going to cost the city a ton of money.

It is fiscally irresponsible.

Um, judgments and claims against per the previous speaker SPD and the city of Seattle in general continue to rise.

I organized with solidarity budget and I don't want to see another budget with that has to have more money for judgment and claims, but this, this ordinance will be an equally report enforced and it will result in a whole bunch of litigation.

In the meantime, it's extremely vague terms.

We'll make prosecutions under it.

Um, also extremely expensive and time-consuming.

We don't need it.

We don't want it.

Please don't do it.

Thank you.

Next person up is Castile Hightower.

My name is Castile Hightower, and I'm speaking in regards to the confirmation hearing for SBB 2, Sean Barnes.

I am the sister of Herbert Hightower Jr. who was murdered by Seattle police while experiencing a mental health crisis.

So I know firsthand the deadly consequences of SPD refusing to de-escalate, but instead choosing to escalate interactions with the community.

My question is, how will you prevent continued escalation surrounding ICE with an SPD scope of involvement along with preventing police brutality towards community members who are exercising their constitutionally protected free speech and all other interactions with the public, like the killing that happened just March of this year, so that no more people have to live with the tragic reality that my family and so many lifemines continue to face.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Alberto Alvarez.

Well, thank you.

Good morning.

Hate groups that rallied at City Hall on May 27th were allowed to question people's religious affiliation or lack thereof for entry.

They have plans to return this summer.

Yes, the group has a legal right to preach their personal hate.

However, the same constitutional protections of free speech also stop government from establishing a religious test for entry onto public property.

The city granted a private entryway, traffic reroutes, and Seattle police to enforce a church event that prohibits entry to anyone not part of their religious group, all in violation of separating church and state.

What oversight action or accountability review can you make to ensure that religious affiliation is not a requirement for entry into Seattle's public spaces?

Thank you, and have a good day.

Thank you, Mr. Alvarez.

Next up, we have David Haynes.

Hi, thank you, David Haynes.

Maybe we should have a requirement that all cops have to stay sober in between shifts and they're not allowed to have more than one beer on weekends and vacations or the night before returning to work.

And the bartenders who keep over serving them need to be fined or shut down.

That said, out of all the crime hotspot nuisance buildings and motels, how many have been shut down properly and torn down completely and then redeveloped with emergency hotel housing or affordable housing?

or any semblance of progress in the neighbor of slum real estate?

Is council going to prioritize persecuting graffiti artists on vacant buildings as if they're discouraged of community because 79% of them are white, trying to change the skin color percentages incarcerated and to blame for what makes it unsafe?

This comes from the same mayor who's been running interference for his criminal underworld neighbors of his childhood who are presently conducting uncivil war on community with rival drug gangs escalating most of the violence while the mayor acts like we got to sympathize with the devil and be one Seattle that's unsafe to live, work, play, eat, and visit.

Where is the real proactive crime fighting that shuts down all the predatory drug pushers and all the open drug markets?

And where is all the trespasses and questions of all these junky thieving repeat offenders who need to be put on a court-ordered path to break their addiction in some sort of authorizing candidate, maybe set up by the National Guard within 24 hours with community service officers and security and service providers on site.

And where is the noble use of technology where a drone would follow back two predatory drug pushers on bikes and scooters?

using stolen debit cards to rent transportation, who go back to the stash house to get another supply.

This is the type of time that we need to combat.

We don't need the police chief to go into the law-abiding community to let us know how nice the cops are.

We need a cop to proactively shut down the evil criminals who are conducting uncivil war on community with impunity, outsmarting the cops who are ill-trained and non-deployable in crime hotspot shutdowns.

Instead, we're focused on policy.

Next up we have Aiden Carroll.

Well, I don't agree with the previous speaker, but I want to keep the focus on the fact that these policies are a mixture of a problem we don't have and a solution to the problems we do.

These laws are not only vague, they cannot effectively address the public safety issues that they claim to.

When we have vacant buildings and we have poverty, those are not trying to make equilibrium.

That's not the only thing we have happening here.

I don't want to imply that More people are more criminals, but so much crime is caused by poverty, and it's impossible to solve these problems unless you address that.

I just want to take the opportunity to reemphasize that progressive revenue to actually alleviate desperation is the most effective thing you could possibly be doing instead of looking for different ways to enforce different kinds of laws and different kinds of beliefs that you can't find enough of.

And we've been working hard to make that happen for more than five years now.

Besides the fact that if a law is being selectively enforced, it's not fair.

There's no reason that you can simply claim that when people are drinking alcohol from a place like Brewing, that that's a different kind of nuisance.

than if it's bought in the store.

Like, this is just so much waste of our time and money and all of these distractions.

But as long as the politicians are bought off, our only hope is to communicate with each other and try to find a way for the civilians to go around.

Thank you.

And our last speaker is Julia Buck.

Morning, council.

My name is Julia Buck.

I'm a resident of District six.

I am calling to express some concern over the updated language regarding nuisance properties in terms of broadening it to be events that occur in proximity to a building or to a property rather than on a property or related via a nexus, which is also not defined in the text that I can see.

I am concerned because this law change seems to be designed so that the law can be applied to multiple properties at once or entire blocks, potentially over a single set of problems.

The reason why I am concerned about this is I have a real estate background and I'm familiar with the blockbusting, which is illegal under housing discrimination laws.

Although, of course, those are no longer subject to federal enforcement.

But the practice of blockbusting was making a call to a white neighborhood indicating that a non-white family was moving in.

And that caused a panic and the homeowners would sell their property for cheap.

And then the homes would be resold to non-white families at an exorbitant marked up rate.

This would sort of be an inverse where the law could potentially be applied in the future to apply fines to, say, an entire block that has potential for property development as long as someone calls in criminal complaints.

This would force people to sell their properties at below market value under duress and potentially facilitate gentrification.

Thank you for your attention to my concerns.

Thank you.

Okay, the public comment period has expired.

We'll now proceed to our items of business.

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

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

Will the clerk please read item number one into the record.

Appointment 3175, appointment of Sean Fitzgerald Barnes as Seattle Police Chief.

OK, good morning, Chief Barnes.

Welcome.

Director Walton Anderson will be joining you.

Excuse me, Chief.

I understand we'll have some remarks, and then I'll move the item.

But go ahead, please.

State your name for the record.

Thank you.

Sean Fitzgerald Barnes.

Natalie Walton Anderson.

Okay.

Well, let's start with some remarks or comments you'd like to make.

Thank you.

I will start with a remark and then comments.

Happy birthday to Addison McKenzie Barnes, your 14th birthday.

So I wanted to put that out there since I couldn't be with her today.

To our chair, public safety committee, vice chair, council members, and members of the public, and to the dedicated men and women of the Seattle Police Department, good morning.

Thank you once again for the opportunity to speak with you as a part of my confirmation process.

During our first hearing, I shared my journey into policing and the experiences that shaped my leadership philosophy.

Today, I would like to focus on the current state of the Seattle Police Department, the progress we've made over the past six months and the path forward.

When I assumed leadership of this department, I was clear eyed about both the promise and the challenges ahead.

The people of Seattle deserve a police department that is effective, trusted, and continuously evolving to meet their needs.

I am proud to report that under our current strategy of Seattle-centric policing, which was previewed during our last session, we're seeing real results in crime prevention and, most importantly, collaborative public safety.

As of today, homicide is down 37% in our city, and the clearance rate stands at 73%.

Robberies have declined by 16%, aggravated assaults by 7%, and burglaries by 23%.

Motor vehicle theft, a top concern for your constituents, has decreased by 27%, and we're seeing clearance rates above 60% across multiple crime categories for cases assigned to our detective units.

But these are not just statistics.

They represent real people, safer streets, less trauma, and stronger neighborhoods.

And with your approval of the Star Chase technology, in addition to our expanding use of ALPR, public space cameras, and the Real-Time Crime Center, we're putting in place an intelligence-led and modern infrastructure that reduces dangerous pursuits while enhancing our investigative capacity.

But numbers and stats alone do not build trust or make people feel safer.

Community safety must be defined with our community.

I am firm in my belief that true public safety happens when everyday people work alongside of those of us who are inside the system to determine how to define, implement, and achieve public safety.

The council plays a critical role in this effort by translating public sentiment into legislation, policy, and funding.

Together, we can ensure that our vision for community policing is grounded in listening, respect, and in shared responsibility.

Retention and recruitment continue to be my top priority.

In the first half of this year alone, we have hired 87 new officers matching our total hiring for all of 2024. Our net staffing increases stands at 47 officers, a significant improvement over last year's net gain of just one.

And the numbers are increasing daily as qualified applicants are completing our backgrounding process.

This is progress, but we must do more, particularly in attracting and retaining women and people of color.

Our commitment to the 30 by 30 initiative is aspirational, but is also actionable.

This fall, we will launch a women only leadership training, defensive tactics training, and we've begun issuing tailored ballistic vests for our women employees.

we're also preparing to receive recommendations from the Imagine Institute's report on childcare, because we believe in creating a supportive environment for our employees.

