Comments

1

Oh my! A dissenting opinion on the council.

2

Wait just so I'm clear on this, when Nelson pushes back on the council because SPD recruitment is maybe different than the cafeteria cashier its a faux pas because she is just a newbie and should know her role yet when Sawant throws gasoline on literally everything the council does and actively undermines some of their work she is fighting for the people and is a true leader? The juxtaposition of the TS coverage on these two is something to behold.

4

Hmm. Maybe The Stranger will support the competent progressive candidate next time, rather than the dubious flaky one? Nah.

5

A Sawant non-sequitir! Drink!

6

"Nelson disregarding process allegedly for the sake of 'get shit-doneism.'”

The Seattle City Council needs more of this. Herbold in particular seems to get paralyzed by indecision. If it was up to her, we'd still be weighing replacement versus repair of the West Seattle Bridge.

7

“the latest instance of Nelson disregarding process”
All hail Seattle process!!

8

There are plenty of valid critiques of the "Seattle process" and ample opportunities for a newcomer to shake up the status quo in constructive ways. But hiring bonuses for cops is not constructive. We need cops who WANT to be a part of a serious re-evaluation of the role of policing in society and who are open to questioning the racialized presumptions of traditional cop culture. We most definitely do NOT need lunkheads who we can only attract with money and who will seek to undermine reform at every turn once they're here.

10

Finally the voice of reason ... Yes, we need more police on the force. Period.

It was a massive mistake to cut officers, the budget and vilify the entire police department for the actions of a handful of bad apples. .

The city council needs to admit is behaved stupidly, apologize to the electorate hire more police and be supportive of your police department.... or in the alternative resign.

Spend more money on training, recruitment and get the officers you need.

11

@8 Conversely we do not need overly reactionary city counsel members who roll with the political flavor of the moment and disrespect the police and their work.

A lunkhead is better than no police at all when you are being robbed or assaulted.

By the by, police generally aren't here for the money, but to serve and protect.

The city created a massive problem by reducing the police force by lack of support and funding, now just like the rest of the business out there they have to pay a premium to their employees back.... all at our expense in terms of cost and safety.

Frankly, if we would burn one or two of the counsel members at the stake at the Westlake mall we could show our support and this might attract more officers. I'm willing to give it a go.

13

@12 I'd also add at this point you are going to have to pay a premium to attract the officers you want because the job environment is so toxic. Officers in Seattle do make more than other jurisdictions but we can already see recruits are voting with their feet and decided the extra pay is not worth having city leaders bash you on a regular basis and activists trying to dox you and your family. Signing bonus or not it is going to take years to undo the damage done by the council in 2020.

14

In a comment thread full of illiterate bootlickers that completely ignore the article, #11 wins.

"Police generally aren't here for the money, but to serve and protect", so we should pay them more money. That's one interesting and totally logical take.

Bonus points for calling for burning council members at the stake, nothing like calling for a witch hunt/human sacrifice to signal sensible discourse and informed decision making. Hiring more law enforcement that is pro mob-justice and murder? What a great way to make the city safer.

15

I'm not sure why Hannah omitted this context, but Nelson's explanation is below. The gist is that the hiring incentives have only been in place 5 months, but SPD's hiring process takes 6 months, so the study does not reflect the effect of the incentive.

“I would argue that the number of hires is not a meaningful metric for evaluating the incentive’s effectiveness,” Nelson wrote in an internal memo to the council.

“SPD’s hiring process is a minimum of six months long and includes an initial screening just to apply, a written test, psychological and physical assessments, a background check, and an oral exam (the “Oral Board”) and multiple interviews.”

“It is cyclical, with defined application periods and limited testing dates. So by my logic, it would have been impossible for SPD to have hired anyone who applied during implementation between October 29th, 2021 and the beginning of January 2022.”

17

@14 You obviously don't know many police officers.

But as @13 correctly points out the city has made the environment so toxic for police officers... the only incentive left is to offer more pay.

From time to time, one tries to introduce a little levity in the discourse. You might translate "burning at the stake" to mean "getting rid of some of the jack ass council members" who created this hot mess. (specifically voting them out of office)

Do you really think I was serious about burning them at the stake. I think the elastic band on your tighty whites may have restricted blood flow to your cranial regions.

Setting fires and burning things seems to be the exclusive purview of street protestors... if my memory serves.

18

@14 Now here is a thought we passed around during Koffee Klatch at a top secret Republican Stronghold high up in the cascade mountains.... (Ernst Blofeld.... was in attendance)

Let's "Defund the Homeless" and use the proceeds to hire more police! : D .

19

The funniest part of this entire "story" is the mighty mighty "report" which opponents of hiring bonuses for cops keep waving around as if it's some magic talisman which can re-invigorate the flagging Defunderpants Gnomes. This "report" is barely two pages long, and the laughably unnecessary "Executive Summary" which occupies one-half of the first page simply repeats verbatim material from the rest of the "report," reducing further the tiny amount of material in this insubstantial wisp of a document.

Almost as good, CM Mosqueda clearly has not read it -- and/or she doesn't know what "quantitative analysis" actually means:

'“[The surveys] yield very important not only quantitative analysis but qualitative analysis that should be taken to heart and weighed against one individual's comments that is not steeped in this work,” she said.'

There can be no "quantitative analysis" in the report, because the report contains no numbers. The authors of the report simply asked city recruiters, and heads of city departments, about their staffing problems, then wrote their own opinion about what those recruiters and department heads had said. That's all. The "report" is nothing more than an opinion based upon opinions. That someone has an opinion about hiring bonuses doesn't actually mean CM Nelson (or anyone else) need care about that opinion, let alone care enough to stop action because of that opinion.

If this is the best opponents of hiring bonuses for cops can do, then the case for those hiring bonuses has been made.

(Oh, and award for "Best Political Writing" goes to, "Nelson also stepped on Herbold’s toes when she hosted a roundtable with business owners to complain about crime in her own committee." Who is the antecedent to "her" in that sentence, and exactly how much crime takes place in her committee?)


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