I am on the streets every day, on my way back and forth to my job. The statement that the majority of the street dealers is white sounds bogus to me. What research are you basing this off of?
I see who is dealing on the street every day and the racial mix seems to closely match that of the Pioneer Square bust. Is it ever possible that the reason that more afro-americans and latinos are busted selling drugs downtown is that they are, in fact, larger in number in the downtown street drug selling "community"?

Why was my posting removed? Because I asked what research you were using to indicate that the majority of street drug sellers downtown is white? I am only reporting what I see on the street every day. I had a much higher opinion of the Stranger before this..

I take it back- I see that my posting has been reposted - thanks Stranger it is nice that we aren't suppressing any opinions here today...

How dare you presume to comment on the work of The Seattle Times. Until you have won the Pulitzer Prize as many times as The Seattle Times or even Willamette Week, you should keep your comments to yourself.

That whites are responsible for most of the drug delivery in Seattle is the conclusion of a report I mention in the article. Katherine Beckett, a researcher at the University of Washington, published a report called "Race and Drug Law Enforcement in Seattle" in 2004 (.pdf) that cites extensive research on local drug markets, delivery, users, and arrestees. Here are some excerpts of that report:

[T]he available evidence indicates that the majority of those who deliver serious drugs in Seattle are white.

[W]hites comprise the largest group of deliverers of cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin in Seattle. If the survey results for blacks and whites are converted to ratios, this data source indicates that heroin transactions involving a white drug deliverer outnumber heroin transactions involving a black deliverer by a ratio of 7.3 to 1; for methamphetamine, by 11 to 1; and for cocaine, by 1.2 to 1. When the form of cocaine is specified to be crack, black deliverers outnumber white delivers by a ratio of 1.2 to 1.

Thus, for all serious drugs with the possible exception of crack cocaine, the available evidence indicates that the majority of transactions involving these substances involve white drug deliverers. As is shown below, however, those arrested for delivery of serious drugs in Seattle are predominantly black.

Second, all outdoor drug markets are not treated alike. In particular, outdoor drug markets dominated by white buyers and sellers of heroin and methamphetamine receive significantly less police attention than racially diverse markets where crack is more likely to be sold. For example, in the comparison of the Capitol Hill and downtown markets discussed previously (e.g. Nyrop 2003), researchers were able to observe hundreds of outdoor drug transactions in the Capitol Hill area, and reported that the vast majority of these transactions involved only white people.

This comparison thus provides further evidence that predominantly white outdoor drug markets are treated quite differently by the Seattle Police Department than the racially diverse or predominantly black drug markets.

Nyrop (2003) concluded that there were slightly more whites than blacks delivering drugs in the 2nd and Pike vicinity.

It's also worth noting part of another study by Beckett and other researchers conducted in 2005 called "Drug Use, Drug Possession Arrests, and the Question of Race: Lessons from Seattle" (.pdf) that shows people have a skewed perception of who is engaged in drug activity:

Indeed, one study found that when asked to imagine a typical drug user, over 95 percent of survey respondents pictured an African American (Burston, Jones, and Robertson-Saunders 1995). Similarly, a Seattle precinct captain responsible for the predominantly white Capitol Hill area reported that outdoor drug transactions do not occur in that area (Klement and Siggins 2001:13). However, we were able to observe hundreds of drug transactions in that area in a fairly short period of time, the vast majority of which involved whites. This example suggests that white people who engage in drug transactions outdoors are simply not perceived as drug offenders by Seattle police officers.

If providing nuanced and thoughtful coverage of Seattle's drug enforcement policy is so important, why did it have to be spurred by an attack on the Seattle Times?

Mr. Holden seems to have based his article on the wrong report. Having studied journalism myself in college, I recall learning to seek out relevant sources.

The report is six years old and is referring to Capitol Hill and 2nd & Pike - not Pioneer Square. Isn't that what this article is about, Pioneer Square?

First of all, you can’t talk about Pioneer Square without also talking about Chinatown. They’re one in the same.

Now, having spent December of '07 to January of '09 living on the fourth floor of the Alps Apartments on King Street in Chinatown, I right away sided with the Seattle Times article based on... all the crazy shit I saw/experienced.

