There will be no gaslighting if we stop the insanity.

https://stopdefunding.com

I like Jenny and will (if it gets that far) vote against Recall and vote for her on ‘21.

I see we're negotiating.

Fine.

Let's cut the SPD budget 98% and then we'll rebuild next year.

Would you like to do MORE negotiating?

I think Best and Durkin have good and legitimate concerns to raise, but they have shown no good faith or openess to discussions or collaboration.

Yeah, only the unserious like arbitrary.

@8 - Agreed

@7 friend, the current budget is "arbitrary".

Say, will we ever learn how the decision was made to abandon the East Precinct building was made? Or is the truth too embarrassing to someone in power.

@11: You can argue that, but at least budges are based on data from actual expenditures and revenue.

Nathalie,
Your caption reminded me of something I learned in college. "Not to decide is to decide".

Got a chuckle out of what you wrote.

I don't know why you're mad at the Mayor and the Chief; they were never on board with "defund". It's the City Council hedging and moving the goalposts on what "defund" really means.

@14 You're showing your age there friend, it's been like 35 years since anyone played Permanent Waves in the dorms.

@17,
Ha!

Go ahead, lay-off experienced senior officers, simply because they are white. First of all, those officers will never miss a paycheck, and this joke of a city will be tied up in lawsuits for years. If these (white) officers are smart, they wake each morning praying that the City Council moves forward with this insane plan. Mayor Durken is no friend of SPD. However, she is an attorney and she has enough sense to see through the arbitrary "50% defund" nonsense.

@20 I know rite? What did all those constitution-writer guys think they were doing, giving spending power to legislatures instead of executives.

Why are we pretending like this is still a debate?

A veto proof majority of the city council has decided to honor the will of their voters to cut the SPD budget by 50%.

Who cares if mayor Durkan and Chief Best, both bought and paid for by the corrupt police union feel otherwise?

The decision has been made. No one has forgotten that it was mayor Durkan and Chief Best who defended the right of the SPD to attack peaceful protestors.

Let them piss and moan all they want. They're on the wrong side of history and their lies and scare tactics aren't working. Cut the budget and move on.

Anyone that believes that there won't be slower 911 response times after a drastic budget cut is an idiot.

@13 The point is that changing the budget from one arbitrary number to a different arbitrary number might be a good idea or it might be a bad idea but the arbitrary nature of the numbers is neither here nor there. You need a better objection.

@31: I do. Tell me the data supporting 50% reduction. There is none.

Budgets are based on past data, forecasts based on budgets can be arbitrary, but they are at least based on actual data. The 50% figure is haphazard.

https://stopdefunding.com

@22: "I know, rite"

No, you didn't "know".

Neither side really wants to "defund" or even "reform" the police. If they did, they'd already be working on it. They just want to pose.

I could have sword the CM's name is Herbold, with a B.

Anyway, didn't she end up paying a fine for contacting the Chief directly? So it sounds like someone who is able to learn.

@33 Oh? You live in a country where the executives have the power of the purse and not the legislators, then?

@38: It's not about that. It's that you used the idiom "I know, right?" and then twisted the "know" into something unleaded to what @20 was saying.

But this is too stupid for you to reply back about. So I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that I misread you to spare this thread from further back-and-forth.

Seems both the Mayor and SPD Chief are a tad unclear on who actually sets the budget.

Hint: it's the citizens. And through them, the City Council.

Hence my arguments about negotiating. We hold the cards.

Did you see last night's election results? We're serious.

@40: At the risk of blemishing your reputation with my kudos, that was right on.

You’re all insane. Defunding the Police? That’s the rally cry/objective? You want someone else to pull people over at 1am while speeding on meth? What happens when a “citizen patrol” or whatever the fuck you’re replacing Police with get shot for nothing? Then they demand guns and what’s the fucking difference then?
Defunding SPD 50% wont decrease unarmed citizen deaths by 50% or even 5% but it will dramatically increase the number of rapists who get away with it. If BLM had any balls they would demand legalization of all drugs (except while driving or hurting others) and legalization of prostitution (focusing limited resources on the victims). Those would do more for communities in poverty than anything else.
Seriously defunding Police is only defunding SPD which is a token nothing, then only 50%? Half measure pussyshit and even THAT the Council is backing away from because ya can’t even do that. Hahahahahahahahhaa if I were Socialist I would hate incompetent Sawant

@25:

You don't think the City Council HASN'T been thinking about this for the last two and a-half months?

Also, the only thing that would about 911 that would change under a defunding plan is that it would no longer be run by SPD and most of the calls would be responded to by people who aren't LEO's, but rather experts specifically trained for the situation. And given SPD's generally terrible response times (in some cases documented as long as EIGHT HOURS after the initial call), I don't see how it could be any slower than it is already; in fact, one would expect faster responses in many instances, since the responders would naturally give higher priority to incidents that fall within their purview, such as safety checks, mentally-disturbed individuals, domestic disputes, etc., things SPD traditionally hasn't put high on their list.

@48 the problem with this whole effort is outlined in your statement. "experts specifically trained for the situation". How many different types of experts are you going to have? How fast can you hire hire and then train them? What are you even going to train them to do? None of this is thought out at all. As you stated these are specially trained people so you can't put an ad in The Stranger and just immediately hire a bunch of people to do this. Listen to the council's rhetoric. Is there anything about improving lives or outcomes? No, it's about punishing the SPD. I have zero confidence that this council is capable of building an organization to replace SPD that will be any more competent or will actually change anything. Their work on homeless issues and transportation (remember Pronto! bikeshare) speaks for itself.

Professor dear, I know you’re touchy as a tenor, but I’m not seeing much action on police reform on any side. Why don’t you show all us unenlightened types what progress has been made? What has the Council done? What has the Mayor done? What has BLM done?

@24: "A veto proof majority of the city council has decided to honor the will of their voters to cut the SPD budget by 50%."

Is that like the veto-proof majority which enacted the EHT in 2018, or is it more like the veto-proof majority which voted to "Save the Showbox"? Because each of those policies enjoyed far more success than any arbitrary budget cut will have in reforming SPD.

I will correct myself: The council is trying to take some action, but the realities of legislation and budgetary issues is making it difficult - and Sawant is, as usual, using the issue to promote unrealistic (and frankly stupid) proposals. We should go back to a citywide council, if for no other reason that is would get rid of her.

Crosscut lays it out pretty well.
https://crosscut.com/news/2020/07/defunding-seattle-police-50-proving-complicated-council