Podcasts about lake forest park

The government’s about to run out of money.There’s an ongoing, multi-fronted showdown in the courts over who has the power to cut federal spending after it’s been appropriated.And also a little bit of a trade war brewing with new U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel just announced.Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal shares her view from the House of Representatives with Soundside. *Note: since this conversation aired, President Trump has halted his plan to double tariffs on Canadian metals. Guest: Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal represents Washington’s 7th congressional district, which ranges from Lake Forest Park to White Center Related Links: Trump halts doubling of tariffs on Canadian metals, after Ontario suspends electricity price hikes - AP New deputy FBI director Dan Bongino previously called for imprisoning Democrats - NPR Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

4pm: Spinning the Wheel of Executive Orders! // Takeaways from Trump's flurry of executive orders — and whether they'll stick // On this day in 1977, Jimmy Carter pardoned all draft dodgers // Guest - Met in DC - Joe in Lake Forest Park received a pardon // Man who runs Everett business charged in U.S. Capitol case

The U.S. presidential race has undergone a big transformation.  But has anything changed for Democrats who voted "uncommitted" in Washington state's presidential primary? As the party prepares to nominate Vice President Kamala Harris in a virtual role call vote, an uncommitted delegate says Harris needs to show more separation from President Biden on the war in Gaza before she will earn his support. Guest: Yaz Kader, uncommitted delegate for Washington's 7th congressional district, which encompasses most of Seattle and Burien, as well as Vashon Island, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and Normandy Park. Relevant links: Seattle Times: WA to send 2 ‘uncommitted' delegates to Democratic National Convention Washington State Standard: Harris snags support of Washington Democratic delegates See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Thu, Jun 13 10:26 PM → 11:05 PM RP states man pointed gun at woman and then at them in custody shortly after. Radio Systems: - Puget Sound Emergency Radio Network PSERN Full

On November 2, 1978, 24-year-old Barbara McClure went out with friends and acquaintances. There was a dance competition that evening at the Fandango disco bar in Lake Forest Park, Washington, a suburb of Seattle. There was a disagreement that evening, and Barbara left on foot to walk home, which was about five miles away. A couple who had been with Barbara at the disco said they later went after her and offered her a ride, but she declined. Barbara never made it home that night and was never seen or heard from again. Days later, Barbara's license turned up on the side of a roadway, but the stories of who exactly had found it have varied. At the time of her disappearance, Barbara was a single mother with a young daughter, Jamie. Decades later, Jamie decided it was time for her to fight to uncover the truth. Teaming up with her cousin, Karleen, Jamie delved into a perplexing trail of clues, exposing unsettling connections within their family circle and the closely-knit church community they belonged to.If you have any information regarding the disappearance of Barbara McClure, please contact the King County Sheriff's Office at 206-263-2090. You can follow developments in Barbara's case on social media at Where is Barbara Annette Mcclure?If you have a missing loved one that you would like to have featured on the show, please fill out our case submission form.Follow The Vanished on social media at:FacebookInstagramTwitterPatreonSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What’s Trending: Adrian Diaz is out as Seattle Police Chief and Mayor Bruce Harrell has picked his interim replacement. Lisa Evans (Vice Chair of the Washington State Republican Party) responds to the Semi Bird story. // Big Local: For the first time ever, the Yakima City Council voted down a Pride Month declaration. Lake Forest Park is installing cameras to prevent speed racing but some locals are convinced it’s just money-making scheme. // Black men who were asked to leave a flight due to body odor are suing American Airlines.

Welcome to today's episode featuring a captivating conversation with Eddie Pate and Jonathan Stutz, co-authors of "Daily Practices of Inclusive Leaders: A Guide to Building a Culture of Belonging."In this episode, host Kevin P. Henry engages Eddie and Jonathan in a dynamic discussion about their book and the principles of inclusive leadership it explores.Jonathan shares the genesis of their collaboration, stemming from his master's thesis titled "The Yellow Brick Road of Leadership," which laid the groundwork for their current work.The conversation delves into the core principles of inclusive leadership, emphasizing the importance of qualities like heart, courage, wisdom, and vision in guiding teams toward collective success.Listeners gain insight into practical strategies and daily practices outlined in the book that promote inclusivity and effective leadership within any organizational context.Eddie and Jonathan invite listeners to a book talk and signing event on May 29th at 7 p.m. Pacific Standard Time at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park.Don't miss this opportunity to engage directly with the authors and deepen your understanding of inclusive leadership principles.Stay tuned for more thought-provoking conversations on future episodes of our podcast. Remember, authentic leadership begins with inclusivity!Pre-order their book now to be released in May 2024: https://www.amazon.com/Daily-Practices-Inclusive-Leaders-Belonging/dp/1523006412/Leaders will learn:- Why they are the key to inclusion- Insights for the lifelong journey- Successful practices they can start today- And much more#inclusiveleadership #DEI #inclusion #leadershipqualities #leadersintheworkplace #corporatetraining #businesstraining #leadership #diversity #equity #belonging The All The Way Authentic Podcast with Kevin P. Henry covers a wide range of topics including, but not limited to, diversity and inclusion, mental health, and empowerment. Kevin P. Henry has worked in the Diversity-Equity-Inclusion, communications, and training field for over 30 years. He has extensive experience as a journalist, voice actor, and writer. Currently, he works for the private and public sectors, businesses, organizations, and nonprofits. Kevin utilizes a variety of skills to meet client needs, which include strategic planning, training, facilitation, and writing.​While living in Hawaii, Kevin developed educational programs for high school students focused on career planning, writing, and video production. In addition, he worked with domestic violence survivors and at-risk youth, coordinating career planning workshops. Let's get social! Like us on FacebookFollow us on InstagramFind us on the Web

What’s Trending: Redmond is hosting inclusivity meeting that excluded almost everyone in the city, Local Jew haters will rally in support of Yemen because Houthis hate Jews and Rantz knew people would be complaining about roadside boulders near Olympia.  Big Local: Family seeks justice after relative killed while driving an Uber in Edmonds and a Lake Forest Park dispensary is hit for a second time this month. You Pick: Will avalanching ruin your dating life?

On this topical show re-air, Crystal learns about north King County's innovative new Regional Crisis Response (RCR) Agency with its inaugural Executive Director Brook Buettner and Kenmore Mayor Nigel Herbig. Following national guidelines and best practices for behavioral health crisis care, a five-city consortium established RCR in 2023 as part of a vision to provide their region with the recommended continuum of behavioral health care - which includes someone to call, someone to respond, and somewhere to go. Executive Director Buettner and Mayor Herbig share how the program grew out of a need for a person-centered mobile crisis response, rather than the traditional law enforcement response which is often without the right tools or expertise for the job. They describe the collaborative process of getting buy-in from police agencies, electeds, and city staff to design a service that has evolved from the RADAR co-response program to approaching a 24/7 behavioral health first response. Finally, they cover impressive early results in cost-savings & outcomes and offer advice to other cities looking to bring similar solutions to their own communities. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Mayor Nigel Herbig at @nigelherbig.   Brook Buettner Brook Buettner is inaugural Executive Director of the groundbreaking Regional Crisis Response Agency, which deploys services to people experiencing behavioral health crisis in the North King County community. She is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and an experienced human services professional with a focus on policy advocacy and program implementation for high-needs populations. During her two decade-long career, she has been focused on transforming systems to meet the needs of individuals who are high utilizers of both criminal legal and health and human services systems. Ms. Buettner holds Masters in Public Administration and Social Work from the University of Washington. Mayor Nigel Herbig Nigel grew up in the Seattle neighborhood of Wallingford, attended Seattle Public Schools, and graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in Political Science and Comparative Religion. Nigel and his wife, Tiffany, decided to move to Kenmore when their daughter was a baby as they were looking for a great place to raise their daughter where they could purchase their first home. They have never regretted that decision. Nigel has worked in broadcasting, fundraising, and politics. He currently works at the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. Mayor Herbig represents the Council on the Eastside Transportation Partnership (Vice Chair), and the Sound Transit SR 522 Bus Rapid Transit Elected Leaders Group. He also sits on the King County Affordable Housing Committee.   Resources The Regional Crisis Response Agency | City of Kirkland   “RCR Agency Welcomes Brook Buettner as Executive Director” from City of Kirkland   National Guidelines for Behavioral Health Crisis Care - Best Practice Toolkit Executive Summary | SAMHSA   The North Sound RADAR Program | City of Shoreline   King County Outcome Data for North Sound RADAR Navigator Program   “RADAR: Response Awareness, De-Escalation, and Referral Final Evaluation Report” prepared by the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy Department of Criminology, Law & Society at George Mason University   “North King County cities will broaden mental-health response to 911 calls” by Amy Radil from KUOW   “New Crisis Response Center in Kirkland to Serve North King County” from City of Kirkland    “$500k grant from DOJ to help reduce use of police force in North King County” by Hannah Saunders from Bothell-Kenmore Reporter   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review show and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, I am very excited to be welcoming Mayor Nigel Herbig - he is the mayor of Kenmore. And Brook Buettner, who's the Executive Director of Regional Crisis Response - a collaboration for a mental health alternative response between the cities of Kenmore, Kirkland, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and Bothell that's really innovative and I think a number of cities are looking at this in the region - want to just explore what this is. So starting out with Brook, how did you get involved in this work and what interested you in this? [00:01:27] Brook Buettner: Thanks, Crystal - I'm so happy to be here with you. So my background is that I'm a licensed clinical social worker and I also have a background in public administration. And most of my social work career has been in service of folks that have chronic behavioral health conditions, are living homeless, and then have some overlap with the criminal legal system - either with the police, or with having multiple charges around poverty, or around homelessness. So this is a really exciting program for me to be able to be involved in. [00:01:54] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. And Nigel, as mayor of Kenmore, what got you involved in this particular program and work? [00:02:00] Mayor Nigel Herbig: First, I want to start off by saying that I'm a long-time listener, and I'm excited to be here, Crystal - so thank you for having me. Kenmore entered into this work back in - I want to say 2017 or 2018 - when we joined with other cities and King County MIDD funds and started the RADAR program, which was a co-response model across parts of North King County to give folks other ways to have service calls responded to - without the only response being a police response, because I think we all recognize that a solely police response is not always the right answer and is not always in the best interest of everybody involved. And we did that successfully for a few years. And then in 2021, we started larger conversations with the cities of Bothell, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and then we reached out to Kirkland also, about expanding what we were doing with RADAR and making it into a larger regional model. And so our staff and our councils worked for about a year and a half trying to figure out how that would all work. And what we ended up doing was folding the North King County's RADAR Navigator program with Kirkland's Community Responder program to form a new entity that's regional in nature, is going to have a lot more resources, will be operating more hours during the day - I think we're aiming towards 24/7, I don't think we're quite there yet - and will really be a resource for folks who are experiencing, or decompressing in public, or having some sort of other issues so that they'll get a response that actually meets them where they're at. And gets them help immediately rather than the other alternatives, which are the ER or jail - both of which we know are not ideal for anybody who's experiencing either an issue with drug addiction or a mental health issue. So yeah, it's exciting to see multiple cities all coming together to recognize the issue and working together - 'cause as individual cities, there's no way that we could have done this - little Kenmore could've never done this on our own. But working with other cities, we're gonna be delivering something that I think will be meaningful to folks who are experiencing issues out in the field, and I think we'll be getting better outcomes for everybody. And I think that's something we're very excited about. [00:04:00] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. You talk about how challenging this is for individual cities to address and to deal with. I do think it's notable that there was an attempt, a recognition by Kenmore that this was something that needed to be tackled. There was the RADAR program, previously in place, that you just mentioned - this was built on top of and leveraged with the region. How did the discussions go with the region? How did you get buy-in for taking this collaborative approach? And how did you work through the design of the program? How did that work, Brook? [00:04:34] Brook Buettner: We're very lucky in North King County that there was already a great deal of support for alternatives to police response for people in crisis. As you mentioned, the commitment to the RADAR Navigator program that had been going on for about four years prior to this conversation and showing really successful outcomes for folks. And across our elected officials, our police leadership, and our community, there was a strong commitment to doing things in a new way for people in crisis. And so it was a matter of not having to bring people on board, but just discussing what's our shared vision - what do we want our community to look like and how are we gonna get there? And so it was a big lift for city staff to come up with the agreement, the interlocal agreement, that governs this entity - but it was done pretty quickly in my experience and very well to where we have a strong and robust infrastructure to start really offering these alternative services to folks in crisis. [00:05:29] Crystal Fincher: Nigel, what advice would you give to other cities working through this process right now in terms of figuring out the agreements that are going to govern these collaborative approaches, getting buy-in from various stakeholders? How did that work in your experience and what guidance would you give other folks working through this? [00:05:48] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I think part of what made things work, where we are in North King County, was the fact that we'd already been partnering with other cities with RADAR. But we also have other regional models that we're used to - we're used to doing regional collaboration around here. Kenmore is part of ARCH, which is a regional coalition for housing - which is a multi-jurisdictional affordable housing developer that covers kind of Kenmore and then down to the Eastside. And so we're very used to working in a collaborative manner with our neighbors to address issues that we really can't do, again, by ourselves - we can do affordable housing, but it's very hard for a smaller city, right? It's a lot easier if people are pooling things together. So we already had those models that we were familiar with, which I think really helped some of the conversations - 'cause Kirkland's also part of ARCH, I think Bothell is too. So we're starting from a place where we understand how these models work. I think having trust between the cities is important also. We have good relationships with - I have good relationships with my colleagues in Kirkland and in Bothell and Lake Forest Park and Shoreline - I think that's helpful. And then also having staff that's willing to really dig into the details and work collaboratively with their colleagues is important. A lot of this came out of the fact that - and I think we all recognize this - the state and the county have largely been underfunding our mental health response for a long time. And even on our council, there was some pushback to - this should be a county response, this should be the county's responsibility. And I don't completely disagree with that assessment either, but I think we all recognize that something had to be done. And at the end of the day, sometimes cities just have to step up and figure out a way forward. And it's nice to see five cities coming together to work together towards a solution, while we try to figure out the larger long-term solutions that are truly regional and even statewide, frankly. [00:07:25] Crystal Fincher: So can you walk me through what your most frequent calls look like, feel like, what that process is? I think for a lot of people - they're familiar with the concept of alternative response, they're familiar with how important it is, and understanding that police can't do everything and they are not the most effective response for every kind of crisis - so having a tailored response that is most appropriate and most effective is really helpful. How, as you work through this, what does a typical call look like? What does a typical day look like? [00:07:58] Brook Buettner: In crisis, of course, there's no typical call or no typical day. But we are looking to deploy social workers or mental health professionals on any 911 call that comes in that has some identified component of behavioral health. So that's mental health, or substance use, or some social service need like a homelessness component, a family dynamic issue where it could be helpful to have a social worker there. And then the social workers - we call them crisis responders - the crisis responders are going either in the car with the police officer, or when possible in an independent vehicle and meeting the police officer on the scene. And we are stepping more and more in our community into the space of two crisis responders going to - responding to the scene - without a first responder. And that is really what we call the alternative response model. And it can be anything from somebody that has called 911 because they themselves, or somebody that they care about, is suicidal - has made suicidal statements or gestures. Or someone that is in a community space and is having mental health symptoms or substance use-driven symptoms that are causing them to be troubling to the other folks in that environment. To, like I said, family dynamics where someone calls 911, for example, because their teenager is so agitated and escalated that they become violent. And our crisis responders are very, very good at identifying what's going on, deescalating folks, bringing them down to a level of calm where they can talk through what's underlying the crisis. And then the crisis responder's job is to figure out what to bring to bear on the situation to alleviate the immediate crisis and then connect the person to the system of care so that they don't fall into crisis again. [00:09:33] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And it looks like you've structured the program on best practices for the continuum of behavioral health care starting with having someone to call - we have our 988 line, someone to respond - these crisis responders, and then having somewhere to go once it's determined where the appropriate place is for them to receive the help that they need. Especially when it comes to that somewhere to go, we just passed a county-wide behavioral health center levy that will fund a number of those services and staff. But that's been a big challenge in our region. How have you navigated through this in the program, Nigel, and how's it working? [00:10:14] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Well, I'm really excited. I mean, Kenmore and our partner cities - we're actually out ahead of King County a little bit and had been working in partnership for - I don't know, a little while now, I think going back to 2021 - really reflecting on the lack of a door for people to go to, a place for people to go to when they're in crisis. And working together, we identified funds and we identified a location, we identified our provider, and we will be opening up the first crisis response center for North King County. And again, it's the same cities - it's Kenmore, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, Bothell, and Kirkland - and we're excited to have this model here. They selected Connections Health Solutions, which is a national innovator in the space. They've done a lot of great work in Arizona, and that model is also what I believe the executive based his models off of. And they should be opening up next year, and it's gonna offer a place for people who are facing any sort of mental health issue or behavioral health issue - a place where they can go and actually talk with somebody, regardless of insurance, regardless of where they live, or any of that. It'll give people a place to go, which right now is severely lacking throughout the county. [00:11:23] Crystal Fincher: What happens when there is no place to go? [00:11:26] Brook Buettner: I can kind of speak to that. So in the past, when we encountered someone in the field in crisis, the options were either that they stay where they are, that they go to the emergency department, or an arrest and jail - if it's not safe for them to stay in the community setting or in the home where they are at - safe for themselves or safe for the people around them. And this allows us an alternative to say - Maybe the emergency department is not the right place, and certainly jail is not the right place for somebody in deep behavioral health crisis. We're gonna take them somewhere that we know will accept them, we know will allow them to stay, will provide robust psychiatric and behavioral healthcare, and do discharge planning so that they're walking out with a plan and a connection to ongoing care. Connections, in particular, has a model that has multiple levels of acuity and step-down so that if somebody comes in at the highest acuity, they're in one setting. And as they deescalate, as they get different treatment on board or medications on board, they can step down to a lower acuity setting and even to an outpatient model while they wait to get hooked up with the local behavioral health system of care. And Crystal, you mentioned the behavioral health continuum of care, and I love that you brought that up because this is - North King County is about to have, kind of the first in our state, fully-executed crisis continuum of care when this facility opens up and it's super exciting. [00:12:44] Crystal Fincher: It's very exciting and so necessary. And I appreciate you all doing the work to get this implemented to be a model for the region. Other areas are looking at this - some areas are eager to adopt this and have public safety agencies, police agencies that are willing partners. Others have some concerns and there's almost a concern of - Okay, is this competition for us? Are they looking to move us out? What feedback have you heard from law enforcement officials, and how have they said it's impacted their job and the work that they have to do? [00:13:19] Mayor Nigel Herbig: To be honest, I haven't heard anything negative from our police partners - Kenmore, like Shoreline, contracts with the King County Sheriff's Office - they've been great partners in this. I think our chief is always looking for better ways to interact with folks who are in crisis and this gives him another tool. This gives him more resources to address the problem at hand, rather than only having law enforcement resources to fall back on - and I think he views that as a positive. So I have not heard any pushback from our law enforcement community up in North King County around this, and I think they're looking forward to using this as a resource and being partners in this. [00:13:56] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. For years and years - going back a decade and more - have heard several officers, chiefs talk about how challenging it is to respond to calls where there's a behavioral health component, or there isn't any illegal activity per se but someone is clearly in crisis, or people are being impacted around them and an intervention needs to take place but a criminal or a legal intervention doesn't seem to be the most positive. Brook, what have you heard from officers who have co-responded on these, or who are looking forward to a complete alternative response? How are they saying it's impacting their work and their ability to do their job? [00:14:37] Brook Buettner: We have been extraordinarily lucky in North King County that we've had support from law enforcement leadership since the get-go. Law enforcement was who asked for this program initially five years ago, saying these are not the kind of calls that we're supposed to be on - we need help, we need support. And so it has been a journey to get all of the responding officers - patrol officers and deputies - socialized to this idea. But once an officer or a deputy sees it in action, it's an easy sell. So what we find is that the more interaction we are having with law enforcement, the more referrals we're getting because they see - wow, that works - or we'll let them know that the follow-up that we did ended up keeping somebody from falling into deep crisis again. And it becomes a really good alternative for them and a good tool in their tool belt. I also am really attentive to making sure that we maintain good relationships on a one-on-one basis with all of our law enforcement partners, so that it's not a pain to have a social worker along but rather a pleasure - to say we're a great team, we work well together. Both sides recognize that each role has something to bring to a highly escalated crisis situation, and both sides recognize where their limits are. And so it's just been a constant growth of support and of buy-in. I've heard from several chiefs that they see shift in the culture - in the willingness to talk about behavioral health in a new way among the community and also within the department - that it opens up conversations that otherwise may not have happened. So it has really been a positive for our five police agencies. [00:16:05] Crystal Fincher: I think that is really an outstanding observation. And strikes me as important, especially as we hear from several police agencies across the state really that they're trying to recruit, they're short on officers, they're having a tougher time on that - and needing to triage their time and resources, and response times being impacted, other things that they're saying are being impacted. How can this help manage the workload for officers and across the public safety continuum? How has that been working? [00:16:34] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Speaking for Kenmore, our officers, right - until we had RADAR in place and until we had these partnerships - if somebody was out on the street decompensating, yelling, screaming, doing something like - like you said earlier, that's not illegal, but is disruptive to the community and the person is obviously in crisis - the only response we had was a police response. And I think even our officers recognize that there are better ways for them to be spending their time than dealing with somebody who's decompensating. It's not what they were hired for, it's not what their expertise is in. And this gives them a tool so that they can - working with the social workers - find what the right response is, hand off the person to the social worker, and then get back to catching speeders or investigating break-ins or whatever it is that they could be doing rather than dealing with the guy who is having a breakdown. So I view this as actually an expansion of our response, if you will - it gives us the ability to respond to more calls on both sides of things, both law enforcement and people experiencing a crisis. [00:17:38] Crystal Fincher: How have you seen that play out, Brook? [00:17:40] Brook Buettner: It is absolutely allowing officers to focus more on life safety and law - criminal law issues - by kind of carving off this segment of the work that comes into the 911 system and routing it to the appropriate resource, the right tool at the right time. I see what we're doing as a third kind of branch of the first response system. Going back again to the continuum of care, the level of care that someone gets should be based on the acuity of their need and of their crisis. And we have outpatient behavioral health for folks that have behavioral health challenges that are at a low acuity level. We have other systems in place that are secondary responses for people that are in crisis. And when people are in very high acuity crisis and 911 is needed, we now have this first response behavioral health tool in our toolbox - that crisis responders that are skilled and trained and experienced in meeting people that are in the highest acuity level of behavioral health crisis, but still not committing a crime. So it is a 911 call - it's not necessarily a law enforcement need, but there is a need for a very high level response - and we're now able to provide that. [00:18:47] Crystal Fincher: Did you have anything to add, Nigel? [00:18:49] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Well, I was gonna say - I think a lot of this came out of the recognition that we've seen over the last 150 years that when your only response is a police response, the outcomes are not ideal. We have seen too many folks who are dealing with a mental health issue - and that is a huge section of our population - it's not something we talk about, but a huge proportion of folks are dealing with some sort of mental health issue. And just because somebody is having a very hard day doesn't mean that they should end up in jail or be put at risk, frankly, of a police interaction. We know that sometimes those interactions can turn out tragically. And being thrown into jail or worse, because you're experiencing a mental health issue, can ruin somebody's life or - and frankly, can ruin not only their lives, but also their kids' lives. When we enter somebody into the criminal justice system, it has long-lasting effects on not just the person impacted, but also their family, their kids, their kids' kids - it can have multigenerational effects on people. And we've seen that play out over the last, well, 50, 100 years. This gives folks, this gives our police officers a different response. And I think it's - that's what I'm excited about - I'm excited that people who are experiencing mental health issues can actually get the treatment they need rather than a pure law enforcement response, because nobody deserves to go to jail because they're having a breakdown. [00:20:12] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And it's a shift in how we've been doing things. What are the results that you're seeing from this? Obviously, people are looking to justify these expenditures and implement these in their own areas. What results are you seeing when it comes to amount of calls, recidivism? I know in some other cities, they talk about how many calls come in about behavioral health issues that aren't someone breaking the law but that are someone in crisis, as you've talked about, and how much time that takes up, how many repeated calls those spur, and how much time that demands - just the amount, enormous amount, of resources that demands. How are you seeing that impacted and what results are you seeing from this program? [00:20:55] Brook Buettner: Directly to your question, Crystal, we don't have a lot of data yet on reduction in 911 calls, or 911 dispatch center or officer time. I do have some outcome data though that our King County partners were able to pull together for us for the RADAR Navigator program - that folks that were touched by the RADAR Navigator program - in two years following that program touch, we saw a 67% reduction in adult jail bookings. And that is a tremendous impact. We saw a 60% reduction in behavioral health crisis events. And that is measured by King County's Department of Community and Human Services who oversees the behavioral health system crisis response. They also experienced a smaller 4% reduction in emergency department visits. And of the folks that our program touched, 14% were subsequently enrolled in publicly funded behavioral health services. And I think that's a significant undercount because a lot of the folks in our community do have private pay insurance and so there would be no way to count that. But we know that interaction with this program results in a reduction in jail, a reduction in crisis services, and an increase in engagement with the behavioral health system. And those are all big wins. And to your specific questions, those are the kind of things we're gonna be looking at in our program analysis as we go on. How is this saving on 911 calls? How is this saving on officer time? My dream is that we capture the cost savings of reduction in jail nights and say - let's put that back into the earlier end of the continuum of care and fund diversion, and ultimately fund a robust system of community-based behavioral health care so that people don't fall into crisis. Again, I wanna say we're extraordinarily lucky that our electeds and our city staff are all so interested and committed to doing this kind of analysis and thinking in this way. [00:22:37] Crystal Fincher: Thanks - I appreciate that data, that information - it's really, really powerful. And what strikes me hearing that is that when you talk about being booked into jail, emergency room visits - these are the most expensive parts of our system to use and to utilize. And savings on these are incredible - I'm looking at that reduction in the jail number, and that is a budget-altering number right there. Pretty incredible. And I recognize this is a newer program - certainly you've done the work with the RADAR program, this predecessor, and getting the data there. I'm sure more will be rolling in as this continues and you move on, so that's great. Did you have something you wanted to add, Brook? [00:23:16] Brook Buettner: Yeah, just a thought that this is what we sometimes call a different purse problem - that each of these reductions affects a different financial system. And so part of our work is gonna be pulling together those cost offsets and making sure that the savings are redirected appropriately to meeting people's needs. [00:23:34] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, that is such an incredible problem in the public sector - yeah, this is saving a billion dollars, but if that's spread across a ton of different budgets in different ways, it's a whole different animal than someone handing someone basically a rebate check for a billion dollars. As you look forward, you talked about moving forward and moving towards a program where it truly is an alternative response where there are one or two crisis responders who respond to these calls without law enforcement initially - they can certainly call them in if it's warranted or they need backup. How do you see this progressing with that change and beyond it? What are the plans? [00:24:14] Brook Buettner: First, I'll say that the primary challenge that stands between us and a pure alternative response system is the dispatch question - and the ability to understand when a 911 call comes in, what's really going on - and that is often not clear from a 911 call. So we really wanna work through this very carefully with all of our partners and make sure that we're doing the outreach in a way that's safe and appropriate, that meets people's needs, but also keeps our responders safe. And so that is probably my work for the next two years - is digging into - How do we do call receiving? How do we triage? And then how do we appropriately dispatch the right resource? I have kind of been moving from calling it alternative response to thinking of it as a behavioral health first response. Whatever - when someone is in behavioral health crisis - whatever resource is the right resource. And I can see, for example, that being a crisis responder plus an EMT when someone has or has stated that they will take too much medication - and that's a medical plus a mental health need. Whereas if there's maybe a weapon in play, then that's a law enforcement plus a mental health need. And so thinking of it as a first response system with all of the tools that we need available to our dispatchers. [00:25:27] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Nigel? [00:25:28] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I think something that Brook kind of glossed over a little bit - but I think is an important thing that we're gonna have to work out - is the fact that we're using multiple different police. We have different police forces, if you will, and different dispatch systems. So like I said earlier, in Shoreline and Kenmore you have King County Sheriff's Office and they're dispatched in one way. And then Lake Forest Park and Bothell, they have their own. And Kirkland, they have their own police officers and they're dispatched differently. And so it does create - it is a complication that I believe we'll work through. And I know with Brook's leadership, that'll get worked out - but it's not as straightforward as just having one dispatch system that we need to educate and get up to speed. [00:26:06] Crystal Fincher: How is this being funded? How much did you have to come up with as individual cities in this regional partnership? How is the funding talked about? Because this is something that has been kind of thorny when we look at the Regional Homelessness Authority, but with this collaboration, how does this work, Nigel? [00:26:25] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I can't get into what the specific numbers are we're spending - I do know it's more than what we were with RADAR. Part of that is because we're expanding things from - we're approaching 24/7 is part of the goal. Part of this is also funded by King County MIDD, the Mental - oh, I don't remember - [00:26:41] Crystal Fincher: I know - I always try to remember what MIDD stands for. [00:26:43] Brook Buettner: Mental Illness Drug Dependency. [00:26:45] Crystal Fincher: Thank you. [00:26:46] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Thank you, I was just digging around. [00:26:48] Crystal Fincher: Very, very useful. [00:26:50] Mayor Nigel Herbig: No, super useful - and they're the reason why we were able to do RADAR and test out, essentially test out the model, set the foundation for where we are now - is because of the MIDD funding. And we're very thankful to King County and Councilmember Dembowski for his help with that. Our expenses are definitely higher than they were in previous years with RADAR - there's no question around that, and it was part of our budget discussions last year. But I think it's something that we're all committed to because we do see the long-term payoffs - not just on our budgets, but frankly in outcomes - and all the councils seem fairly committed to that. So I believe that they - I wasn't involved in these negotiations, staff was - but I believe that they were negotiating based on population and number of hours that would be required to cover each jurisdiction, and then breaking up the cost and using some sort of formula that we all agreed to. Brook can probably speak a little bit more to that, but we got to a place where everybody was comfortable with the investments that we'd be making. [00:27:47] Crystal Fincher: Sure, Brook? [00:27:48] Brook Buettner: Yeah, so like Mayor Herbig said, the MIDD funding has been really foundational to piloting this as the RADAR Navigator Program and even to the expansion. We also have some funding through the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs' Trueblood dollars for Mental Health First, or Field Response teams. And we have had some support from the Association of Washington Cities. And then I'm so delighted that starting this year, we have general fund contribution from each of our five cities. It is per capita-based at this time. We have plans to really keep a close eye on utilization and think about whether some cities have higher utilization and that may affect their contribution rate. But I also have plans to get the payers on the hook for this as well. So when we talked about the wrong purse problem - a 4% reduction in emergency department visits is a big bonus for insurers and for the managed care organizations. And King County Department of Community and Human Services and the behavioral health services organization have been thinking about this as well. How do we get the private insurers to be picking up what they are supposed to be covering for their covered lives around crisis services? There are a couple of folks at the State Legislature that are really thinking carefully about this. And I see us as being kind of a test case outside the traditional behavioral healthcare system to be reimbursed by the health payers for this service that ends up with better outcomes and lower costs over time. [00:29:07] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. As we move to close this, what advice do you have to other cities approaching this? And what would you tell residents about why this is so useful and so important? [00:29:21] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I think I would advise other cities to take a look at their 911 calls, talk with their police officers - see what sort of calls they're responding to that maybe they're not the best equipped first responder for. I don't think police officers enjoy these sorts of calls on their own. I also think that you can point towards the outcomes that we will have around better results for the people involved, better results for the community, and frankly, cost savings at the end of the day when it comes to jail days and ER visits. And other cities might be big enough to do this on their own, which will make their lives a little bit easier and all of that. But I think other cities - and if you're looking in other parts of the county, there are places where there are multiple cities all right next to each other that could, if they wanted to, join together and do this sort of work. And I would encourage them to have those conversations and really ask themselves - What do they want the response to be when somebody calls 911 in crisis? Because I don't think anybody actually thinks the right answer is a person with a badge and a gun. And I think people need to really reflect on that, and really think about how they truly serve the people that they are working for, and make sure they're doing that in the best and most responsive and person-centered way possible. And this is, I think, a huge step in that direction. [00:30:36] Crystal Fincher: Any final words from you, Brook? [00:30:38] Brook Buettner: I love what Mayor Herbig said - just asking yourselves - What is it that we want people in crisis to get from our first response system? And then from my social-worky side, building relationships across jurisdictions and across sectors to bring - this is very complex - so to bring all the players to the table to offer the kind of response that people deserve when they're in crisis. [00:30:59] Crystal Fincher: Well, thank you both to Brook Buettner, Mayor Herbig - sincerely appreciate you spending time with us today and helping to educate us on what's going on there in the north part of the County. And it's certainly a lot to reflect on and hopefully emulate moving forward. Thank you both. [00:31:16] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Thank you. [00:31:17] Brook Buettner: Thank you so much for having us. [00:31:18] Crystal Fincher: Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is produced by Shannon Cheng. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on every podcast service and app - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