Man I saw blacks drunk, high, smoking crack up in the stairs by Jefferson street, fighting in Hing Hay park (and one memorable fight at 2 am on Jackson st. in front of a bank) swarming Occidental Park almost every night, throwing their cans of Joose everywhere, stumbling around the community garden of Main st. every night, yelling at all hours of the morning (almost every night, I swear!). Sure there where some white guys around (and one batshit crazy white lady that caused a couple daytime scenes in Hing Hay). Man, all around Occidental Park is a circus some nights. And all around the Gospel Mission in Pioneer Square, wow.

Did blacks try to sell me drugs? Oh yes. More times then I can remember. I guy even tried to sell me and my Dad something when we were walking up Maynard to Ho Ho seafood restaurant. Did any whites try to sell me drugs? Maybe, but I don't remember.

Mr. Holden, do you ever go down there? Do you ever leave Capitol Hill? You should talk to my friend who used to work the door at Fuel bar. Crazy black guys trying to stab him, threatening him, because he wouldn't let their drunk asses in. Or talk to my man Douglas who, to my knowledge, is still the apartment manager at the Alps. He's been there over a decade and can tell you some stories from what he's seen.

So what’s really going on here? I’ll tell you. The black guys down there in Pioneer Square/Chinatown are the loudest, most intimidating, most openly drunk, most aggressive at panhandling (by far, with only a native guy who cussed me out called me evil whitey for not giving him money belonging in the same level of aggressiveness) litter the most, fight the most, etc. etc.

Bad for business. Bad for tourism. Bad for the people who live there.

Who’re you going to trust on this issue? Some ivory tower research paper by somebody who never hung out talking to bums, walking the trails under the overpasses through the chain link fences in S dot territory (crack smoking free-for-all back there), walking Chinatown, Little Saigon, the terraces and Pioneer Square at night. And that report is six years old!

Or are you going to trust the police. Who are on the streets daily, seeing what’s going on with their own eyes. That report says they don’t see whites as drug dealers. Bullshit. They harass and stop everybody who’s hanging out after dark and looks suspicious. They have to.

One night I was leaning against the stop sign on King and Maynard and a cruiser did a u-turn through the intersection, pulled up on the curb and the cop leans his head out and says, “what’re you doing, huh, you dealin’?
I says, “Do I look like a drug dealer?”
He says, “I dunno, what does a drug dealer look like?”

So what're we going to do about all these poor black drug dealers? "...address the problem humanely through a public-health strategy" says Lisa Daugaard.

Great. Whatever the hell that means.

The only source in here that had good input (although pretty obvious stuff) was Ian Goodhew, the King County Deputy chief of staff. But none of these sources (aside from the UW researcher) Back up your claim that whites are the majority of drug sellers in Seattle (not sure what are of Seattle you’re even talking about here) and that the SPD is racial profiling. Instead, they only talk about the futility of the SPD’s drug busts.

Oh my God! The criminals are back. Of course they’re back! There will always be criminals. Just like you must continually sweep your bedroom (Oh my God! The dust bunnies are back!), you must continually sweep the streets of aggressive/fighting drunks, drug dealers, troublemakers etc. etc. The SPD is doing its job! So let us think of ideas for them to do it better.

“The other side of the story” indeed. More like a fractured fairy tale.

@ 17) You are wrong. The report is about drug use, delivery, and arrests in all of Seattle and examines many markets, including Pioneer Square. (Ongoing research has identified the same trends over a period of many years--both about the demographics of drug sellers and of those busted for drugs.) Some excerpts that refer to Pioneer Square:

Significantly over-policed census tracts include those that encompass the racially diverse downtown market (80 and 81) and the markets in Pioneer Square (91 and 92).

In short, census tracts 80 and 81 downtown and the Pioneer Square area experience a significantly greater number of purposeful drug delivery arrests than would be predicted on the basis of the number of crimes known to the police in those areas.

By contrast, the SPD made 305 purposeful arrests for delivery of serious drugs in census tract 92, the tract that encompasses the Pioneer Square market, widely perceived as a racially diverse or predominantly black drug market.