As such, our commitment to officer safety and wellness is unwavering.

Every shift, every day, we prioritize officer safety, not just through equipment and tactics, but through emotional, psychological, and peer support.

Our chaplain program, counseling services, financial wellness, and recreational activities reflect a holistic approach to public safety, which begins with caring for those we work with.

Throughout the course of my career, I've been deeply committed to continuous improvement.

For the Seattle Police Department, that means confronting hard truths, building new systems of accountability and never settling for the way things have always been.

It means refining our policies, evaluating the escalation training, and investing in technology that supports both public officer trust and effectiveness.

It also means aligning our efforts with the city's broader One Seattle vision, working collaboratively with other departments and the communities we serve.

Seattle has the opportunity to lead the nation in what modern community-centric policing looks like.

But to do so, we must be bold enough to change, consistent enough to improve, and united enough to succeed.

I believe that the state and the future of the Seattle Police Department is strong, but achieving our goals will require leadership that is courageous, collaborative and compassionate.

These are characteristics that define our city council and our mayor's office.

I will end my remarks with a quote from the only American president who was a police chief and was a police commissioner, which was Theodore Roosevelt, who was the NYPD commissioner from 1895 to 1897. Now, I don't know if he said this as a result of being a police chief or being a president, but it always speaks to me.

He stated, it is not the credit who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the person who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred with dust, sweat, and blood, who strives courageously, who errors and comes up short again and again because there is no effort without error.

but who does so to strive to do good deeds, who knows great enthusiasm, devotion, and who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows that in the end, at least if he fails, he fails while daring greatly.

I believe we can fulfill our mission to build a safer, stronger Seattle and one that works for everyone.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief Barnes.

Ms. Walton Anderson, anything to add?

Okay.

Well, again, welcome to you both.

And I'd like to welcome back my vice chair, Vice Chair Saka, who couldn't make the last meeting.

And as usual, I always go to my vice chair if there's any comments or questions that you may have.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Regrettably, I couldn't be here that last meeting.

I had a horrible flu and was bedridden.

But I went back and watched the tape of that first session.

And so, but it is a pleasure to have you appear before us with me joining today.

So thank you, Chief Barnes.

Couple questions.

First question pertains to gun violence.

And I'll say, as a council member and vice chair of this committee, I've been very encouraged by your commitment on, among other things, looking at data and focusing on community engagement regarding gun violence.

But you've been in office, albeit on an interim capacity, now for about five months, a little over five months, my math.

offhand serves me correctly.

Can you talk a little bit more, Chief, about what changes you have made since becoming interim chief that you felt with respect to gun violence, that you felt were lacking at the department to address, again, the issue of gun violence, and what have been the initial results, and what additional opportunities do you see that may lie ahead on a going forward basis?

Sure.

Thank you for that question.

And we're glad you're back.

We're glad you're feeling well.

Gun violence is something that is certainly related not only to our crime rate, but it's also related to the fear of crime.

When community members at meetings that I go to talk about being fearful of crime, they talk about hearing gunshots.

They talk about not knowing the origin or the destination of those gunshots.

And so that's something that our department has always taken very seriously.

Some of the changes that I've made since I've been here is we normally do a weekly, what we call a gun call, where we have our partners, federal partners, local partners, our intelligence group to discuss the incidences of gun violence that we have heard.

whether it's shots fired calls or whether it's a homicide or whether it's a robbery, if it involves violent crime, we have that meeting.

We've expanded that meeting to two days a week so that we can get ahead of what's going on the weekend, which tends to be for most cities where you see an increase in gun violence.

And then after the weekend is over to reflect on how well we did and any changes that we need to make.

Number two, we're certainly working, I think, with some of our task force officers to make sure that if there are persons who are repeat gun violence offenders, that those charges are not only brought federally, but if we can bring those charges to our King County prosecutors, then we can do that.

We're working together to bring better cases for prosecution using our intelligence group and, of course, our detectives.

We did try to create a group of officers specifically for proactivity, but that was not able to be actualized because it is a volunteer basis and there's so much competition for work that we were not able to fill those on a consistent basis, but we still have that available for officers and commanders.

We are empowering our precinct commanders to work across different bureaus, different divisions, different sections to ask for help.

We've implemented the help of other units that traditionally have not given us proactive patrols to help with some of the proactive patrols, to include even our SWAT teams and our harbor patrols for some of our parks with boat launches on them.

And so we're trying to work together as a team.

In addition to that, we are certainly a big proponent of community violence interrupters.

I have a meeting later today to discuss how we can engage the community more in doing some of that.

And then I think lastly, just our commitment to the community.

The officers and precinct captains, I think, have increased the number of community engagement opportunities.

We're talking about this at meetings.

We're making people aware, I think, of the trends that we're seeing.

We're asking for their help.

We're asking for them to talk to their parents and their families.

And we're also spreading the message about not leaving guns in your vehicles.

we have an enormous amount of guns that are stolen from vehicles, and those guns tend to end up in the wrong hands.

And so when we do recover those weapons, we do what's called a trace form.

And that trace form helps us to understand the origin of where that weapon may have occurred.

And what we're finding is some of these weapons are being put in the hands of people because they're stolen from vehicles.

So we're asking people to take their weapons inside and to secure them properly.

Thank you.

Next question on violence.

In your assessment, Chief, how can the council, through legislation, or being an effective partner during the budget process, best help and empower you and your department to help drive down gun violence and start seeing better results?

Yeah, I think the council has been amazing partners since I've been here, at least, on doing some of that, you know, putting up or helping us develop the real-time crime center we think will help.

We've already solved at least, I know, one incident of shots fired that was caught on camera.

I'm not sure why that occurred, but we're able to make an arrest safely, actually.

not able to intrude on someone's personal privacy that wasn't involved.

And so being laser focused on that certainly helps.

I think that, you know, when it comes to our staffing, certainly, What the council have done to make sure that this job is attractive and that when people come here, they can take care of their families and they can live certainly helps the support.

I think that we have received that I have seen from city council members such as yourself, councilwoman Kettle and others.

who've gone to lineups or briefings, who've talked to police officers about what they can do.

You know, we do have some crimes that are on the books that we're trying to re-educate our police officers on what they can and what they can't do for some of the lower level crimes, which we think will have a greater impact on what we're seeing with gun violence.

But the final thing is that we have to keep the lines of communication open between my office and all of council members.

We were on a call yesterday with all of your chiefs of staff, and they met with my new chief of staff for an introductory call to talk about what kind of products do you need so that you can demonstrate to your constituents what we're doing to reduce crime, to have those open lines of communication so that if there is something going on crime-related, not legislative-related, but crime-related, my chief of staff will make sure that you get that and to have a regular cadence for information.

Thank you, Chief Barnes.

And I'll note that I appreciate your partnership and collaboration on the issue of gun violence from a citywide perspective, and particularly with respect to some known problem areas in my council district, District 1, along North Delridge, High Point, Snake Hill, and...

looking for, I think there's some still, and the partnership and collaboration of the mayor's office as well on those issues.

I think there's still some work to do to address that because people are, people are victimized and people are traumatized, even if they don't, if they aren't personally hit or struck by a bullet or a straight bullet.

Um, It is, people are fed up and I'm fed up and I know you are as well.

Plenty more work to do so, but I appreciate your initial collaboration and looking forward to supporting you in your work in that with respect to that specific neighborhood in West Seattle or set of neighborhoods.

to do more, whether it's a CEPTED review, the extra emphasis patrols in those parks, et cetera, et cetera, but also from a city-wide perspective.

This is some of the most important work.

And Chair Kettle, I appreciate your indulgence.

I do have more questions, but so let me change gears now.

Keeping people safe, Chief.

is our highest responsibility that we have in this city, bar none.

There's no greater responsibility that we have, in my view.

We literally have a charter as elected officials and then department heads, everyone throughout the city, that is our highest responsibility.

Keep people safe.

We keep people safe on our streets, in our neighborhoods, in our communities and on our roads.

And that's what I would love to, The focus of this next line of questioning is keeping people safe on our roads.

So our city has an ambitious goal of ending traffic deaths and serious injuries on city streets by 2030. It's our Vision Zero initiative.

Together, we have made investments, including in the transportation levy, the recent voter approved transportation levy, to directly address and make bold investments to directly advance this ambitious goal that we have.

This council has also passed and adopted funding in implementing legislation to deploy, among other things, automated traffic enforcement, safety cameras in neighborhoods that desperately need them.

And we know that enforcement, particularly automated enforcement cameras and technology is literally a federally proven countermeasure.

One of 40 plus proven countermeasures, engineering countermeasures to help keep people safe on our roads.

whether it's red light cameras, speed cameras in school zones, speed cameras in non-school zones, block the box cameras, et cetera, et cetera, the list goes on.

The implementation and use cases for these automated enforcement cameras seems to be growing all the time.