On this Tuesday topical show, special guest host Shannon Cheng and fellow co-organizer with People Power Washington, Amy Sundberg, delve into everything they wish people knew about the looming Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG) contract. The conversation starts by outlining the outsize control the SPOG contract has on the City of Seattle's police accountability system, the City budget, and efforts to civilianize jobs that don't require an armed response. Amy and Shannon then break down a soon-to-be-considered Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the City and SPOG - what each side gets, its fiscal impacts, whether the agreement will have any effect on SPD understaffing, and why the already-disappointing dual dispatch pilot is worse than they thought. Next, the two non-labor lawyers try to explain why any attempt to offload roles from an overworked police department entails lengthy negotiation and sign off from SPOG, how SPD continues to be understaffed despite best efforts to counter attrition, and what might happen if City electeds stood up to the police guild. Finally, in anticipation of a full SPOG contract coming out sometime in the next year, they discuss why the MOU is a bad omen of what is to come, how the process is designed to exclude public input, the difference between police guilds and labor unions, a stalled attempt at a state legislative solution, what Councilmember Mosqueda stepping down from the Labor Relations Policy Committee means - and wrap up with Amy giving Shannon a powerful pep talk! As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the guest host, Shannon Cheng, on Twitter at @drbestturtle and find Amy Sundberg at @amysundberg.   Amy Sundberg Amy Sundberg is the publisher of Notes from the Emerald City, a weekly newsletter on Seattle politics and policy with a particular focus on public safety, police accountability, and the criminal legal system. She also writes about public safety for The Urbanist. She organizes with Seattle Solidarity Budget and People Power Washington. In addition, she writes science fiction and fantasy, with a new novel, TO TRAVEL THE STARS, a retelling of Pride and Prejudice set in space, available now. She is particularly fond of Seattle's parks, where she can often be found walking her little dog.   Shannon Cheng Shannon Cheng is the producer of Hacks & Wonks and new to being in front of the mic rather than behind the scenes. She organizes for equitable public safety in Seattle and King County with People Power Washington and for state-wide policies to reduce police violence and increase accountability with the Washington Coalition for Police Accountability. She also works on computational lighting technology, strives to be a better orienteer, and enjoys exploring the world in an adventure truck with her husband and her cat.   Resources Notes from the Emerald City   People Power Washington - Sign up for our mailing list   How the SPOG Contract Stands in the Way of Police Accountability with Shannon Cheng from Hacks & Wonks   Council Budget Action to authorize Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the City and the Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG) | Seattle City Council   “City Council Agrees to Pay Cops Double Time for Working Special Events” by Ashley Nerbovig from The Stranger   “Will Seattle Pay SPOG a Premium to Let Others Help SPD with its Staffing Woes?” by Amy Sundberg from Notes from the Emerald City   “Harrell's Dual-Responder Proposal Would Fail to Civilianize Crisis Response” by Amy Sundberg from The Urbanist   Better Behavioral Health Crisis Response with Brook Buettner and Kenmore Mayor Nigel Herbig from Hacks & Wonks   Labor Relations in the City of Seattle | Seattle City Council Central Staff   Labor Relations Policy Committee | City of Seattle Human Resources   “Firefighters' Tentative Contract Could be Bad News for Other City Workers Seeking Pay Increases” by Erica C. Barnett from PubliCola   “Police Unions: What to Know and Why They Don't Belong in the Labor Movement” by Kim Kelly for Teen Vogue   “Seattle Police Officers Guild expelled from King County's largest labor council” by Elise Takahama from The Seattle Times   SB 5134 - 2021-22 | Enhancing public trust and confidence in law enforcement and strengthening law enforcement accountability for general authority Washington peace officers, excluding department of fish and wildlife officers.   SB 5677 - 2021-22 | Enhancing public trust and confidence in law enforcement and strengthening law enforcement accountability, by specifying required practices for complaints, investigations, discipline, and disciplinary appeals for serious misconduct. Labor 4 Black Lives - Seattle   DivestSPD   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review show and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. [00:00:52] Shannon Cheng: Hello everyone! This is Shannon Cheng, producer of Hacks & Wonks. You have me again today as your special guest host. Today, I'm super excited to have a fellow co-organizer with People Power Washington with me, Amy Sundberg, who also writes Notes from the Emerald City. And we were wanting to have a conversation about the Seattle police contract negotiations as they relate to the Seattle Police Officers Guild, or SPOG. We're hoping to break down what is a dense but very important topic for our listeners. Amy, do you have any thoughts on this before we get started? [00:01:29] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, I mean, I think it's really important whenever we talk about police guilds that we make the distinction that just because we might be being critical about police unions, police guilds - that in general, we are very supportive of labor and that there are many reasons why police guilds are different than all other labor that hopefully we'll have a chance to get into later in this episode. But until then, just to be clear - in general, we support workers' rights, we support workers organizing for better conditions in the workplace, and that is not a negotiable part of our philosophy. [00:02:06] Shannon Cheng: Yes, 100% - completely agree. We in no way are saying that workers' rights are not important. They absolutely are. Police are entitled to have living wages, but there are also issues that crop up with the way that negotiations happen in Washington state that sometimes are counter to other goals that we have as a society. So before we jump in, I wanna talk about what impact does the police contract have in the City of Seattle? So one aspect that I've been following super closely for the last many years is that the current police accountability system that we have here in Seattle - you may have heard of it before, it's composed of three independent bodies. There's the OPA or the Office of Police Accountability, the OIG or Office of Inspector General, and the CPC, the Community Police Commission. This three-body accountability structure - the powers that they have are completely governed by what the SPOG contract says that they have. And you may have heard that we had a strong accountability ordinance passed back in 2017 - establishing these bodies and giving them authority. Yet the following year in 2018, we passed a SPOG contract that rolled back a lot of those accountability provisions. So oftentimes I hear community members frustrated that we aren't able to hold an SPD officer accountable for something egregious that has happened. And it all goes back to the accountability system and what has been written in the SPOG contract. [00:03:44] Amy Sundberg: I would also just say that this is one of the reasons that police guilds are different from other unions - is because they are currently negotiating these sorts of accountability provisions in their contracts. And they're the only workers that are negotiating for the right to potentially kill other people, right? They're armed. And so it's a different matter because of the stakes involved. [00:04:09] Shannon Cheng: Yes, a very big difference. I used to be a union member of Unite Here Local 8 - I worked at a restaurant. And we had accountability measures in our contract, but it was for things like if I didn't charge a customer for a bread basket. And the consequences of me not charging $1.95 for the company I work for is very different than an officer using excessive deadly force to kill a community member. So stakes are completely different. So beyond the accountability system, the SPOG contract also has a huge impact on city funding and what the City budget looks like every year. We did an episode recently about the budget and how the police have an outsize portion of that - do you wanna talk a little bit more about that, Amy? [00:04:57] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, so the contract will determine how much money is flowing into SPD. And right now, SPD gets about a quarter of our general fund - so that's the part of the budget that can be allocated to anything that isn't already tied up via statute. So a quarter of the general fund, which is a significant amount of the money that we have available to us as a city. And the question always is - Is that number gonna grow? And how much of the general fund are we as a city comfortable with SPD taking up? That is a question that is decided basically in this contract. [00:05:32] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, 'cause the contract sets the pay rates and raises that SPD will receive. And I think we've heard from a lot of other city unions that are also currently bargaining their contracts that there's this issue that a lot of them are being offered raises that aren't keeping up with the cost of living. For example, the Firefighters, the Coalition of City Unions. So it will be interesting to observe and see, when the eventual SPOG contract comes out, what kind of raises do they get and how do they compare to other city workers? The final thing that I think the police contract holds a lot of power over is something that we know is extremely popular in the city. When we've done poll after poll, people really want to see an alternate crisis response available to community members. We know that police are not the best at deescalating crisis response situations. And sometimes it's very harmful - and actually escalates - and has led to deaths of community members. So we've been struggling as a city to stand up some kind of alternate crisis response since the summer of 2020. And unfortunately the SPOG contract has been a huge obstacle in the way of that. Could you explain that more for us, Amy? [00:06:44] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, I would say first of all, that definitely this alternate emergency crisis response is a big part of this, but the contract stands in the way of civilianization in general overall. So this is one big piece of that, but it also means that if there are jobs that we feel like should be done by civilians who are not armed - besides crisis response - that also gets decided in the contract. So I do think that's important to talk about. [00:07:10] Shannon Cheng: So that's why keeping an eye on this police contract is really important. It really does hold the key to so many facets of the change that we want to see in our city. Let's now talk about what's been happening more recently. During the Seattle budget process, we learned that the City had come to a possible temporary agreement with SPOG, which they call an MOU, or a Memorandum of Understanding. To be clear, this is not the final full contract that we do expect to see with SPOG eventually, and that we've been waiting for for several years now. The previous contract expired at the end of 2020, and they have been in negotiations for about three years at this time. So this MOU came out. It was meant to address what some electeds are calling "emergent needs" of the city. And they had to do this during the budget process because it had budget implications that needed to be approved. Do you want to tell us a little bit about what's in this MOU? [00:08:16] Amy Sundberg: Yes, I would love to. I'm glad that you emphasized this is different than the actual SPOG contract. It is temporary, and it is to address these "emergent needs," so to speak. So it does have an expiry date of the beginning of January of 2026. So I just want to get that out there first. But the MOU accomplishes three main things for the City, and then we'll talk about what it gives SPOG. So the three main things that it accomplishes for the City are - first of all, it would allow the City flexibility to sometimes use parking enforcement officers or other civilians to staff special events. They certainly wouldn't be the only people staffing special events, but perhaps they could do things like traffic control that don't really require a sworn armed officer to do. It would allow the City to use park rangers at parks outside of downtown. Right now, they have an agreement that park rangers can only be used in downtown parks. But last year, they started a huge expansion of the Park Ranger program, so now they have a lot more park rangers - or they're in the process of hiring them - and would like to be able to expand to use them at all the parks in the city. And the third thing it would do is allow the City to implement its new dual dispatch emergency alternative response program. Basically, the pilot just launched this past October. And it turns out that if this MOU is not approved - which it is not currently signed yet - it's not actually true dual dispatch yet, from my understanding. What was said in all of the press briefings and all of the communications is that how this program is supposed to work is that there's dual dispatch, so that means that SPD will go out at the same time as the alternative responders - CARE responders, I'm gonna call them. They go out at the same time. But apparently right now, they're not actually allowed to be dispatched at the same time because this MOU hasn't been approved. So the police have to go first, and then they can request to have an alternate CARE responder team come out after they arrive. So that is not how I understood this was going to work, and if this MOU is approved, then it will be able to work the way it's been described previously. [00:10:38] Shannon Cheng: Okay, so there's a difference between what we've seen from press releases and press briefings about this new dual dispatch pilot within the CARE department to what is actually possible right now without this MOU. [00:10:53] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, and my guess - and this is me guessing, to be clear - my guess is that, of course, people involved knew that this MOU was being developed, knew that this agreement was being developed. And so when they launched the pilot, they explained how it was gonna work if this MOU was signed, even though it hadn't been signed yet - in maybe a burst of hope that that's how it would turn out. As well, I imagine, because of - you're not allowed to talk about things that are going on in negotiations at the labor table, so they probably weren't allowed to talk about it. And instead of getting into the nitty-gritty of it and confusing people, that they might have decided - for simplicity's sake - explain it the way they did. But, you know, of course, now we know that that wasn't entirely accurate. [00:11:38] Shannon Cheng: Okay, so basically, what we had seen in the past that was all this glowing announcement about this new dual dispatch pilot should have a giant big asterisk next to it because they had not actually completed what needed to be done to be able to launch it in the way that they were talking about it. I do wanna eventually dig deeper into what the MOU specifically says about the dual dispatch, but first, we've talked about what the City is getting out of this agreement. And to be clear, even though this isn't the full contract, this is something that was negotiated with SPOG. And so I think that it's important for us to look at because it gives us a little hint as to how negotiations with SPOG are going. So we've heard what the City is getting. So what is SPOG getting out of this negotiation? [00:12:21] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, so what they have now in the MOU is that they want to give officers who volunteer to staff special events a special additional bonus. So it would be $225 bonus for each special event shift that they volunteer to do. And that's in addition to overtime. So what The Stranger reported, which I actually think is a really helpful way to think about it, is that this bonus basically means that officers will be getting paid double time for any shifts that they work - that they volunteered for - for special events. Normally, overtime is time and a half. So instead of time and a half, they're getting double time. However, if they finally reach an agreement on the full SPOG contract, the bonus would not necessarily increase - so it's not tied to their current wages. [00:13:15] Shannon Cheng: Okay, so let me get this right. We are giving SPOG extra bonuses to work shifts they already get paid overtime for. And in exchange, they are letting us let them work less at some of these special events. Is that a fair characterization? [00:13:33] Amy Sundberg: I mean, possibly. It's a little bit - to be honest, I'll be interested to see how it plays out because I don't know how much less they actually will end up working. So we might just be paying more to get the same thing, or we might be paying more for them to work less so that parking enforcement officers can take a few of their jobs. It's unclear how this will work out in practice. [00:13:59] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, I've heard some of the discussion of this. We all know, or we've been told over and over again from many quarters, that SPD is very understaffed, that the officers are overworked, that people are upset that response times are slow - and everybody blames the fact that there aren't enough officers to do the amount of work that is out there for them. So part of trying to offer these special event shift bonuses is that right now for these shifts, when they ask people to volunteer - if they don't get enough volunteers, my understanding is that they go by seniority. And so maybe some of the newer officers are made to work these extra shifts, thereby making them even more overworked than they already are. So some of the thinking behind this is that if they offer this bonus to sweeten the deal in terms of working these extra shifts, that perhaps some of the higher senior-ranked officers would be willing to take some of these volunteer shifts and thereby spread the workload out better across SPD. But this doesn't actually do anything to help with the overall understaffing issue, right? We still have the same number of officers doing the same amount of work, unless they do agree to let some of these other parking enforcement officers take over some of the shifts. [00:15:23] Amy Sundberg: Right, and unless there are actually shifts available for those parking enforcement officers to take after whoever has volunteered has volunteered. So it kind of depends how they set it up. I will say, I think what you said is exactly what the City and SPD has been saying - I think that's a very accurate characterization. But I've also heard from other sources that special event shifts are actually pretty popular among officers and that it's a nice way to make extra money potentially - because it is paid overtime, and now double time. So that's why I'm not really sure how this is gonna play out in practice. And just to talk about the overall impact of what offering this bonus does to the budget - because this was just passed in our 2024 budget now. This Memorandum of Understanding would start October 1st, 2023. And like I said, it would go to the beginning of January 2026. And we are paying $4.5 million - that would cover from October of this year 'til the end of next year. And then we'll be paying another $3.6 million for 2025 to cover these special event bonuses. So altogether, it's a little more than $8 million for a little bit over two years of bonuses. For at least this next year, the money came from a reserve fund. But again, this is $4.5 million that is being spent on these bonuses instead of on any other pressing needs that the city might have. Just to name one, we gave a big cut to mental health services in tiny home villages. And if those tiny home villages don't have these services, certain people who have more acute needs cannot live there. So it's gonna really impact who is able to live in a tiny home village going forward. So that is one thing that we cut in 2024 - we have much less money for that now. Obviously, there are lots of needs in the city though, so that's just one example. [00:17:24] Shannon Cheng: That's really good for us to understand - what is a concrete example of what we're giving up in order to give these bonuses to the police officer. So this really matters because we're in a time of budget shortfalls, both current and upcoming. We're being told that SPD is overworked, and yet we're in this state where we're being asked to pay SPOG more money to maybe do less work and accept help for tasks that they said they're not good at. And I'm talking about this dual dispatch co-responder program. So why don't we turn to that and get a little bit more into the weeds and delve into what is problematic about how this dual dispatch pilot is set up. I think there's been a lot of talk about the alternate crisis response that we've been trying to set up in the city. I think it's evolved a lot over time. And something that I want people to appreciate about all this is that all this talk fundamentally doesn't matter unless we have the agreement of SPOG - that they will accept how we want to do things. And this MOU is the first time that I have seen - spelled out - some of the details of what our dual dispatch program could look like. Amy, I know you've been following this for a very long time. I think you've been at pretty much every meeting that's been about this topic. And so - of people in the world who I think would know how we've ended up at this dual dispatch program, you could tell us about that whole history. So I will turn it to you. [00:19:04] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, I can. And I will say, I wrote an article about this for The Urbanist, I think, a couple of months ago. We'll link to it in the show notes. I will say it was a very hard piece to write because I have been following this since 2020 in all of its little details. And then I was trying to boil it down into a thousand words - explaining to someone who maybe knew very little about this - what exactly had been going on for the past three or so years. I do recommend you check that out. But it has been a very frustrating process, I will say. We started talking about some kind of alternative crisis response in summer of 2020 because of the George Floyd protests. And we had a few, I would say, champions on the city council who really wanted to see this happen. So it wasn't that there was nobody advocating for this - there definitely was. Councilmember Lewis in particular, and also Councilmember Herbold - both very strong proponents of having some type of program like this in Seattle. But what we saw was just obstacle after obstacle, after hurdle after hurdle, and just a lot of back and forth, a lot of dragging feet from both the executive's office - both previous Mayor Durkan and current Mayor Harrell - and a lot of dragging of the feet of SPD. You can kind of chart it out and see the strategy of making this take as long as possible, which I do in that article I was talking about. But I think one of the most powerful things I can do is compare Seattle to another city who did it differently. So in Seattle, we have this new pilot now through the CARE Department. It has six responders hired. They are focused, I think, only in the downtown area. And they work 11 a.m. to 11 p.m, so it's not 24/7 coverage - because there's only six of them, right? There's only so much you can do with six people, and they work in teams of two. So that is what we have. That just got stood up a month ago, month and a half ago - very recently. And like I said, it's not even a true dual dispatch until the MOU gets signed. And frankly, I was very disappointed that it was a dual dispatch at all. So that's what we've finally accomplished in Seattle after all of these years of politicking - versus Albuquerque. So Albuquerque, first of all, it's a little bit smaller than Seattle - maybe about 200,000 fewer people live in Albuquerque. So keep that in mind when we think about scale, right? So they also are under a consent decree, just as we have been, for a slightly shorter amount of time - but for a long time as well. So that is comparable in some ways. But in 2020, they took seriously the call from community to start some kind of emergency alternative response to respond to crisis calls. And in 2023, they budgeted $11.7 million to their response, which has been growing over the last several years. They now have over 70 responders employed to do this alternative emergency response. Their teams respond to calls related to homelessness, substance abuse, and mental health, as well as calls related to things like used needles and abandoned vehicles. And they are allowed to answer calls on their own, and they don't have to go out with the police. And they talk a lot about how what they're doing is using a public health approach. This is Albuquerque. And I guess I didn't mention earlier, but Seattle - what we are paying for our alternative response program for 2024 is $1.8 million. $1.8 million versus $11.7 million. And Albuquerque is smaller. [00:22:46] Shannon Cheng: That's incredible. And also I wanna call out - so $1.8 million is a little over a third of the bonuses that we are giving SPOG in this MOU to have them maybe work less special event shifts. That is just mind blowing - the difference in scale of what we're willing to put money towards. [00:23:08] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, and the Albuquerque program has been so successful, they keep scaling up. And they've scaled up pretty quickly - it's really impressive. So kudos to them. I really appreciate that they're offering us a vision of what could be, but it certainly is not what we have been doing here in Seattle - which is really disappointing, especially given how strongly people that live here reacted to the murder of George Floyd and how long those protesters were out there - night after night after night asking for something better, right? And we look now at where we are and like - well, we haven't given people something better. That's just - I mean, that's my opinion, but I think it's also - if you look at the facts, it's pretty backed up by facts. [00:23:53] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, and by polling. And I agree, it's been really frustrating to see other places around the country continue to lap us - even locally here. I don't feel like it's talked about very much, but we did do a show with them here on Hacks & Wonks. So up north, there's a five-city consortium that is Bothell, Kenmore, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and Kirkland. And what they started with - they didn't start out immediately with full civilian-led crisis response. I think something that people are concerned about in standing up these programs is that they're worried - well, what if the crisis responder comes across something that they can't handle and they get hurt? - that kind of question. And that's why they're arguing that they need this police backup. There's all sorts of things about that - I mean, I would say sometimes the police tend to actually escalate these situations and make them more dangerous, and thereby I'm not sure that having the police backup would actually help. So what happened with this five-city consortium is that they started out with a program within the King County Sheriff's Office called RADAR. And it was a co-response model where a sheriff's deputy and the crisis responder co-responded to a situation. And I believe that it was more equal - that the co-responder had agency in these calls. It wasn't just the sheriff's deputy making all the decisions. But what happened is that over time - and I feel like it was a relatively short amount of time, like on the order of one to two years - the sheriff's deputies realized, You know what? We're not really needed at these calls. And it's actually really boring for us to sit around, watch a crisis responder who's skilled deescalate a situation, and I could spend my time better doing something else. And so that's actually what's happening. This program has now evolved into something called the Regional Crisis Response Agency, which is civilian-led. And they're not yet, I think, at 24/7 coverage, but they're working towards that. And so this is happening literally just north of us, okay? So it is possible here in Washington state - I know that there've been comments made that some of these other places, maybe they have different state labor laws that might affect things. But fundamentally, I think the difference is whether the police guild is willing to work with the program and allow it to happen. So I think for whatever reason, with the King County Sheriff's Office - they were more open to accepting this kind of program, and letting it grow and evolve, and thereby taking workload off of them. Whereas here in Seattle, we don't really see that same situation with SPOG. [00:26:33] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, I've been really interested in this consortium of cities that has done this. I think that is, from what I understand, it's not an uncommon path for these programs to take - to start out with more of a police presence and then kind of realize over time, Oh, maybe this isn't actually necessary, and to evolve in that way. So I mean, there is certainly hope that Seattle could do the same thing. We're just very far behind in terms of timing. And there's also - while there is hope, there's no guarantee that it will develop that way. [00:27:08] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, I would say that a lot of what I'm seeing happening in Seattle now is putting a lot of trust in faith that SPOG is going to allow certain things to happen, or not stand in the way, or not demand exorbitant amounts of money to get the things that the City wants. And I don't know that - looking at past history of our dealings with SPOG - that we can really trust that that's how things are gonna go. I mean, they have social media accounts that literally post made up images of a public safety index that has no relation to reality - doing fearmongering about whether people in the city feel safe or not. I just don't see them as being good faith participants in working with us on measures that make the public feel safe that doesn't involve the police department. [00:28:04] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, I agree with you. I am also concerned - certainly that's been part of my motivation for following this story so closely over the last several years. Because like I said, there's no - just because it's gone like that in other cities does not mean that it will happen that way here. And as we see, in fact, it hasn't. The type of program that Albuquerque has developed doesn't look very much like what we have developed in the same amount of time. So no guarantees then - just hopes, thoughts and prayers, which doesn't necessarily get you very far. [00:28:36] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, so I guess what was spelled out in this MOU about the dual dispatch that I found concerning is that it really looks like the police officer has authority over almost every aspect of what the alternate - well, I don't even know that we can call it an alternate crisis response - what the dual dispatch looks like. They get to decide when and if it's safe for the crisis responder to enter the scene. They get to decide whether they leave or not. The MOU specifically says that it doesn't affect the number of officers who respond to the incident. So if you're worried about understaffing and needing less officers going to some of these calls, that's not in this MOU. Something that really worried me is that even if the officer