@Mr. Hickman at al - the Capitol Hill report indicates that basically, when you see white people engaged in drug deals, you don't perceive a drug deal, or maybe it's just one friend supplying another with weed. Meanwhile, when two blacks exchange money for any reason, you're likely to suspect a drug exchange has gone down, and for crack, pills, etc. I think this cuts across communities, certainly the whole 10 blocks from Broadway to 2nd.

Certainly an arrest of 10 "Ave Rats" or the tweakers that used to hang out on Broadway (are they back?) would never be trumpeted as a drug bust, although I guarantee you could get more cash and drugs out of either of those avenues than the police pulled out of Pioneer Square.

Reading these comments is pissing me the fuck off.

The crime of narcotics delivery is the same under Washington law, regardless of the drug being sold. Even assuming more blacks than whites sell crack, crack represents a minority of the drug transactions that occur in Seattle. Many data sources suggest that whites dominate the sale of other serious drugs, which outnumber crack transactions. Yet arrests are concentrated overwhelmingly on crack, although crack is less related to public health problems than meth, heroin & powder cocaine.

And setting aside the racial composition of those arrested -- the main point of the article is how anyone in 2010 can get excited about busting a handful of petty-ante drug dealers and "throwing away the key?" We can't afford it, it doesn't work, and it actually increases the social instability of affected individuals and families. Can we not think of a more reasonable and promising way to deal with people trapped in this miserable niche of our economy?

@23: There are a lot of white folks in the Mexican Mafia. Even in the Syndicate there are quite a few who got in back in the 80s or have parents in it that got them in (rare, but it happens!). More than a few white folks in the Bloods and Crips, but increasingly rare in the former.

The funny thing about your remark, tinged with racism as it is, is that La Eme's biggest allies in prisons are the Aryan Brotherhood and the NLR.

Tying this so strongly to race is betraying a lack of comprehension.

Thanks for this article, Dominic - for pointing out that we do need to see much more researched and nuanced reporting on crime & enforcement.

Pew Center on the States reported last year that 1 in 30 Washington adults are either behind bars or under community supervision at any one time. That's absolutely unprecedented. We need much better reporting on it.

I noticed that you were at the recent presentation by Mark A.R. Kleiman, author of When Brute Force Fails: How to have less crime and less punishment. You - and others - may be interested to read a review I did of that presentation and book -- and of Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.

It's at http://tinyurl.com/alexander-kleiman

Alexander's book -- and my review -- discuss the research on Seattle drug busts that you cite here.

You guys ever watch the Wire? The hoppers never hold on to large amounts of cash or drugs. There's always the stash somewhere else and someone else to pick up the money.
Just because the people the cops arrested didn't have a lot of crack or cash on their person doesn't mean that they weren't dealing all day.

Other than that, yes busting street dealers and buyers doesn't completely solve the problem, or even half the problem, but what else can you do? Let every neighborhood turn into an open air drug market where the dealers fight for turf and try to hook new customers?

Until there is a much larger scale solution put in place, there is little alternative to having to keep the dealers in check with these expensive policing operations.

@28: But we could have the much larger scale solution you suggest -- a public health solution -- for less than we spend on the current criminal justice non-solution. So let's do it. Let's voluntarily get off the futility train and do something that is both somewhat less costly, and vastly more humane.

@27 said: "Thanks for this article, Dominic - for pointing out that we do need to see much more researched and nuanced reporting on crime & enforcement."

Really? Thats what we need to see? More nuances and "research"? How about some actual solutions and blunt enforcement? This article is a great example of what happens when people confuse their wishful thinking with reality.

It would be nice if whites throughout the world were equally uncivil and violent as blacks. It would mean that the whole "equality" marketing myth young people like me have had shoved down our throats was real. I wanted to believe it, but, unfortunately, being a poor white, i have had to deal with this shit in real life, and can't afford to fantasize. I seriously doubt this writer has spent the slightest amount of time in the areas profiled in this EDITORIAL, and the study he cites is a fucking joke. Universities are on par with American Idol as far as institutions go, if that study is considered legit.

