Comments

1

So he essentially wants to put up an “[x] days since killing a Black person” sign?

I feel like that would backfire, SPOG will make up t-shirts with a photo of the number at “0”.

2

Right now killing black people is pretty evenly distributed between SPOG and the King County Sheriff Office.

I feel like this will only put more pressure on the Sheriff's Office to pick up the slack from SPOG executions at a time when the Sheriff office is already working in this area at full capacity.

3

"The plan now involves having a celebration every day the Seattle Police Department doesn't kill a Black person."

well Crap looks like I
picked the Wrong Dec-
ade to open up a Party Store

4

@3 you have my vote for best comment of the week. đź‘Źđź‘Źđź‘Ź

5

Don't sleep on candidate Lance Randall. What the city needs is a common sense approach to these issues and a very well thought out and detailed plan. Lance is the candidate that brings all of that. Let's get someone in there that isn't part of the existing establishment. If Seattle wants change it's up to the voters to do that! Lancerandall2021.com

6

So Bruce is going to have lots of parties. What is he going to do on the day that a black person is killed? Put a sad face up on the readerboard? And the cake budget is going to huge! And about getting rid of the bad apples and racists? How is that going to happen? And SPOG is sure to agree to have the surly cops walk the plank, right? Because, sad face. This is classic Harrell.

7

So, after 150+ years of police killing & abusing people, AND GETTING AWAY WITH IT, Harrell's plan is to ask them to stop & to try to teach them why it is wrong. In what other aspect of law does a society adopt this kind of harebrained plan? Doesn't he understand that many people are attracted to policing because it offers unbridled power over those they consider lesser?

Harrell isn't an idiot, but he clearly believes we are proffering this transparent nonsense.

Harrell, as council president in 2018, went to the mat to fight for adopting the disastrous police union contract which has allowed cops to fully escape accountability. When he did that in 2018 he claimed his critics were liars and rumor mongers & that no one cared more for the Black community than him.

I am not sure who would be the worst choice for Seattle: Gonzalez, who developed our current police un-accountability system & also voted for the 2018 police contract, Echohawk, who has been on the Seattle Community Police Commission for over 3.5 years (joining 2 months after Charleena Lyles was murdered) & watched as 9 more people were killed by the SPD, or Harrell.

Harrell is not alone among ALL the current mayoral candidates in spewing anodyne mealy-mouthed generalizations while avoiding the obvious: we need 100% civilian control over police for investigation, discipline, & policy. None are willing to speak about this because it does offer real accountability and, after 150+ years, finally would curtail obscene police power & abuse.

8

@7 -- "... we need 100% civilian control over police for investigation, discipline, & policy."

well there's a
damn Bingo.

9

@7: 100% civilian oversight of all local policing is the real answer. That would include not just SPD, but also the large King County Sheriff Department and Highway Patrol that somehow magically get left out of these conversations about accountability despite their own horrendous track records. That's why it's the one proposal those in power will never make.

It's easy (and kinda fun) to take cheap shots at Harrell's woo woo pizza party solutions, but it's only marginally less ridiculous than claiming real change is about more micro-aggression training, implicit bias training and hiring more minorities.

None of those things are bad, but we have been doing that around the country for 30 years and the verdict is clear that it has changed nothing that is wrong with policing. Police unions will accept these performative reforms in exchange for large pay bumps because they know it will make no difference and these "reforms" have had the same impact as pizza parties for not killing black people.

In the end, the participants in police accountability feed at the same trough and have a monopoly to:
• Make the laws,
• Enforce the laws,
• Prosecute the laws,
• Hire the prosecutors,
• License the “defense” attorneys,
• Pay the “judges”,
• Build the jails,
• Contract jails out to private entities,
• Employ and pay the wardens,
• Employ and pay the guards,
• Employ and pay the parole officers,

What could possible go wrong?

One can’t honestly call it a “justice” system. It’s a system of abject tyranny.

10

@9 Yes. The Washington State legislature tried that with HB1203 & it was killed before even getting to the floor for a vote -- word is that the municipalities/cities lobby killed it behind closed doors, & it is likely that Seattle, while publicly claiming to support the bill, also helped kill it since, after all, the bill would have forced Seattle to civilianize all investigations of police misdeeds. So, our best shot at getting county & state wide reform is to get it in Seattle first. Other cities around the US have done it (notably Nashville, Portland, Oakland, & Newark), but the current council members are either determined not to have it (Herbold, Gonzalez, & Lewis), don't care, or are scared off. A Seattle initiative may be the only way to get some measure of police reform & accountability.

11

@9 the Orwellians
INsisted they call it
'Justice' not just US
and they Won -- yet a-
gain! what're the Odds?
well so far they're battin' a Thousand.

keep an Eye on Minneapolis*

*will it be a Tipping Point?
they so-called Right's just
waitin' for a Good Excuse
to Kill some of the Citizenry.


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