And we've, as a council, passed and provided significant appropriations to double the amount of of automated enforcement cameras in school zones to added almost $1.2 million in startup expenses.

Most of the cameras pay for themselves over time, but in startup expenses to initially start to deploy these cameras, the non-school speed zone cameras in other neighborhoods.

So they play a vital role, vital role in keeping people safe on our roads and ultimately helping us better achieve our Vision Zero goals.

but it's not the panacea, it's not the magic bullet, no such thing.

It's a fairy tale, it's a myth.

But it is an important part of the solution, of a broader comprehensive solution.

That said, as we've learned, this council has authorized the deployment seven, eight months ago now of doubling the number of schools or speed zone cameras in schools and $1.2 million for non-schools.

And we still haven't seen one of the non-school speed zone camera deployed.

And I think the department is making good initial progress on some of those school, deploying those school speed zone cameras.

Bottom line, it takes work to operationalize, to fully operationalize and implement these investments that we do here in partnership with the mayor.

Work and time, unfortunately, and I'm ruthlessly impatient, but it does take some time to do it right.

So even when we do fully operationalize these automated enforcement technologies, automated enforcement technologies today don't cover things like reckless driving, distracted driving, which are huge contributors to some of these traffic deaths and serious bodily injuries on a road.

They also don't address, unfortunately, due to state law prohibitions, some certain problem activity like excessive noise and excessive vehicle noise.

And you'll know that we, last year, we tried to work on an initiative and we'll revive it, we'll resuscitate it again next year in Olympia to try and get that change.

But my point is, operationalization of these automated enforcement technologies takes time.

To do it right, it takes time.

And even with the current feature capability, there are still some gaps in what it can do and what it can't do.

There's still no substitute for a patrol officer undertaking personalized enforcement action on a limited basis I don't think anyone's advocating for broad, wide-scale deployment of patrol officers, particularly in such a staffing crisis, to focus solely on traffic infractions.

But they do play a part in the broader solution, especially given the feature gap that we talked about.

In terms of ultimately, the ultimate goal is changing behavior on our roads, especially changing driver behavior.

But I do personally recognize the role of police officers in traffic enforcement on a smart basis, on a limited basis.

So my question, all that throat clearing aside, my question to you, Chief, is, but important context, what do you believe SPD's role is in helping support the goals of Vision Zero?

in eliminating traffic deaths, serious injuries on our roads.

What do you believe the department's role is in helping to do that?

And what additional actions do you think the department could potentially take to help better achieve these goals?

Recognizing that SDOT plays a central role in implementation as well.

Thank you.

We're aligned in that technology is certainly a force multiplier for us in public safety and in policing, but there are no panaceas.

I think when it comes to public safety, whether it's traffic or gun violence that we spoke about earlier, police are the tip of the spear.

We're normally the first ones to acknowledge or to be able to identify what the problem may be.

And so with that, I think our role, number one, is to work with like SDOT and others who are involved in Vision Zero, something that I support, something that we did have in my last job as well, Vision Zero.

And we work together.

And I assume we would do the same thing here.

We have data that we can provide as to where we're seeing the most dangerous collisions.

And in my former job, we developed what we call the high injury traffic network.

It was a list of intersections that disproportionately accounted for motor vehicle collisions where injury was the thing.

And so we worked with environmental design.

We worked with engineering to see if there were changes that we could either make to the road design or changes we could make to the traffic lights, which I learned is an exact science.

Those traffic lights, changing those changes almost the landscape of an entire section of your city.

So it's not as easy as making flashing lights or making the light red longer.

It's a whole science behind it.

But making sure that we can provide data to our other Vision Zero partners is important.

Enforcement is important.

It is certainly not the only thing.

We've been writing traffic tickets since the beginning of time, and we're still writing traffic tickets.

So it's usually a poor indicator of change behavior, but it certainly does help.

I know we have a traffic unit.

We also have a special assignment, I believe, going on now where we have a cadre of officers who will be working or are working with our traffic units, whether it's our motorcycles or whether it's other type units to enforce traffic.

But that is not a permanent solution.

And so once we get back to full strength, we'll look to, of course, making sure that we have those particular units fully staffed.

And so that most important, they can be at the right place at the right time to make sure that we can slow down behavior and change behavior so that people are not getting hurt in accidents.

Thank you, Chief.

And as chair of our city's transportation committee and vice chair of this public safety committee, I would encourage you to continue to partner closely with SDOT and the mayor's office to figure out how we can best you know, work across these silos and address the issue of traffic safety through enforcement in your role, but also through like SEPTED and, you know, working with the departments to design, you know, and other engineering solutions as well.

But make no mistake, enforcement is part of that.

So thank you, chief.

Appreciate your feedback here.

No further questions, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, vice chair.

And yeah, we did turn into a transportation committee there for a second, but I'm on transportation too.

And I mentioned transit safety earlier.

This is a really important point.

And by the way, parking enforcement, the city made a mistake years ago when we pushed it to SDOT.

It's back where it belongs now.

And that's another area of interest for me.

I'm just gonna put a plug in for parking enforcement.

and doing those pieces too.

The little things count.

Council President.

Thank you for being here.

We're at a critical moment in the city's public safety trajectory.

It's great to hear that we've got a net positive of 47 so far as compared to one last year.

My question is about the community response group.

The community response group was formed in, I believe it was October 2020 with 100 officers and the unique thing about this group is that they are deployed citywide, not assigned to any precinct and they're deployed to respond to what's needed in the moment.

And it's my understanding that they also do some proactive policing as well and that's really great because I can't tell you how many times I get the question similar to, I can see people right there selling drugs on the street out of an RV or whatever, why aren't there, why isn't there anybody kind of sort of proactively going after that?

And so my understanding is that this group is important for many, many things, including just emergency response.

I would like to know how much it's down by now or how many people are in that group anymore, and do you have any plans to add to the numbers as we staff up so that we can respond to those kinds of questions or issues that I hear about a lot?

You know, sort of the more low-level things that people do notice and think that there should be a more sustained or a presence from SPD.

So I agree with you that proactivity and crime prevention is number one.

That's number one for me.

I've said that my entire career.

I said it in our first session.

We have to create ways to have more proactivity.

Our community response group does an amazing job for us.

but they are quite frankly pulled in many directions.

They're usually the first ones we call when there are protests or special assignments or things that are going on.

What I would like to see as we staff up, which we're going to get there, but as we staff up, I would like to see more proactive units assigned to the precincts.

I think the precinct captains need and deserve their own cadre of officers who are proactive and can address the concerns in their neighborhoods.

And so as we staff up, I would rather see us create a system so that those officers are responsible to the precinct captains, because quite frankly, we put a lot on them.

They're your first point of contact.

And it's a lot easier to call people who are under your umbrella than it is others.

Now we're breaking down some of those silos, but yet there are, you know, five precinct captains and they're all asking for the same group to help.

And they do help.

They do a great job.

But to answer your question, I would like to see as we staff up more proactivity or more proactive officers assigned specifically to the precincts.

Got it.

Thank you.

Well, I agree.

And it does make more sense that those proactive groups are within precincts because they know what's going on on the street.

And so I don't really care which group it is.

It's the proactive policing part that I think is so important and would increase the confidence of our constituents as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President.

Councilmember Hollingsworth.

Thank you, Chair.

And I'll be brief, because I don't have any questions, Chief.

I just have a couple quick comments that I wanted to relay.

So thank you for being here, Chief.

And I also want to thank Public Safety.

Is it Public Safety Chief Natalie Walton-Anderson?

Is that your official title?

That sounds right?

Okay.

Sounds good.

For all your work as well, I come from and represent a district that is very unique in District 3. And safety looks different for every neighborhood, and needs are very different.

We have mental health, traffic safety, youth safety.

We have drug crisis on our streets, gun violence.

Sometimes when people say gun violence, it also...

I prefer, if it's youth, I would say our babies are shooting each other because that really humanizes a lot of when people talk about gun violence.

And we also have a long history in our district from policing, from our first black council member, Sam Smith, who advocated for the East Precinct because the Central District was not getting responded to.

to 2020 CHOP-CHAS events in the district that have taken place.

And during this time, during your confirmation, I've listened to community.

I put together a list of feedback, which is great, that I've received that people want to see in our police department and our new chief.

So departments that are guardians, guard our community, not necessarily warriors, but they help educate our community as well.

A department that is collaborative with other city departments and they're integrated with our city.

Oftentimes I hear people say, hey, they wanna be able to walk inside a precinct and be able to talk to someone front facing or just have that interaction.

A department that's accessible to the community on all levels, from your captains, the chiefs, lieutenants, and officers.

A department that's transparent and communicative.

Recently, the social media communications with certain events in our city have been the right tone and direction.

And I really appreciated the social media content that has come from our police department and talking to our community.

I think it has the right tone, and I love that.

A department that respects, honors, and elevates women to different positions, and also our officers.

A department that understands that tailored responses are needed.

