CHS commenter calhoun can be cranky — but this question asked on a recent report of yet another SPD incident at the Harvard Market QFC got a newsy answer this week:
It seems like the Harvard Market QFC is a site of regular incidents involving weapons and violence. Why?…is that area significantly different than, say, the Broadway Market QFC?
“I for one would not shop there. Too risky,” calhoun added in typical calhoun style. It is indeed, scary out there, cal. But for those of us willing to brave the mean aisles of Capitol Hill, we want you to know that the Broadway Market QFC can be as sketchy as its Pike/Pine cousin as this early Wednesday morning incident illustrates.
Police were called to the supermarket in the 400 block of Broadway East just after 3 AM Wednesday morning for a report of a woman who had attacked an employee with some sort of weapon and fled the store. A brief search of the area turned up the mid-20s woman who some of you might have heard hysterically screaming as she was arrested for aggravated assault with a weapon, trespassing and then handed over for treatment from Seattle Fire. She was also busted for carrying meth.
So, no calhoun, Harvard QFC isn’t special and, yes, there are lots of people with drug problems in the city who filter through our largest semi-public places.
This news is especially ironic since it may have been QFC that blocked the formation of a neighborhood safety district that would have made funds available to hire police for extra patrols in the Broadway and Pike/Pine corridors. This proposal was similar to the Downtown’s MID district only the property owners in those corridors would have taxed themselves (in the MID district the businesses tax themselves to pay for the extra police patrols). Given how frequently people are being violently assaulted or threatened in the Pike/Pine and Broadway corridors — two or three times per week that we know about as per this blog’s own reporting — it seems rather short-sighted of any property owner to have blocked this sort of public safety proposal.
like the perpetually present Harvard Market QFC nodding-off junkie dude? He’s always there, like a Wal-Mart greeter, when I cross the street at Pine and Harvard, just patiently waiting for his fix. Never causes a problem!
to “Resistance is futile” you should make sure you know if its true that QFC blocked it since you said “it may have been” which shows you don’t know if that is true and only start false rumors. second, the SPD has a precinct just up the street from Harvard Market on 12th and Pine so there is always more police in the area. Third, these two QFC incidents were inside their stores. police do not patrol inside businesses so any extra patrols on the streets would not have stopped those crimes.
um, no.
we may not be talking about the same junkie. but if we are, that one followed an employee home.
even the peaceful ones can be creeps.
Questions of crime and safety in the neighborhood are tough. Nobody loves street crime, but a lot of folks in Seattle do not want to look at or hear what it takes to fight it. Police have few tools in Seattle to fight street crime until the crime is actually committed. Those officers know the folks that prowl cars, commit burglaries, assaults, street robberies. As one walks down the street and sees officers contacting what a regular citizen sees as a “homeless” person I often hear comments from people like, “Oh yeah, harass the homeless guy!” I have heard this numerous times from people and most recently 3 days ago while waiting for my burger at Dick’s. Seattle has very few ‘Grapes of Wrath’ homeless folks, very few are just the hardworking fella down on his luck when the shipyard closed up. Most are addicts, mental problems, and plain old thieves and turds. I have worked at DESC for 7 years and know this to be fact. I have also watched the police interact with a lot of my clients. Most of our street crimes and quality of life incidents (pissing, drinking, showing off their peckers) are committed by these folks. We have reached a high level of property crime in the city, life starts to suck when your stuff is stolen a few times a year. Living on the street sucks, poverty sucks. However, by the time the crimes are committed none of that matters, the crime has been committed. I guess the point of what I am trying to say is lay off these officers, especially on Capitol Hill. When I started my job, which I thought was temporary, I had the same attitude about policing as many of my neighbors on the hill. Years of watching things face to face has changed my mind dramatically. The best thing we can do to fight crime is report it, document it, and support officers when they arrive. All to often we bitch about the police until we need them, then they show up and we want magic like we see on TV. I have seen them a thousand times in impossible, no win situations. Somehow in the end they have sorted it out. People’s feelings get hurt. Sometimes someone’s melon gets thumped, sometimes it gets much more violent. We all want safety, we just don’t want to see how we get it.