decides that the crisis responder can handle the situation - afterwards, the crisis responder will file the incident report within the police department's system. And so - I think in 2020, what we heard was a lot of community members coming out saying that they do not feel safe calling the police when they or a loved one is undergoing a crisis. And so if the solution we're offering now is one where police show up and even if they don't participate, they get record of what happened with the loved one - this kind of goes against everything that was being asked for, and it is still not going to serve people in the city who don't wanna use police for these situations. [00:30:08] Amy Sundberg: I agree. I don't think that it is what community was asking for. There definitely are people who don't feel safe calling the police who aren't gonna want their information then transferred to a police database to potentially be used later. I will say that one thing the MOU does do - that wasn't particularly clear from the original press release about it - is that it does allow a police officer to clear a scene while not being physically present. So it does clear the way for potentially calls being answered only by the CARE responders and not actually having a police officer there as well. So that is important to note, but even if that is happening, there will still be information about that filed into the police database - in SPD's database. So that is part of the agreement, part of what is being memorialized here. Also, the scope of the program is defined by this agreement, and I find that quite troubling. The number of responders allowed to be hired by the end of 2025, beginning of 2026 is 24 full-time. 24. So just to remind you, Albuquerque - smaller than us - has more than 70, and they were able to ramp that up in two to three years. So we're talking about a two-year ramp up here. If we were serious about this program, we could definitely ramp up above 24, but we will not be able to because of what this MOU says. We are limited to 24 - that's all we'll be able to do. And then the other thing that I found very interesting is that this MOU limits the call types that CARE responders will be allowed to answer to person down calls and welfare check calls. So there will be no ability to expand beyond those two call types, regardless of how anything might change in the interim. I thought that was really interesting because during one of the hearings - when they had Amy Smith, who is the director of the new CARE Department, people were really interested in the call types, right? What call types would be answered? Yes, right now it's person down and welfare check, but could we expand that later? And she seemed, to me, to be kind of reluctant to answer - kept heading off and being like, Well, first we need to expand to 24/7 coverage. Which reasonable, fair enough - but after reading this MOU, I was like, Oh, and also they won't be allowed to expand, so it's a moot point, right? These are the two call types, and that's all that they're gonna be able to do - period. [00:32:43] Shannon Cheng: So let's back out a little bit because this is something that I know I have been confused about for a long time. And to be clear, I am not a labor lawyer - if there's any labor lawyers listening to this and who can help explain this to me better, I would really appreciate it. But you hear about all these types of calls that we acknowledge - and I think even sometimes SPD acknowledges that they are not the best first responders for. So why is it that we have to go through this whole negotiation process - and whether it's through an MOU or the full contract - why does that have to happen before we can offload work from an understaffed department to other people who are better at the job? [00:33:26] Amy Sundberg: Well, Shannon, I am also not a labor lawyer, but I will do my best. From what I understand, workers have bodies of work. So you have to negotiate if you wanna take away any piece of that body of work and give it to a different worker. So that's what we're looking at here - because these are considered SPD's body of work. However, you make a really compelling point in that - for years now, SPD has been talking with increasing urgency about how understaffed they are, about the staffing crisis. And we know that this staffing crisis of police departments is not just here in Seattle - it's nationwide. Police departments all across the country are facing the exact same staffing shortages that we are here in Seattle. So obviously this is not just a local problem - this is larger than that. Given the fact that this is a problem that doesn't seem to be able to be addressed anytime soon. I mean, as much as people like to slag on City Council about these sorts of things, the fact is - they, in the last year or so, they passed these big police hiring bonuses. They've approved the hiring plans. They've done everything SPD has asked them to do regarding staffing in particular. And yet we do not see any particular improvement in this area. Staffing so far for 2023 for SPD - they actually still are in the negative. They are not hiring as much as they are losing officers - still, even with these bonuses, which have not been shown to work. So this is gonna be a problem for a while. This is not something you can fix quickly. There is a hiring training pipeline that takes quite a while to complete to get new police officers. There are not a lot of lateral hires - that is, police officers who are already trained, who are willing to move from a different department - we hired hardly any of those in 2023. Apparently we had some candidates, but they weren't qualified to serve in SPD - they weren't appropriate candidates. So we don't have a lot of them. Chief Diaz has said he expects potentially more lateral hires in 2024, but he did not give any reasons as to why he would expect that to be any different, so whether he has actual reasons or whether he's just kind of hoping - I'm not certain - but this is obviously something that's gonna go on for more than a year or two, right? [00:35:55] Shannon Cheng: Right. [00:35:55] Amy Sundberg: So because of that, I do think that there is potentially a legal argument to be made that some of the body of work of SPD officers needs to be given to other people because there just simply aren't enough SPD officers to do it all. And then you made a great point that what we've seen in other municipalities is that police officers - some of this work - they don't even wanna do it. They're actually end up being quite happy to have other people doing it so that they can go off and do other parts of the job that perhaps they prefer. So it's interesting watching this play out here and how it's kind of different from how it's playing out elsewhere in the country. [00:36:38] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, it feels like here - as you said, the City has done everything they possibly could to encourage staffing and hiring of new or lateral hires to the department and it just - it's not working. So in the meantime, we still have all these needs in the city to address - and they're not getting addressed, or they're getting addressed poorly. So it's frustrating that we're being held up by this issue of certain aspects being considered under the police body of work and not being able to let people who are better able to do that work - and honestly, for less money - and alleviate some of all the problems that people are frustrated about in this city. So again, not a labor lawyer, but my understanding is there would be concern that if we just went ahead and started taking some of this work from SPD without their signing off on it - is that SPOG could file an Unfair Labor Practice with the state PERC, the Public Employment Relations Commission, which oversees state labor law. And I guess I don't know what that ruling would be, but it seems like the City's not willing to go that route. I understand that it would entail standing up to SPOG, which I agree completely is a scary thing to do, but the people who are our electeds are the ones with the power to do that. So I don't know - if you've been elected, we need you to stand up to SPOG. [00:38:10] Amy Sundberg: Well, and because of the staffing shortage at SPD, that does present a really compelling argument that the city can make if there was to be an Unfair Labor Practice suit filed, right? Because if SPD is unable to do this work because they can't hire enough and they've been getting all the support they've been asking for to hire as much as possible, and yet they still don't have enough staffing, someone has to do the work. So I do think that - I don't know how that suit would go, but it's not for sure that SPOG would win. [00:38:44] Shannon Cheng: Right. I just wonder why that's not an option that the City seems to be pursuing and that they're just, with this MOU, basically just saying, Fine, we'll just pay out. - what to me feels like, I don't know, sort of a ransom that SPOG is holding us under to let us do things that we all fundamentally want to do. So where is this MOU in the process? You said that the $4.5 million plus $3.6 million the next year has already been approved through the budget process. So what happens next? [00:39:15] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, so the money has been approved - that part is done. But what happens next is that the full council has to vote on the actual MOU agreement. So there's money for it, but they haven't yet approved it. So that vote, I believe, will be happening at their full council meeting on Tuesday, December 5th, which is at 2 p.m. in the afternoon. So if people want to get involved and share their opinions with their councilmembers about this MOU, you have until December 5th to do so. You can email your councilmembers, you can call your councilmembers, you can see if now that budget season is over, you can potentially even meet with them - although it is a pretty tight timeline to do that. And then you can give public comment at that meeting on December 5th, either virtually - you can call in - or you can go to City Hall and do it in person. I do encourage people to do this if they are so moved. I think it's really important for our elected leaders to hear from the people and hear what we wanna see and what we are concerned about. Even if we are not able to stop this MOU from being approved, I think it's really valuable for our elected leaders to know that this is an issue of concern, that the people of Seattle care about it, and that we're paying attention. And I do feel that there is significant value in that as we move towards potentially looking at a completed contract with SPOG. Those negotiations are ongoing - I don't expect to see that contract this year, but I would not be shocked to see it sometime next year. So to let electeds know now that this is something that we care about will then build momentum for the bigger conversation that is to come. [00:40:59] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, completely. Our electeds really do need to hear that this is something that we're concerned about, that we understand is important, that we've been waiting for five years for a different full SPOG contract to help address some of the things we talked about at the beginning of this show. I would also - I just wanna let people know - I think this is also something that's very in the weeds and maybe isn't really well understood. But the way that these labor contracts get negotiated at the city is that there's a whole team on the City side, which includes representatives from the mayor's office, as well as from city council. And the way that it's structured - it's called the LRPC, or the Labor Relations Policy Committee - the way they have it set up is that five councilmembers, and the five is important because five is a majority. Five out of nine of our council sits on that LRPC, so they are privy to the negotiations. And under state labor law, all of these negotiations are behind closed doors. So the public really has no insight into what's happening until we get something like this temporary MOU coming out for approval, or eventually a full contract for approval. The last time that the public had any opportunity to give input into what this SPOG contract is gonna look like was in December of 2019, when a public hearing was held 90 days ahead of when they started negotiations for the new contract. So it has been four years since the public has had any chance to weigh in on what we would like to see in this contract. And as we all know, a lot has happened in those four years that may affect what we hope to see that comes out. Anyway, just going back - the LRPC, I believe, is purposely structured to have this majority of council on it. Because that means that any labor agreement that comes out of that committee means that it had the approval of those five councilmembers. So if we get to the City Council meeting where Council's gonna approve it, and one of those councilmembers ends up voting against it, there could be a argument made that they were not bargaining in good faith. So the whole thing is set up that the public has very little in the way of power to affect how these agreements happen. And I just wanna call that out. [00:43:14] Amy Sundberg: For sure, Shannon. If this is an area that you work on regularly as we do, it is very frustrating how few chances there are to have any real impact. [00:43:23] Shannon Cheng: I would also say that the other period of time where you might have impact is that period between contracts - so after a contract has been accepted and is implemented, and before the next contract is entering into this black box of contract negotiations. The way that we've seen some of these negotiations happen, they are so lengthy in time that - SPOG is currently working without a current contract for three years. I think the contract they're negotiating is five years long. So we're already behind the last time that we did this - last time they approved it in November of the third year, it's almost December. So this is gonna be even less time after they approve this contract before they're gonna have to start negotiating the next one. I seriously wonder if at some point we're gonna get to the point where they're gonna be negotiating two contracts at the same time, or maybe they need to make the contract longer than five years? I just - again, not a labor lawyer - I don't know what happens with all this. But the reason - I think, and I've seen indications of this - that the negotiations take this long is because SPOG is not willing to accept accountability provisions that the City wants. And what's gonna happen, which is the same thing as what happened the last time, is that so much time will pass with them not having a real contract that they're gonna come out and make this argument that they haven't had a living wage increase for many years, and we just - the City needs to cave and give them what they want so that they can get raised back up to whatever level that they deserve. Which I'm not saying that they don't deserve, but they're doing this at the expense of us getting things that we want in that contract. And it's the same playbook every single time - and we need people to step up and call this out if we don't want it to keep happening. [00:45:15] Amy Sundberg: I will say too, that from what I understand - and I actually did talk to a labor lawyer about this - this is fairly unusual in labor overall for these contracts to be so far extended. And one of the issues that arises because of this is issue of back pay. Because when negotiating for raises, it's actually not unusual for any kind of union to get back pay as part of it for when the negotiation is taking place. But normally that amount of time would be maybe six months max of back pay, because that's how long it takes to complete the contract. In this case though, we're talking about over three years of back pay, and three years in which there has been a lot of inflation, right? So we're talking about potentially millions upon millions of dollars in a lump sum that the City will need to pay when they approve this contract - just for back pay, for things that have already happened - not even looking forward and thinking about how much the raises will cost the City in the future. So that becomes a significant issue at that point. [00:46:22] Shannon Cheng: And this links back to why this MOU matters, right? As you were saying that - we know the money for it is coming out of some special pay reserve that the City has. I would think that that pay reserve has been put aside in part to probably help pay some of this back pay that we're expecting to get when there is a final SPOG contract. So if we're using up $4.5 million now through next year, $3.6 million the next year from this reserve, that is less money that we have at the bargaining table to have leverage over what we get from SPOG in the final contract. [00:46:53] Amy Sundberg: But not only that, Shannon - also it impacts all other city workers. That's the money that's potentially for them too. So I mean, if you look at the firefighters, they're in the middle of negotiating a contract right now - I guess they have one that maybe they're voting on - which doesn't keep up with inflation. So if they agree to this contract - in real terms, they'll be receiving a wage cut - our firefighters. And then we have the Coalition of City Unions, who I - unless this has changed in the last few days, the most recent offer was a 2.5% wage increase. 2.5% - do you know how much inflation has been? These poor workers. And of course we don't have any insight into what SPOG is being offered right now - that is not public information. But it will be really interesting - when this contract does become available to the public - to see how that compares to the contracts that the Coalition of City Unions is being pressured to accept, or the contract that the firefighters are being pressured to accept. So it's not like this all happens in a vacuum. Whatever SPOG does also affects all the other unions in the city. [00:48:01] Shannon Cheng: That's a good point. I mean, much like the general fund funds lots of aspects across the city, I imagine this pay reserve - it's not the SPD pay reserve, but effectively it feels like that might be what it is. And that's super unfair to all the other city workers. Everything at the city is interrelated - SPOG is not the only union that the City is dealing with, both in terms of funding for their department, but also the staffing and the pay raises. So let's go back and talk a little bit more about police guilds and other unions, and I've heard police guilds are different from other workers' unions and that sometimes aren't aligned with the working class. Could you talk a little bit more about that, Amy? [00:48:44] Amy Sundberg: Yeah, I mean, I would say that police guilds are different from other unions in at least three ways. The first way, as you said, is that in general - police are on the side of the boss. They're not on the side of working people. They get their power from protecting rich people, right? Obviously I could say it in more academic language, but that is basically what I mean. They get their power from protecting rich people's interests. They get their power from protecting rich people's property. And that is not in alignment with other working people who are fighting for different rights. And you can see this in history. If you look at the history of policing in this country - in the South, police kind of rose up - they caught slaves. That was one of the first things they did, right? And the police developed from that, which is obviously horrendous. And then in the North, it was a little bit different, but police rose up or were very heavily involved in union busting back at a time when that was a big deal. So they have never been aligned with the working class, but I do think that those origins have become hazy through the passage of time and because of messaging, right? It definitely benefits police guilds to be seen as part of unions, even though they're not necessarily gonna be fighting for the same things that unions fight for. And so I think that's part of why there is that kind of argument at play. So that is one reason why they're different. Like I said earlier, another reason why they're different is because they, along with potentially prison guards and border patrol workers - these are kind of a different class of workers in that they're the only ones negotiating for the right to use force, right? To potentially kill, to hurt somebody, to surveil people - all of that kind of stuff, which is just inherently very different than the rights that other workers are organizing to get. And then the last point is that they do benefit from exceptions to rules governing other workers in terms of scope and in terms of contract negotiations, particularly with respect to provisions governing transparency and discipline. So they have different rules applied to them. So it's just - it's different, they're different. And it's important to really talk about these things, and study these things, and look and see more deeply how they're different because this is an argument that is brought to bear to kind of stop further accountability from being possible - as I know, we've both seen that play out here in Washington state. [00:51:21] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, completely. As I mentioned before, I foresee that when the eventual SPOG contract comes out, there will be pressure from SPOG that this is part of their inherent labor rights, that if we don't get what we wanna see in it in terms of the accountability pieces specifically, that - Well, you'll just need to wait till next time, or something like that. It'll be this incremental approach. When the 2018 SPOG contract got approved - I was at that hearing - and definitely there was a division within labor there. As you were just mentioning, I think that some people do see that the police guilds are not always aligned with workers - and we did see some unions come out to that effect. We also saw other workers come out in solidarity with SPOG arguing that - Yeah, they deserve their raises and benefits and they had been working too long without a contract. At the time, SPOG was still a member of the MLK Labor Council, so I think that helped a lot. We did, in 2020, see SPOG get ousted from that MLK Labor Council. So I am curious to see if anything plays out differently this time around - remains to be seen. And finally, I will say that I've heard a lot of councilmembers reference this - that they are hoping for some kind of state legislative solution that will help them with being better able to negotiate these contracts with the police guilds. But we've been following this at the state level also. And I will say that currently any action on the state level - it's dead. It's been dead for several years. There was a bill introduced in 2021 that laid out some things, but there was no movement on it. And the reason there's no movement on it is because labor as a whole is not on board with it - they feel like it's gonna be an erosion of workers' rights. And it may be, but as you were saying, police guilds are different than unions - and I think that the legislation was crafted to try to make that distinction. And so I'm not sure whether those fears are completely founded or not, but in any case, nothing is happening on that front. [00:53:27] Amy Sundberg: I did find that legislation very interesting. And I agree that over time it was worked upon to be really laser precise in terms of what it did. And at the end of the development that I'm aware of, what the bill actually did is that it took accountability measures for police off of the bargaining table by creating an overall unified standard that police departments across the state would have to live up to. So it would no longer be something that you negotiate in the contract - it would just be, This is how we operate. This is how accountability works in the state of Washington. And as I said, that is one of the ways in which police guilds are different than unions - is that they have this bargaining power over these accountability issues that are just not relevant in any other union's bailiwick of work. So that is why the bill was crafted the way it was to be such a kind of surgical carve-out of certain things. The reason this would be helpful - first of all, it would set a statewide standard so that's inherently helpful. But also if you take those accountability issues off of the bargaining table, then you can actually spend more time and energy bargaining for other things - like a better emergency alternative response program, or something like this. So right now it's harder for the City to do that because they have to be thinking about these accountability pieces. And especially right now, because - I do not know that they will be allowed out of the consent decree totally until they meet the 2017 accountability ordinance in the SPOG contract. And I do not think that Judge Robart will allow them to leave without showing that that is part of the new contract. I will say as well, that one of the reasons the MOU is worrisome to me is because it kind of shows potentially how things are going with the larger negotiation around this actual contract, which as we know - because it takes so long to negotiate it, once we get one, we're stuck with it for potentially a really, really long time, right? So it's a big deal. Whatever ends up in this new contract is a really big deal because we'll be stuck with it for a while. So even though the MOU is term limited - it will expire at the beginning of 2026. So at first I was like, Well, at least we don't have to pay these special event bonuses in perpetuity, at least it's only for a couple of years, at least we're only limited to 24 alternate first responders for a couple of years. But the thing is, these are also aspects that will have to be in that full contract - something will have to be in that full contract to allow us to continue this pilot in 2026 and beyond. So what is that gonna say? Is that also gonna limit how many people we can hire by a really significant amount? Is that also gonna limit the call types to be very, very narrow that they can respond to? Is it going to memorialize this sort of bonus so that we're paying out millions upon millions of dollars just to have permission to do these things when we know that SPD doesn't have the staffing to do them? That is an issue of real concern. And the MOU - to me - says these are things that we are potentially - they're going to have to be addressed in the contract so that we have something that reaches after 2025, and this might be how they are addressed, right? I mean, we don't know, obviously - black box - but these are things that when that contract is released, I'm going to be looking at very carefully and going to be very concerned about. [00:57:11] Shannon Cheng: What if they don't include any of this stuff in the eventual contract? Does that mean on January 2nd, 2026, the dual dispatch pilot just suddenly has to stop operating? [00:57:20] Amy Sundberg: I mean, yes - I think so. Unless they come to another MOU, right? Or like you said, they could risk an Unfair Labor Practice suit. But I mean, ultimately, this is gonna have to be worked out. So it's all fine and good for councilmembers to be like, Well, this is temporary - but ultimately it cannot be temporary. We're going to have to come to some kind of arrangement as to how this is going to work in the future. [00:57:46] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, completely agree. I mean, Amy and I have been staring at this black box of contract negotiations for a really long time and trying to see any indication of anything that's going on with it. And this MOU is the first indication of how things are going. And I would say our estimation is - it's not going well. I mean, I think the other thing I saw that happened is we heard Councilmember Mosqueda say that she stepped down from the LRPC. I don't know that she fully explained what her reasoning was behind that, but my sense is she is probably the councilmember on current LRPC who is the most wanting of all the things we've been talking about in this episode. And she's specifically said that she didn't agree with the MOU because she felt like it was bad strategy in terms of the overall SPOG contract negotiation. So to me, part of her stepping down sounds like it's because those negotiations are not going well. And to me, that's very concerning. [00:58:45] Amy Sundberg: Absolutely, and especially because she's going to be moving over to King Council now - she got elected as a King County councilmember now and she knew it was going okay. So she knew that was a possibility for her political future. And so she only had a few months left and yet she still stepped down. To me, what that says - obviously she's not allowed to say anything - but to me what that says is that there were big problems because otherwise why wouldn't you just finish your term? Like it's no big deal to do just a couple more months. And we also know that Councilmember Mosqueda has in general been a fierce champion of workers' rights and is very aligned with labor. So I am very concerned both as to what this means about the upcoming SPOG contract and about what this means to other labor and how they're being treated by the City. And we've seen this already playing out. So the fact that she stepped down shows, I think, the potentially - some deeper issues that are going to continue to be revealed over the next several months. [00:59:49] Shannon Cheng: And I think this all happened kind of under the radar, but I was trying to do some digging to try to understand when that happened. And as far as I can figure, it was sometime around August. It was the same time that - from the mayor's side, Senior Deputy Mayor Monisha Harrell used to be on the LRPC. She has now been replaced by Tim Burgess. And with Councilmember Mosqueda stepping down, she has now been replaced by Councilmember Strauss. [01:00:12] Amy Sundberg: I will say that Monisha Harrell was also known as something of a champion when it came to accountability, right? I felt that accountability was genuinely important to her and that she was committed to fighting for that in the next contract. But with her gone - again, black box, so we don't know - but it is discouraging news. [01:00:35] Shannon Cheng: Yeah, so not to end everything on a huge downer, but that is the life you choose when you decide to make police contracts your issue of main interest. [01:00:49] Amy Sundberg: You know, I actually - yes, this is bad news. But I do not think people should take this as a downer at all. I think people should take this as encouragement to get involved. If you haven't gotten involved up until this point, or if you are involved and you're beginning to flag or feel a little tired - which believe me, at this point I can really, really relate to - we're gonna need all hands on deck next year. And that's just me being realistic. It is really frustrating, but the only way we're gonna see the change that we want in this regard is by organizing. Organizing, organizing, organizing. And I will be more specific than that because I remember a time when people would say that to me and I would be like - I don't know what that means. Like, sure, but what do I actually personally do? And what I would say is if you wanna get involved - and I highly, highly encourage you to get involved with this - you need to find an organization to plug into so that you have that accountability of structure and community to kind of keep you going. And it doesn't mean you can't take breaks. In fact, I'd say you 100% should be taking breaks as well. I am about to take a week and a half break and I'm very excited about it, so I am the last person that will say anything against taking breaks. But if you're part, if you're building those relationships with others, it will keep you involved for the longterm, which is what we need for this kind of fight. And organizations that are working on this specifically - I mean, I don't know them all, but I know People Power Washington - Shannon and I are involved with - we definitely are always working on this. Defend the Defund is another organization that you can look