We have different generations that have different needs, and we're evolving as a society and keeping up with the times.

I've heard that.

A department that understands that most of our youth are not bad, but they're bored, and they need accountability as well.

And we need to incorporate parents' success in that community as well.

I've had two friends that are my grade school friends that, between the two of them, have spent over 30 years in prison, and they went to prison when they were 18, 19, from the Central District, and they recently got out.

And I remember we were at the corner And they had never been to City Hall, but they knew the address.

And we used to joke about it.

Y'all know the address across the street to the county jail.

And they would be like, yeah, 500 Fifth Ave.

But they did never had ever stepped foot into City Hall.

And a lot of kids just need exposure in our community.

A lot of kids need resources and to understand our city is filled with so many resources and exposure and just changing a kid's life just takes one moment for them to be exposed to something they've never seen before.

Especially all these kids on social media and they're seeing so much content.

And so a chief in a police department that understands that kids just need to be exposed to good things that really will correct them on a different path.

Also, a chief that uses their platform to help transform some of the stereotypes of traditional policing.

And last but not least, and hopefully I got all your titles right, chief, because you're a father, you're a husband, you're a son, you're a brother.

You are a Kappa.

My family's alpha is over here, but it's okay that you're a kappa, so I'll give you that.

You have a PhD, you're a former history and teacher and educator, and oftentimes, Seattle does this a lot, America does, but Seattle particularly, often looks at certain communities through the lens of criminal justice.

and they pigeonhole certain communities through that.

Our progressive Seattle sometimes looks at black community through the lens of criminal justice, and that's it.

And my goal and my hope is that you continue to use that platform to break those stereotypes, to educate people.

for you to be able to continue to tell people about peace, small businesses, economic opportunity, healthcare, education, those pieces that can be integrated with our Seattle Police Department as well, and you can use that platform as well.

And my ask is that you continue to stay rooted in your mission, What I do believe is that your heart is in the right place to protect our city.

I know there are times where we all make mistakes, but you are human, and I know that you will do a good job for the city of Seattle.

So those are my comments.

I really appreciate your time, and I'll be sure to send these to you as well so you have them.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Hollingsworth.

I might add Maureen.

Maureen.

My apologies, Mr. Chair, and a Maureen.

Councilmember Rink.

Thank you once again, Chair Kettle, for allowing full council participation today for this important confirmation process.

And thank you, Interim Chief Barnes, for being here today, for the second round of questions, and again, for answering all of those questions we had for you in writing ahead of this process.

For today, I just have three questions, and I'll jump right in.

Just over one year ago, Amar Murphy Payne was murdered outside of Garfield High School.

On June 6th, the one-year anniversary of Amar's death and National Gun Violence Awareness Day, I and some of my colleagues joined Amar's family, classmates, and community in a walkout and rally against gun violence outside the school.

Amar's murderer is still at large, possibly still walking in our neighborhoods.

And I heard from numerous community members and local independent media that our community has not gotten the kind of regular updates on the investigation that we deserve from SPD's PIO office.

So how specifically will you be directing the department to improve communication with our families on this important matter?

And what specific improvements to transparency and media access can we expect from SPD under your leadership?

Thank you.

So to the family of a life that was lost, more than a life, potential and a life, that was lost outside a place that I've always believed should be a sanctuary, our public schools.

Our officers and detectives continue to work that case.

There's no such thing as a cold case in the Seattle Police Department.

Obviously, during my first month, I got briefed on ongoing cases, cases that we have yet to solve, and this was one of them.

I was assured that our detectives are in contact with the family.

There has not been a lot of communication with the community for a reason.

Officers and detectives are following up on information.

And we would not want to put anything out that would compromise the information.

Or when people come forward, we want to make sure that the information they're giving us is consistent with the evidence that we have in this case.

That could not be the case if we gave too much information to our public.

We are committed to resolving this one and many other cases that have gone unsolved, and I have full faith and confidence in our homicide unit and our detective units because they're working together on this particular case.

Moving forward, I am very excited that we have a new communications director with us.

As council member Hollingsworth stated, even what we're doing on Twitter looks different, feels different because her and her team are doing an amazing job and they have a lot of ideas about it.

I've always believed in, I guess the word would be over communicating, but you gotta be careful about that.

And usually, throughout the course of my career, I've gone a couple of rounds with my detectives about what information we should or should not put out.

But if it does not compromise the case, my belief is that the public has a right to participate in their own public safety.

And you can't do that if you do not have all the information that you need.

So you can expect a communication style that is open, that is frequent, and that is transparent.

I certainly appreciate that.

Thank you.

And moving forward with my second question, last year the city ratified a partial labor agreement with over $170 million in officer raises and passed a budget with a roughly 15% increase to overall allocation for SBD.

The city is facing at least a $250 million budget gap that this body is going to have to close in some combination of cuts, postponed investments, and additional revenue.

We're all on the same team here.

And if Seattle is going to do right by all of its employees and our residents, then we're going to have to make some sacrifices and shoulder our fair share of the work.

And so big picture, where are you looking in SPD's budget for the kind of reductions in expenditures we're all going to have to make in the next two years to ensure our city is able to keep its promise to both our employees and the people that we serve across the city?

Yeah, I think we're doing that process now.

I think some of our non-sworn positions are being frozen for salary savings.

Obviously, we're not where we want to be with officer hiring, so there's salary savings there.

And in my experience, reevaluating some of our technology licenses that are set for renewal or will be expiring is also a way to save money and give salary savings.

But I do not want to turn back the hands of time on our recruiting and the officers that we're bringing in prior to the budget instructions.

You know, I gave them a mandate of 200 officers by the end of the year, which may have caused a couple of people to have hard palpitations.

But once they came back, they said, OK, we can do this.

I think our background investigations and what we're doing with HR, they're doing it.

an amazing job.

They're literally working almost 24-7 to make sure that we can get qualified people in.

And I don't think that's an area where the city needs to turn back now.

Thank you.

And my final question for today, my office has asked a number of questions related to how you intend to approach accountability and partner with our accountability bodies moving forward.

And thank you for providing those answers in writing.

But just today, during public comment, we heard from Castile Hightower, whose brother, Herbert Hightower Jr., was killed by SPD while experiencing a mental health crisis.

Too many in this community and across the US have been killed at the hands of police.

We need accountability, we need to improve our de-escalation tactics, and we need to prevent these deaths from happening.

So from your perspective, what does justice look like for victims and families of victims of police violence?

What does that look like?

Well, I think when it comes to incidences that have a disparate income outcome or an outcome that no one wants, including the police, accountability begins long before that happens.

Accountability begins with a police department that's well trained, that uses good tactics.

that has good supervision.

And quite frankly, my definition of accountability means that this department will have the tools, training, time, technology, and team to get the job done.

But accountability also means that we need our community to help us out as well.

and to make sure that when you see the warning signs of mental health, when you see the warning signs of substance abuse, that you know where to go.

You'll be surprised that many people don't know where to go.

So they call 911, and then a police officer shows up.

And so I've been working or part of Seattle-centric policing that we debuted last time is making sure that people or officers have a resource list.

So when we go to those calls and we see the warning signs, we can give out a resource list so that people know that the next time if something happens, if someone begins to escalate, who they can call for help.

because when people don't know where to call for help, they call 911, and then a police officer shows up.

I want to be more collaborative in that.

I want to be a partner with anyone in the community, whether it's government or civic or even our nonprofits.

In my last job, we had an amazing community relationship with our nonprofits.

And we provided data that they needed to get their grants.

We also applied for grants and did what we call pass through grants.

We had millions of dollars in pass through grants that was given to us from the federal government and others, and we gave that directly to the nonprofits.

And so I would like to do that here in Seattle, because again, we all work together to increase safety and decrease the likelihood that anyone gets hurt in a police interaction.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Ring.

Thank you for the questions.

I'd just like to add thank you to the public commenters too.

There's overlap here.

I'm not gonna ask any questions.

I'm just gonna go one, two, three pretty quick because we are on some time challenges.

Appreciate the question on communication.

I've often said there's one way to go for communications as it relates to SPD and that's up and I'd like the direction that we're moving.

Budget, a lot of things going on there to include some opportunities.

Washington State, we need to be mindful of that.

Accountability, really important.

We have the general accountability and our accountability partners.

We've spoke to that last time.

But it's interesting too, because as the question was asked, and sometimes like with Mr. Gale, it's asked as well, it's like another version or another intersection of public safety and public health.

And we have to get both sides right.

in addition to the accountability with SPD, we also have to work the public health side of this challenge that we're facing.

And I think that's important to highlight.

And that came up with Ms. Hightower, but also Mr. Gale and some others as well.

To the council president's question about, you know, basically on view, kind of goes to Mr. Rostello's question.

We are in this bridging moment where you know, the, you know, public safety for the masses, you know, for those neighborhoods, you know, I believe that we're in this bridging moment and I think it's important to do that expectation management saying, yes, we're working there, but we're not there yet.

