Comments

1
McGinn insists the city can pursue its community policing goals ahead of schedule—“it’s not determined by the number of officers,” he said.


Does anyone really believe Mayor McGinn has any idea of how to run a police force? I'm no expert, but I would probably hire a police chief and ask him or her first before I started talking back to people who have done this sort of thing before.
2
"McGinn and a host of speakers all said they were committed to improving public safety—but the took issue with the bill."

How will they improve public safety?
3
I can make up some new graphs showing Seattle has the fewest cops per capita of any major city in the US. Does McGinn think better with graphs?
4
Does he realize that they took about 8-10 officers off normal patrol and put them in the tunnels just to show the public the bus tunnels were safe to use?

I dont care how much support he has from whatever local groups that appear to support him, they'll drop support once the lack of officers starts to affect THEIR neighborhood.
5
Here's a simple question: compared to comparable cities, how does crime rate in Seattle?
6
He's gonna make cops sit around and listen to gang bangers and baby mamas whine about being oppressed.
7
Speaking of safety, I was saddened to hear about the 3 year old killed by an SUV today at U. Place.

I Googled:

"killed by SUV" 27,500 results
by car 725,000
by bus 27,400
by train 839,000
8
@1 I'm thinking after this he will dramatically improve bus service without adding any hours and complete both the pedestrian and bicycle master plans with no new money.
9
Meanwhile a homeless guy got stabbed by a crazy person under the Aurora underpass at 63rd Street. Thank god we're not going to violate that crazy person's civil rights; a few stabbings here and there, it's no big deal, right?
10
Stabbing someone just happens to be illegal, Fnarf.
11
#10: Yeah, but they get a lawyer and a trial. Fnarf and Burgess prefer we fine and jail them with no access to legal representation.
12
The Real Change crowd calls the folks who disagree with them liars and thugs who basically want to exterminate the homeless and Harrell complains about dishonesty against him?

He should be ashamed of how his "teammates" acted during this so-called debate.

Grow up Bruce - don't whine.
13
At the end of the day, we know this: Seattle is still far safer than people are ready to acknowledge.

Oh, and the bill is dead. Dead-dead-dead.

If the rest of you are done tilting at can-shaking windmills, we've got a community to synergize and ideate.
14
One idea on the horizon: a bill addressing “disorderly conduct and disturbing the peace”

Uh, who is gonna to enforce such a measure? Wouldn't that take some more Police?
15
Elenchos (who's probably ignoring me, though I bear him no illwill) and Bacon, I'd LOVE to see simple--I mean simple, that any idiot can understand--charts that show

1. How Seattle fares in police presence to resident ratios versus
1a. Other US cities of our size, +/- 5% of our population or so (exclude general drug crimes)
1b. The top 10 biggest US cities.

2. How we fare in person-on-person and property crimes versus
2a. Other US cities of our size, +/- 5% of our population or so (exclude general drug crimes)
2b. The top 10 biggest US cities.

Those would be some really interesting numbers, to rank us versus comparable cities and the Big Boys.
16
@14 I'd like to see someone have the balls to pass a law that requires a certain ratio of police-to-citizen ratio, mandating that the city government budget up for that. Anyone on Team Burgess willing to man up and introduce something that daring if they really are worried about "cleaning up" Seattle?
17
@10, but being crazy and threatening isn't. Until you go for it. Even if you're plainly a public menace.
18
@14-- you are onto something, what we need is to bring back all the vagrancy laws, maybe polish them up a bit & call them anti-aggressive vagrancy ordinances. 'cause that would be sweet.
19
@15: Via the DOJ, not annualized to 2008 (that one is missing!) but there's a rough correlation between the last one in about 2000 and the one before it so I can't imagine the ratios are drastically different: http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf…

Sorted wikipedia chart that collates FBI data: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Stat…

In terms of property crime, it's high but still outside the top 26. In terms of violent crime and murder, we're very very near the bottom.
20
@17: Threats and intimidation with reasonable risk of violence are also illegal. In terms of being threatening, we have laws that allow for involuntary commitment.

