Tuba Man breathes a sigh of relief.

Oh good. Is this part of the violence reduction strategy for South Seattle?

Dear Seattle, ever heard of "too liberal"?
I didn't think so.

The council passed a resolution. My, how effete of them. What are they going to pass a resolution against next? Drought?

Don't get me wrong - I am against most youth incarceration, and I favor treatment of the cause of the infraction wherever possible. But this is just stupid council posturing. All it means is that if this resolution ever got any teeth behind it, it would be challenged in court. If the city won the challenge, the county would build a new youth center elsewhere in the county, which it would probably need to do by that time anyway, as the new facility will be very old by then.

In the meantime, Council lets the SPOG steal their lunch money, they refuse to do anything about affordable housing, and all they can do is wring their hands over the huge amounts of cost overruns in major civil projects.

Stupidest PR stunt yet.

I commend Michael Moynihan. Restoration is the necessary course.

Moynihan is naive as fuck.

This sort of thing has the right wingers just pissing their pants in fear. Obviously those simpletons can't get beyond the base instincts to really understand the issue, but at the same time neither can the council get past the idealism to see that there is a reality somewhere in the middle that will need some incarceration capability when the next 14 year old shoots someone in a gang battle.

Even in thug-loving, police-hating Seattle this is beyond the pale. Now Seattle insists on being a sanctuary city with it's hugs for thugs program. It's time to get a CCW if you don't already have one. Get some hoodie shooting targets, find a local gun range, and practice, practice, practice!

http://www.kingcounty.gov/safety/sheriff…

Is this part of the 100 new cops Bruce Harrell wants to add to D2? Yes, I'm talking about the same Bruce Harrell who said in one of the candidate forums last summer, "Some brothers need to be locked up."

Teckel dear, as the old saying goes "Paranoia will destroy ya". You need to find another reason to justify your phallic symbols, or just spring for that penile enlargement operation. What the council did is just silly posturing, so your "practice, practice, practice" mantra is better spent on you, the internet and some lubrication.

God Forbid, the OP Ansel's family doesn't get killed by a pair of 15 yr olds. He'll just say "Aw, they're just kids who had a bad upbringing. Don't lock them up. That's not the answer. Just let them go home".

Way to go, you credulous liberal assholes. Just remember: when your poor, economically disadvantaged 'youths' are gutting you like a fish for the contents of your wallet, they won't give a shit that you follow Ta-Nehisi Coates on Twitter.

I'm not exactly a proponent of the prision-industrial complex but I'm also smart enough to recognize that we don't live in Lake Wobegon either. Guess it's a good thing that the City Council doesn't have a whole lot to do with criminal justice and serious crimes are prosecuted by governmental entities that they don't control.

Resolutions have no legal/legislative power whatsoever.

Resolutions have no legal/legislative power whatsoever. The Council didn't "move" to do anything.

Damn it, did it again -- time for a new faster computer.

Keep 'em separated

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2gTFBhQ…

This measure may have no legel effect but it represents a shift in thinking, and if Burgess opposes a measure that has no real effect or teeth, what does that say about his utter lack of understanding, lack of compassion, and extreme privilege??

There is another group in town that often gets overlooked for one reason or another called No New Jim Crow Seattle who has worked on this issue as well. We've had meetings with King County execs, the prosecutor, and the sheriff's office on the crucial importance of not caging youth and instead turning toward restorative justice. We're older, interracial, not terribly.loud or radical but we've been quietly hard at work.

(Apologies to Burgess if he does support alternatives to incarceration.)

The state of Washington is not as liberal as its reputation and neither is the city. Thankfully, the city council is pretty progressive, but citizens here, not so much, as many of these comments reveal. There is a vocal and active contingent of progressives here but overall my opinion is that seattle and especially washington state enjoys a reputation it doesnt always deserve. Look at those statistics cited, and look around you.

But thank god we have Jay Inslee and not Rob Lock 'em Up McKenna of that loon Dino Rossi. THAT was a close one, remember? He's nuttier than Huckabee, Ted Cruz, and Donald Chump combined, and homegrown.

If all you assholes are against it, it must be a good idea.

Mandy's, I largely agree with you, which is why I find this resolution to be so infuriating. It's a meaningless gesture, meant only to feel good for the people passing the resolutuion and those who agree with its sentiment. It won't change anything. It didn't even make the news last night.

But I do have to ask, for the right wingers ask, and I feel they deserve a practical answer: what do you do with a minor who kills, assaults or rapes someone? Adult prison? Involuntary commitment? Not putting them away is not an acceptable answer.

Catalina, I do believe these symbolic gesture have meaning and help shift thinking and start conversations. When I first moved here and started paying attention, I was surprised by all the resolutions, then I realized it's a seattle thing: pleasant, polite but empty gestures.

Don't look to network news for substance. Count on The Stranger for REAL NEWS, right? :)

It would have been a much more meaningful resolution coming from the County Council.

But back to my question: What is to be done with the "youth" who really do need to be "caged"?

Violence is a problem in the US aided by easy access to guns and a lack of a safety net for kids in need, traumatized themselves by violence and neglect, BUT most adults are in prison for drug related nonviolent charges. Kids can be caged for truancy, shoplifting, and things as a kid I was able to mature out of and learn from. Children are not little adults but are reckless fun-seeking immature youngsters who are made angrier by knowing we'll throw them away and make a profit doing so.