And don't give the kind of false.

And I think that's important for us as a city to be doing.

I noted that there was a questions regarding the protests from a couple.

I understand a, there's some lessons learned for the CMIC.

and those processes for crowd management.

And at some point we'll get those reviews and we'll bring them to committee.

And I have two more, but I'm gonna end with a positive.

ICE, federal law enforcement department, Homeland Security.

I recognize with the Jackson Building, the Federal Protective Service, that's one piece.

But if there's anything related to federal law enforcement specifically with DHS or ICE, if there's communications, going back to communications, my understanding and talking to different people, there's not been any, and there really doesn't seem to be any interest coming out of the federal side.

But if there's anything on that front to please contact, unless you have something to say, contact us.

And so the last thing I just want to say before we make a move here is in the answers that you gave us to our questions, you talked about, you know, trust and the gain, the way, the ability to gain trust is listening.

And so I talked to a lot of people, have a lot of meetings.

And in one meeting, we're talking about the native community.

and how you met with members of the Indigenous Advisory Council and others.

And that was important.

And this outreach to all these communities to include those communities that are suffering like our native communities, doing that outreach is really important.

So I appreciate you putting yourself on your own before the badge program for that.

So thank you.

So with that all said, I move the committee recommend confirmation of appointment 3175. Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, it's been second, third, fourth.

It is moved and seconded to recommend confirmation of the appointment.

Are there any final comments?

I don't think so.

One quick one.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

And thank you, Chief Barnes for your partnership over these past few months and addressing these complex public safety challenges.

Appreciate your collaboration.

Been very impressed with you and your approach.

You are clearly very highly credentialed.

You have the requisite knowledge skills experiences and abilities to help us as a city better deliver upon our highest responsibility to keep people safe.

And you came in at a time when we needed an outsider more than ever.

And I hope there's this whole concept of the Seattle freeze.

I hope it hasn't been too chilly for you in that regard.

I'm proud to be able to support your nomination today.

You are very responsive.

I think our city is lucky to have you.

And I know So Addison is her birthday today.

Is she your daughter?

She is.

OK.

Addison, happy 14th birthday.

And as a dad of three young kids myself, I also know firsthand that service often requires sacrifice.

And unfortunately, today is a day that you're going to have to make some personal and familial sacrifices.

But I hope Addison and your whole family and your whole community, which is our community now in Seattle, understands that your sacrifice is making an impact.

And hopefully today, we'll clear biggest hurdle in helping you to become permanent chief, which reflects great credit upon you, your family, and the entire city of Seattle, our community.

So that said, thank you, Chief Barnes.

Proud to be able to support your nomination today.

Happy birthday, Addison.

And like I said, we are lucky to have you.

Yes.

Will the clerk please call the roll and recommendation to confirm the appointment?

Council Member Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Council President Nelson.

Aye.

Council Member Saka.

Aye.

Chair Kettle.

Aye.

Chair, there are four in favor and none opposed.

Okay, the motion carries and the recommendation that the appointment be confirmed will be sent to the City Council and please to Ms. Addison Barnes as a birthday present to your daughter.

My vice chair beat me to that.

So happy birthday to her.

And by the way, thank her for her service and your other kids and your wife because that's something that's not really understood by a lot and it's really important.

So Addison, a special thank you on her birthday.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Okay, we'll move on to our second item of business.

Will the clerk please read item two into the record?

Council Bill 120995, an ordinance relating to a new civil cause of action against graffiti taggers for illegal graffiti on public and private property and requiring restitution, adding a new section 10.07.055 to the Seattle Municipal Code and amending section 10.07.01 of the Seattle Municipal Code.

Okay, thank you, clerk.

And I want to thank City Attorney Davison for joining us for our second bill, joining with Mr. Lindsey, also from the City Attorney's Office, and I believe Mr. Doss from Central Staff.

Thank you very much for joining us.

Please state your name for the record and begin your presentation.

Hello, good morning.

I'm City Attorney Ann Davison.

Scott Lindsey, Deputy City Attorney.

Morning, Greg Doss, Council Central Staff.

Okay, great, thank you.

Again, welcome, and over to you.

Thank you very much, Council.

I appreciate all of you being here and participating again.

Also, thanks, and even though he's already exited, appreciate Interim Chief Barnes and hope to be soon permanent, right, as well, with permanent Chief Barnes.

and his work, importantly, on all the things that are public safety that we're focusing on as well.

We are the second step, as you hear me talk about.

After police show up, sometimes when they do find need to refer, often it's referred to my office.

80% of the crime in Seattle is misdemeanor crime, which comes to my office, of which we're talking about graffiti, And I've heard from many of you sitting here on the dais that this is a concern for you individually and for your districts.

We've heard from the mayor that's also a concern of his and it is a concern of mine.

So I've been focused on how can I be instrumental in helping this so that our city is known as a place of order, a place where we take care of our resources, which means also our assets, our buildings and our locations.

What can we do to further make sure that our laws are meaningful and that people comply with them?

You are our lawmakers for the city, and so that's where we need to make sure we have things followed.

And so I am part of that accountability when it comes to enforcement, when it comes to criminal acts here in the city of Seattle for misdemeanors and gross misdemeanors.

So what I'm coming to you with today is a legislative strategy that you can be partners in the support for this topic in regards to our city, the illegal graffiti action that we see happening so much and is so prevalent throughout our city.

I'll say recently I hosted many city attorneys from across the country to our beautiful city.

They had not been here before.

and several of their locations I've been at and they do not have the same battle that we have in regards to graffiti.

So despite there being large metropolitan areas, we have this significant problem that we seem to be able to need to get under control as we help to support our small businesses and our property owners and the good stewardship of tax dollars because we have to expend a lot of them in the cleanup of this.

So what I'm bringing to you is a civil strategy whereby we can supplement the criminal prosecution piece.

If we find that the evidence is difficult to proceed on from a criminal process, what can we do from a civil process that would also be a deterrent to say people need to comply with our law and not destroy other people's property?

So what I'm bringing about today is about that because in the city of Seattle, it costs us as a city and the state of Washington, all of which is taxpayer dollars, millions of dollars to clean up in addition to property owners.

I have to have my own paper here with me.

A lot of our police officers know the taggers because we have seen them through social media.

They use this to promote themselves and their work.

And I have no interest in giving them any airtime, so I'm not gonna talk about them personally.

I think that we do not want to encourage action that we don't want, so we don't gonna give them more airtime and attention.

But we do see their actions.

A lot of police do know who they are.

We're looking at how can we be instrumental with that information and do things.

Here I've given you some information about the number of times that we do have graffiti incidents.

Over 28,000 just in 2024 alone, but only 35 of those were sent to my office for referral for potential prosecution.

So that is really a significantly, incredibly and significantly small number that they have enough evidence that they think that they can send that over to my office and then we look at that.

Again, though, our city is spending $6 million, as Council Member Rinke just talked about, being a good steward of our resources and future investments and things that you all want to appropriate for.

I would guess that this is not money that you would like to spend in this capacity, but it would be easier if people would just simply comply with the law and not damage other people's properties, and you can use those dollars for betterment of other items.

In addition to our property owners who also have to spend money of their own to abate the graffiti problem.

Just to give you a visual as to what we have been seeing over the course of time, again, wanting to make sure that we provide for the public.

And this is how I help make myself make decisions is based upon the data we have.

You can see a look back to 2017 of how many referrals we have gotten from Seattle police.

Again, as you've lived in the city with me, I've lived for 30 years, I've seen this problem grow.

So this is something that even though the number of referrals is going down, the problem has been increasing over time.

But also to give you a comparative then is how much am I charging?

Since 2022 and I came to office, I'm charging more of those referrals, but I'm still getting fewer than we were before.

Again, I put that to the inability to put the low number of officers when we often need them to actually see somebody commit that crime.

So how else can we be strategic in helping to deter people in this type of activity where it's causing millions of dollars of damage to properties?

Again, not wanting to give airtime to people who think this is the way to get a social value for themselves and build their own reputation.

But you have seen a lot of these tags where you would probably recognize the name over and over and over.

Many, you might see all the way down through Tacoma, all the way through along I-5, along road signs where you maybe can't read the exits that you're trying to safely take.

Again, this is part of what our people come to our city to experience.

We had FIFA Club, and we'll have FIFA World Cup next summer.

We want to make sure that our city is a place where people can get about safely.

And when there's tagging over road signs, et cetera, that is problematic for us.

Council Member Sock, as you talked about road safety earlier, I think that's an important piece that we need to be making sure we're focusing on.

Again, so many of these taggers are known because they promote themselves on social media.

Sadly, they have people that are encouraging them.

I'd like to make sure that we provide a tool that is meaningful to say our laws need to be complied with, and that's why I brought this civil strategy for you.

This new civil enforcement tool would help be able to closely connect consequences with conduct.

And I think that's a really critical part that we wanna make sure we're getting across to people who want to engage in this type of damaging activity to property.

