SPD chief addresses staffing issues, jail restrictions and ‘astounding’ gun violence
by Jeremy Harris, KOMO News Reporter
Tue, July 23rd 2024 at 3:18 PM
Updated Tue, July 23rd 2024 at 7:38 PM
SEATTLE — Seattle’s Interim Police Chief Sue Rahr cited concerns about staffing, as well as issues with restrictions on bookings at the King County Jail in a presentation to the Seattle City Council’s public safety committee on Tuesday.
Rahr also noted there have been “astounding” levels of gun violence in the city in recent months and officers are struggling to keep up.
“It’s a math problem. They really have to prioritize their call and it results in a longer wait time for people to get to calls,” Rahr said.
She showed the committee a snapshot of a recent night of patrol staffing when the city was short 24 officers on a single shift.
SPD data presented to the Council showed the agency continues to lose roughly twice as many officers as are being hired, with 21 hires made in 2024 through the end of June and 55 separations.
“The impact for people in the communities is if they have a crime that isn’t urgent, they end up waiting a long time for a police response,” Rahr said.
Rahr, and city attorney Ann Davison, also cited concerns about misdemeanor crimes and booking restrictions at the King County Jail.
According to city data, the city is currently receiving less than half of the beds they are contracted to have at the jail.
Council president said she ‘wants her money back’ for the discrepancy.
“There are repeat offenders out there committing crimes over and over again and there doesn’t seem to be a solution,” Nelson said. “You’ll get some disagreement from the county and the city about what is going on.”
Nelson added that the jail restrictions have undercut the city’s effort to tackle public drug use.
“Our voters are losing trust in the ability of the council to actually make the city safer,” she said.
Several people addressed the council during public comment to say drug use and street crime in downtown Seattle are a persistent issue.
“Nothing every changes and people aren’t held accountable.,” said Kevin Dares, a property manager in Belltown. “We had an individual sexually assault one of my tenants, then proceed to smoke and sell meth on my property. When he was approached by employees, he assaulted them. He was subdued, he was arrested. Two days later he was back on our doorstep.”
Dares said most of the issues he sees in Belltown are connected to the drug trade.
“We have had the same group of drug dealers poison the minds and the streets of our communities for the past four years and nobody does anything about it,” he said.
An audit released earlier this month listed several steps the city was encouraged to take to tackle drug use and overdoses in public places.
Tom Graff, with the group ‘Belltown United’ also criticized the council for not moving faster to address drug dealing on the streets of Seattle.
“What is happening right now is not working, and it’s not sustainable,” he said. “This is madness. We do not have to put up with this. You cannot run a business this way and it is directly affecting our city. Please change your ways.”
Several council members matched Graff’s frustration.
“Currently the public safety challenges that we are experiencing today are a shameful legacy of the defund the police movement. It was wrong then. It’s wrong now,” councilmember Rob Saka said.
Interim Chief Rahr said there is a gap in options for people who are arrested for drug related crimes.
“There are some people who are too medically fragile to be booked into the jail, but they are too dangerous to be left in the ER or left in the community. We need a place, a safe secure detention to take people who fit that category that we can’t leave them on the street,” she said.
What we are seeing right now is the result of public policy being rooted into this ideological purity that either you treat, or you incarcerate. We have to do both things. We haven’t found the right balance for this yet.
In addition to the drug issues, the city is also dealing with an increase in gun violence.
Reported violent crimes were up slightly from 2023 and reports of shootings and shots fired in the city were up by 10% when compared to last year.