Julio Rodriguez taunted by Astros pitcher and the benches cleared in last night's Mariners game. The Senate unanimously passed a formal dress code. Bryan thinks Trump got the better of his GOP rivals after holding an event during the republican debate on Fox News. Dumbledore actor dies at 82. Sen. John Fetterman riffed on China, pandas, and farmland. One person dead after a collision and shooting involving an RV in Lake Forest Park. // The GOP debate consisted of a lot of candidates constantly talking over each other. // Bryan points out a racial component to arrests that were made in connection to various home invasions. Prime Minister Trudeau again apologizes for heralding Ukrainian veteran who fought with the Nazis in WWII. 

Study shows being sedentary could lead to dementia. KNOW IT ALL: 1) An RV sped off after a collision and shooting in Lake Forest Park. 2) Dress code formalized in the Senate. 3) Julio Rodriguez was taunted by Astros pitcher after a strikeout. 4) Defector Travis King back in U.S. custody 5)  6) Gov't shutdown looming. // Belltown neighborhood stabbing. Breaking news: Keeping your body moving is good for your health. // Christie took his jabs at Trump last night and attempted a one-liner zinger. 

On this Tuesday topical show, Crystal learns about north King County's innovative new Regional Crisis Response (RCR) Agency with its inaugural Executive Director Brook Buettner and Kenmore Mayor Nigel Herbig. Following national guidelines and best practices for behavioral health crisis care, a five-city consortium established RCR in 2023 as part of a vision to provide their region with the recommended continuum of behavioral health care - which includes someone to call, someone to respond, and somewhere to go. Executive Director Buettner and Mayor Herbig share how the program grew out of a need for a person-centered mobile crisis response, rather than the traditional law enforcement response which is often without the right tools or expertise for the job. They describe the collaborative process of getting buy-in from police agencies, electeds, and city staff to design a service that has evolved from the RADAR co-response program to approaching a 24/7 behavioral health first response. Finally, they cover impressive early results in cost-savings & outcomes and offer advice to other cities looking to bring similar solutions to their own communities. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Mayor Nigel Herbig at @nigelherbig. Brook Buettner Brook Buettner is inaugural Executive Director of the groundbreaking Regional Crisis Response Agency, which deploys services to people experiencing behavioral health crisis in the North King County community. She is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and an experienced human services professional with a focus on policy advocacy and program implementation for high-needs populations. During her two decade-long career, she has been focused on transforming systems to meet the needs of individuals who are high utilizers of both criminal legal and health and human services systems. Ms. Buettner holds Masters in Public Administration and Social Work from the University of Washington. Mayor Nigel Herbig Nigel grew up in the Seattle neighborhood of Wallingford, attended Seattle Public Schools, and graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in Political Science and Comparative Religion. Nigel and his wife, Tiffany, decided to move to Kenmore when their daughter was a baby as they were looking for a great place to raise their daughter where they could purchase their first home. They have never regretted that decision. Nigel has worked in broadcasting, fundraising, and politics. He currently works at the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. Mayor Herbig represents the Council on the Eastside Transportation Partnership (Vice Chair), and the Sound Transit SR 522 Bus Rapid Transit Elected Leaders Group. He also sits on the King County Affordable Housing Committee. Resources The Regional Crisis Response Agency | City of Kirkland   “RCR Agency Welcomes Brook Buettner as Executive Director” from City of Kirkland   National Guidelines for Behavioral Health Crisis Care - Best Practice Toolkit Executive Summary | SAMHSA   The North Sound RADAR Program | City of Shoreline   “RADAR: Response Awareness, De-Escalation, and Referral Final Evaluation Report” prepared by the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy Department of Criminology, Law & Society at George Mason University   “North King County cities will broaden mental-health response to 911 calls” by Amy Radil from KUOW   “New Crisis Response Center in Kirkland to Serve North King County” from City of Kirkland    “$500k grant from DOJ to help reduce use of police force in North King County” by Hannah Saunders from Bothell-Kenmore Reporter   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review show and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, I am very excited to be welcoming Mayor Nigel Herbig - he is the mayor of Kenmore. And Brook Buettner, who's the Executive Director of Regional Crisis Response - a collaboration for a mental health alternative response between the cities of Kenmore, Kirkland, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and Bothell that's really innovative and I think a number of cities are looking at this in the region - want to just explore what this is. So starting out with Brook, how did you get involved in this work and what interested you in this? [00:01:27] Brook Buettner: Thanks, Crystal - I'm so happy to be here with you. So my background is that I'm a licensed clinical social worker and I also have a background in public administration. And most of my social work career has been in service of folks that have chronic behavioral health conditions, are living homeless, and then have some overlap with the criminal legal system - either with the police, or with having multiple charges around poverty, or around homelessness. So this is a really exciting program for me to be able to be involved in. [00:01:54] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. And Nigel, as mayor of Kenmore, what got you involved in this particular program and work? [00:02:00] Mayor Nigel Herbig: First, I want to start off by saying that I'm a long-time listener, and I'm excited to be here, Crystal - so thank you for having me. Kenmore entered into this work back in - I want to say 2017 or 2018 - when we joined with other cities and King County MIDD funds and started the RADAR program, which was a co-response model across parts of North King County to give folks other ways to have service calls responded to - without the only response being a police response, because I think we all recognize that a solely police response is not always the right answer and is not always in the best interest of everybody involved. And we did that successfully for a few years. And then in 2021, we started larger conversations with the cities of Bothell, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, and then we reached out to Kirkland also, about expanding what we were doing with RADAR and making it into a larger regional model. And so our staff and our councils worked for about a year and a half trying to figure out how that would all work. And what we ended up doing was folding the North King County's RADAR Navigator program with Kirkland's Community Responder program to form a new entity that's regional in nature, is going to have a lot more resources, will be operating more hours during the day - I think we're aiming towards 24/7, I don't think we're quite there yet - and will really be a resource for folks who are experiencing, or decompressing in public, or having some sort of other issues so that they'll get a response that actually meets them where they're at. And gets them help immediately rather than the other alternatives, which are the ER or jail - both of which we know are not ideal for anybody who's experiencing either an issue with drug addiction or a mental health issue. So yeah, it's exciting to see multiple cities all coming together to recognize the issue and working together - 'cause as individual cities, there's no way that we could have done this - little Kenmore could've never done this on our own. But working with other cities, we're gonna be delivering something that I think will be meaningful to folks who are experiencing issues out in the field, and I think we'll be getting better outcomes for everybody. And I think that's something we're very excited about. [00:04:00] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. You talk about how challenging this is for individual cities to address and to deal with. I do think it's notable that there was an attempt, a recognition by Kenmore that this was something that needed to be tackled. There was the RADAR program, previously in place, that you just mentioned - this was built on top of and leveraged with the region. How did the discussions go with the region? How did you get buy-in for taking this collaborative approach? And how did you work through the design of the program? How did that work, Brook? [00:04:34] Brook Buettner: We're very lucky in North King County that there was already a great deal of support for alternatives to police response for people in crisis. As you mentioned, the commitment to the RADAR Navigator program that had been going on for about four years prior to this conversation and showing really successful outcomes for folks. And across our elected officials, our police leadership, and our community, there was a strong commitment to doing things in a new way for people in crisis. And so it was a matter of not having to bring people on board, but just discussing what's our shared vision - what do we want our community to look like and how are we gonna get there? And so it was a big lift for city staff to come up with the agreement, the interlocal agreement, that governs this entity - but it was done pretty quickly in my experience and very well to where we have a strong and robust infrastructure to start really offering these alternative services to folks in crisis. [00:05:29] Crystal Fincher: Nigel, what advice would you give to other cities working through this process right now in terms of figuring out the agreements that are going to govern these collaborative approaches, getting buy-in from various stakeholders? How did that work in your experience and what guidance would you give other folks working through this? [00:05:48] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I think part of what made things work, where we are in North King County, was the fact that we'd already been partnering with other cities with RADAR. But we also have other regional models that we're used to - we're used to doing regional collaboration around here. Kenmore is part of ARCH, which is a regional coalition for housing - which is a multi-jurisdictional affordable housing developer that covers kind of Kenmore and then down to the Eastside. And so we're very used to working in a collaborative manner with our neighbors to address issues that we really can't do, again, by ourselves - we can do affordable housing, but it's very hard for a smaller city, right? It's a lot easier if people are pooling things together. So we already had those models that we were familiar with, which I think really helped some of the conversations - 'cause Kirkland's also part of ARCH, I think Bothell is too. So we're starting from a place where we understand how these models work. I think having trust between the cities is important also. We have good relationships with - I have good relationships with my colleagues in Kirkland and in Bothell and Lake Forest Park and Shoreline - I think that's helpful. And then also having staff that's willing to really dig into the details and work collaboratively with their colleagues is important. A lot of this came out of the fact that - and I think we all recognize this - the state and the county have largely been underfunding our mental health response for a long time. And even on our council, there was some pushback to - this should be a county response, this should be the county's responsibility. And I don't completely disagree with that assessment either, but I think we all recognize that something had to be done. And at the end of the day, sometimes cities just have to step up and figure out a way forward. And it's nice to see five cities coming together to work together towards a solution, while we try to figure out the larger long-term solutions that are truly regional and even statewide, frankly. [00:07:25] Crystal Fincher: So can you walk me through what your most frequent calls look like, feel like, what that process is? I think for a lot of people - they're familiar with the concept of alternative response, they're familiar with how important it is, and understanding that police can't do everything and they are not the most effective response for every kind of crisis - so having a tailored response that is most appropriate and most effective is really helpful. How, as you work through this, what does a typical call look like? What does a typical day look like? [00:07:58] Brook Buettner: In crisis, of course, there's no typical call or no typical day. But we are looking to deploy social workers or mental health professionals on any 911 call that comes in that has some identified component of behavioral health. So that's mental health, or substance use, or some social service need like a homelessness component, a family dynamic issue where it could be helpful to have a social worker there. And then the social workers - we call them crisis responders - the crisis responders are going either in the car with the police officer, or when possible in an independent vehicle and meeting the police officer on the scene. And we are stepping more and more in our community into the space of two crisis responders going to - responding to the scene - without a first responder. And that is really what we call the alternative response model. And it can be anything from somebody that has called 911 because they themselves, or somebody that they care about, is suicidal - has made suicidal statements or gestures. Or someone that is in a community space and is having mental health symptoms or substance use-driven symptoms that are causing them to be troubling to the other folks in that environment. To, like I said, family dynamics where someone calls 911, for example, because their teenager is so agitated and escalated that they become violent. And our crisis responders are very, very good at identifying what's going on, deescalating folks, bringing them down to a level of calm where they can talk through what's underlying the crisis. And then the crisis responder's job is to figure out what to bring to bear on the situation to alleviate the immediate crisis and then connect the person to the system of care so that they don't fall into crisis again. [00:09:33] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And it looks like you've structured the program on best practices for the continuum of behavioral health care starting with having someone to call - we have our 988 line, someone to respond - these crisis responders, and then having somewhere to go once it's determined where the appropriate place is for them to receive the help that they need. Especially when it comes to that somewhere to go, we just passed a county-wide behavioral health center levy that will fund a number of those services and staff. But that's been a big challenge in our region. How have you navigated through this in the program, Nigel, and how's it working? [00:10:14] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Well, I'm really excited. I mean, Kenmore and our partner cities - we're actually out ahead of King County a little bit and had been working in partnership for - I don't know, a little while now, I think going back to 2021 - really reflecting on the lack of a door for people to go to, a place for people to go to when they're in crisis. And working together, we identified funds and we identified a location, we identified our provider, and we will be opening up the first crisis response center for North King County. And again, it's the same cities - it's Kenmore, Lake Forest Park, Shoreline, Bothell, and Kirkland - and we're excited to have this model here. They selected Connections Health Solutions, which is a national innovator in the space. They've done a lot of great work in Arizona, and that model is also what I believe the executive based his models off of. And they should be opening up next year, and it's gonna offer a place for people who are facing any sort of mental health issue or behavioral health issue - a place where they can go and actually talk with somebody, regardless of insurance, regardless of where they live, or any of that. It'll give people a place to go, which right now is severely lacking throughout the county. [00:11:23] Crystal Fincher: What happens when there is no place to go? [00:11:26] Brook Buettner: I can kind of speak to that. So in the past, when we encountered someone in the field in crisis, the options were either that they stay where they are, that they go to the emergency department, or an arrest and jail - if it's not safe for them to stay in the community setting or in the home where they are at - safe for themselves or safe for the people around them. And this allows us an alternative to say - Maybe the emergency department is not the right place, and certainly jail is not the right place for somebody in deep behavioral health crisis. We're gonna take them somewhere that we know will accept them, we know will allow them to stay, will provide robust psychiatric and behavioral healthcare, and do discharge planning so that they're walking out with a plan and a connection to ongoing care. Connections, in particular, has a model that has multiple levels of acuity and step-down so that if somebody comes in at the highest acuity, they're in one setting. And as they deescalate, as they get different treatment on board or medications on board, they can step down to a lower acuity setting and even to an outpatient model while they wait to get hooked up with the local behavioral health system of care. And Crystal, you mentioned the behavioral health continuum of care, and I love that you brought that up because this is - North King County is about to have, kind of the first in our state, fully-executed crisis continuum of care when this facility opens up and it's super exciting. [00:12:44] Crystal Fincher: It's very exciting and so necessary. And I appreciate you all doing the work to get this implemented to be a model for the region. Other areas are looking at this - some areas are eager to adopt this and have public safety agencies, police agencies that are willing partners. Others have some concerns and there's almost a concern of - Okay, is this competition for us? Are they looking to move us out? What feedback have you heard from law enforcement officials, and how have they said it's impacted their job and the work that they have to do? [00:13:19] Mayor Nigel Herbig: To be honest, I haven't heard anything negative from our police partners - Kenmore, like Shoreline, contracts with the King County Sheriff's Office - they've been great partners in this. I think our chief is always looking for better ways to interact with folks who are in crisis and this gives him another tool. This gives him more resources to address the problem at hand, rather than only having law enforcement resources to fall back on - and I think he views that as a positive. So I have not heard any pushback from our law enforcement community up in North King County around this, and I think they're looking forward to using this as a resource and being partners in this. [00:13:56] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. For years and years - going back a decade and more - have heard several officers, chiefs talk about how challenging it is to respond to calls where there's a behavioral health component, or there isn't any illegal activity per se but someone is clearly in crisis, or people are being impacted around them and an intervention needs to take place but a criminal or a legal intervention doesn't seem to be the most positive. Brook, what have you heard from officers who have co-responded on these, or who are looking forward to a complete alternative response? How are they saying it's impacting their work and their ability to do their job? [00:14:37] Brook Buettner: We have been extraordinarily lucky in North King County that we've had support from law enforcement leadership since the get-go. Law enforcement was who asked for this program initially five years ago, saying these are not the kind of calls that we're supposed to be on - we need help, we need support. And so it has been a journey to get all of the responding officers - patrol officers and deputies - socialized to this idea. But once an officer or a deputy sees it in action, it's an easy sell. So what we find is that the more interaction we are having with law enforcement, the more referrals we're getting because they see - wow, that works - or we'll let them know that the follow-up that we did ended up keeping somebody from falling into deep crisis again. And it becomes a really good alternative for them and a good tool in their tool belt. I also am really attentive to making sure that we maintain good relationships on a one-on-one basis with all of our law enforcement partners, so that it's not a pain to have a social worker along but rather a pleasure - to say we're a great team, we work well together. Both sides recognize that each role has something to bring to a highly escalated crisis situation, and both sides recognize where their limits are. And so it's just been a constant growth of support and of buy-in. I've heard from several chiefs that they see shift in the culture - in the willingness to talk about behavioral health in a new way among the community and also within the department - that it opens up conversations that otherwise may not have happened. So it has really been a positive for our five police agencies. [00:16:05] Crystal Fincher: I think that is really an outstanding observation. And strikes me as important, especially as we hear from several police agencies across the state really that they're trying to recruit, they're short on officers, they're having a tougher time on that - and needing to triage their time and resources, and response times being impacted, other things that they're saying are being impacted. How can this help manage the workload for officers and across the public safety continuum? How has that been working? [00:16:34] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Speaking for Kenmore, our officers, right - until we had RADAR in place and until we had these partnerships - if somebody was out on the street decompensating, yelling, screaming, doing something like - like you said earlier, that's not illegal, but is disruptive to the community and the person is obviously in crisis - the only response we had was a police response. And I think even our officers recognize that there are better ways for them to be spending their time than dealing with somebody who's decompensating. It's not what they were hired for, it's not what their expertise is in. And this gives them a tool so that they can - working with the social workers - find what the right response is, hand off the person to the social worker, and then get back to catching speeders or investigating break-ins or whatever it is that they could be doing rather than dealing with the guy who is having a breakdown. So I view this as actually an expansion of our response, if you will - it gives us the ability to respond to more calls on both sides of things, both law enforcement and people experiencing a crisis. [00:17:38] Crystal Fincher: How have you seen that play out, Brook? [00:17:40] Brook Buettner: It is absolutely allowing officers to focus more on life safety and law - criminal law issues - by kind of carving off this segment of the work that comes into the 911 system and routing it to the appropriate resource, the right tool at the right time. I see what we're doing as a third kind of branch of the first response system. Going back again to the continuum of care, the level of care that someone gets should be based on the acuity of their need and of their crisis. And we have outpatient behavioral health for folks that have behavioral health challenges that are at a low acuity level. We have other systems in place that are secondary responses for people that are in crisis. And when people are in very high acuity crisis and 911 is needed, we now have this first response behavioral health tool in our toolbox - that crisis responders that are skilled and trained and experienced in meeting people that are in the highest acuity level of behavioral health crisis, but still not committing a crime. So it is a 911 call - it's not necessarily a law enforcement need, but there is a need for a very high level response - and we're now able to provide that. [00:18:47] Crystal Fincher: Did you have anything to add, Nigel? [00:18:49] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Well, I was gonna say - I think a lot of this came out of the recognition that we've seen over the last 150 years that when your only response is a police response, the outcomes are not ideal. We have seen too many folks who are dealing with a mental health issue - and that is a huge section of our population - it's not something we talk about, but a huge proportion of folks are dealing with some sort of mental health issue. And just because somebody is having a very hard day doesn't mean that they should end up in jail or be put at risk, frankly, of a police interaction. We know that sometimes those interactions can turn out tragically. And being thrown into jail or worse, because you're experiencing a mental health issue, can ruin somebody's life or - and frankly, can ruin not only their lives, but also their kids' lives. When we enter somebody into the criminal justice system, it has long-lasting effects on not just the person impacted, but also their family, their kids, their kids' kids - it can have multigenerational effects on people. And we've seen that play out over the last, well, 50, 100 years. This gives folks, this gives our police officers a different response. And I think it's - that's what I'm excited about - I'm excited that people who are experiencing mental health issues can actually get the treatment they need rather than a pure law enforcement response, because nobody deserves to go to jail because they're having a breakdown. [00:20:12] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And it's a shift in how we've been doing things. What are the results that you're seeing from this? Obviously, people are looking to justify these expenditures and implement these in their own areas. What results are you seeing when it comes to amount of calls, recidivism? I know in some other cities, they talk about how many calls come in about behavioral health issues that aren't someone breaking the law but that are someone in crisis, as you've talked about, and how much time that takes up, how many repeated calls those spur, and how much time that demands - just the amount, enormous amount, of resources that demands. How are you seeing that impacted and what results are you seeing from this program? [00:20:55] Brook Buettner: Directly to your question, Crystal, we don't have a lot of data yet on reduction in 911 calls, or 911 dispatch center or officer time. I do have some outcome data though that our King County partners were able to pull together for us for the RADAR Navigator program - that folks that were touched by the RADAR Navigator program - in two years following that program touch, we saw a 67% reduction in adult jail bookings. And that is a tremendous impact. We saw a 60% reduction in behavioral health crisis events. And that is measured by King County's Department of Community and Human Services who oversees the behavioral health system crisis response. They also experienced a smaller 4% reduction in emergency department visits. And of the folks that our program touched, 14% were subsequently enrolled in publicly funded behavioral health services. And I think that's a significant undercount because a lot of the folks in our community do have private pay insurance and so there would be no way to count that. But we know that interaction with this program results in a reduction in jail, a reduction in crisis services, and an increase in engagement with the behavioral health system. And those are all big wins. And to your specific questions, those are the kind of things we're gonna be looking at in our program analysis as we go on. How is this saving on 911 calls? How is this saving on officer time? My dream is that we capture the cost savings of reduction in jail nights and say - let's put that back into the earlier end of the continuum of care and fund diversion, and ultimately fund a robust system of community-based behavioral health care so that people don't fall into crisis. Again, I wanna say we're extraordinarily lucky that our electeds and our city staff are all so interested and committed to doing this kind of analysis and thinking in this way. [00:22:37] Crystal Fincher: Thanks - I appreciate that data, that information - it's really, really powerful. And what strikes me hearing that is that when you talk about being booked into jail, emergency room visits - these are the most expensive parts of our system to use and to utilize. And savings on these are incredible - I'm looking at that reduction in the jail number, and that is a budget-altering number right there. Pretty incredible. And I recognize this is a newer program - certainly you've done the work with the RADAR program, this predecessor, and getting the data there. I'm sure more will be rolling in as this continues and you move on, so that's great. Did you have something you wanted to add, Brook? [00:23:16] Brook Buettner: Yeah, just a thought that this is what we sometimes call a different purse problem - that each of these reductions affects a different financial system. And so part of our work is gonna be pulling together those cost offsets and making sure that the savings are redirected appropriately to meeting people's needs. [00:23:34] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, that is such an incredible problem in the public sector - yeah, this is saving a billion dollars, but if that's spread across a ton of different budgets in different ways, it's a whole different animal than someone handing someone basically a rebate check for a billion dollars. As you look forward, you talked about moving forward and moving towards a program where it truly is an alternative response where there are one or two crisis responders who respond to these calls without law enforcement initially - they can certainly call them in if it's warranted or they need backup. How do you see this progressing with that change and beyond it? What are the plans? [00:24:14] Brook Buettner: First, I'll say that the primary challenge that stands between us and a pure alternative response system is the dispatch question - and the ability to understand when a 911 call comes in, what's really going on - and that is often not clear from a 911 call. So we really wanna work through this very carefully with all of our partners and make sure that we're doing the outreach in a way that's safe and appropriate, that meets people's needs, but also keeps our responders safe. And so that is probably my work for the next two years - is digging into - How do we do call receiving? How do we triage? And then how do we appropriately dispatch the right resource? I have kind of been moving from calling it alternative response to thinking of it as a behavioral health first response. Whatever - when someone is in behavioral health crisis - whatever resource is the right resource. And I can see, for example, that being a crisis responder plus an EMT when someone has or has stated that they will take too much medication - and that's a medical plus a mental health need. Whereas if there's maybe a weapon in play, then that's a law enforcement plus a mental health need. And so thinking of it as a first response system with all of the tools that we need available to our dispatchers. [00:25:27] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Nigel? [00:25:28] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I think something that Brook kind of glossed over a little bit - but I think is an important thing that we're gonna have to work out - is the fact that we're using multiple different police. We have different police forces, if you will, and different dispatch systems. So like I said earlier, in Shoreline and Kenmore you have King County Sheriff's Office and they're dispatched in one way. And then Lake Forest Park and Bothell, they have their own. And Kirkland, they have their own police officers and they're dispatched differently. And so it does create - it is a complication that I believe we'll work through. And I know with Brook's leadership, that'll get worked out - but it's not as straightforward as just having one dispatch system that we need to educate and get up to speed. [00:26:06] Crystal Fincher: How is this being funded? How much did you have to come up with as individual cities in this regional partnership? How is the funding talked about? Because this is something that has been kind of thorny when we look at the Regional Homelessness Authority, but with this collaboration, how does this work, Nigel? [00:26:25] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I can't get into what the specific numbers are we're spending - I do know it's more than what we were with RADAR. Part of that is because we're expanding things from - we're approaching 24/7 is part of the goal. Part of this is also funded by King County MIDD, the Mental - oh, I don't remember - [00:26:41] Crystal Fincher: I know - I always try to remember what MIDD stands for. [00:26:43] Brook Buettner: Mental Illness Drug Dependency. [00:26:45] Crystal Fincher: Thank you. [00:26:46] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Thank you, I was just digging around. [00:26:48] Crystal Fincher: Very, very useful. [00:26:50] Mayor Nigel Herbig: No, super useful - and they're the reason why we were able to do RADAR and test out, essentially test out the model, set the foundation for where we are now - is because of the MIDD funding. And we're very thankful to King County and Councilmember Dembowski for his help with that. Our expenses are definitely higher than they were in previous years with RADAR - there's no question around that, and it was part of our budget discussions last year. But I think it's something that we're all committed to because we do see the long-term payoffs - not just on our budgets, but frankly in outcomes - and all the councils seem fairly committed to that. So I believe that they - I wasn't involved in these negotiations, staff was - but I believe that they were negotiating based on population and number of hours that would be required to cover each jurisdiction, and then breaking up the cost and using some sort of formula that we all agreed to. Brook can probably speak a little bit more to that, but we got to a place where everybody was comfortable with the investments that we'd be making. [00:27:47] Crystal Fincher: Sure, Brook? [00:27:48] Brook Buettner: Yeah, so like Mayor Herbig said, the MIDD funding has been really foundational to piloting this as the RADAR Navigator Program and even to the expansion. We also have some funding through the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs' Trueblood dollars for Mental Health First, or Field Response teams. And we have had some support from the Association of Washington Cities. And then I'm so delighted that starting this year, we have general fund contribution from each of our five cities. It is per capita-based at this time. We have plans to really keep a close eye on utilization and think about whether some cities have higher utilization and that may affect their contribution rate. But I also have plans to get the payers on the hook for this as well. So when we talked about the wrong purse problem - a 4% reduction in emergency department visits is a big bonus for insurers and for the managed care organizations. And King County Department of Community and Human Services and the behavioral health services organization have been thinking about this as well. How do we get the private insurers to be picking up what they are supposed to be covering for their covered lives around crisis services? There are a couple of folks at the State Legislature that are really thinking carefully about this. And I see us as being kind of a test case outside the traditional behavioral healthcare system to be reimbursed by the health payers for this service that ends up with better outcomes and lower costs over time. [00:29:07] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. As we move to close this, what advice do you have to other cities approaching this? And what would you tell residents about why this is so useful and so important? [00:29:21] Mayor Nigel Herbig: I think I would advise other cities to take a look at their 911 calls, talk with their police officers - see what sort of calls they're responding to that maybe they're not the best equipped first responder for. I don't think police officers enjoy these sorts of calls on their own. I also think that you can point towards the outcomes that we will have around better results for the people involved, better results for the community, and frankly, cost savings at the end of the day when it comes to jail days and ER visits. And other cities might be big enough to do this on their own, which will make their lives a little bit easier and all of that. But I think other cities - and if you're looking in other parts of the county, there are places where there are multiple cities all right next to each other that could, if they wanted to, join together and do this sort of work. And I would encourage them to have those conversations and really ask themselves - What do they want the response to be when somebody calls 911 in crisis? Because I don't think anybody actually thinks the right answer is a person with a badge and a gun. And I think people need to really reflect on that, and really think about how they truly serve the people that they are working for, and make sure they're doing that in the best and most responsive and person-centered way possible. And this is, I think, a huge step in that direction. [00:30:36] Crystal Fincher: Any final words from you, Brook? [00:30:38] Brook Buettner: I love what Mayor Herbig said - just asking yourselves - What is it that we want people in crisis to get from our first response system? And then from my social-worky side, building relationships across jurisdictions and across sectors to bring - this is very complex - so to bring all the players to the table to offer the kind of response that people deserve when they're in crisis. [00:30:59] Crystal Fincher: Well, thank you both to Brook Buettner, Mayor Herbig - sincerely appreciate you spending time with us today and helping to educate us on what's going on there in the north part of the County. And it's certainly a lot to reflect on and hopefully emulate moving forward. Thank you both. [00:31:16] Mayor Nigel Herbig: Thank you. [00:31:17] Brook Buettner: Thank you so much for having us. [00:31:18] Crystal Fincher: Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is produced by Shannon Cheng. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on every podcast service and app - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