This would authorize the city attorney to bring the civil action against illegal taggers in Seattle Municipal Court.

The civil fine amount would be $1,000 per violation, plus the restitution for labor and material costs to abate the damage.

In addition to that, it would allow for the monetary damages to be converted to community service.

If you don't want to pay for that cleanup, then you can do it yourself because we do not want people to engage in this activity.

And there's other ways to use Council Member Hollingsworth, as you said.

Sometimes people are just bored.

So let's find some.

In the civil case, the standard booth...

preponderance of the evidence as opposed to in a criminal violation where I have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

This is not instead of criminal prosecution, but again, this is on cases where we think that the better way we can proceed for a deterrent impact is through a civil preponderance standard.

That's where we would be able to move and hopefully make sure that deterrent message is received.

We would prioritize bringing actions against the most prolific one, illegal graffiti taggers.

Many of, again, tags that you would recognize because you've seen them numerous times, but I'm not going to give them any airtime today.

This will give you a description about kind of the referrals that we do have so that you can understand from a legal perspective of what kind of impact would that have to different communities within our city.

You can see predominantly over the five-year average, the referrals that we've seen.

I guess I need to ask, is this on our referrals or is this on our...

this is based on our criminal referrals, 85% male and 79% Caucasian.

So that's the demographic that's engaged in this.

And I will continue to emphasize, these are not necessarily 19 year olds.

These are people that are fully functioning, employed adults oftentimes.

And so they are not just people that are lost and young adults.

Oftentimes these are people that have strategically engaged in this activity for a long time and again, looking to increase their social reputation and notoriety by damaging our property and costing us millions of dollars.

So again, this civil tool would be able to add to a different way to deter people from engaging in that type of activity.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mr. Doss, anything from central staff perspective?

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I don't have any prepared remarks today.

There is a staff report online for you all if you are interested on Council Bill 120995. We'll note a couple things from the staff report observations that Council may wish to consider, and one is that this bill doesn't have any reporting requirements.

If you all wish to see in the future how many cases the city attorney tried and the outcomes, restitution or penalties that were paid.

That might be something that either you could add to the bill via an amendment or you could just ask the city attorney's office to report that during one of their annual reporting sessions.

And the second thing that I would note is that the language that defines graffiti offenders says that it's any person or entity who applies illegal graffiti to public or private property or who assists or encourages another person or entity to do the same.

Might recommend that you ask the city attorney or maybe the city attorney would be willing to talk a little bit more about how that provision would work in court and who that provision is targeted at and specifically thinking about the folks that encourage online graffiti.

And that's all I have.

Thank you, Mr. Doss.

Looking at the clock still for questions, Vice Chair.

Thank you, Chair.

And thank you, City Attorney Davidson, Mr. Lindsey, Mr. Doss, for your presentation today.

I read the central staff analysis, very, very helpful.

I would hold it up here, but I've learned never hold up documents from one of my wiser colleagues.

But I marked it up, dog-eared it, highlighted it, and very helpful.

And also appreciate the presentation here, also read the summary and fiscal note.

My question, my first question is, so I originally had a question about like, what's the anticipated net revenue we can expect to receive from this?

And then I read further is that the city attorney It doesn't expect there to be much, same with the executive, much in the term with respect to net revenue that the city could potentially realize from this, which is understandable.

That said, another aspect or feature of this bill is that it would authorize the conversion of fines and restitution into community service hours.

And so I totally understand that, and it makes sense that we can expect not to receive much in terms of material fines and revenue from this.

But we also at the same time need to be able to quantify based off of the information we know today, what is the initial anticipated impact of this.

So that said, on the one hand we know probably fines, amounts, revenues received from the city perspective de minimis.

But how much anticipated restitution and community service hours, roughly ballpark, could we potentially expect to see or be yielded from this bill in year one or over the next few years or whatever period you think makes sense.

But what's the estimated impact in terms of anticipated restitution and community service hours?

Well, thank you, Council Member Saka.

I know this is a critical piece.

I will say I'm not asking for additional budget for this specifically.

So I just wanted to highlight that for other members as well, as you're talking about dollar amount, our civil enforcement section would do this work that they currently do for other things.

And so again, we would be focusing on the most prolific taggers that we have been able to identify.

So that's not a large number, but it is again, they do a lot of damage.

And so that would be on a case by case basis up to the individual if they wanna just pay the fine amount or if they would rather do the work as cleaning up.

so that we would negotiate that.

My attorneys would negotiate with their representation to do that.

So it's probably difficult for me to forecast, given that an individual could choose between the two options available there.

Thank you.

I note on attachment, one of the memos, summary of graffiti prosecution in Seattle, the graffiti rates, graffiti charge rates are high, but...

generally above 50% over the last four or five years, but the disposition rate on another chart outcomes, only 11% resulted in guilty pleas.

So as I understand it, this would be intended to help provide another tool to address that.

So based off the current referrals, charge rates, can you at least quantify ballpark?

What kind of, like the volume of the anticipated volume of those cases that you would try or pursue?

Well, again, we only can act after we get information from the investigating authority, which in this case would be from police for criminal prosecution.

And much of that data would be the ones that is used also for the civil peace.

And so we are able to give you what we've been receiving, and hopefully that's increasing, again, from the investigatory work and in relation to the graffiti that the executive has as well.

I'll probably have my deputy add some additional details if you want some additional pieces that I'm not able to speak to right now.

Councilmember, most of the top 20 graffiti taggers in the city right now have been identified, so we know who they are.

There may be outstanding misdemeanor and or felony cases against them, but often those felony cases will be for a single incident where we know that they're responsible for dozens or even hundreds of graffiti tags around the city.

We're not able to charge those other cases because they weren't caught in the act for those.

Therefore, we can't prove those beyond a reasonable doubt.

But as the city attorney said, we believe that we can bring a civil case for those because we can bring it under the preponderance of the evidence standard.

So the initial goal really is focused on those top 20 or so graffiti taggers.

identifying them, most of whom have already been identified, collecting the work and bringing cases against those top and most prolific folks, trying to create the deterrence effect at the top and let that filter down.

Thank you.

Councilmember, real quick.

Yep, go ahead.

Another thing to know is that when the city attorney's office talks about known offenders, the One Seattle graffiti team, the graffiti czar that the city attorney referred to a moment ago, When there are known taggers, when it is a high-value damage that has been done, they will document their abatement activities.

They'll clean it up, take pictures of it, and store that information such that when there's another tag done, they've got a documented history of a place and time and person.

And they store that information and work with SPD, and they would work with the Seattle Attorney's Office to go after those folks.

I think what's important, the reason I mentioned this, is that there's already sort of the system built and a queue ready for the city attorney to prosecute some of these folks.

I shouldn't say prosecute, go after for civil abatement purposes.

Thank you.

And thank you for providing the demographics analysis of the...

the people committing these offenses.

It's important to understand as we devise solutions that address the need.

So by my read of the demographics charts provided it's overwhelmingly white men, which begs the question from an age perspective, What are the demographics with respect to age?

Presumably, you wouldn't see juvenile cases because they don't go through your office or even our courts.

But would still love to better understand the demographics from an age perspective.

I heard there is one prolific 19-year-old, potentially, But yeah, it would be better, it would be good to better understand the age.

So for, we have not, we did not, but will conduct the age analysis of the referrals.

What I can say is for the most, we focused and have focused a lot of attention, including helping the Seattle Police Department build felony cases, I think 17 major felony cases.

A majority of those folks were not only white male, but in their 30s.

And what the city attorney was saying earlier was that our experience is that many of these folks actually have jobs, they have resources, they have cars and condos and other things.

They do this in part for building a social media reputation, and that was captured on, I think, slide four.

is a lot of this is about self-promotion online under their tagger names, and that's the subculture in which they are trying to thrive.

Thank you.

Would you be able to follow up with an analysis of the age demographics similar to kind of how you did for this?

Absolutely.

And break it up however you think makes sense, 20 to 25, like whatever, I don't know.

But that would be helpful to understand.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I have a question about...

pertaining to page five of the central staff analysis memo, a question that where he's like calls out the council may consider asking the city attorney's office to elaborate on how this provision might work in court.

And like, uh, which is an important question and actually would love to follow up offline.

Because in the interest of time, I want to get to one other question.

So if you all wouldn't mind, it's contained in that last paragraph, that last sentence.

There's a question about how that provision would operate in court.

I would love to get more clarity around that.

But in the time remaining, I will say, can you talk a little bit more about the fine amount?

I note that it's $1,000 per violation.

What factors inform that determination of $1,000?

Did you think about...

Compounding or escalating fines for subsequent violations, for example.

Can you talk a little bit more about how that specific fine amount was set?

Well, we looked at other municipalities, again, that have used this type of a strategy.

It was our starting place.

And again, looking at the ones that are large pieces, they are costly to remove.

So this seems like a good round dollar to start with.

And we just wanted to have it be as straightforward as possible.