Even for violent offenses, children can be reached and set on the right path if we invest time and resources and community involvement. Check out what RJOY is doing in Oakland schools and the documentary "Fixing Juvie Justice.". New Zealand and Baltimore are doing it right. Here, we profit from children and adults going to jail while the rest of us pay, in dollars and despair.

@25, So very true. What do we do?
Going beyond the fact that this is just another meaningless resolution (and excuse to get the right wing fired up) what is necessary to even move toward this goal of no youth incarceration? It looks like it would take a massive effort to create and support the mechanisms to rehabilitate juvenile offenders. What is that going to look like? What is the authority behind it to enforce it? What is the safety system to mitigate continued violence?
Not incarcerating youth is a laudable goal, but how do you implement this in the real world?
I think there might be some better solutions to the effects of a juvenile record here as well. For example, if you have non violent crimes on your juvenile record and can stay out of trouble for a year or two, how about expunging the juvenile record and allowing that person to have a clean slate to move forward in life? That's just the first thing that popped into my head, but I think we can do more to keep young people from being forced down the wrong path here without giving up our ability to maintain law and order.

I dislike prisons, and also have zero desire to have any relationship with the people who've mugged me.

But what to do about violent youth? First, remember that one day they will be released from prison, so let's work with them with that in mind to help them with whatever problems they have, whatever it takes to treat and rehabilitate them. I'm not an expert or really very knowledgeable about how to really rehabilitate youth but I know it takes a whole community to make it successful. . I'm just a parent of a young man who stayed out of trouble and on the right path, partly due to luck and partly due to our efforts. But I know there are countries around the world and even communities in the United States who have worked to significantly reduce their prison population especially of youth. So we need to study what's been done that works and then do that. I don't mean that to be a cop out answer, but our first step is to want to do that, and then believing it can be done, and then shutting down for-profit jails and prisons.

Ryannmm, in a safe setting would you like to face your mugger and make him (him?) look into your eyes while you tell him how his cruelty harmed you and make him really face what he did? Wouldn't it be more satisfying and effective in the long run if you could see that you've reached him in some way, and see the regret and sorrow in his eyes for what he did, and to know that, as a result, he's less likely to offend in the future, and possibly accept whatever gesture or effort he could make to try to fix what he did? Isn't that more satisfying then sitting in a courtroom, not being able to participate much in the process and watching him be taken off to jail, to sit in jail, only to be made angrier and to learn from other angry criminals, and then released? Also, at a very high financial cost to the rest of us.

Restorative justice addresses all this and the racism that's inherent in all of our institutions.

@32, you're right. Attempting, more than likely in vain, to make an extremely violent person see the light, is worth the risk of him killing or assaulting another victim(s).

Will knowing there will be no actual punishment a) discourage crime, or b) encourage crime. Discuss.

I'm wondering - for those who've been reacting to incredulity to this article... The justice strategies that "naive" Moynihan alludes to were detailed in the extensive linked-to report, backed up by 10 years of hard data, and showed those strategies to be incredibly effective. And - effective in OAKLAND which, lets be frank, is probably dealing with issues a bit more intense that Seattle (considering their 4x violent crime rate). So - what's the problem? Is the fact that the report deals with youth crime/bad behavior at school versus not-at-school make it totally invalid when thinking about the latter case (and - restorative strategies are used in criminal contexts as well - what's that data look like)? Are there studies available showing, say, incarceration-based strategies work BETTER at lowering crime rates, decreasing recidivism etc? Is there some other factor that makes putting an offending child in a cell for long period WORTH more crime / worse outcomes / higher recidivism?

@32 -- do you think that when Josh Duggar molested his sisters, that when his parents sat him down and had him look his sisters in their eyes and tell them how his cruelty had harmed them, that it made him face what he did and change his behavior? Or do you think the criminal justice system should have been involved to protect those girls by getting him away from his victims?

Bax, that's not what I described. Restorative justice in that situation, in my opinion, would include members of the community outside of the nutty family, which is a family that shields and protect this behavior and they are not objective participants. (I'm sure that next we'll hear about the dad's deeds.). Away from the pressure of the family his sisters might be free to tell this asshole how he hurt them and that's probably the only thing that would reach him bc he feels entitled to do it and his parents excuse it and other bad acts. I'll admit that sex crimes like child molestation are very difficult to overcome and treat.

Restitution for BOTH parties, great! That is, if the other party isn't DEAD!!

So a kid is charged with robbery, a violent offense. A judge finds probable cause and, in the spirit of no detention, releases him. Next day another robbery. Judge releases him. Kid blows off his next court date. No detention? Really? What do we do? Juvenile detention in King County is down from 200 to an average of 50. The cliché that we'll always fill the beds is wrong.

Enjoy becoming "Detroit on The Sound".

Seattle liberals are the most naive and stupid liberals.

Really, it seems the best solution would be for all of the whining right-wing garbage in this thread to lock themselves in cages where they'll be safe from the terrors they imagine threaten them daily, instead of putting kids in them.

The left is strong at identifying gaps in social justice.....however, they seem to have far less talent in finding reasonable solutions .

Working as a career social servant in the city of Seattle, I can promise you that there are plenty of "kids" exhibiting sociopathic behaviors on our streets and in our schools where their forced removal from our community and academic institutions is necessary for public safety.

This is not to say that there are not significant reforms needed within the criminal justice system. There are many reforms that not only need to target the police, but the prosecutorial abuse of over charging individuals with the intent of forcing a plea bargain. Reform not stupidity!