Furthermore, this type of ish is not journalism. I dont know what to call it, 'fantasy fiction' maybe? Pathetic.

This @17 Martin Hickman guy's comment resonated with far more sincerity, and was also far more engaging a piece of writing than the boring tow the line yellow journalist that was published for this piece. I spend time in the areas he described every day. The Stranger's free, so it's a redundant point, but that was a comment that rang of truth, which is something i'd pay for. This crap i would never. The writer of this article will not address my comments, i am certain.

Another angle on this is that the goal of law enforcement is rarely to target the most drug dealing (on a money changing hands basis), but rather the drug markets where there are the most peripheral crimes. When people are forced to commit other crimes (from mugging to forgery to what ever else) in order to feed their drug habit, a relatively small drug market (dollars and cents wise) will create more total 'crimes' (and citizen complaints) then a larger drug market patronized primarily by people who are wealthy enough to maintain a habit on the side (rtaher than living the full on drug lifestyle). This is ONE reason (and I acknowledge that socio-economic status also correlates very nicely along racial lines) that people are pushing mountains of powder in Fremont and Lower Queen Anne with impunity, while the cops sweep Pioneer Square every other week.

Isnt it cute to see Dominic jealous of real reporters. Must suck to be stuck at a hipster publication with such a poor reputation. But have fun riding Dan Savage's coat tails. Geez.

@35, 36 - That's because of a ton of socioeconomic factors, you dumbasses. A good deal of those black-on-black murders were gang-related crimes (I even witnessed one of them firsthand - the shooting in Southcenter Mall last summer), something you have absolutely no clue about and is invisible from the view from your Ballard condo. These people are from parts of town that blacks and other minorities were pretty much forced to live in since Seattle's early years because of fucked up zoning codes and segregation. Look it up in city records or talk to one of the old-school Seattle blacks or Filipinos who have lived here since before the civil rights movement if you don't believe me (you probably won't since minorities obviously intimidate you). And that's just a tiny piece of the puzzle...

But back to the original topic - I work in Pioneer Square on 2nd & Jackson, a block away from where this bust happened. I see these people every day. Yes, they're drug addicts who have hit rock (no crack pun intended) bottom, but if you have a shred of human decency you have to kind of feel for these people. Dominic Holden is just standing up for the little guy in this issue, and although there are a few holes in his argument (the "most drug sellers are white" thing for one) the bottom line is that the Times blew this out of proportion into a self-congratulatory SPD wank-fest. Some good press in a time when they're in the hot seat for "stomping the Mexican piss" out of an unarmed suspect. And I commend him for that. Clearly SPD should be approaching this problem in Pioneer Square from a different angle.

Also, I like how all the ignant-ass crackers commenting on this issue are anonymous, unregistered trolls. I knew Seattle was overrun by white people, but I had no idea there was this unspoken, underlying abundance of racism. And I've lived here my whole life.

@45 - what do you mean "deal" with blacks? My guess is you have some fucked up job in some crazy negative environment (are you a cop yourself?) where you see the worst of the worst. By that very assertion your viewpoint is skewed. How many black people or black families do you know personally? And there are plenty of crimes and gang activity from other races - look at the Samoans in White Center and Delridge or Filipinos in the deeper-South parts of town.

@47 - I/m only 1/4 white, and your argument is beyond stupid. Pretty much all of those places are fucked because of outside influences (many involving white people) from the past that have ruined their foundation. The Congo? Seriously? Have you ever read a history book?

I'm done here though, there's obviously no changing any of your minds and this comment board has been overrun by you spineless bigots. Register yourselves some names, own up to the hateful bullshit you're spouting and stop hiding behind your anonymity. Bitches.

The major issue I had with this article was the lack of viable alternative solutions to Pioneer Square's drug problem. Presumably as an alternative to sweeps of the kind performed by SPD, the author suggests the following:

"There are other ways to handle open-air drug dealing, including programs that divert arrestees to treatment, warning suspects that they'll be arrested if they don't clean up their acts, and a host of of social services."