 What's Trending: Seattle housing levy to push up taxes, Movie Review: Dungeons and Dragons has no right to be as good as it is. Go see it, and a man is kicked off a flight for being 'fatphobic'.Big Local: A man accused of killing an officer is arguing PTSD, a resident killed a would-be burglar in Lake Forest Park and budget cuts are coming to Olympia Public Schools. // California may end ban on travel to 23 red states.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm doing a Meet-Up with Followers and Listeners! Wednesday, February 22nd at 11am-NoonLive & In Person in the Seattle area17171 Bothell Way NE, Lake Forest Park, WA 98155We'll be between Third Place Books & a sandwich shop at one of the tables.  Seek my purple hair! Take this opportunity to get a coaching session with me or a tarot card reading. We can just slide it in after the meet up is done. DM or email me to talk deets.Now, about this episode!How can you help your stress and anxiety levels when they are Through The Roof from a shitty life moment?1) Increasing feelings of safety and control in all the ways that you can is paramount.  I go into this a little more deeply, and here is the link that I mentioned, Sensory Self Soothing Kit 2) When we feel unsafe, this often means were are also ungrounded. Safety resides in the root chakra, & this is also where grounding occurs. So grounding soothes the root chakra, rebalancing it and making it feel more safe.  Email me if you want my guided grounding meditation!  I'll send it right over.3) You can actually also use logic to help with the stress and anxiety, too. See the situation clearly, and compare facts.  Make sure you're not engaging in Thinking Errors (pod episode here), which will always always always sabotage logic. 4) Make sure that the reaction you're having to the shit hitting the fan isn't actually past trauma coming up.   5) The Big Picture:  Are you getting hit with a Universe 2X4 (as Jennifer Longmore says)? Basically, have you not been paying attention to lessons and changes you need to make in your life, so the Universe had to up the ante to get you to pay attention to it? Remember that the 200th Episode is next week-February 22, 2023!  Be sure to listen to get the treats I'm sharing! Only available when you Listen to the Podcast! Contact Me or Consume My Stuff Here:Crush Your Codependence Masterclass--Get it HereThis is a 10 video series where I interview guest experts on aspects of codependency formation and how to heal it. Everything from somatic work, relationships, codependency experts and breath work!  Just $47.Join my email list--just click here!I share insights here not anywhere else, as well as coupon codes, early access and bonus' for early sign up! If you want all the cool things, this is the place to be!  Email comes out every Monday morning.Conversations with Your Soul--Sign Up Here$50 gets you messages your Soul wants you to know, conveyed through me! You will receive by snail mail my actual hand written notes I took. I will also email you an audio recording where I describe in more detail what happened. Just to be transparent & clear, we're not together when this happens.Sign up for my  Transforming Your Codependency Text messages! I can be in your texts messages every M, W & F. I'll be giving advice, loving reminders & information to help you love yourself & heal codependency NOW. Sign up by texting the word PEACE to 877-338-0875 or visit this web site:  https://slkt.io/xlBeWebsite:  Soulamplified.orgInstagram:  @SoulAmplifiede-mail:  Vanessa@soulamplified.org

Kids get asked all the time what they want to do when they grow up. High schoolers get asked what their plans are after graduation. College students get asked the same thing, with a big emphasis on work. But we never ask the most important question that foundationally will prepare a kid for success: What kind of person do you want to become? What a kid does professionally is important. We want them to be responsible for themselves and become self-sufficient. But it's only one part of the life equation- and it's not the most important. A key phrase we've used over the years that resonates with parents is, “You can be successful in school and successful in your career but still fail in life.” We've found that if we put most of our focus only on what kids do for work someday, we miss the opportunity to help them build a meaningful life. ABOUT MIKE BOROUGHSMike oversees all aspects of our wealth management and financial planning business including maintaining ongoing relationships and developing holistic solutions for our clients. Prior to Fortis, Mike was an Assistant Portfolio Manager for Glacier Peak Capital. Glacier Peak Capital was a registered investment advisor with approximately $190 million in assets under management spread across two discretionary hedge fund portfolios. Mike played a key role in launching Glacier Peak Capital as a spinoff from Summit Capital Group, where he formerly worked as an Equity Analyst. Prior to Summit, Mike was an auditor for Ernst & Young LLP where he earned his CPA designation, specializing in financial statement investigation. He graduated as Valedictorian from University of San Diego. Mike resides in Lake Forest Park, WA is married and has three kids. He is Chairman of the Board for Teleios and on the Audience Development Committee for the Virginia Mason Foundation. In his free time he is active in his church community in NE Seattle and loves to travel and get outside with his family.