But again, costly, because it does cost us a lot to contend with.

We're here having to discuss it because people have chosen to engage in this destructive behavior.

So that's the most, unless my deputy wants to add some more.

Key to this, as the city attorney said, was kind of a guidepost based on what other cities did, what other fines the city imposes for other problematic conduct.

But in addition, I would say, This is a $1,000 fine per violation, so imagine a significant graffiti tag on the side of the freeway, a billboard, on a light box, and in addition, we would add on top of that the costs of abatement.

Sometimes those costs of abatement can be $3,000, $5,000, $10,000.

So just for that single graffiti tag, it would be $1,000 plus the cost of abatement from the city.

So that could end up being, again, upwards of $5,000 to $10,000 per graffiti tag that we're actually seeking judgment on.

Thank you, and I note that I've learned that conversations with you all and SPD and others that it's not necessarily, when we're talking about graffiti, it's not necessarily the spray paint itself that is the most problematic, it's those etching tools.

Most spray paint can be removed fairly easily with chemicals, but the etching tools that really sear and damage the material and corrode the material, whether it's glass or walls of some sort, that's what really creates the most harmful damage.

So in any event, thank you for entertaining my questions.

No further questions or comments, Chair.

All right, thank you, Vice Chair, Council President.

So I have to say, I have been looking forward to casting a hell yes vote on this legislation ever since you told me about this, which was a long time ago.

Because I think of this as graffiti prevention, and it's extremely important.

I have to say that I care less about the $6 million that graffiti vandalism removal costs the city, and much more about the time, effort, and cost to small businesses to remove it, because that is the law.

And as a small business owner, I know that It takes a long time, one single tag, over and over and over again.

Very frustrating.

And I will have you know that also graffiti is the single most common complaint in my inbox.

Again, I'm a citywide council member, and so that's a lot of complaints about graffiti.

So this will be extremely welcome.

So I just applaud and thank you so much, City Attorney Davison, for providing us with a tool to deter graffiti.

vandalism, which is so important.

And it also seems to be, through a civil infraction, which seems I'm kind of cluing into a pattern, it seems to be an approach that you've taken or that you're specializing in.

And it really does, it matters because there has to be a, there has to be something that makes people think twice that, you know, that the likelihood of having to pay, I mean, how many of us don't speed because of the ticket they might get.

In any case, thank you so much.

You know how I'm going to vote.

Just wanted to say thanks.

Thank you, council president.

Oh, I also have to say, I would like to be a co-sponsor of this legislation.

I think you are.

Yes, Council President.

Thank you.

All right, again, in the interest of time, you weren't here for chair comment.

I went at the 18-month mark, highlighted the connective tissue that's binding these public safety challenges.

One of them is graffiti, and that's why it's pillar four.

So thank you for this.

I said that thank you.

City Attorney Davison earlier, but I appreciate your work on this and the collaboration with the council and specifically this committee on a whole host of issues to include the next one.

And before I move to the next one, I did want to also thank, you mentioned the graffitis are Mr. Jackson and the team that does a lot of that work and does a lot of the documentation.

That's important work.

So thank you, Mr. Doss, for raising that point about the team that's really working hard to work this graffiti issue and potentially they may get some help.

All right.

With that, thank you very much.

We'll move quickly to the third item of business.

Clerk, please read item three into the record.

Council Bill 121006, an ordinance relating to chronic nuisance properties allowing under certain circumstances and off-property nuisance activity to count towards determining that a property is a chronic nuisance, amending sections 10.09.010 and...

10.09.030 of the Seattle Municipal Code.

Thank you, Clerk.

Thank you again for joining us, City Attorney Davison and Deputy, as well.

Welcome Deputy Mayor Burgess and Director Noble from Central Staff.

We'll go into this.

I recognize we're running late.

I indulge the patience of my colleagues.

It's important.

We have a very busy committee schedule basically through the rest of the year, so we'd like to keep things on track.

So thank you, and over to you.

Thank you very much, council members.

My presentation will take less than two hours.

Thank you for letting us present to you this morning on the chronic nuisance properties ordinance, which was first adopted by the city council back in 2009. In the 16 years since the ordinance has been in place, the city has used it 17 times.

Seven of those uses against motels, five involved nightclubs, three were private homes, one apartment building, and one commercial event space.

A property may be declared a chronic nuisance if three or more criminal nuisance activities occur in any 60-day window.

or seven or more in any 12-month period.

There's one other category related to chronic nuisance involving drug trafficking and seeking judicial warrants that could also be used.

This ordinance has been a vital tool in addressing serious criminal behavior at specific locations in the city, places that cause great harm to people and the adjacent neighborhood.

The city has carefully and effectively used the ordinance to stop criminal nuisance activities.

As currently written, the nuisance activities must occur on the property being evaluated, but sometimes these activities with a direct nexus to the property occur nearby.

And that's why we're proposing these amendments.

Next slide, please.

This is a list of the current qualifying criminal offenses that can be used in considering whether or not a property is a chronic nuisance.

And you'll notice here that the majority of these offenses involve crimes of violence.

The chief of police is authorized in collaboration with the city attorney to declare a property a chronic nuisance and then to negotiate a corrections agreement with the property owner or the person in charge of the property.

Once the chief's declaration letter has been sent to the property owner, they have seven days to respond and work on this corrections agreement.

Penalties for noncompliance can be up to $500 per day.

There's also a provision for a one-time $25,000 penny.

The police chief's letter declaring a property a chronic nuisance documents the activities that led to the declaration, and explains the process that the property owner or person in charge needs to follow.

Correction agreements typically require mitigation steps, such as adding lighting, advanced training for security staff, trash cleanup, vegetation removal, enhanced fencing, better screening for weapons, or other actions designed to stop the chronic nuisance activities.

Property owners are usually very quick to comply, and the city has never had to go to court to enforce a corrections agreement.

The ordinance includes due process protections that have worked well to protect property owners' rights, and have, as I mentioned, led to these correction agreements.

This next slide looks at the most recent five uses of the ordinance.

There have been five applications in the past five years, and they're documented on this slide.

The three motels in 2020, 2023 were closed, and were not allowed to reopen until the corrections agreement was satisfied and the property passed a city inspection.

The private residence in 2021 involved a family member with significant mental health challenges.

The family was able to successfully move this individual to an adult care home, and then they sold the house.

The After Hours Club in April of this year was closed and the owner informed the city that he would not reopen.

So to the amendments themselves, the first adds liquor violations to the list of offenses that can be considered when a property is being evaluated.

And this change addresses after hours venues and other establishments that continually violate our city and state criminal laws related to alcohol.

The Second Amendment allows off-property nuisance activities to be considered when determining whether a property is a chronic nuisance.

But those off-premise activities must meet a three-part test.

They must occur adjacent to or in proximity to the property.

They must involve a person associated with the property, including guests, and specific facts and circumstances must establish a nexus between the nuisance activity and the property.

This is not unusual in Washington State.

Bremerton, Everett, Fife, Renton, Spokane, Sunnyside, and Tacoma all have the ability to analyze off-property instances when they're making a determination of chronic nuisance.

Next slide, please.

We conducted stakeholder outreach regarding these amendments.

We did this with the Washington Nightlife and Music Association, approximately 40 individual owners of nightlife venues.

We held a team's question and answer session with nightlife owners.

and we engaged with business improvement areas, the Downtown Seattle Association, the Seattle Metro Chamber, and the GSBA.

We also had discussions with our three professional sports stadiums.

We heard two things in these conversations with stakeholders.

The first was they all told us, we understand why you are seeking these amendments.

And then some shared with us, we're concerned with how the city will enforce the new ordinance.

We answered the concerns about enforcement by pointing to the history of the ordinance, being used only 17 times in 16 years, and the three-part tests that must be met.

We also reminded stakeholders that multiple nuisance activities must be documented within specific time frames.

This is not a one-off situation.

This ordinance is used when properties present a consistent threat to public safety.

In every previous use, there has been a pattern of criminal behavior that we would all agree caused grave harm.

These were good discussions with the stakeholders, and I reminded them, most of whom were from the nightlife and music sector, that this ordinance has been an effective tool to protect and strengthen the city's nightlife environment by addressing irresponsible property owners and venue operators.

At the end of these stakeholder discussions, no one expressed opposition to these amendments.

Thank you, and we're happy to respond to any questions.

Thank you very much, Deputy Mayor.

Central staff, Director Noble, anything to add?

Not much.

The memo I provided you offers a basic description as Deputy Mayor has regarding the status quo as things exist now, which as described involves, allows the city to engage in a regulation for onsite activities.

It does provide a fair amount of due process so that the chief can act but after consulting with the city attorney and ultimately the city attorney and the court are left as a way to enforce any of what the city is demanding.

Again, it is an authority that has been used relatively infrequently.

The proposed amendments expand that authority with respect to alcohol It feels to me like that's not a significant expansion, and it's obviously targeted towards venues that are serving alcohol either after hours or inappropriately altogether.