The first alternative 'diverting arrestees to treatment' is a head-scratcher since it has arrest as a prerequisite. The second, 'warning suspects that they will be arrested...' screams ineffectuality and seems to imply, once again, arrests. The third, 'a host of social services,' is so nebulous that it's hard to even consider. Perhaps this should have been fleshed out instead of using the bulk of the article to play the race card.

Additionally, the racial issues the author raises may indeed be valid, but have no bearing on the case being addressed which is specifically drug-dealing in Pioneer Square. I don't think anyone would dispute that the bulk of dealers there are minorities. Based on the author's reasoning it sounds like more efforts should be expended elsewhere, where whites are dealing, but that doesn't make the Pioneer Square drug sweep an inherently racist effort. Unfortunately Pioneer Square, for obvious reasons (tourists, stadia nearby etc.), is going to get higher scrutiny.

@47: Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia are the most violent places on earth. Outside of South Africa's urban areas and plantations, the African continent is a cakewalk compared to a lot of former Soviet Russia or colonial Asia. In fact, I will go so far as to suggest that Russia itself is more dangerous for black people than anywhere in Africa.

But yes, let's whine about how frightened you are and oh my god, people aren't as afraid as you are, but they must surely be lying because isn't EVERYONE afraid of black people?

Oooh, spooky.

@2,3,7. I remember this study that claimed most drug dealers are white. It raised an eyebrow with me because most people who have tried to sell me drugs in Seattle are black, like 85% of the time. I am white and live in a predmoniately white part of town so perhaps if people think blacks are more likely to be drug dealers it is based on life experience.
I don't believe that our experiences count for 100% but it is strange how we are ordered to ignore what we have experienced and see with our own two eyes (usually by someone claiming that our own 2 eyes can't be trusted because they must be racist) in order to believe some study probably done by someone with preconcived beliefs who is trying desperately to back them up. Perhaps the study is flawed because the people doing it already made up their minds before the study began

@40- it's fasinating that the bahvaior of "people of color" is always linked to past injustices. Yet I never hear African Americans saying Jews, whether here or in Isreal, are somehow not responsible for their actions because 2000 years of opression are responsible for anything unseemly they do.

@52: Because they're black? Is there some high-degree of self-loathing in Africa that leads to race-motivated murders?

Or are there other factors that don't fall under the umbrella of skin tone?

@ 60) Do you know what "disparity" means? It's not racial profiling or enforcement bias. It means there are unequal levels of enforcement. You're the one attributing a motive to police behavior.

I mention racial disparity, a subject that has been researched extensively in Seattle's buy-bust operations, only in two paragraphs of a much longer article. It seems you're obsessing--several trolls are also obsessing--over a minor issue of race in a story that is overwhelmingly about something else.

I tried to reach people in Pioneer Square but they didn't respond to requests to comment. Did you read the article? It explains this. And obviously I have been to Pioneer Square many times and was there the day before I wrote this article.

@61: This certainly should have been an article about the efficacy of certain law enforcement tactics, but I think it's hard to dispute that the thrust of the criticism aimed at the current strategy is race related. To say that there was "a minor issue of race in a story that is overwhelmingly about something else" is a stretch considering that the arrestees' race is repeatedly brought up and your two main sources were someone from the "Defender Association's Racial Disparity Project" and a university study on racial disparity in drug arrests.

True, you do touch on the ineffectuality of such small-time/low-level arrests several times, but as I mentioned before (post 50) you offer no viable alternatives to this type of drug sweep, which make these more valid concerns seem like mere kvetching.

Regardless of your intent, this is indeed a race article. To harp on race as much as you did and then think that it's not going to overshadow the remainder of your points (which were problematic in their own right) is naive.

THANK YOU for this article. It provides a more researched and less biased presentation of the drug bust that occurred in Pioneer Square. I haven't been reading the Stranger lately do to a recent move. When I just happened to pick up this week's edition and read your article, I was thoroughly impressed. This is the kind of writing that is needed in papers more widely read like the Seattle Times. Please continue what you are doing for this city. It is a very needed service.

The focus on Black and Hispanic crack users because WE the people don't like the APPEARANCE of SCARY DRUGINESS. If all these people were getting high and ruining themselves in a flop house where no one ever saw them, if they never went out on the street, and never "bothered" anyone, we wouldn't care.