On today's week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Executive Director of The Urbanist, Doug Trumm. They start by looking at research that shows Seattle is continuing to grow faster than the suburbs around it. Next, they discuss the future of a Tukwila ballot initiative to raise the city's minimum wage. In policing news, Crystal and Doug examine the troubling future of funding for non-police public safety and crime prevention programs in Seattle, and how despite the documented success of those programs, the city seems to dismiss their impact. After that, Doug explains what the city's Comprehensive Plan is, covers why it's important, and breaks down the various proposals for the plan. Finally, they end the show discussing the State Rep. Position 1 race in Seattle's 46th LD and how it reflects current debates we're having across the state.  As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Doug Trumm, at @dmtrumm. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources “Outpacing Suburbs, Seattle Grows 20,100 in One Year in Latest Population Estimate” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2022/06/30/outpacing-suburbs-seattle-grows-20100-in-one-year/  “Initiative for higher minimum wage in Tukwila qualifies for November ballot” by Daniel Beekman from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/initiative-for-higher-minimum-wage-in-tukwila-qualifies-for-november-ballot/    Raise the Wage Tukwila: ​​https://www.raisethewagetukwila.org/   “Seattle Might Soon Defund a Promising Police Alternative” by Will Casey from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/news/2022/06/23/75477450/seattle-might-soon-defund-a-promising-police-alternative    “When Will Seattle Get Police Alternatives?” by Will Casey from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/news/2022/06/28/75720496/when-will-seattle-get-police-alternatives   “Seattle Reveals Rezoning Concepts and Invites Scoping Comments for Big 2024 Update” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2022/06/23/seattle-reveals-rezoning-concepts-and-invites-scoping-comments-for-big-2024-update/    “Far-Right Freaks Could Force Washington to Act Fast to Protect Abortion” by Will Casey from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/news/2022/06/30/75818300/far-right-freaks-could-force-washington-to-act-fast-to-protect-abortion    Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in our State through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Full transcripts and resources referenced on the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a cohost. Welcome back to the program today's co-host, Executive Director of The Urbanist, Doug Trumm. [00:00:49] Doug Trumm: Hi Crystal. Thanks for having me - I'm really excited - there's so much happening right now to talk about. [00:00:53] Crystal Fincher: I know - we've got a full slate of things to talk about. Starting from the top is news that you covered in The Urbanist this week - in that Seattle's growing a lot faster than its suburbs once again. What's going on here? [00:01:10] Doug Trumm: Yeah, the Office of Financial Management at the State released their April estimates and Seattle was up a little over 20,000 residents, which was by far and away the biggest gain across the state. All of King County was up about 30,000. So Seattle is again back to taking the lion's share of the county's growth and was also growing faster than Pierce and Snohomish County, so it just dispels that notion that Seattle is in decline, or is dying, or that the suburbs are certainly the place to be. [00:01:47] Crystal Fincher: That's always so interesting - we've talked about that narrative a lot on this program and candidates who've run talking about "Seattle is Dying" - that whole thing - have never caught on. They've usually topped out at about 15% of the vote in Seattle elections, but there's been a lot of effort put into that narrative and one of the things about a narrative - if someone can walk outside and see that that's not the case, it doesn't quite gain the traction that people would hope. So people in Seattle basically have mocked that the entire time. However, that narrative has caught hold in the suburbs for people who actually don't live in Seattle, visit Seattle, know many people in Seattle - they just take that on faith - it's what they see, have seen on TV, or have heard people mention, or as they're browsing Facebook with all the other stuff on there. They see that and - oh, it's a chaos city, it's burning to the ground, my goodness. And couldn't be further from the truth. Obviously people there keep saying that, and the numbers of people attracted to the City continue to steadily grow. It's just one of those really interesting things where there is a very intentional political narrative that's laughable inside the City, but because it's just been so pervasive and the people have been persistent talking about it, it takes hold outside of it. [00:03:21] Doug Trumm: Yeah, and sometimes the narrative can be destiny, but that doesn't seem to be the case here, where you'd think this produced narrative of Seattle just being chaotic would eventually lead to people moving to the suburbs. But that's not in the numbers - Bellevue posted like 1,300 population gain compared to Seattle's 20,000. And there are a couple standouts, like Shoreline and Redmond are growing at a relatively fast rate, but most of the suburbs are just growing very slowly. So all this talk of people wanting to ride out the pandemic out in bucolic setting or in a suburb is maybe starting to reverse, and I think some of the numbers obviously is also reflecting the fact that students are back on campus. So places like Bellingham saw a big jump as well. [00:04:11] Crystal Fincher: Also another - exciting news this week - the initiative for a higher minimum wage in Tukwila, Raise the Wage Tukwila, qualified for the November ballot. This is really exciting. Have you been following this? [00:04:25] Doug Trumm: Yeah, this has been really cool - Southcenter being in Tukwila - that's a lot of jobs, it's huge job center for south King County - and they qualified with a really healthy cushion. So it looks pretty certain that that's going on the ballot and, I think, in our state, once something like that is on the ballot, usually it passes. So hopeful sign, hopefully good - will be a solid raise for workers if it passes and with the mall being the driving employment center in the area, there are a lot low-wage workers. [00:05:01] Crystal Fincher: Lot of retail, lots of service - yeah, definitely a lot of lower wage workers. And one of the issues there is surrounding cities have raised their wage - starting with SeaTac, which was the first in the country to go for a $15 minimum wage. And other surrounding cities have also raised the minimum wage. And one of the biggest, as you talk about, job centers in that entire area has been left behind. So even though Tukwila has to adhere to the state's minimum wage, which is currently $14.49/hour, they're comparing with minimum wage at $17.54/hour in SeaTac, Seattle is $17.27/hour for most workers. So just the geography is the differentiation here, and especially with the higher percentage of those low-wage workers, this is really meaningful. These initiatives have won, but they've won with a lot of work in the campaign and door-knocking and calls with neighbors. So this is one where it's absolutely winnable, but it's gonna take people getting involved, volunteering - this has largely been a volunteer effort - the Transit Riders Union has been a big part of this and in conjunction with people, business owners, community leaders from within Tukwila. So very exciting, but definitely a point to get engaged in this issue - if this is something that's interesting to you, we are linking the information in our episode notes. This was also covered this week by Daniel Beekman in The Times - just always exciting to see a community-led effort successfully gather enough signatures to get on the ballot. So very, very good - congratulations for the qualification and looking forward to seeing how that initiative proceeds throughout this campaign. [00:07:02] Doug Trumm: Yeah, great work to Transit Riders Union - I'm a member over there, but the leadership team there is just really great - Katie Wilson and all the organizers over there. [00:07:10] Crystal Fincher: Really, really great. In less great news, I would say, Will Casey from The Stranger, who's been writing some great articles for The Stranger, wrote this week that Seattle might - the defund and movement in Seattle is going along just fine, except it's not the one that everybody keeps trying to complain about. It looks like the City might actually be defunding a really promising alternative response to armed police. What's the deal here? [00:07:43] Doug Trumm: Yeah, this one's a head scratcher to me - just having tried to cover police as well for the past few years - whenever you're talking about police alternatives, everyone brings up JustCARE - it's almost like a rule. So you would think with everyone name-dropping JustCARE, that they would be ready to fund JustCARE. But it doesn't really seem like that's necessarily the case. And then, the successful program that JustCARE has helped stand up - that offers a police alternative so that when some of these motels and hotels that have been converted to serve homeless folks if there's an incident - canceling this program would just force more calls to the police, more emergency room visits, more things that are really expensive. If we're looking at brass tacks to the City - so if you do a broader accounting, and a lot of folks who do this kind of work say, you really should be looking holistically at this - you're gonna save this $10 million maybe initially, but you're going to end up paying for it through other ways. So it just seems like someone's - we just have to figure out a way to keep these police alternatives going because $10 million for this program could really go a long way - and the budget is very large for the City and Seattle Police Department's spending far more than that. So if we're serious about funding public safety, I think this is one place to really invest. [00:09:12] Crystal Fincher: Completely agree. And if we're serious about public safety, we start by acknowledging that public safety is bigger than policing. With - crime has increased - there are things that are happening in our community that are scary, that are worrisome - the rates of gun violence. Just the things that we're hearing about gun violence, assault and there are some crazy things going on. And if we are actually serious about solving that problem and reducing crime, we can't just focus on the responses after crimes have been committed, the response after people have been victimized. The most powerful way to keep people safe is to keep them from being victimized in the first place - certainly I've talked about this before, we've talked about - lots of people have talked about this before. And we talk about alternatives to policing or really just - hey, we're working on preventing problems and victimization and intervening in things before it gets to the point where it's hurting anyone else. So JustCARE and a local public safety firm called We Deliver Care has been protecting outreach workers who serve people experiencing homelessness - so as they're doing outreach, they're also involved in that. They've been providing de-escalation services for people in crisis, and they've been doing it without the involvement of a uniformed cop. And this is what so many people are talking about - hey, police don't have the tools to, and were never intended to be people who respond to someone in crisis - mental health crisis - and are actually able to do something about that crisis and get that person into a situation where they need help. JustCARE and We Deliver Care are doing that. And we had a conversation with Senior Deputy Mayor Monisha Harrell on this program where they talked about - hey, we're doing a review and analysis of our partner organizations who are doing alternative responses. And we just wanna make sure that they're effective, we wanna make sure that we're getting the results of the money that we're investing. I did make the comment that - I would love to use that kind of analysis across the board, including with the police department and all of our public safety stuff. But the University of Washington actually conducted a study of JustCARE that included findings about the work that We Deliver Care does - their analysis showed a 39% reduction in 911 calls in the neighborhoods where they operate, a 12% reduction in 911 calls from the hotels where the programs provide shelter. The police department would be celebrating and calling a press conference, I'm sure Mayor Harrell would be celebrating and praising these numbers. So one, this is absolutely a success. If there was a small pilot program - that where they are operating, they're getting these kinds of concerns - a nearly 40% reduction in 911 calls where they are, meaningful reductions in crime and people being victimized and people being worried and anxious and concerned, and unsafe being able to handle crisis situations. This is what we need. This is keeping people safe. We have data showing this is keeping people safe, and this is gonna wind up on the chopping block, while we're increasing funding in other areas that certainly are not getting these kinds of results. It's just, it's really confusing. And it just seems if you're making this move, are you actually serious about keeping people safe, or are you invested in a particular method of, or a strategy - that maybe there's investment or a payoff in continuing that strategy, but it's not anything related to actual public safety. Just really confusing. [00:13:14] Doug Trumm: Yeah, and are we only going to put our data on public safety through the prism of SPD? Because it doesn't seem like they're really, truly open to looking at these alternatives. [00:13:26] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I know they're talking about establishing a Department of Public Safety - certainly did seem like some of the defunding effort of these community prevention and intervention programs may - that funding may disappear in order to stand up this Department of Public Safety. But whether internally or externally, it seems like the point is - do what it takes to keep people safe, do what it takes to make people safer, do what it takes to reduce the calls we - they keep talking about cops are overloaded and not able to respond to 911 calls - well, what would a 40% reduction in them do? This is what this program is accomplishing - seems like that might right-size things according to their calculations and help balance things, so maybe they could stop ignoring sexual assaults and actually start investigating them again. Just it is - this seems to fly in the face of everything that the public is demanding, everything that they say that they are standing for, and it's just not coming. How do you stop a program that's getting those kinds of results, and then move the money to somewhere that is not? Either we care about keeping people safe or we don't. People are scared and anxious and they want solutions - hiring more police officers is not even something that will - those police officers won't land on the ground until later this year, or next year - that's not a plan for keeping people safe today, and people are demanding a plan to make their streets safer right now. I just don't understand what they're doing. [00:15:02] Doug Trumm: Yeah, and one thing I'll say really quickly is - as a policy nerd, one really cool thing about the program design is the fact that We Deliver Care is hiring largely from folks who are formerly incarcerated or formerly homeless - you're creating a virtuous cycle there where people get meaningful and gainful employment and it interrupts that cycle of poverty. So it just seems like a really, just a really solid program that we shouldn't be pulling the plug on so abruptly. [00:15:30] Crystal Fincher: That's a really good point - and really those are subject matter experts. Few people are better poised to be able to understand, connect with, and really help - with appropriate and meaningful help, and not something that people who've never been in that situation feel is best for that community or that group of people - but people who have been through it, who understand a lot of the challenges and ways that other folks don't. And so they can be more effective a lot of times in identifying and connecting people to help. I hope we see an increase and a further investment in that program and not a decreased one. And if you feel the same, it would certainly be very, very good to talk to your City Council people and to let, most of all, Mayor Harrell and his office know that we want to be investing in things that work and not defunding them. Also this week, scoping for the Comp Plan update is underway - you've been covering this in The Urbanist - what's going on? [00:16:38] Doug Trumm: Oh, so much - a lot of different advocates and organizations are really spinning their wheels right now trying to get geared up for this, because it's a month long - currently announced as a month-long - scoping period to determine what are the options, what's on the menu for our big Comprehensive Plan update in 2024, which is - [00:17:02] Crystal Fincher: I'm gonna jump in and pause right here, just to ask you - a lot of people are not familiar with - okay, Comprehensive Plan? What's its purpose? Why does comprehensive planning happen and what does it accomplish? [00:17:14] Doug Trumm: Yeah, the Comprehensive Plan - it's both kind of opaque and esoteric, but also it's sort of like the Super Bowl of planning. And you certainly can do things between the major Comp Plan updates, but this is when the big zoning changes, the big land use changes, and also the big changes in the related plans - like the Transportation plans and even Parks plans, everything - they try to line everything and get everything, hopefully in harmony, more or less. And there's a lot of debate about - that's really the case - but this happens. Now with the recent reform at the state level, every 10 years - you have to do a major update to your Comp Plan. And every 5 years, there's a minor update. Now if you really get a fire under someone, you can do major zoning changes in between them - and sometimes it's like a station area plan - if you're getting a new bus rapid transit or a new light rail station. So you can do stuff in between, but it's rare and you have to have the staff time to dedicate to it. So really there's a lot of pressure on this 2024 Comp Plan update to be ambitious, to really try to do as much as we can because worst case scenario, we're not gonna get another opportunity to do something really big until the next major update, which is a full decade later. And this has really gotten the attention of climate advocates, which we would include us at The Urbanist as those, that - okay, well, the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is saying, okay, we need to do a lot of concerted climate action now because if you don't do anything by 2030, our options just get considerably less. If we're not lowering emissions immediately, our pathways just get worse and worse. So land use is the forgotten aspect of climate change for many policy makers, 'cause it's a hard thing to deal with, but it really is crucial to actually decarbonizing our economy and our society. So not to put a ton of pressure on this, but it is a huge moment and a good chance to do climate action through land use, and also through - to connect the Transportation Plan. [00:19:42] Crystal Fincher: So as they're talking about this plan, they're looking at some different - conceptual alternatives. They've laid out some - and some look more promising than others - what's on the lineup? [00:19:55] Doug Trumm: So, there's five alternatives currently. And one of them by default is no change alternative - they use as a baseline. So that's Alternative 1. Then there's also an alternative, that is called the focus alternative. I think that's alternative to - apologies if I get this order a little bit off - and the focus alternative uses the concept of urban nodes, so it's sort of like urban villages, but they'd be adding these nodes in between urban villages and other business districts, or existing grandfathered-in areas of multi-family and some commercial. And they'd be adding these sort of urban village-esque aspects - and urban village is just the City's term of art for - it's an urban neighborhood, but because it's Seattle, we have to throw in village to make it feel a little neighborhoody and quaint. But it's basically continued the urban village idea and then, I guess, the implication then is we wouldn't be doing a lot outside of those nodes. So it'd sort of be a truce on single-family zoning outside of those. [00:21:03] Crystal Fincher: So basically any growth will be happening in these concentrated areas, any absorption of density, increase of density is limited to these new nodes. But most areas outside of that are still going to be high-cost detached homes. [00:21:20] Doug Trumm: Exactly, and I think you would basically be going along roughly the same in the existing urban villages, potentially with some expansions, which would be nice in some areas where some of the urban villages are very skinny and gerrymandered. And then there's Alternative 3, which is sort of the opposite approach - which is taking these Neighborhood Residentials, which the city's calling single-family zones now - it's taking these Neighborhood Residential zones and it's adding some missing middle types. And so far the types that OPCD, the Office of Planning and Community Development - it's the City agency tasked with this plan - so far, the types that they're listing are triplexes and fourplexes and that type of - it's on the low end. And so one thing advocates can do, who are looking for more than that - in the State bill, they contemplate sixplexes - is asking for sixplexes, maybe rowhouses, stack flats - more of those denser but still missing middle types that fit it very well into single-family neighborhoods or Neighborhood Residential, if you will. And so that's Alternative 3 - it's looking primarily outside of the urban villages, not necessarily only focus - it would be broad sections of single-family zoning, or you could just redefine single-family zoning to be that fourplex or sixplex zoning, or something like that. Because this is a scoping phase, none of that's really decided - it's just setting the menu, like how much would OPCD actually study - because what they actually put into the draft is what we then can actually order. You can't order something that hasn't had some of that underlying work, like the environmental impact analysis, because then you get sued and you'll lose. And you will get sued probably anyways. But we can move on to Alternative 4 now, which is called - I think a corridor approach, or transit corridors, I forget their shorthand name - but it would do more just along transit corridors and they didn't exactly say how wide of a band. So that would be one thing to give feedback on is - if we were to only focus on transit corridors and there's some arguments against that, which we could get into later, but that would be where you focus zoning change. Are we going a quarter mile from the stops, are we going a half mile, are we going only less than that? And if you're going only in a very narrow band, that's when those criticisms really creep in - because many of our transit quarters in this City are along busy, polluted, congested arterials, where you're not really gonna want your kid to be playing outside, you're not really gonna necessarily be breathing that air if you face out into that street. So, I think one concept that advocates are really bringing into this study is we need to be putting housing where people wanna live and it can't only be in the space leftover that single-family homeowners don't want. It also has to be places that are livable. [00:24:49] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it has to be everywhere - otherwise we're just redlining by another name, really. It's really interesting - and this is, this is wonky, totally wonky - but as a former planning commissioner myself, it really is the skeleton of a community. This is the thing that the determines the composition of how the community can grow, can evolve, can look, who's going to be there, who's not going to be there, who we're gonna include, how we can be responsive and resilient against climate change. It's - everything about how a city develops is really dictated by this footprint that's established that says - this is what is allowed here, this is what can go here, this is what we wanna encourage in these areas and what we don't, this is what is included and straight up outlawed. This is how we're going to enable this community to become walkable - that this can build that 15-minute city where everything is within walking distance - everyone's basic needs. So this is basically determining what Seattle's gonna look like in - 20 years from now - is based on the decisions that we make today. And if you think about what Seattle - I'm old, so I remember what Seattle was like 20 years ago - maybe people listening here may have moved here, maybe a lot younger, but it looks a lot different now than it did 20 years ago. And the planning process is what basically started the ball rolling on all of this. So if we think about the conversations that we're having today and what we're looking at in the City right now and saying - this is what we like and this is what we don't like, and this is what we wanna see, or don't see - then engage in this process because this is what will determine Seattle in 2042, and the Seattle that our kids and grandkids live in, or not able to live in - the decisions now determine that. [00:27:06] Doug Trumm: And it has a big impact on affordability and what housing options and prices are out there. And we did save the best of the bunch proposed so far for last - the concept, Alternative 5 is the combined approach. So basically it sounds like you would stack those three approaches, just described, on top of each other - which makes sense, because like you said, some of these Neighborhood Residential zones - they're attractive places to live, but good luck if you don't have a million dollars sitting around. So it would add more housing options there, which helps folks age in place, while also still doing that stuff around the nodes and around the transit corridors - to focus even more potentially multi-family development or just more options in those areas where they're well served by services and transit. So, of the ones proposed, 5 looks promising, it looks like it would be a huge upgrade. And there's also some talk of there being an Alternative 6 that advocates are - do we need an alternative that sort of even goes beyond the concepts proposed so far? And I haven't seen exactly what Alternative 6 would be, but obviously if it's something even better, then that's definitely something worthy of discussion. [00:28:28] Crystal Fincher: Well, we will keep an eye on that - certainly we hope you will keep an eye on that and engage, and at least conceptually make your voice known that - I think my perspective, a lot of people's perspective is - yeah, we don't want to constrain where people have the choice to live. People should be able to live in desirable, healthy, attractive, enticing neighborhoods. And we shouldn't reserve that for the most wealthy residents who can buy into them - those should be accessible to all of us. Another thing this week, I guess leading into that, it is lots of conversations about the City we wanna see - as we were just talking about - and a race in Seattle for the Legislature that really is talking a lot about the kind of Seattle we wanna see. And that's the one between Gerry Pollet and Hadeel Jeanne in the 46th legislative district. What have you seen in this race? [00:29:29] Doug Trumm: Yeah, this has been a really interesting race - so far this year, there haven't - well, and the deadlines passed, so we see what the field is - there haven't been a lot of progressive challenges of incumbents, like we saw two years ago with a lot of incumbents having to defend the record, which is I think a healthy thing for democracy rather than people just going unopposed for decades at a time. But the exception to this is this Gerry Pollet race where he's been there a good amount of time - he's also has a very important chair, which he's Chair of the House Government Committee - Local Government Committee - which is where many of these zoning bills have to go through. And he disputes this sometimes, but I think the record speaks for itself - we just haven't been able to get a zoning bill through his committee and he always has massive changes to bills, it seems like - rewriting bills like he did to Jessica Bateman's bill which was the big missing middle reform that we've covered in previous shows, I'm sure, and on The Urbanist. That was going to have that fourplex zoning, potentially sixplex zoning in an earlier draft, before - relatedly - Gerry Pollet voted to amend that. So in other words, he's been an obstacle to that kind of reform. And he represents, now, North Seattle - he used to have Lake Forest Park and kinda more in farther north. But now it's just North Seattle and Northeast Seattle. And I think he's a bit outta step with his district because these are places where people are really concerned about housing affordability, where the idea of a fourplex isn't that scary necessarily - and it's something that he hasn't furthered in his time as a legislator. So he's getting a challenge from someone who's specifically saying - this is a reason why I'm running. We got a chance to interview Hadeel and she's clearly passionate about this issue, she clearly knows a lot about this issue, she's clearly approaching this race from a - much more of a sense of urgency around both climate and housing affordability, and not just doing the things the way we've always done 'em. The Urbanist's Election Committee is still yet to vote and issue its endorsements, but I would say that it's looking promising for Hadeel and that's just a testament to someone having the bravery and the gumption to run against a long-time incumbent with sort of this institutional backing. [00:32:12] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it really is gonna be interesting to continue to follow these races. I am working in a 46th legislative district race with Melissa Taylor - that's the only candidate race I'm working on, but that does make it really interesting to watch what's happening in these other seats in Seattle and beyond. And housing affordability, which this conversation is directly tied to, is a huge concern in the district. The stories that I hear from the doors from Melissa, who's out there every day, are harrowing. So many people are struggling in so many different ways - even people who - you drive down to see - North Seattle street, right? You see the homes now - the average home price, it's pretty high in Seattle - and people may look comfortable from the outside, but a lot of them are struggling. A lot of people have had to bring in roommates and extra people to live in their homes. Some of them can't fit any more people in and are at the point where if rent goes any higher, if mortgages go any higher, if costs go any higher, they're not going to be able to stay in their home and stay in Seattle. There's so many people dealing with this - even in single-family neighborhoods - where they're saying something has got to give, we're being squeezed to the point where we have nothing left to give - and it's really displacing people from neighborhoods. This is a conversation about who do we want to be able to live in neighborhoods - do we want these neighborhoods to be exclusive places where no one ever is able to move in again, unless you are effectively making half a million dollars a year or more? Or places where young families starting out, people graduating from college, the kids of the people in these homes - are they going to be able to move into this neighborhood and build the kind of life that other people have seen, or not? So it's just really interesting to see the different levels of urgency, as you just talked about, 'cause some people are - we're at this point with a number of things - you talked about with climate, the IPCC report saying - look, we get this right and we start making meaningful, tangible progress by 2030, or we're in for a world of pain and consequences. And we get this housing thing right, and this comprehensive planning process right now, or we're in for a Seattle that just does not reflect anything that we've seen before and that's really a playground for the rich, a very exclusive place. The only accessible places are ones that come with harm attached - with pollution and a lot of the consequences of poorly managed growth. And it's just - this is a time where the urgency is now - we need people to act and not continue to kick the can down the road. [00:35:15] Doug Trumm: Yeah, exactly. And it really speaks to - there's so many legislators who are homeowners and who - many of them are wealthy, and there are not many tenants. And Hadeel would be someone who's bringing a younger tenant perspective to the Legislature at a time when it's really needed. And you would think that legislators who have had that luck - to have bought into the housing market, now have a home that's worth over a million dollars, like Representative Pollet - you would think they would have some sort of empathy or sympathy for folks who are not buying in at the opportune time, who are buying in when the prices of admission is a million dollars. You'd think that they would policy make to try to correct that problem, but it doesn't appear there's that sense of duty or urgency there. [00:36:10] Crystal Fincher: Yeah - different experiences, different things - and when you look at polling, it's really interesting. And one of the things a lot of people have talked about - yeah, young people are feeling different, and younger people are - they have different voting patterns. But "young" is doing really heavy lifting in that sentence because when you look, the dividing line is 45 or 50 years old. This is not young as in college. This is young as in not senior. Everybody is being squeezed and that line keeps on moving up and up and up, which is why we are seeing different people being elected, different challengers gaining strength and momentum, different kinds of policies that weren't in mainstream conversation even five years ago now moving with urgency. 'Cause when you talk about just the community under 50 - that's parents, that's grandparents, that's a whole big swath of people who are feeling this pain and who understand that we can't continue the way we're going, that we're going to have to substantially change something if we want these results that we're seeing to change. Another thing I wanted to talk about this week was another article from Will Casey. And it was about - hey, given these continuing Supreme Court decisions - first and foremost, the Dobbs decision overturning the right to abortion from Roe vs Wade - hey, is anyone gonna call for a special session in Washington to address this? What's in this article? [00:38:02] Doug Trumm: Yeah, that - Will Casey made a really good point there. We've had special sessions for a lot less. The most recent example is, that comes to mind, is the 2013 special session to make a special tax break for Boeing - that was hoping to keep, entice them to keep their jobs in Washington State. And they ended up still moving their corporate campus to Chicago and they've moved also some of their production to the South and other locations in the country. So, we did it for that. But we're not doing it for fundamental rights that speak to the - both the physical and economic security of our population and people who really are scared right now because the Supreme Court really upended what we thought was sort of settled. And obviously we saw this coming for many years, and even if Democratic establishment sort of buried their head in the sand about this. But yeah, it seems like we could call a special session about this. There's a ton of Supreme Court mischief right now of overturning precedents and there are laws that we could pass to lessen the risk there. And really just - it's also important to remind people that maybe if not the federal level of government, but the state and local levels of government can still work how they should. It's a lot harder without the federal government, but I think at a certain point, you also just have to restore faith in our system. [00:39:43] Crystal Fincher: That's such a great point and it's absolutely true. Lots of people are, myself included, frustrated by federal government, which is why I have a podcast talking about state and local government 'cause I do think we need to talk about that more and so much is possible, still, at these levels. But it's such a challenge when talking about this - so there is - Democratic leadership is all saying that we do need to pass legislation. And they're saying we need to carefully craft this legislation, we're working on it, we'll have it ready for when the January session starts. The risk to that is we have an election before the January session and people are working hard, but it's possible that Democrats lose seats this Legislative Session - to the point where it's possible to lose a chamber in our State Legislature. There are many competitive races here in our state in battleground districts, so it is not a given that we walk into 2023 with the same composition in our Legislature that - and given the current composition, they should be able to pass legislation that does codify abortion protections. I should note we should absolutely be going beyond that because we know that they're going to be attacking contraception, marriage equality, basic privacy rights - we know that's on deck, so we shouldn't wait for that either and that should be ready. But it's possible that we lose the seats necessary to pass this before that time. Hopefully that doesn't happen, but there's a chance of it. And the one thing that we should never do with basic human rights is leave them up to chance. As you said, we called a special session for Boeing. We've called special sessions for transportation packages. We can do that with such basic, fundamental, necessary protections for Roe - protections for abortion access and the others, as we should say. I will tell you - so what is not talked about upfront - the problem is when you call a special session, it basically forces people to stop campaigning. We cannot campaign while a session, or fundraise, while a session is happening. So leading up to a session, during the session - you basically have to suspend campaigning activity, you have to suspend fundraising - which unfortunately is a necessary part of winning campaigns in our existing political system - would love to change that, but that's part of the existing system. And so, I'm sure there's calculations going - my goodness, we've got these more competitive races than we've seen in quite some time. We do have - we're fighting to defend seats on the Democratic and progressive side, with vigorous challenges by Republicans in several of them. The last thing that people wanna do is to take some time off the campaign trail to do this. We can do it in January. And my response to that would be - one, it's the right thing to do and you don't leave rights up to chance. So one - morally, ethically, logically, it's the right thing to do. We can do it now, you do it now. You might not be able to do it later, so you do it now. On top of that, there's an opportunity to, as you said, show the State that one, government can work as it's intended. The majority of people in this state, as we've covered in polling and talked about over and over again - want, believe in, are passionate about these protections. You have the opportunity to have all eyes on you as you take action and deliver the protections that people in this state are currently protesting in the streets for. You have the opportunity to have a ton of earned media show that you're responding to the needs of the state. And only one party is willing to do that - you have the media shining a light on who truly is pro-woman, pro-family - pro-life in terms of being able to live, have opportunity, have rights and not be subjugated or treated like a second-class citizen. That's the opportunity ahead of us. And then you can roll after talking about - yeah, we just did take extra steps and take the action necessary to make sure you are protected. You can run on that. People will see that, people believe in that, they're asking for that. This is a humongous opportunity for the Democratic party to demonstrate, in the most clear and present way, that they are serving and protecting the interests of the residents in the state right now. So I think there's absolutely a case for doing it - I understand that it's not the best thing, but I truly believe that if they were to do that - coming off the other end, they would have a lot of thankful, happy people who are ready to roll in to 2022, to continue to defend the threats that are being brought about by this extremist, far-right Supreme Court, the extremist Republican Party that's looking to gain seats in our federal legislature. The pressing need to defend against Republicans is not going away, so let's not leave any rights at risk and let's put ourselves in the best position to be able to continue defending and then moving forward to pass policies that we know people in the state want. [00:45:24] Doug Trumm: Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more. And it goes to that fundamental critique of our politics, especially as the Democratic establishment party politics, where - issue polling, you can't be scared of your own shadow. You have to design the situation that you want to see, both as a policymaker and as a campaigner. If they're looking at polling and saying - oh no, maybe this won't be that popular in this swing seat or something like that. At a certain point, I think you have to just - A) take a moral stand, like you were saying. But also, have a little faith that people can change their mind, that you can campaign on something and change people's minds, that maybe this poll isn't really reflecting what would be salient in a race or that we'll see - oh, the Democrats took concerted action and that will have, and passed something and did something brave - that might have a bigger impact than whatever they fear for blowback by not apparently calling this sooner and just go charging ahead with this. Because I think people really need a shot in the arm - just this, I think people are a little dejected right now, and they have a right to be, because we've seen this organized, concerted campaign from conservatives for decades to take over the court system and undo all this legislative work. And in the meantime, we didn't even codify it at the federal level. And now we have a chance to codify at the state level - and eventually, you have to treat this like it truly is - which is an all problem, and conservatives are coming for many of these basic rights. And they're coming for the climate, as we saw with the recent decision announced, I think yesterday, with the Clean Power law. This Supreme Court is on the march, it's corrupt, it has no regard for precedent and they make up their own. And if we're not all hands on deck right now, when are we going to be? [00:47:39] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely - that's a question a number of people are asking. This is not a drill, we are here and it's time to act. We have to, we may not get this chance to act later on in the future, so now is the time. With that, thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks this Friday, July 1st, 2022. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler with assistant producer Shannon Cheng, with assistance from Bryce Cannatelli. And our wonderful co-host today was Executive Director of The Urbanist, Doug Trumm. You can find Doug on Twitter @dmtrumm, that's two M's at the end. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii. Now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave us a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - we'll talk to you soon.

2PM - The Big Lead // GUEST:  Issaquah basketball players Courtney and Azra talk about their disappointment losing their coach // Recap of Lake Forest Park judge story // Awesome Audio See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Melissa Robertson is mom, spouse, friend, Founder and Director of Pepitas Bilingual Preschool in Lake Forest Park, WA.  She is visionary, energizing, reflective, bubbly and tenacious!  "On the Verge: From Inspiration to Incarnation" Podcast is sponsored by the Northwest Coast Presbytery. CREDITSCorey Schlosser-Hall is host and editor. https://www.northwestcoast.org/coreys-bioJean Chaumont is producer, composer, recorder of all original music is https://www.jeanchaumont.com 

Welcome to the first episode of season #2!  Bearly and Taebyn have a great time with this episode. We visit with YouTuber/Author/Podcaster/Furry Matt Baume about his writings and YouTube. Brutus joins us for Five Minute Furs. Taebyn has so many questions. We define a Taebyn Word. Bearly reads a Grimm's Fairy tale that confuses Taebyn. Come join us for some fun and mayhem. Oh, and here is the 'thing' Teabyn wanted in the show notes:  begin{pmatrix}1&2&1 0&-1&1 2&3&3end{pmatrix}.  I think it may be a math thingVulpine Taproom – Taproom in Lake Forest Park (lfpvulpine.com)Support the show (https://ko-fi.com/bearlyfurcasting)

Former Seahawks cornerback Marcus Trufant joins Softy and Dick to discuss the idea of Richard Sherman returning to Seattle, what it was like for Marcus being the veteran leader at the position early in the LOB era, the Russell Wilson situation and more. Don from Lake Forest Park is leading our tournament bracket contest and he joins Softy and Dick to discuss how he managed to get 11 teams correct through the first two weeks of the tournament. Kraken broadcaster Everett Fitzhugh joins Softy and Dick to discuss the firing of referee Tim Peel by the NHL after he was caught on a hot mic saying he was looking to call a penalty on Nashville, thoughts on expansion draft process. Softy wants Aldon Smith to come to the Seahawks.

Former Seahawks cornerback Marcus Trufant joins Softy and Dick to discuss the idea of Richard Sherman returning to Seattle, what it was like for Marcus being the veteran leader at the position early in the LOB era, the Russell Wilson situation and more. Don from Lake Forest Park is leading our tournament bracket contest and he joins Softy and Dick to discuss how he managed to get 11 teams correct through the first two weeks of the tournament. Kraken broadcaster Everett Fitzhugh joins Softy and Dick to discuss the firing of referee Tim Peel by the NHL after he was caught on a hot mic saying he was looking to call a penalty on Nashville, thoughts on expansion draft process. Softy wants Aldon Smith to come to the Seahawks.