As far as I can recall, they will send a specialist to make an assessment and then process the person into a hospital treatment center or jail. Usually jail at this point, but still.
21
@19

Fascinating... Assault and robbery would on the level of this whole panhandling aggressively thing, or the closest 'hit'.

Assault: we're on exactly on par with Raleigh and San Diego in per capita.
Robbery: Tuscon and NEW YORK CITY.

NYPD size: 35,284; city population: 8,274,527. Ratio: 1 cop to every 234.5 people.

SPD size: 1,300; city population: 602,000. Ratio: 1 cop to every 463 people.

Safest cities for robbery and assault: Plano and Fort Wayne, respectively.

I can't seem to find numbers of police officers for Plano and Fort Wayne, which isn't surprising, to see how they ratio up or down...
22
Also, why is Ohio collectively tops in the charts for rape and so much else? It makes Ohio sound fucking abysmal.
23
I love it. So nothing has changed. Bums can still harass you downtown(which is why EVERYONE KNOWS DOWNTOWN SUCKS) and there will be no extra cops.

Hmm....anyone ever tried to walk around westlake plaza? McMayor definitely has not. If so he would understand this isnt about "our values as a city", it is about being able to go fucking shopping downtown without someone bugging you.

3....2.....1...... hipsters attack!
24
PubliCola has the real scoop on this. It's possible to want the mayor to succeed without being so in the tank for him that you blithely report any nonsense he says without question or criticism.

McGinn campaigned saying that you couldn't implement the Community Policing Plan without increasing staffing. And his current intentions are moot because he can't even attempt to implement the plan because the 10 hour shifts the plan depends on violate the police union contract. Unless the city hires more cops.

What we need is the mayor to cooperate with the city council to share the political blowback from cutting programs or raising taxes to pay for these cops. Instead he's digging his heels in and playing games to prove who's top dog. While these pubic safety problems are neglected, the city continues to suffer.
25
@21: New York City is at that level mainly because of the "eyes on the street" factor and a better awareness of valuables. Warnings on the subway sometimes tell you to keep your wallet in your front pocket and valuables either in your lap or squeezed between your knees (or something like that).

I think we're an exceedingly safe city (and national rankings always reflect that), so I think urgency is not important. Public education about protecting one's valuables (leave them at home, people!) and vehicles (park where there's light and people) can probably do a lot.
26
why doesn't the stranger take a more critical look at this guy - he is a bozo and being an apologist does not draw readers.
27
all this talk of new laws.

we have 25000 outstanding warrants on people convicted or pleading guilty, who have failed to pay or show up in court for post sentence hearings.

in our system today, we make no effort to find these people. none.

we've caught 'em, prosecuted 'em, then we let 'em go.

maybe we should look at whether or not we are enforcing the assault laws we already have?

oh wait that'd be all boring, how government actually performs, big yawn, so much more fun to propose new laws and oppose new laws!

28
Not only has Harrell shown independent thinking but I just love the fact that he is also showing the courage to tell the establishment to cool it. I really think he had the most to lose politically as a "no" vote but judging by his comments when he did vote it was obvious he believed this bill was bad and voted as he felt rather than by political calculations.
29
RE: all this talk of new laws. . . . . we have 25000 outstanding warrants on people convicted or pleading guilty, who have failed to pay or show up in court for post sentence hearings. . . . . in our system today, we make no effort to find these people. none. . . . . . . we've caught 'em, prosecuted 'em, then we let 'em go. . . . . . maybe we should look at whether or not we are enforcing the assault laws we already have?

oh wait that'd be all boring, how government actually performs, big yawn, so much more fun to propose new laws and oppose new laws!

RESPONSE: Of course -- it would take having sufficient funds to police, prosecute -- or send some folks to something other than jail . . .. and oh yeah, then follow up. The state is so broke they can't follow up on parole violations and there won't be any of that follow up via the district or superior without some $$ for King County. Or, thats how I understand it.

30
According to the Seattle PD's crime statistics, major crime totals for 2009 were below the ten-year averages for all crimes except robbery.

http://www.cityofseattle.net/police/crim…

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