We'd rather have the APPEARANCE of an effective drug policy than an actually effective drug policy. People don't worry about people using crack. They worry about the crack head that THEY were inconvenienced by or made uncomfortable by, or accosted by. Fix that OUTWARD problem, this absurd logic goes, and you're fixed the drug problem.

Decriminalize small-timers, focus on the big boys, provide REAL funding for substance abuse programs and holistic approaches to homeless and at-risk populations and watch what happens.

I grew up here and always thought that ignorant racists could never last in Seattle.

I also thought, how could anyone openly defend hate and loathing? Or why would anyone want to play compare the ethnic dehumanizations?

What I've finished reading bothered me to no end. The longest comment calls 'my ethnic group' The Blacks.

Funny, based on past results, we should all be afraid of white people. But we're not, because many of us are still working overtime trying to get over being sold like cattle and perceived as wild, over-sexed beasts.

Martin Hickman...Dude, you're a prick and I feel sorry for you.
Jane Doe, there is life outside of Bellevue.
But hey, we're American. We're free to let our freak flag fly.

FYI, when I sold drugs back in my youth, I scored from a well to do white guy.

I grew up here and always thought that ignorant racists could never last in Seattle.

I also thought, how could anyone openly defend hate and loathing? Or why would anyone want to play compare the ethnic dehumanizations?

What I've finished reading bothered me to no end. The longest comment calls 'my ethnic group' The Blacks.

Funny, based on past results, we should all be afraid of white people. But we're not, because many of us are still working overtime trying to get over being sold like cattle and perceived as wild, over-sexed beasts.

Martin Hickman...Dude, you're a prick and I feel sorry for you.
Jane Doe, there is life outside of Bellevue.
But hey, we're American. We're free to let our freak flag fly.

FYI, when I sold drugs back in my youth, I scored from a well to do white guy.

Ignant McNugget you are clearly a racist. And following your hate rant, have left most educated people with a very clear fact. You Sir (used very loosely in this case) are a living example of ignorant and are exactly the type us educated people (you know us, we don't marry our family) refer to when speaking about closed minded people. I feel very sorry for you. Packs of people like you make me nervous, I get a little paranoid around all the white sheets.

Each read just follows a deeper path into hate and ignorance. I see mention of 'Blacks and their never ending bs' Wow.

I don't care for fire arms personally but I keep them to protect myself and my family from some of you racists that have some misguided impression that I am less than you. Like perhaps my service to my country doesn't matter as much. Perhaps you're upset that I commanded you in action. Lets look past the degrees (plural), lets dig past the 6 figure income, lets move past the unmistakable fact that whatever woman you used to love is now with an educated, financially comfortable 'black' with all his bs, tailored suits and sports cars.
Do these things make me less than you?
Did I not hire you? If you live in my neighborhood or live in one of my apartments, you're keeping all that hate speak to yourselves. COWARDS.

FYI, I am a black man and I have yet to meet every black person in this city or the world. Which makes me unqualified to speak of all black people. So the statement that white people are sick of the 'blacks' and their bs is proof of your ignorance. Unless you've met every white person and they've all concluded that all black people are loaded with bs.
FYI, most every human being has a bs section and they all smell the same.

Some of this 'Free Speech' should be prosecuted as hate crimes as it appears the statements are made to purposely make members of this city uncomfortable and fearful of whatever actions you may be capable of, since obviously you have difficulty forming complete thoughts into sentences. You shouldn't drive or vote. But most importantly, please, please, please do not reproduce. There are no more vacancies in the trailer park.

Lastly, I feel sorry for your Mother.

ps- Kiss my entire penny.

I'll gladly shut up if you promise not to reproduce and agree to clean up your meth labs when you're finished. Do we have a deal?