 As a natural follow-on from the previous episode, we're continuing on the walking theme and are visiting a working forest where we can take our dogs, bikes and even horses out for a good amount of exercise. The fantastic thing is that you wouldn't even know it was there if you didn't know to look for it! So, put on your walking shoes and let's go

On the 130th episode of the Seattle Foodie Podcast, the show might have gone off the rails just a tiny bit. Nelson recently visited Smith Tower for Happy Hour this past week and it made us reminisce about the first time we both visited the Smith Tower for the first time and this selfie. Smith Tower is reopened for happy hour, cocktails, and food, so make sure to check out Seattle's bar with the best views. In addition to the Smith Tower, Nelson also went out to West Seattle for dinner at Lady Jaye, returned to Mangosteen and BobaBar for drinks, wings, and popcorn chicken, had hot pot with the family, and picked up an order of wings from Tony's Bakery and Deli. Meanwhile, Monica had lunch at Dumpling Generation in Lake Forest Park, had another cake delivery this time with BabyCakes, had savory pies and cookies delivered by GoodAFBakedGoods, and also had beer delivered to her from Logan Brewing in Burien. Thank you so much for listening and we hope you enjoy the latest episode of the Seattle Foodie Podcast!

Diane Easley, Principal Individualist at Easley Inspiration, believes that living our liberated sparkle in a radically authentic way is core. She lives the belief that doing our own work is key AND it is through our ability to move through life as our best selves that we WILL have peace in the world. Author, Create the Life You Want Creator of: Widow Truth, a loving, eyes wide open, unflinching, fearless look at living with grief 52 Powerful Energy Tips, small, powerful ideas to enhance and support your intuition and vision. Champagne Friday, a super exciting new on-line and in person movement coming summer 2021 Owner and Managing Broker, Easley Real Estate, a by-referral only company, in Lake Forest Park, Washington. At Easley Inspiration, we believe in attention to detail, feeling all our emotions, laughter is usually a good idea, dancing is good for the soul, there is always Champagne in the refrigerator, Champagne in the refrigerator is reason enough for a celebration and loving what we do. www.DianeEasley.com www.facebook.com/DianeEasleyUniversity from me: Diane created a series of supportive cards for widows after the death of her husband. They can be found here http://widowtruth.com/ along with helpful advice as what to NOT write in a condolence card, as well as what might bring comfort. She's also a realtor with 30 years experience, just saying. ___________ About Erin: Female-identifying and want to be a guest? Book here! https://WearHappyConsult.as.me/conversationsaboutclosets Erin Keam is a stylist like no other, thanks to her unique The Happy Wardrobe Method which deeply explores your beloved possessions in your home to find your personal themes and create a one-of-a-kind Style Statement which is then taken to your wardrobe, business, career and life. Oh, and she helps you look and feel great, getting dressed easily and with confidence. Discover your style brand, your essence and get to your ideal closet faster! https://www.thehappywardrobe.com/ Click here to book a FREE Wear Happy Consult book here (she's on PST time) https://WearHappyConsult.as.me/FREE Or to talk about how you look on camera/find out about her FREE Zoom-Ready workshops, book here. https://WearHappyConsult.as.me/ZoomReady --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/erin-keam/support

For our Halloween episode...Jake introduces Ron to the world of H.P. Lovecraft!Joyce Carol Oates (ed.), Tales of H. P. Lovecraft: https://www.indiebound.org/book/%209780061374609T.E.D. Klein, The Ceremonies: https://www.pspublishing.co.uk/the-ceremonies-trade-paperback-by-ted-klein-4424-p.aspH.P. Lovecraft Historical Society: https://store.hplhs.org/Necessary Reading: Joyce Carol Oates, "King of the Weird," New York Review of Books (10/31/1996): https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1996/10/31/the-king-of-weird/There are also a fair number of Lovecraft adaptations in film (a list of "Lovecraftian" films would be impossibly long); amongst my favorites are Dagon (2001), Whisperer in Darkness (2011), Call of Cthulhu (2005), Color out of Space (2019), and pretty much anything with actor Jeffrey Combs.New Lovecraft fans should also check out the fabulous "Whisperer in Darkness" podcast from BBC Podcasts: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06spb8wSupport your local bookstore!Your Favorite Bookstores Are Dying. They Told Us How We Can Help.by Natalie Morinhttps://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2020/10/10123763/local-bookstores-need-help-support8 Ways to Support Your Local Bookstore While Quarantiningby K.W. Colyardhttps://www.bustle.com/p/8-ways-to-support-your-local-bookstore-while-quarantining-22633650How to support your local indie bookstore without leaving your houseby Constance Gradyhttps://www.vox.com/culture/2020/3/14/21178178/how-to-support-your-local-indie-bookstore-coronavirus-covid-19-publishingThird Place Books https://www.thirdplacebooks.comThree locations in the Seattle area (Lake Forest Park, Ravenna, Seward Park)Walla Walla Roastery https://www.wallawallaroastery.comWe highly recommend Brown Bear Melange  (aka "Kyle's Blend")!Pursued by Bear Winehttps://www.pursuedbybearwine.comKyle MacLachlan's winery located in Walla Walla, WALovecraft Arts & Sciences Store: https://www.weirdprovidence.org/store/c1/Featured_Products.htmlAero Coffee Roastershttps://www.aerocoffeeroasters.com318 Main StreetNorthboro, MA 01532The Wrath of the iOtiansTwitter:  @OfiOtiansGmail: thewrathoftheiotians@gmail.comMusic:Land Of The Me-me by Aleksandar Dimitrijevic (TONO)Licensed under the NEO Sounds Music License AgreementInterested in starting your own podcast? Jake and Ron have had a great experience with Buzzsprout. Sign up at  https://www.buzzsprout.com/?referrer_id=1397515. If you sign up for a paid plan Buzzsprout will send you a $29 Amazon gift card.

Tim from Lake Forest Park has asked for help with his girlfriend Anna who is pregnant with their first child together. He says Anna has always been really into putting their lives on social media and wants everything they do together documented online. He even thinks Anna might’ve gotten pregnant just to have something to post about. Now he’s upset she wants to join the trend of a having a Gender Reveal stunt. Tim says that’s a moment he really wants to be private and not just done for “hits and clicks.” And he points to the brush fire started in California over an irresponsible Gender Reveal stunt and he doesn’t think they should do anything dangerous just for attention. When Anna comes on she agrees she is using Facebook as on online journal and scrapbook. Plus she says with the pandemic making it impossible to see her family, doing it online is a way to have everyone enjoy it together. Anna is really upset at Tim’s claim that she only got pregnant for the Facebook attention. But wait until you hear what he does for attention on our show…!

We usually love looking out the window and enjoy the moon but with the fog we can’t see a dang thing. Ryder is officially starting his October Spooky Movie Marathon today. Fitz’s mother-in-law is in town and getting their house in order - it’s OK to put your Mom to work, right? In the What Are You Kidding Me stories, a 36-year old man is arrested after a month of hiding in the closet of a 15-year-old girl he met online, a man shoots through his own windshield during road rage, a guy freaks out at a Subway restaurant over wearing a mask, a little girl goes viral for calling her Mom’s bra her “booby holders”, and Luke Combs says he learned to sing by listening to Backstreet Boys, N’Sync, and other boy bands. Dick’s has put out the list of upcoming locations where you can find their Food Truck including West Seattle, Everett, Bellingham, and Bellevue. In the Fitz Files the “Dancing with the Stars” producer who fired Tom Bergeron and hired Tyra Banks tries to explain himself, Chrissy Tiegen has lost her baby due to pregnancy complications, and NBC has started casting “Young Rock” about The Rock growing up. On Make Up or Break Up Tim from Lake Forest Park says his girlfriend Anna insists on having a huge Gender Reveal stunt but he doesn’t think they should use something so personal for hits and clicks. Patrick Mahomes Mom was tweeting so much about Monday Night Football broadcasters calling her son “Pat” that word got to him on the sidelines in the middle of the game. Playlist Profiling is Brian the Outreach Supervisor from Union Gospel Mission. Throwin’ Shade brings another epic Battle Room, with Shade is taking on the Rest of the Nation for ignoring Russell Wilson.

Earning Freedom: Conquering a 45-Year Prison Term Chapter 9.3 1998-2002 Months 127-180     It’s September 11, 1998. I’ve been in Miami for a week and since my counselor hasn’t yet given me a PIN code, I haven’t been able to use the telephone. The staff isn’t giving me any information about my transfer and I don’t know if Bruce and Carol have made progress toward getting me out of here. Ty and I are resigned to the likelihood that we’re both on our way to state prison, knowing that we’ll leave whenever officials from the Florida Department of Corrections arrive to pick us up. We exercise together, doing pushups, deep knee bends, and stomach crunches. After our early morning workout, I glance at the dorm’s television screen, appalled to see President Clinton and his media machine.  He organized a nationally televised prayer breakfast, assembling Billy Graham, Jesse Jackson, and other distinguished clergymen.  They pray for forgiveness of Clinton’s indiscretion with Monica Lewinsky. The irony is not lost on me. President Clinton scandalized the country. He told lie after lie to the American people and to Congress about “not having sexual relations with that woman.” Anyone else would serve prison time for telling such lies to Congress. Although I was young and uneducated, my own sentence was extended by two years because I lied during my trial. It angers me, because the president should be held to a higher standard. After all, President Clinton is a graduate of Yale law school, a Rhodes scholar, and a former attorney general.  Yet he gets a pass for his offense by saying he’s sorry. I’ve been working to atone for 11 years, not with televised speeches but with measurable actions. It infuriates me to see the inequality as I sit in an orange jumpsuit, knowing that my acts of atonement mean nothing while the president can exonerate himself with a simple prayer meeting. “Santos!” The guard yells into the housing unit as he steps out from his station, interrupting my mental rant. “Roll up!” “What about Moreno?” Ty asks. “I said Santos.” “Can you tell me where I’m going?” I feel queasy, my legs weakening. “FTD.” I recognize those initials as the BOP designation for Fort Dix. My face immediately broadens into a smile. “Fort Dix?” I ask to confirm. “All’s it says here is FTD. Pack yer shit.” “How’d you’ pull that off?” Ty looks at me, disappointment in his eyes. “I don’t know. My family must’ve gotten through to the right person.” I say carefully, suddenly aware of the impact this news has on Ty. We’ve only known each other for a few days, but through exercise, chess games, and talk, we’ve bonded and had hoped to see it through as a team. Now I’m deserting him. Although the news elates me, I don’t compound his loss by gloating over being spared a tour through a Florida state prison. ******* My support network really came through for me, and I’m thrilled when guards lock me in a holding cage on the main floor of FDC Miami to process me out. I’m grateful, optimistic, and eager to begin the return trip to Ford Dix. My spirits are dampened, however, when I notice a woman sitting alone in another holding cell directly across from me. She’s crying. I step to the front of my cage, wrap my fingers around the bars, and she looks at me. The guards who patrol the corridor prohibit us from talking, so instead we communicate with our eyes. In hers, I see such sadness that it pains me. She tilts her head as she opens her hands in a gesture of helplessness, as if to say “I want to talk to you, too, but we can’t.” Her smile is modest, but I see a dimple in her cheek. She has long brown hair, and even in the green, oversized jumpsuit I can see her slender figure. Her eyes are blue, or maybe green. It doesn’t matter. We’ll never meet. I hope she’ll find the strength to sustain herself through the loneliness. I look away as guards come to fasten her in chains. My return to Fort Dix takes me on a 30-day detour through USP Atlanta. It surprises me to feel some nostalgia at my first sight of the high walls. While locked in a holdover unit I see several staff members I used to know. One of them sends a message to Lynn Stephens, my former work supervisor. After receiving news from her colleague that I’m in the holdover unit, Lynn walks over to see me. More than four years have passed since my departure from USP Atlanta and seeing her feels almost like a reunion. She had such an essential role in my early adjustment, allowing me to study in the office we shared, providing sanctuary from the penitentiary madness that destroys the lives of so many young prisoners. She’s barely aged but tells me she’ll be retiring in another few years, and she updates me on her family while asking about mine. Since she knew me in my 20s, naive to prison life, Lynn is amazed that I’m now nearly 35 and comfortable in my surroundings. Our unexpected reunion helps me measure how much I’ve matured since beginning my term. I talk with prisoners I knew when I served my sentence in Atlanta, but after a month, I’m glad to leave the penitentiary behind. Ironically, Fort Dix feels like home and I look forward to my return. After several hours our plane lands briefly for a prisoner exchange in Manchester, New Hampshire. From my window seat I look at a dense growth of trees with leaves that flutter in the wind and appear to change colors before my eyes. It’s a spectacular natural display of orange, yellow, red, and green, and I realize that during the two months I’ve been locked inside Oklahoma, Miami, and Atlanta prisons, summer has turned to fall. The plane takes off again, and a few hours later, on Thursday, October 15, 1998, I’m processed in and admitted back inside the gated community of FCI Fort Dix. My friend Carol Zachary is responsible for my return. She met with a high-ranking decision-maker in Washington, and that meeting resulted in the reversal of my transfer order, immediately blocking my move to a Florida state prison. I walk back onto the Fort Dix compound, and my friend Gary welcomes me with a white mesh laundry bag full of commissary items. “Welcome back,” he laughs, embracing me. “I can’t tell you how good it feels to be back.” “Did you hear the news?” Gary asks. “What news?”
 Gary smiles, knowing that financial news interests me. “The Fed lowered the interest rate and the market’s on fire. I hope you didn’t sell.” “Sell? Are you kidding? I’m a buyer, not a seller.” “The prices for Yahoo! and AOL are almost back to where they were before you left.” “Don’t tell me you’re hooked on the stock market now, too.”  Gary laughs, telling me that he needed something to pass the time. ******* As we approach the transition from the 20th to the 21st century, fears spread throughout the business community that many of the world’s computer programs will fail. Every day, pundits on CNBC discuss the upcoming “Y2K” problem, hyping up the calamity that would befall the world if computers crash. As a market speculator, I’m paying attention to these stories. To ease worries about how the markets will react at midnight on the last day of 1999, central bankers from around the world take action by lowering key interest rates in the fall of 1998. Their objective is to provide more liquidity for business, thereby averting panic. An offshoot of their strategy is rampant speculation, and I’m one of the euphoric participants. I follow the flow of easy credit and hot money by subscribing to a dozen financial publications and studying them daily. I’m fascinated with the technology sector, as I perceive companies with an effective Internet strategy as having the most upside.  Understanding the risk, I concentrate all of my stock holdings in speculative Internet stocks.  That approach proves a winner, and I revel in watching my equity increase, sometimes by tens of thousands each day. I tap that equity by using it as collateral to leverage my holdings. I’ve got 100 percent of my holdings in Internet stocks, and by using margin I’ve got double exposure to the market swings. “You know, I really think it’s time you diversify,” Jon, another prisoner, advises me. “This market bubble can’t last forever. Perhaps you should sell now, put your money in fixed income.” “I can’t sell. All my gains have been short-term. I need to hold on to my positions for at least one year, otherwise I’ll owe too much tax.” Jon shakes his head. “All wise men diversify.” I’m reluctant to sell any holdings for two reasons.  On the one hand, I don’t want Julie to incur short-term capital gains taxes, and on the other I’m convinced the market euphoria will last longer than a year. Each evening, after the market’s close, I chart my day’s progress, read my industry news, and then I walk outside to tell Gary how we did. “How was the casino today?” “I bought Cisco, Real Networks, and At Home Communications.” Besides being a Grand Master at chess, Gary has tremendous musical talents. We sit under a maple tree in early March 1999, bundled in our green jackets and orange knit caps. Spring is in the air but it’s still chilly. Gary strums an acoustic guitar and practices while we talk. As a child, he played for weddings and parties in Russia. I test his talents by asking him to play music from China, Spain, Japan, Italy, or Greece and in an instant his songs transport me to those countries. “So, what’s in the account now?” “We’re holding $600,000 worth of stocks, and we’ve got $300,000 out in margin loans. Equity’s at $300,000.” “You’re a winner,” he says, strumming his guitar. The value of Internet stocks surge through the spring, and I continue using margin to leverage a bigger position with all of my holdings. On April 12, 1999, when the bell rings closed on Wall Street, the 4,000 shares of AOL, 2,000 shares of At Home and a scattering of other high flyers have a value that exceeds $2 million. With $1 million out in margin loans, the account’s equity surpasses $1 million. I’m tempted to tell Julie to sell, but if I do, the short-term capital gains will incur a tax obligation of nearly $400,000. One year ago I didn’t have commissary money, but now greed rather than a principled position prevents me from feeling satisfied with what I have. I’m determined to hold on until my equity reaches $1.6 million. That will generate a million dollars after taxes, and if I sell at that level, I’ll be able to put that cash in the bank. I’m shooting for a two-comma cash balance. Until I hit it, I’m determined to continue swinging for the fences. The value of my account doesn’t change my status in prison, of course. I still stand for census counts and strip naked for searches whenever a guard commands. I’m scheduled to serve 14 more years, yet the time now is just something I tolerate. I don’t need school or library books as I’m living vicariously through the market, a phenomenon the BOP is powerless to stop. ******* Two brutal trading days in April wipe out more than $400,000 from my account’s equity, causing me to change strategy.  Rather than holding on, I pull the trigger, calling my sister with instructions to sell. That move eliminates my margin debt, allows me to return the money Gary advanced, provides the resources to pay off the IRS, and leaves me with a cash-balance measured in six figures.  It’s far lower than the peak value, but far higher than where I began with my trading career. “Remember one thing,” Gary says, trying to cheer me up as we walk around the yard on one of his last days before authorities deport him to Russia. “Money doesn’t make the man; the man makes the money.” “I know, but I can’t stop thinking about what we could’ve had if I would’ve sold sooner.” “What’s the big deal? You started out wanting to finish law school, to work for 15 years to earn a lousy hundred grand. Now you’ve got that in the bank and you didn’t have to hustle with any of these schmucks. No one else in here earned what you did.” He advises me to forget about the market and to use the rest of my time in prison to do something else with my life, assuring me that I need to prepare for the endless opportunities that will await my release. ******* When we move into the new century, I know that I need something new to occupy my time, some project I can work on independently, without interference from the prison system. In August I’ll finish my 13th year, meaning I’m halfway through, with only 13 more years until release.  I must find a way to make them productive. Carol Zachary and Jon Axelrod bring Zachary and Tristan to visit for Thanksgiving and as we sit, side-by-side in the brightly lit and crowded Fort Dix visiting room. Carol inquires whether I’d like to renew my petition for clemency. “I can’t bring myself to go through all that again,” I tell her. “It’s too much of an emotional roller coaster. I need stability, something I can work toward.  Instead of waiting for someone else to make a decision that will determine my future, I need to find something that will allow me to chart my own course.” “Have you spoken with Tony? What does he have to say?” She asks about Tony Bisceglie, the prominent lawyer she persuaded to spearhead the legal effort to free me in 1997. “Tony is honest. He said that my chances of the president commuting my sentence are less than one in a million. Besides that, I’m no longer indigent. If I were to move forward with the petition, Tony’s fee would start at $50,000.  I’m not willing to part with the resources to pay that fee.” “Michael, you’ve got to do it,” Carol urges me. “Don’t you think you could earn that money again once you were released?” Zach, a sophomore in high school now, asks. He’s a student athlete who looks forward to studying business and economics. I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees. “The thing is, I’ve been living inside prison walls and fences for my entire adult life.” Although I feel their love and concern for me, I want them to understand why I perceive my situation differently from others who haven’t lived in confinement. “When people leave prison, they have a hard time finding employment, and financial pressures block them from making a new start. I see it every week when prisoners return after failing in society. If I thought we had a better chance at commutation, I’d take it. But when one of the top lawyers in Washington spells out the odds, I have to weigh the costs. The truth is, I’m more afraid of going home broke, into a tornado of financial uncertainty, than I am of serving another 13 years.” Carol folds her arms across her chest and nods her head sympathetically. Jon observes silently, and then says, “You’re going to have options when you come home, Michael. People love you and will stand by to help you.” I shake my head. “I need to build more support. If I could persuade 1,000 people to support my petition, then I’d feel better about moving forward with it.” “Too bad you can’t use the Internet,” Tristan states. He’s in eighth grade and an aspiring musician. We have an ongoing chess game that we play by sending our respective moves through the mail. “You’d be able to find 1,000 supporters on the Web easily.” “I’ve got some friends from school who’re pretty good on the Web,” Zach suggests. “Maybe I could help.” “I’d like to invest my time and money into an idea like that. Why don’t we start a Web business? I’ll write and type the content, then you guys coordinate putting it online,” I suggest. Jon looks at Carol. “We could buy a scanner to convert the typewritten pages into digital files. It might be a good project to give the boys some business experience.” “I could be the CEO,” Zach lights up. “What about hockey, baseball? You can’t fall behind with school,” Carol admonishes, taking in the scope of this possible business with more caution. “Mom, I can do it,” Zach asserts. “The business could earn revenues by charging a fee for prisoners to publish their information, giving them a platform to build support,” I say. “And once we build enough traffic, we could charge for advertising space,” Zach is on the edge of his seat, already chapters ahead in a business plan. “Hold on a minute,” Carol barks, throwing up her hands in a “time out” move, speaking as the voice of reason. “We’re talking about a project to generate support for Michael, to get him out of here. Let’s not distract ourselves with how much money we can make.” “I could really use a project like this, one that would take my mind away from here. I could work on it every day. If I build support, then we can explore the possibilities for clemency.” Carol nods her head. “Okay it’s a deal.  We’re after a thousand people.  Then we’ll move forward with a new clemency petition.” ******* “I’ve been following your writing on the Web,” my friend George tells me during our visit. “It’s very good.” Dr. George Cole is the author of American Corrections, the leading textbook used in universities to teach students about America’s prison system. He’s been my mentor for nearly a decade and he led the push for my acceptance into the doctoral program at the University of Connecticut. “Why don’t you write a book about your prison experience? I’ll present it to my publishers as a supplemental text to sell alongside my textbook.” It’s the most exciting proposition I’ve had since I began in the stock market and I ask George to advise me on how I can start.” He tells me to write a proposal for Wadsworth-Thompson Publishers to consider. The suggestion presents me with a new opportunity to turn the page, inspiring me with the confidence to launch the next chapter of my life. With my responsibilities to write for the Internet project that Zach coordinates, and the hours I invest to write the new book proposal, the outline, and the sample chapters, I have new reasons to wake before dawn and work 12-hour days. Unlike studying toward advanced degrees, writing doesn’t require me to seek permission from small-minded administrators. The activity is like a respite, freeing me from spending time with inmates who whine about the injustice of 12-month prison sentences.  Further, it doesn’t require me to read a dozen financial publications, it cuts my CNBC ticker addiction, and it provides a new challenge of learning how to express myself more fluently. To write, all I need is a pen, blank pages of paper, and a dictionary. Still, I know where I am, and I ask for written clarification from the BOP legal department on the rules that govern prisoners who write for publication. That inquiry brings confirmation from a BOP staff attorney who says that as long as I’m not inciting others or being compensated for my writing, I’m within my rights to continue. Working to write for publication becomes a goal I can pursue with gusto, and I welcome the challenge of persuading publishers to work with me.  To succeed, I must work to become a better writer, and by doing so, I’ll transcend prison boundaries, connect with readers everywhere, and build support. I go to the library in search of more information. “Do you have any books on the shelves about the publishing business?”  I’m hopeful that the librarian can steer me in the right direction. “All we’ve got is an old-edition of The Writer’s Market.”
 “I’ll take it,” I say. The reference book shows the difficult odds that beginning writers face. Fewer than one in 1,000 authors sign publishing agreements. Those who succeed frequently toil for years, writing many manuscripts before they see one of their books in print. I perceive an edge because of the mentor relationships I’ve nurtured over the years, and because I’m writing about a unique subject matter. After I write my proposal for About Prison, George advises me to send it to Sabra Horne, a senior acquisition editor at Wadsworth-Thompson.  She responds with a publishing agreement, and I write the manuscript that described my first decade as a prisoner.  The academic publisher will package the book as a supplementary text for university professors who teach courses in criminal justice. With that project behind me, I write to Dr. Marilyn McShane, another mentor who, in addition to teaching criminal justice and authoring books, is a senior editor for Greenwood-Praeger Publishing. She offers to publish Profiles From Prison, my second book, which describes backgrounds, adjustment patterns, and future expectations of 20 prisoners. The thousands of hours I spend writing, typing, and editing the manuscripts gives me the feeling that I’m doing something more than simply serving time.  It’s as if I’m making a societal contribution, living a life of meaning and relevance. If readers find value in the books once they’re published, perhaps more people will see the need to think smarter rather than tougher about America’s dysfunctional prison system. As the final months of Clinton’s presidency approach, I’m at ease with my decision to focus on writing. The book projects, together with weekly contributions I’m making for the Web site, provide readers with a prisoner’s perspective of confinement, and the work connects me in ways that make me feel almost whole. I’m leading a useful life, feeling legitimized as a citizen. After more than 13 years I no longer feel the “punishment.” Writing counteracts the “isolation,” neutralizing the stated goals of imprisonment. ******* I’m alone in the visiting room on my work assignment, buffing the tile floor and thinking about what I’ll write the next day when my friend Tom walks in and taps my shoulder. I release the lever that powers the machine. “Hey, Bud, I didn’t hear you come in.” Tom shakes his head. “Did you hear the news?” “What news?” “Clinton commuted the sentences of about 20 people, two from Fort Dix.”
 “Who’d he let out?” “It doesn’t matter. Sorry, Pal. It should’ve been you.” I made my choice of not pursuing the clemency application, so I’ll live with it and move on, even though I’m disappointed to accept the reality that I missed a genuine opportunity for liberty. Tony had a clear plan for pursuing my commutation. He intended to use endorsements from my network of mentors and supporters to persuade my former prosecutors and judge that I had earned freedom.  If he succeeded in getting that support, he was going to lobby his Washington contacts to bring my petition to the attention of the White House. In light of the president granting clemency to so many, I sense that Tony’s strategy might have succeeded. I may have been freed. Thirteen years of imprisonment have institutionalized me, blinding me to the possibility of liberty. With the controversial election of George W. Bush, I’ve missed my opportunity. ******* On late February of 2002, I’m standing shoulder-to-shoulder with two hundred prisoners in the television room, listening as the guard shouts out names to distribute mail. My mentor, Bruce, and I still exchange weekly letters.  As I work to improve my craft, he’s my first reader, one of several who challenge me “to show rather than tell” through my writing.  It’s a lesson I struggle to learn. “Santos!” The guard shouts my name. “Back here, by the microwave,” I yell over the noise of the crowd.  I’m waiting for an envelope that I expect will include Bruce’s comments on one of my manuscript drafts. The guard continues hollering names, but I tune him out and watch the envelope that works its way back toward me, passing from one man’s hand to the next. The envelope looks too small to contain my manuscript, and when I take it from the prisoner who stands in front of me, I look at the return address. It’s written in a woman’s graceful penmanship, though her name isn’t one I recognize. I open the envelope while still standing amidst all the other prisoners, and I pull out an artistic postcard. It features a print by Henri Lautrec that I admire. Bruce works at infusing my life with art and artists and I smile, knowing he would be proud of my new cultural awareness. When I open the card, curious to know who wrote it, I see that the sender is Carole Goodwin, a former classmate of mine from Shorecrest High School, class of 1982. Carole and I grew up in Lake Forest Park, Washington, attending school together from the time we were in fifth grade. We spent our summers at the same beach club on Lake Washington. Carole and I were not close but I have a clear memory of walking with her, holding hands, and kissing her once during the celebration following our high school graduation. Ten years earlier in my sentence, I corresponded with Susan, Carole’s younger sister.  From Susan I learned that Carole married someone after high school and that she had two children, Michael and Nichole. But my correspondence with Susan came to an end many years ago and I didn’t know anything more about the Goodwin sisters.  I’m surprised to receive this letter from Carole. I’m even more surprised by what I read in the card and in her accompanying letter. She’s scolding me, telling me how she knows people who became substance abusers, and how as a mother of two children, she abhors drugs, saying that she thinks it’s awful that I sold cocaine. I read Carole’s letter again. Apparently, while she was coordinating our 20-year high school reunion, she received an unsolicited e-mail from an anonymous writer asking whether the reunion was for the same graduating class as mine. When Carole requested more information from the sender, he simply wrote that he’d come across my website and was curious. Carole searched the Internet for my site.  Reading about my crime and sentencing prompted her to send me her thoughts. “Hey, Marcello,” I say, nudging a friend who was standing next to me as I read Carole’s card and letter. “Check this letter out and tell me what you think.” I pass Marcello the letter. “She sounds angry,” he states flatly, handing it back. “That’s what I thought.”
I fold the letter from Carole back into its envelope along with the card. “I don’t get it. If it were someone I didn’t know, maybe a law-and-order fanatic, or a prison guard, I’d get it. But this is a woman I grew up with. I kissed her in high school.” I shrug my shoulders. “I’ve been in prison for more than 15 years. Why do you think she’d write to scold me now, after all this time?” “She’s probably a Republican.” “Maybe,” I laugh, “but I’m going to write her back. I’ll bet I can change her mind.”    