“Cranky”?….who, me? I prefer to think that I just express some opinions that many people are thinking but are too politically correct to put them in writing. If you want to call that “cranky,” then that’s ok…I take it as a complement!
By the way, I don’t think the geographic presence of a police precinct in the Pike-Pine area is any kind of a deterrent to crime…a criminal is not going to factor that in when he/she decides to act.
Thank you for working at DESC – they are a great organization and do good work.
I appreciate your perspective. I personally don’t care how or why someone is homeless, however. I understand that we all make choices and circumstances sometimes force us to make choices that we should not have to. I also ‘get’ that homeless are responsible for much of the ‘petty’ crime you mention.
For folks like me, and perhaps you, who live here and walk the streets of Pike/Pine around Harvard because it’s our route around our neighborhood, the issue isn’t about who is where and why, but about safety.
What we don’t see from our cops, and I’ve mentioned this on CHS before, is a community policing effort. In Pioneer Square, for instance, you see police walking and riding around on bikes who know the folks on the street by name so they know who does what and why. In CH, I don’t see that. When you do see police here, it’s because it’s a major event (NYE comes to mind), or just riding about not making direct contact. I don’t see engagement and relationship-building with people who are on the street. I don’t get the sense that the police in this area ‘know’ the individuals in our local homeless population.
Perhaps I’m wrong, I’d love to hear that I am.
You don’t see officers walking around because it isn’t really viable. It is a large area with relatively low density(compared to downtown). Also look at SPD staffing in Capitol hill. They don’t have the resources or officers to put on such a manner of patrol.
Also I often see officers talking to people. They always seem to have a positive rapport with “street people” when I see them.
Also look at e demographic of the two areas in terms of political views and how the police are generally treated. It was mentioned above about the general negative attitude displayed by us toward the police. Maybe that has something to do with it in the Capitol hill area?(right or not)
Also working in areas with Seattle homeless peolple, I would say that there is a high percentage that are homeless by choice. Seattle has some of the best resources and handouts for homeless people. Why would they want to “get better.” Hell, if I could stand not taking a shower for long periods of time I would be homeless with no worries and take all the handouts, get myself some free health care, and beg for money for beer and drink all day. then when it comes time for sleep, head down town to the sobering place for a place to sleep and food, then do it again the next day.
I also have worked in social service for years, and often have had mutual clients with DESC, but I don’t think I could disagree with you more. First of all, I don’t see why it matters if someone is homeless because they are “down on their luck” versus because of mental health or CD problems. Is one really so much more deserving of our empathy than others?
Secondly, if we really care about community safety, it’s not more policing we need, it’s more supportive services. As you well know, it is exceedingly difficult for people to get housing, food, medical care, not to mention CD and mental health treatment. It is unreasonable for us to expect people to get it together when we give them no resources. Down thread, someone mentioned that Seattle was a relatively good place to be homeless. While this may be true *relatively* speaking, it doesn’t mean that there is this wealth of resources for people living in poverty (especially in the midst of all of the recent cuts). And it is sure is hard to kick drugs and change your whole freaking life when you are living on the street and have access to NOTHING. I know that people view the homeless population as undeserving, but if you care about community safety, you should care about extending services, even if you think homeless people are deviant.
Uhh, and police brutality and “melon thumping” is not an acceptable way of curbing crime.
Lastly, if you really think that the vast majority of your clients are thieves and turds, I beg you to find a new job.
There is one thing that is very available to the homeless in Seattle, and that is a hot meal….I’ve seen a list of all the various places that have food programs for the poor, and it is true that a homeless person can get a square meal 2-3 times a day every day of the week, with just a little effort on their part. So it irritates me when I see all the signs saying “hungry..need money for food”…it’s disingenuous…what they want the money for is for alcohol and cigarettes. As a contrast, I have a great deal of respect (and support) for the Real Change vendors, who at least are doing something active to support themselves.
Also, I think there would be alot more empathy for the homeless if they did not frequently commit the “quality of life” crimes such as pissing/defecating in public, littering, fighting, etc.