@60: When the Pioneer Square residents' group (actually the Fortson Square group) hung out that banner calling their area "Seattle's Open Air Drug Market" & begging for arrests ... SPD was working with the DEA & ATF on the most intensive undercover sting operation in years. Massive numbers of arrests were being made in PS over a 5 month period, in the middle of which the residents hung out their banner, and told reporters that the drug market was the worst they had ever seen. It is time for us to be realistic that this sort of enforcement is not going to succeed in shutting down drug markets. There are too many people buying drugs (including lots of middle class folks who come through looking to score) and we will never be able to afford enough police & jail cells to track down & bust everyone who sells and buys. We need to step back and try other approaches. We should take seriously the reality lived by those folks outside the Lazarus Center, what motivates them, what their needs are which they are trying to meet via drug use or dealing. Then we can address those needs and motivations, just like expensive private treatment programs do for more affluent addicts, without any sensationalized "crack downs" to "send messages."

LIARS LIARS LIARS: you know what? Calling someone "racist" doesn't prove your point. If you liberal cultural studies types are going to bring up race ad nauseam then you should be prepared to actually discuss the topic without resorting to calling us poor whiteboys "racist" then call it a day. get into it: like you do on the bus. If you're going to call me a coward, (intellectually i'm assuming, since this is an internet message board) then enagage this topic on a genuine level. or perhaps, say RACISM, IGNORANCE, or most confoundingly: HATE.

That seems to be the big word with the left. Would you be sad if you realized i don't hate you? Would that bum you out?

Sorry, even though you HATE me, i don't hate you. Too many laughs.

"I don't care for fire arms personally but I keep them to protect myself and my family from some of you racists that have some misguided impression that I am less than you."

You keep firearms to protect yourself from the Stranger Slog contributors? Wow. If you are required to use that gun in self defense there is less than a 3% chance the person you will need to defend yourself against is white (although we make up 80% of the pop in Seattle).
Really, you are barking up the wrong tree.
And there is nothing I have read in the posts that could be prosecuted as hate speech. If you disagree you show me any statement which surpasses the 1st Amendment. Last I knew saying "blacks are disproporately involved in crime" is well within the legal definition of free speech, regardless of whether it is true or not. You also said it is prosecutable because it makes some people feel uncomfortable and is hateful. Same could be said about Louis Farrakhan and Jerimiah Wright and I don't see there rights being taken away

bahahahaha this is my first time reading the comments on the Stranger's site instead of just reading the hard copy. Hilarious. I love how some comments are "pulled" for "trolling" when 99% of the comments are trolling.

Dominic, you know the people you're arguing with are just trolling you right? Nobody's that stupid knee-jerk ridiculous racist (well almost nobody). You just gettin fucked with. Nobody pulling actual numbers and real studies could then come to such a braindead conclusion. You think the people at Fox believe their own stories? Someone with a motive (or just bored and whose already done some research on this) is having some fun with you, it kinda weakens your original work to stay in here and slug it out with the flamebait.

You wrote a good article, let it stand on its own. You can't argue logic with people whose motive is just to draw you out instead of actually discuss and debate.

Again, good article. Think I'll start f5ing this place more the trolls are somethingawful.com quality.

Back when I was buying drugs in Seattle, I bought them from white people, and you always went to their apartment, which was usually located in either Ballard or Capitol Hill (That was back before Ballard got all precious on us)

Of course, all I ever bought was pot, although my dealers usually had other stuff available (never crack, however).

I do know that a few downtown hotels used to have quite a cocaine problem in the management ranks, and a certain retailer's ladies shoe department was heroin-centric for quite a few years. I am certain they didn't buy their drugs on the street from black people, so I tend to side with Dominic on this one.

You poor simple creature (Mitchell). Have you thought that perhaps in defining an entire group of people as a color could also define how closed your mind is? I would never address my neighbors as 'The Whites' because that sort of speech is the bottom line for many of the real hard line racist in this country. Those with the need to categorize everyone into little boxes in order to make themselves feel better. Furthermore, I also believe that Farakhan is a racist hate baiter as well as Jeramiah. They too suffer from closed mind syndrome. The troubling aspect of this dialog begins and ends in statements pertaining to everyone being tired of the blacks and their bs. That statement by itself, all by it's lonesome displays ignorance.Unmistakable, you ought to get hooked on Phonics ignorance.

Jane Doe, you seem so worried about defining who might threaten me as non white. Actually, the two people I have had to forcefully remove from my property were white. This doesn't make me afraid of white people because I can realize that every person is different. I would hope that you wouldn't try to break into my home or office but if you did, I would treat you exactly the same as any intruder.