The expansion to offsite does represent a significant expansion of the city's authority.

I think there's no question about that.

And it really is a question of whether the due process measures that are in place are sufficient to balance the interest of the property owners and the interest of the public for ultimately for public safety.

So I'm happy to meet with any of you individually to discuss details.

If you're seeking amendments, I'm happy to help with those as well.

Thank you, Director Noble.

Since you mentioned city attorney, last word before any questions, city attorney.

Thank you, and thank you, Deputy Mayor Burgess, for that great presentation.

I just will note that the last use of that was to close one of those after-hours venues where the double homicide was, and that was done in an expedient fashion because it was clear to do that, and we got that corrective agreement from that business owner as well as the property owner, and that is significant because it's related directly, as Councilmember Sacco was talking earlier, about gun violence and how can we see a reduction in that.

So to me, the expansion of the proximity piece there is really critical as we look to reduce gun violence because sometimes we are unable to use this ordinance as is simply because the 30, 40, 50 gunshots happen in the parking lot outside of a venue, not directly in it or on its property premises.

So that's a significant piece where we can look to be instrumental and support your work.

Thank you, City Attorney Davison.

We've just passed our standard two-hour time, so maybe one question, and then we'll have the follow-up in our next meeting.

Vice Chair?

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I don't have any questions.

I do have some brief remarks.

First off, I just want to thank Deputy Mayor Burgess.

for being here.

I wanna thank the mayor's office for proposing this smart piece of legislation.

Last year, this council, in partnership with the mayor, we passed a transformative piece of legislation, the vacant building legislation that among other things gave the fire chief greater power to take action against unsafe, dangerous, vacant buildings to prevent fire hazards, save lives.

had among other provisions, a summary abatement provision, allowing for summary abatement of buildings under limited conditions.

But at a high level, it gave the fire chief greater powers to take stronger action.

And as the chair noted in his chair's remarks earlier, it's working.

Even the threats of, hey, I'll wield this power if I have to, is compelled better cooperation and has helped incentivize better action from some of these property owners.

So when we were able to do that last year, I got to thinking, I think there is an opportunity to take the next step and do a companion bill this year pursuant to which we give the police chief greater powers to take action against certain nuisance properties.

And I started taking initial preliminary steps, working with our central staff to explore this and explore the path to writing something up, produce my own legislation.

I think this is an excellent idea.

and I'm looking forward to working within this body to make it even better and even stronger if needed, but this is an excellent idea.

And again, I view this as the next logical step in giving our chiefs the requisite authority they need to effectively carry out their important public safety mandates.

Maybe next year we'll potentially look at giving the care department chief greater authority to carry out there and do something similar.

But in the absence of collective bargaining changes, I don't see a path there, but who knows, there might be a there there.

But this is a smart thing we can do to give our police chief and our department better authority to take action When one of my constituents was here earlier today testifying, Aaron Goodman from the Soto BIA, my district is heavily impacted by some of these incidents.

And it's not just Soto, it's Pioneer Square earlier this year.

multiple gunfire incidents after hours spilling over into parking lots this year already.

And folks from the Residence Council call me up, let me know that they're concerned about this.

And it's not just the establishment itself, it's like the parking lot adjacent activity and the let out.

And then we know from your chart, Deputy Mayor, that it's, I think the primary use cases are commercial in nature, but it's not limited.

There are some limited residence implementations that are possible, which we need as well.

So smart piece of legislation, and kudos to you, by the way, Deputy Mayor, for including the other Washington cities that include similar provisions.

You clearly know your audience.

But all that is to say, Chair, Because I had already started to undertake work to produce something similar, I would love and would ask to co-sponsor this legislation.

Yes, Vice Chair.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

All right, Council President.

Thank you, and I'm going to be fast, and you can take the answer offline.

But I'm looking at the crimes that cause potentially a chronic nuisance charge.

You've got rape, homicide, drug trafficking, weapons, et cetera.

My question is, Is smaller level drug dealing, illegal drug consumption, assault, and just general harassment enough to trigger something like this?

Does the area in the city where this is occurring, get factored into the nuisance level.

I'm thinking, of course, of McDonald's on our 50-yard line of downtown, and I have no idea why it's there.

Could it just be a function of transit patterns or whatever?

But I am, in my mind, trying to get a sense of the gravity of things that are happening inside or around the business to trigger this.

excuse me, drug violations, drug crimes certainly would qualify here.

Whether or not, I mean, I don't think we're prepared to talk about a specific location.

Not to pick on one business, but I mean, just, it seems like a level down from some of these crimes here.

So I'm just, why don't you just answer me later?

Okay.

Okay.

Okay, thank you, Council President.

Council Member Hollingsworth?

I don't have any questions, Chair, thank you.

All right, great, thank you.

No questions for me because we have time, but I will just say, kind of along the lines of Vice Chair, When we built the strategic framework plan together, pillar two, fixing ordinances, this has been in the back of my mind for 10 years.

As you know, Deputy Mayor, from my experience in Queen Anne working issues, I got a perfect example, hotel, motel.

And so thank you.

Thank you for the collaboration.

Again, this is good governance.

This is the executive.

Deputy Mayor, thank you very much.

The judicial branch, thank you, city attorney, working with us.

members of this committee and an extension, the council.

It is very important by doing nothing that just goes to the permissive environment.

I will add based on my experience, not just with the one example in my mind, but others that a couple of things.

One is once you have a drug market, you then have a stolen goods market.

Oftentimes stolen goods markets are part of these locations as well.

I just note that.

to the Director Noble's point about due diligence and the due process, I think we will show that there is a clear and enduring nexus between these properties.

And that's something that's been coming to me from various people.

And I think that will be shown.

And I appreciate the outreach that you've done on that.

And then the one last challenge, and maybe this won't be it, but I think this often comes up.

And this is a challenge for the city generally, is that in the example that I was it's in my mind the Queen Anne example that I have, the issue of absent landlords or property owners.

And so hopefully this will help in that realm too because this is a challenge.

And I think just to close that the example of that we have with our vacant buildings abatement bill, the dangerous buildings is a great example for us.

And I appreciate everyone coming forward to us.

And I was about to go to adjournment, but vice chair, super quick.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair.

As I had noted earlier, I had already started to undertake legislative work to eventually launch my own piece of legislation that would effectively have been council generated as opposed to executive generated, but the executive beat me to the punch, which is terrific.

But I also just want to note and call out that I worked with the city attorney earlier this year to better understand the landscape of this.

As we know, you don't just launch legislation.

There's a minimum bar of work that goes into it ahead of time, and part of that is understanding the legal landscape, the operational landscape, like stakeholder involvement.

There's a lot of moving parts, and that's just the...

tip of the iceberg, so to speak, of what's involved.

But I just want to acknowledge and say thank you for the collaboration from City Attorney Davidson on helping me better understand this issue earlier this year.

No doubt you advised the executive as well, but appreciate the partnership.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Vice Chair.

Absolutely, this is what the committee does.

We work early and often.

This is not by accident.

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

If there's any further business to come before the committee, before we adjourn.

Chair Kittle.

It's okay.

I just raised my hand.

I do have a piece of other business, and I'm raising it on behalf of Erin Goodman, who was here earlier, Director of the Soto BIA.

And it gets at this issue of enforcement, how our laws take place in the real world.

And she has been commenting on the other nuisance legislation that we have concerning nightlife businesses.

And she just wants to note that the Liquor Control Board and FAS don't have the capacity to be watching out for illegal activity during peak hours of 2 and 5. So we need more city and county levers.

One thing she mentioned was more, and we can keep this in mind when we're operationalizing this should it pass.

More city consultants are needed with, consultation is needed with neighboring businesses, not just the LCB in terms of where the illegal activity is taking place and which businesses are operating illegally.

Um, neighboring businesses are boots on the ground and can be an asset to the city.

And then finally, more conversations could be taking place with landlords regarding appropriate permits and following the laws.

In good faith, landlords can be great partners too.

Thank you, Council President.

Yes, Ms. Goodman from the SODA BIH, right?

But that goes to the point earlier.

It kind of went to my bridging point.

It's about helping, working with the executive to put these pieces in place.

And we're doing that starting with recruitment, you know, those pieces, working with fire chief on the vacant buildings, the street racing, across the board that we're doing this, particularly with the technology pieces that are coming online.

And you make a good point, Council, actually Ms. Goodman makes a good point.

There's also these pieces too, like the after hours establishments.

There's some growing pains, if you will, or just putting things in place.

And we'll definitely be following up because this is all about keeping the pressure up, keeping the press on.

And sometimes that's working with our colleagues in other parts of government to ensure that these pieces of legislation are doing what they're intended.

So thank you very much.

Thank you, City Attorney Davison.

Really appreciate you coming.

Thank you.

Thank you Deputy Mayor Burgess and Director Noble.

And thank you colleagues for an extra 15 minutes.

Thank you very much.

We are adjourned.