Mayor Jenny Durkan and the Seattle Police Department announced this week a May-long “Pre-Summer Emphasis Program” to “to improve public safety and address community maintenance needs” to reduce crime concerns in seven neighborhoods across the city. Areas around Capitol Hill and the Central District were not included.
“We have a responsibility to promote the vitality and safety of our neighborhoods and communities. We will continue to advance livability and public safety through data-driven, proactive strategies and listening to community,” Mayor Durkan said in a statement. “We are taking additional immediate steps to not just make communities safer, but to partner with communities on ways we can make neighborhoods cleaner and more vibrant. I will continue to work closely with Chief Best and other members of my cabinet to monitor the impact of these new resources. I am grateful to the community members for their input, and to our SPD officers and other City employees who are helping address these community priorities.”
According to the announcement, SPD has begun focusing on seven areas “based on community input and data analysis” — downtown, 3rd Ave around Pike and Pine, SoDo, South Park, Georgetown, Pioneer Square, Fremont, and Ballard.
“This will not reduce regular SPD and City of Seattle operations, including police patrols and criminal investigations throughout Seattle; regular operations and criminal investigations will continue,” officials wrote.
Seattle City Council member Lorena González, chair of the council’s safe communities committee, is questioning the new program and asking for more information including details of how the areas were selected.
The Seattle Times reports Durkan citing “upticks in property crime and concerns raised by small-business owners as reasons to concentrate on some areas.” “The data tells you one thing but then you go and walk the neighborhood and talk to people,” Durkan told the Times.
Last year, CHS reported on community crime surveying performed by Seattle University on behalf of SPD that revealed how areas like Ballard with lower levels of actual violent incidents reported higher levels of fear about crime while areas like Capitol Hill and the Central District were less fearful.
Capitol Hill and the CD have seen SPD emphasis efforts in the past and, sometimes, in this proactive manner. After a rise in robberies and assaults in 2013 and 2014, SPD began seasonal emphasis patrols around Pike/Pine to quell street violence. More common are efforts that come after serious incidents or strings of shootings as happened late last year in the Central District after a man was shot to death near 22nd and Union.
The new emphasis program will also include a “clean streets” initiative. In addition to the increased SPD presence, the city’s departments will form “multi-disciplinary teams” that will “engage with communities to identify and address maintenance needs, including: tree and landscape maintenance on City-owned properties; replacing streetlights; removing graffiti; improving sign and pavement markings; and removing debris from illegal dumping.”
PLEASE HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE!
Subscribe to CHS to help us pay writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for as little as $5 a month.
Funny, but this sounds like the kind of stuff the city should be doing in every neighborhood as a matter of regular business. And that’s because it is. And leaving Cap Hill off the list is a travesty.
Agree!
Also a travesty – calling Capitol Hill “Cap Hill”
Adam,
You are sooo clever.
I appreciate Lorena Gonzalez following up and am very curious to know what metrics were used to decide locations of focus.
It must be nice to have a council member who gives a shit about her district
Right??? We gotta vote in the elections so we have someone who cares about the neighborhood and not their own political agendas.
Except when you ask her for data to support LEAD that isn’t 6 years old, and that doesn’t exclude assaults from being considered violent crimes, she doesn’t either call for it or provide it. She’s choosey that way.
“The data tells you one thing, but then you go out and listen to anecdotes and throw away the data”
Somebody is missing some major data info. Justin, how many shootings have taken place on Capitol Hill and the CD in the last month? I’m going to guess a lot more than U District, Fremont, Ballard, etc. This seems extremely misguided. I really hope this is not the end of it because people are getting shot and they’re not dying because modern medicine is so damn good. Let’s not keep having to rely on surgeons and stop the problems before they arise. Rethink this Durkan.
Agree!
Most folks I hear on the hill are anti-police so isn’t this a win-win?
People have different opinions. I’ve lived on the hill for 27 years and am partially to blame/get credit for helping increase the influx of people. I believe the majority of the police I’ve dealt with know and handle their jobs. Always bad apples, but there’s too many people getting shot and killed. We had beat cops a few years ago and it helped. Until people can police themselves and not carry and shoot their guns at people we need to do something.
Two more yesterday…
http://www.capitolhillseattle.com/2019/05/victim-hit-in-leg-in-shooting-at-central-district-gas-station/