As a property owner I am personally and financially invested in the communities that I reside and own real estate in. The nicer the area, the higher my rents, the greater my profits. I am a proud veteran who used his GI Bill and veteran assisted mortgages to provide for my family and generations of my family to come.

Due to my global travels I have come face to face with many uncomfortable, violent and ignorant adversaries. This experience has led me to understand the importance of an open mind in order to pursue a better, more profitable community capable of improving the quality of life for all of our neighbors which would in turn make this world a better place for our children to inherit. If you cannot wrap your mind around that objective, please leave our country. They will accept you in China or some other country where the line in the sand is more clearly drawn for an ignorant persons well being.( And yes, I have been to China )

And I still feel sorry for your Mother. I'll bet she had greater hopes for you. That said, I would like to encourage you to return to school in order to obtain information which would in turn improve the quality of your life. I'd wager to say that if you spent a fraction of your passions learning that you do assuming you understand someone else, you might grow to understand yourself. That all alone will improve the quality of your life. (Jane Doe & Mitchell)
My fire arms are equal opportunity. A bullet has no preference. If you came into my house uninvited it would not pan out well for you, whether you are Jimmy Walker, Louis Farakhan or Newt Gingrich.

Ignorance has long been the kindling to a violent confrontation. If I know very little about you, I'm going to assume and since we're all afraid of what we don't know or understand the cycle continues. My fire arms are protected as I am a citizen of this country and I defend my person, property, family and country to the death. Exactly how our military trained me to do.

Get a life haters. Or have I created a new category for you? What? A right leaning conservative that actually loves his neighbors, fire arms, trees and has hope for this troubled world? I'm certain you didn't think we existed but we do. Did I mention that I'm also one 'Of Those Blacks with never ending problems and bs'?
My problems are defined in current bank rates, real estate values and evicting non paying tenants. Not exactly what you thought? Just pay your rent on time and I won't evict you. I promise.

Holy shit. I'm with the others that said I didn't think that racism was really an issue here in our part of the world. After reading the comments here it appears that assumption was wrong, though.

Personally, I agree with the article. Treating symptoms while ignoring the cause is usually a waste of time and money. Half-ass treating a symptom and calling it a triumph is even worse; it insults the intelligence of everyone reading it.

#43: "Also, I like how all the ignant-ass crackers commenting on this issue are anonymous, unregistered trolls. "

I'm fairly convinced that all those comments are coming from only one racist troll with a lot of time on their hands. They all bring up the same talking point and have a nearly identical writing style.

Good piece - thanks for adding to the debate. Do you know if the legislature ever expanded drug courts to allow low-level dealers as well as users? Seems like that would be the right place for these 'dealers.'

It is a shame that people going to the many human service agencies and work release facilities in the area are forced to confront the temptation of falling back into drug use thanks to the proliferation of open-air drug markets in the area. It would be good if the market were moved out of Pioneer Square at the least, for exactly this reason, but I am not holding my breath....

Dominic,

Please respond to comment #50. It raised excellent points that I would like to see you address, rather than reading your responses to some of the obviously idiotic criticism here.

the interweb is CRAAAAZY.

http://www.stories.pk i have visited to this site and found to get the interested site which is very impressive.

@28:

Until there is a much larger scale solution put in place, there is little alternative to having to keep the dealers in check with these expensive policing operations.

And if we can keep it among the darkies in Pioneer Square... all the better, right?

@95, 50

If you re-read the article, Holden's main point is that the Seattle Times has bought into the story that was some sort of fantastic operation by the SPD that will significantly disrupt the drug dealing, when in fact plenty of evidence indicates that its effect will be minor at best. The argument that these were prolific dealers is countered by the paltry amounts of drugs or money that were on them at the time of their arrest.

They make it sound like they nabbed Pablo Escobar here, but in reality they caught 15 crackheads. Congratulations, SPD, you caught some crackheads that were too fried to spot a cop. Job well done. Drug problem solved in Pioneer Square. I guess we can start building those new upscale residences in the north lot.