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New Captain Edwards ready to walk the beat in East Precinct

Two East Precinct officers on patrol -- on foot -- on E Pike (Image: CHS)

Two East Precinct officers on patrol — on foot — on E Pike (Image: CHS)

With a new mayor unveiling a hand-picked cast of characters at City Hall and heads rolling among SPD’s top brass as an interim chief hopes to hang onto his job by proving Seattle policing reforms are taking hold, the East Precinct has made a quieter change at the top.

A 33-year veteran of the force, Captain Mike Edwards now leads the precinct covering Capitol Hill and the Central District replacing Captain Ron Wilson who has retired after his own 37 years as a police in Seattle.

Edwards

Edwards

CHS found out about Wilson’s sudden departure and the change Tuesday morning when we noticed two SPD officers on foot patrol walking E Pike and had a brief chat. The foot beat is a short term “emphasis patrol” we’re told, but it could be the kind of popular development for the department Edwards will be perfectly timed to take credit for. We’d say go for it, by the way — East Precinct foot patrols are a consistent request when CHS surveys readers about improving Capitol Hill public safety. By Tuesday afternoon, SPD’s new Capt. Edwards bio was posted:

Captain Mike Edwards began his police career with the Seattle Police Department April 16, 1980. In his previous assignment as a Captain he commanded the Education & Training Section.

As a Lieutenant he held assignments as the Investigations Procedures Committee Commander, Narcotics Commander, and the Special Assignments Commander which included the Fraud/Forgery Unit, Auto Theft Unit, Pawnshop Detail, Major Crimes Task Force and Electronic Crimes Squad. As a sergeant he was assigned to the North Emphasis Team, North Precinct Nora Sector, East Precinct George Sector, West Precinct David Sector and Traffic Section. As an officer he was a Narcotics Detective, SWAT member and worked East, West and North Precincts in patrol. He served 13 years on the Board of Directors of the Seattle Police Officer’s Guild with 6 of those years as the Guild President.

Captain Mike Edwards is the son of a career Air Force parent and has traveled extensively both domestically and abroad with his family during his father’s 26 year military service. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from the University of Texas but is the proud father of a UW Husky graduate.

precinctmap

Edwards says the foot patrol CHS found Tuesday is nothing new and that changes will come slowly as he acclimates to the new role and transitions out of leading the department’s training.

“Once we start getting new personnel, then there will be more noticeable changes,” Edwards said of his plans and expected influx of new academy graduates as SPD ramps up hiring.

Edwards will lead his first precinct after a career with SPD that also saw him serve as president of the Seattle Police Officers Guild from 1996 to 2002. The often controversial union was busy responding to things like SPD’s actions at the Pioneer Square Mardi Gras riot during Edwards’ tenure. In 2002, The Stranger called Edwards “a strong voice for the rank-and-file union” in the wake of controversy over the Mardi Gras violence. Current guild president Sgt. Rich O’Neill has announced he is stepping down after leading the union through one if its roughest periods following the Department of Justice’s consent decree over SPD’s use of force and treatment of minorities.

Like many among SPD’s senior ranks, Edwards has played a role in designing and implementing the department’s response to the DOJ actions. A Federal monitor cited Edwards’ work as training captain for SPD’s weekly Use of Force Review Board meetings as “admirable” in a recent report on the department’s reforms.

Mike, meanwhile, isn’t the only Edwards with more than 30 years on Seattle’s police force. His older brother William Edwards serves as director of parking enforcement.

Mike Edwards takes over an East Precinct with a diverse set of public safety challenges. The gentrified and gentrifying northern Central District’s former “open air drug markets” are now being readied for mixed-use development while the southern stretches of the precinct still face many of the old school challenges of race, poverty, class and crime. Capitol Hill, in the meanwhile, is morphing into a landscape with criminal habits and patterns more like the downtown core.

Capt. Wilson, the man Edwards replaces, moved into the command of East Precinct in summer of 2012. CHS talked with him about his new job with the smell of pepper spray still in the air following a Pride weekend clash with protesters on E Madison. He leaves after just under 18 months in the job.

Edwards will find himself with a relative wealth of resources and opportunities compared to his predecessor. For one, the fight over reforms has hopefully calmed to a dull roar. But greater will be more boots on the ground as funding has been earmarked for hiring new cops and focusing greater public safety effort on the city’s core.

“In large measure, we’re in this very unique period of time,” Edwards said. “Having gone through a lot of changes, there’s some level of stability.” He was talking about Capitol Hill and the neighborhoods that make up the East Precinct. But he also could just as easily have been talking about the department he’s been part of for more than 30 years.

This post has been updated to correct information regarding William Edwards’ history with SPD.

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11 Comments
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Janet
Janet
10 years ago

Gosh…yay! It’s very good to see movement towards addressing some of our local issues. It’s VERY refreshing.

Tammy Jo
10 years ago

THANKS SPD!
WELCOME CAPTAIN EDWARDS!
WELCOME BACK FOOT PATROLS!

We have lived on the hill for 26 years and have always had a great relationship with the police. We truly admire and appreciate the work they do. The past 2-3 years, the police have been more perfunctory and distant in our interactions with them.

Visual presence and pleasant daily interactions seem to have a strong relationship to calming crime but ALSO creating good relations between the police & the neighborhoods.

Captain Wilson seemed to get exasperated with our calls for more community policing and we hope Captain Edwards will be able to listen to the neighborhoods in his precinct… and find a way to juggle his budget to make community foot patrols a bigger priority.

CHANGE IS GOOD. Thanks SPD!

bb
bb
10 years ago

Yes!!

calhoun
10 years ago
Reply to  bb

Well-said, Tammy Jo. I couldn’t agree more!

Rob
Rob
10 years ago

Hopefully he will spend as much time in the Central District as he does on the Hill. Would be great to see foot patrols (or just more SPD presence in any form) in the CD…

Andrew Taylor
Andrew Taylor
10 years ago

Welcome Captain Edwards. I’m sure you’ve already noted that one of the East Precinct’s patrol sectors is named after you.

Adam
Adam
10 years ago

Hopefully he can do something to shake the apathy of the East Precinct SPD. A semi-permanent homeless camp has sprung up at 11th and E Olive St for the past couple weeks by Cal Anderson. Not only is it a source of verbal harassment for park users, they’ve also turned the bushes by the Hugo house into a latrine leading to some interesting sights, sounds and smells for my walk home every day.

I saw SPD chatting it up with the campers a couple weeks ago, yet of course no action.

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[…] Posted on Wednesday, December 11, 2013 – 6:05 am by jseattle […]

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[…] On Capitol Hill, a smaller change also took place at the East Precinct where Captain Mike Edwards has taken over as commander. […]

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[…] and without much press cover, working through nearly every post in the department since 1981. CHS reported on Edward’s impressive 32-year career with SPD which included six years as president of the Seattle Police Officer’s […]

Wilson kids
Wilson kids
9 years ago

Has anyone every asked Ron Wilson about his six kids by 3 wives he abandoned?