On today's episode we hear inter-generational perspectives from three women. We're lucky to have guests in their 30s, 60s, and one who is on the cusp of their 90th birthday. KT McBratney is the Co-Founder of OwnTrail, Karen Ko is retired after 25 years at the City of Seattle's Department of Neighborhoods, and Anne Stadler is one of the founders of Third Place Commons in Lake Forest Park, WA and works with the Association of Beloved Communities. Our guests spend time discussing how they like to care for others and how they like to be cared for, and then jump into different projects they are working on. Listen to our guests discuss sensory gardens, innovative ways to create more mentorship for and by womxn, and how we create a future centered on belonging during and after COVID-19.0:00 - Introduction03:00 - How would you like to be cared for?09:00 - Karen shares her story of moving to the International District14:30 - Group celebrates the Tai Tung Restaurant15:03 - KT shares her story and how she dealt with being perceived as "too much"18:32 - Anne shares her story of working as a community organizer and TV producer24:44 - KT discusses launching a company during a pandemic and how the OwnTrail App creates a space for women to share their professional journeys34:40 - Karen talks about Seattle Sensory Garden and designing public spaces for people who are blind and deaf39:54 - Anne describes the importance of MLK's "beloved community" in her life

101. Earning Freedom with Michael Santos   Conquering a 45-Year Prison Term (1.1)   I’m reading from chapter 1 of my book, Earning Freedom: Conquering a 45-Year Prison Term   For more information, visit PrisonProfessors.com         I can feel the DEA agents waiting. I don’t know where or when they’ll strike, but I know they’re near. I’ve never been arrested before, and I’m scared. My wife, Lisa, sits next to me in our Porsche convertible, clutching my hand. We’ve only been married five months. She’s a glamorous South American blonde who looks spectacular in her form-fitting designer clothes, better still in a bikini. With her beside me, I feel powerful. I’ve built my life on extravagance and appearances, and Lisa completes the image I want to project. She’s five years older than I am and I always try to appear strong for her–man enough for her. I don’t want her to see my fear, but inside I’m shaking. Shadowy forces feel like they’re closing in, but I don’t have a grasp on what’s coming. Instinct, intuition, a sense of impending doom keeps crowding my consciousness. This high-flying life is about to change. I can feel it. Lisa and I have just left Miami where I learned from Raymond, a well-known criminal lawyer I’ve had on retainer, that a grand jury in Seattle just indicted me on drug trafficking charges.  Raymond said that my arrest was imminent and that the criminal charges I’m facing could include the possibility of decades in prison. After hearing that unsettling news, I followed his instructions and gave him my diamond-faced Rolex to hold. Then I told Lisa how to make arrangements for his $200,000 fee. After leaving Raymond’s office, I drive us toward the Rickenbacker Causeway that leads to Key Biscayne. Despite my attorney’s warning, I’m going home. He convinced me that a huge difference existed between an indictment and a conviction. By paying Raymond all the money I’ve got to fight the case, I’m hoping for a fresh start from the mess I’ve made of my life. I’ve been miserable for months, knowing that I needed to make a change. ******* We arrive at the entry into Key Colony, the private oceanfront community on Key Biscayne where Lisa and I live. The security guard raises the gate and I drive the Porsche forward. We make eye contact, and I sense resentment in his phony smile as he waves us through. I’m half his age, and for the past year I’ve driven through this gate every day in my flashy sports car with Lisa beside me, wearing a gold watch that cost more than he would make in a year. Today he’s sporting a smug grin. Maybe I’m paranoid. No, I shake my head as I accelerate through the gate and turn right. My gut roils with a subconscious awareness that I’ll never drive through this tropical paradise again. I park in the garage beneath Botanica, the building where we live. Lisa and I walk arm-in-arm to the elevator, not speaking. I’m alert, watching, expecting the feds to rush me at any second. With heightened senses, I’m acutely aware of the salty ocean air filling my nostrils. My stomach churns as I push the elevator button and we ascend. The elevator door slides open and we step onto the top floor. An open breezeway with palm trees and lush, tropical vegetation on either side leads to our apartment. There they are, in front of us. The three men wearing dark blue jackets wait, eyeing me as I approach. “Are you Michael Santos?” “Yes.” In an instant, I see three guns aiming at my head. “Freeze! Put your hands out where we can see them!” One of the agents then begins to recite my Miranda rights. I comply with their orders. Lisa steps away from me, gasping. One agent clasps my hands behind my neck as he searches me for weapons, though I’ve never carried a gun. Then he lowers my arms, pulling them behind my back.  I hear clicking and feel cold metal as he slams handcuffs over my wrists. When the agents see that I’m not resisting, their tone becomes less hostile. They begin to question me and, following Raymond’s instructions, I refuse to answer. “I want my attorney present before I say anything.” I’m embarrassed that Lisa sees me so helpless, so impotent in the grip of authority. “Do you want to say good-bye to Lisa?” I cringe at the familiar way her name rolls off the agent’s tongue, and I realize I’m really being taken away. “Michael!” Lisa’s tortured cry echoes across the breezeway. “Michael! What should I do?” I don’t turn around. To see her face would only prolong the agony of the moment. One agent is in front of me. I’m sandwiched between the other two and I feel hands gripping the chains of my handcuffs. I keep walking with my head down, humiliated. ******* It was 1987 and I was 23. For nearly two years I’d been the leader of a small group that distributed cocaine in Seattle. The scheme wasn’t sophisticated. Those at the core of our little enterprise were my classmates from Shorecrest High School, in the North Seattle suburb of Lake Forest Park. Sensing a huge market for cocaine among Seattle’s young professionals, I joined my friend Alex in a partnership to capitalize on it. I found suppliers in Miami. My friend John and his girlfriend, Lori, drove the drugs across the country and delivered them to Tony in Seattle, who stored them in his apartment. Alex coordinated deliveries to customers using Loren and Rico as local drivers. The shallow layers of people separating me from the actual cocaine fed my delusions that I wasn’t really a drug dealer. Instead, I liked to think of myself as an entrepreneur. To the extent that I thought about it, I provided a simple service. No weapons. No violence. My friends and I only sold to consenting adults, so I equated our actions to those who supplied speakeasies during prohibition.  It was my way of glamorizing the scheme to camouflage the severity of potential consequences. The government, of course, saw things differently. Ronald Reagan occupied the White House and he was ramping up the “War on Drugs.” I may have previously seen myself as a businessman, but riding through the streets of Miami in the back seat of a black Ford LTD with my hands locked behind my back, in the custody of DEA agents, left no doubt that I was in big trouble. I thought of Lisa. I thought of my parents. I wondered if my attorney, Raymond, could really get me out of this mess. ******* “So, what’s up? Did you think you could run from us forever?” The two agents in the front seat switch to a friendlier approach. The driver has carrot-red hair, styled with a flattop and military fade. His partner looks hip, wearing feathered brown hair that he holds in place with his stylish sunglasses. They try to engage me in conversation, but I’m silent, deep in thought as I stare out of the tinted windows at the glass-faced, high-rise buildings of downtown Miami. “Talk to us,” the driver pipes in. “This may be your last chance to save yourself.” I’m mute, afraid, sensing that I’ve reached a pivotal moment. “Alex and Tony have given us plenty already. Who’re you tryin’ to protect? This is the time,” the driver speaks with authority. “No one knows you’ve been busted but us. Your pals cut sweetheart deals, left you hangin’ in the wind. Take us to your suppliers and I’ll turn this car around right now.” “You don’t have much time.” The other agent stares at me, tempting me, trying to persuade me. I can tell that he isn’t much older than I am. “Once we move forward, you’re booked, game over. Speak up now and you’ll be able to go home to that pretty little wife of yours.” I don’t say a word. It’s not that I feel an allegiance to any criminal code. As crazy as it sounds, I don’t even consider myself a criminal. It’s simply that escaping problems by betraying others doesn’t appeal to me as much as the chance for total vindication. Raymond suggests we can win through a trial, and I’m swinging for the fences, going for it.  I cling to those hopes, but I’m also conflicted because a deep shame seeps through me. For years I’ve been telling lies, though I’m yet not ready to confront the reality of who I am, of what I am. I desperately want to resume a normal life and spare myself the humiliation of having to admit that I’m a drug dealer. As the DEA agents urge me to confess everything, I think about Lisa. I’ve come to define myself through material possessions, and she is my trophy. I live a fantasy life with her, locked in a constant struggle to mask my shallowness. Cooperating with the DEA and informing against others to spare myself would show weakness, implying that I lacked the wits and enough power to resolve the situation.  It wouldn’t be the forceful image I’ve worked so hard to project. I remain silent, sealing my fate. ******* I’ve never been to prison, nor have I been locked in custody before, but I did have a previous problem with the law. In high school, I organized a sports gambling pool. When one student couldn’t pay up he offered to settle the debt with a stereo he stole. I accepted. A few months later, when police officers caught him in another theft, he told the officers that he gave the stereo to me. That led to my conviction for receiving stolen property.  When I confided in my father about the problems of the stolen stereo, he stood by my side. For my sanction, a judge ordered that I pay $900 in restitution and that I fill out a form for a probation officer each month for nine months. We concealed the incident from my mother and sisters, not wanting to worry them. ******* In the back of the DEA car, I think about how my arrest is going to devastate my family. I’m now in a predicament that’s going to expose the deceitful life I’ve been living and I’m humiliated, yet I still can’t bring myself to come clean because I’ve got too much invested in the lies I’ve already told. In choosing this path, with Raymond fighting my battle, I’ve got to go all the way. ******* My father was a Cuban immigrant. Together with my American mother he built a contracting company in Seattle and provided well for our family. We lived in a beautiful five-bedroom home that sat on several acres in Lake Forest Park. A stream with waterfalls ran through our front yard, with a thick forest behind the house. My parents worked hard to provide my two sisters and me with every advantage, to prepare us for success, grooming me to lead the family company. My father took pride in operating heavy equipment, pouring concrete, and creating work of lasting value. His company specialized in public works, installing highway lighting and traffic signal systems. My dad was an old-country kind of guy, and he aspired to teach me a strong work ethic. But I resented pulling wire and carrying pipe. I especially dreaded working on weekends or during summers when my friends were waterskiing on Lake Washington. Even though I worked by my dad’s side from the time I was six, I couldn’t see myself doing physical labor, not for the long term. I wanted the good times my friends enjoyed. After graduating from high school with mediocre grades, I maneuvered my way out of the field and into the office, wanting to wear clean clothes and to position myself close to the money. With high expectations, my parents gave me the position of vice president, despite the fact that I lacked the maturity to wield the responsibility such a title implied. They trusted me, and I exploited their confidence in my abilities. I’ve always been driven by the pursuit of money and possessions, with a sense of entitlement, wanting more than what my parents gave. Their friends were professionals and business owners, people whose influence and style impressed me. The family business was small when I joined it full-time after graduating from high school, employing only a few electricians. My dad worked alongside them to install illumination and electrical systems while my mom kept the books. The company remained free of debt and afforded us a comfortable life, though it wasn’t enough for my tastes. To me, bigger seemed better. Rather than studying and working through a four-year apprenticeship program to earn the state licenses I would need to assume control of the business, I thought of ways to expand without having to dirty my hands. I could always hire people with the necessary licenses and reasoned that my energies were better spent on increasing revenues. I joined trade organizations and socialized with other contractors. Those relationships led to collusion, bid rigging, and other violations of state contract laws. My parents didn’t object too strenuously as the company’s annual revenues increased from hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars. To finance the growth, I persuaded my parents to sign agreements that required them to pledge their home and assets as collateral for higher credit lines with banks, suppliers, and bonding companies. Within three years I convinced my parents to expand the company from one of boring stability into a leveraged business with more than 50 employees. My dad could oversee jobs across the state while I acted as the big man, schmoozing with people and working with numbers that impressed me. ******* Greed was a sinister enticement, clouding my judgment. My friend Alex had been supplementing his income by selling cocaine. Since I had unencumbered access to money from our family’s business, I proposed a scheme to Alex that would finance bigger coke deals and allow us to work together. I was 21, and the prospect of a quick score seemed harmless, too good to pass up. Taylor, a mutual acquaintance of ours, agreed to supply us with several kilos of cocaine. For our first transaction I pulled cash from the company account to pay Taylor on the morning of delivery, and Alex contacted customers to sell the cocaine during the same day. By late afternoon Alex gave me back the money to reimburse the company’s account. The deal left Alex and me with tens of thousands in profits. All went as planned until the following day, when a maid discovered more than $100,000 in Taylor’s hotel suite and reported it. Hotel management contacted the Seattle police who seized the money. When Taylor tried to claim it, the police required an explanation. “Just give us a receipt that shows how you received the currency and you can have it,” the officers told him. Taylor called me at work to explain what happened and he asked for my help. “I’ll give you 20 percent if you can provide a receipt that will get me the money back.” “Thirty percent,” I countered. Since I’d withdrawn a substantial amount of cash to finance the transaction, I had a plausible explanation, or so I thought. We concocted a story that we were going to use the money to establish a leasing company. I then brought Taylor to the high-rise office tower of our company’s attorney, and hatched a plan to bamboozle him into helping us retrieve the money. I had an excellent relationship with Geoff, who was a partner in the firm.  Since I’d worked with the attorney before, I assumed he would simply make a few phone calls and resolve the complication. Taylor and I sat facing Geoff across his polished cherry wood desk. His office overlooked the mid-rise buildings of South Seattle and Puget Sound. “I gave the money to Taylor so that he could make a cash offer to purchase construction equipment from a contractor who was going out of business.” Geoff listened patiently to my story, but in his eyes I saw skepticism. Lying, I fabricated a story, telling him that Taylor and I were then going to lease the equipment back to my father’s company.  Supposedly, we would rely upon the leases to collateralize a bank loan to reimburse the company. “Is your dad a part of this new venture you’re launching?” I still remember the doubt in Geoff’s voice from his first question. When I told him that I’d made this deal on my own, Geoff nodded, then turned his interrogation to Taylor, who sat across the polished desk as if he were an accomplished businessman there to consult on a corporate merger rather than seek help to retrieve a duffle bag full of cash. “And where do you live?” Geoff’s question was direct. “I keep an apartment in The Grosvenor House.” Taylor answered. “That’s on Queen Anne, isn’t it?” “That’s right.”  Taylor didn’t yet realize that he was out of his depth. “About five minutes north of downtown?” Geoff persisted. “Yes.” “So you keep an apartment in the city.” Geoff nodded, holding a finger to his temple as he rocked in his chair. “I do.” “Then help me understand why you’d take a hotel room a few blocks away from where you live. More to the point, why would you leave so much cash in a hotel room while you went to the gym for a morning workout?” Taylor stumbled through Geoff’s penetrating questions. I remember squirming in my chair, knowing the meeting was a disaster.  The longer we sat there, the more I realized how foolish I’d been to think that I could manipulate a skillful attorney with lies. Geoff said he’d make some inquiries with the police and call me later with a plan. I walked out of the office feeling sick to my stomach, knowing that I’d permanently destroyed my reputation. I wouldn’t have the courage to face Geoff again. “Are you alone?” Geoff asked when he reached me in the car later that afternoon. “Yes.” I was driving north on Interstate 5 toward the company office. Rain drizzled on the black Bronco I drove. “Taylor isn’t with you?”  He sounded concerned for my welfare. “No, I’m alone.” “I’m going to ask you some questions and I want you to answer honestly. Okay?” “Of course.”  I knew what was coming. “Does your father know about this money?” “No.” “Did you give that money to Taylor?” “No.” “Does that money really belong to you?” “No.” “I didn’t think so. Michael, I want you to listen very carefully to me. I’m speaking to you as a friend and as your attorney. You have a brilliant future with your father’s company in this city. But I smell drugs with Taylor. I want you to run as far away from him as you can. He is a cancer and he will destroy you. Do you understand?” “Yes. You’re right. I’m sorry I brought him to your office.” “That’s okay. We’ll keep our meeting today between us.” Despite his kind tone, I sensed that I’d irretrievably lost his respect. I hung up, humiliated. Taylor had created his own problem by leaving his money in a hotel suite while he exercised. By intervening I made Taylor’s problems my own; there wasn’t any way for me to erase what I’d done or re-establish trust with Geoff. Instead of running away from Taylor as Geoff advised, I did the opposite. I abandoned my responsibilities and obligations to our family business. My poor judgment had forced my hand, I thought. With the irrevocable damage I’d done to my reputation I left Seattle for Miami, intending to earn a few million by becoming a coke dealer. ******* And that’s how the scheme began that led to where I sit now, locked up. I’m a prisoner of the Drug Enforcement Administration, on my way to places unknown. ******* The driver turns into an office complex and parks. The third agent, the one who searched me and cuffed me during the arrest, parks a separate, identical car beside us. I exit the car with one agent holding the chain of my handcuffs behind my back. I’m like a dog on a leash, being walked into what I presume is a field office. Once inside, the agents begin to process me. They unlock my handcuffs so I can hold a nameplate beneath my chin while one of the agents photographs my head. Another leads me to a station for fingerprinting. They invite me to cooperate again, to talk with them in exchange for a reprieve from jail. Last chance. The ship is sailing, fading away on the horizon, but I’m not onboard. Disgusted with my refusal to spill the information they’re trying to coerce from me, an agent leads me to a room the size of a broom closet and locks me inside. “Get used to it.” He warns, tossing the words over his shoulder as he walks away. I’m alone in the tiny room. A bench extends the length of one wall. I sit, elbows on my knees, head in my hands. I’ve been immersed in a scheme of selling cocaine for nearly two years and now it’s come to this. Although I’m not ready now, I’ll soon have to answer to the world for the lies I’ve been living. I knew my parents suspected something. My mother even accused me once, crying about how she didn’t want to lose her son to prison. I tried to console her while simultaneously stonewalling her questions about why I had moved to Miami, about why I wouldn’t provide her with a phone number or an address. My irresponsible choices broke her heart long ago. With arms folded across my chest, I stare at the floor, leaning my back against the cold brick wall. I’d like to ask forgiveness, to take my lashes and start fresh, but instead I cling to Raymond’s assurances that I’ll prevail if I simply tough it out. With stress and the bright lights exhausting me, I lose track of time, though I’m sure that more than an hour has passed. My head aches and I’m dizzy. Finally an agent opens the door.  “Cuff up!” He slaps the cuffs around my wrists and locks them behind my back again. The agents take me outside to their car.  They unlock and open the back door, then press me inside. I don’t know where I’m going but I presume I’m about to see the inside of a jail. We drive a short distance and turn into the parking lot of a complex enclosed by double rows of chain-link fencing. Coils of glistening razor wire loop through the tops of the tall gates and many more coils of wire lie stacked atop each other on the ground in the wide space of no-man’s land between the fences. No one could escape without cutting himself to shreds. It’s hot and humid outside. Sweat forms under my arms, across my chest and back as I step out of the air-conditioned car. The agents march me toward the entrance of the Metropolitan Correctional Center, Miami. Prison guards from a control center press a button to unlock the heavy steel door electronically and I hear the click of the dead bolt. A guard from the Federal Bureau of Prisons wearing gray slacks, a white shirt, and maroon tie accepts manila folders handed over by the agents escorting me. They exchange words, though my mind goes blank and I can’t comprehend their conversation. When the guard searches me, looks in my mouth, inside my ears, and tugs on the handcuffs to ensure they’re secure, it’s clear that I no longer share a common humanity with them. The guard leads me inside a series of gates that roll behind us, locking me deeper inside the prison. I spend interminable hours in holding cells, sometimes alone, sometimes with other prisoners. I complete forms declaring that I don’t suffer from health issues or require medication.  Then I stand for photographs and more fingerprints–my life as a federal prisoner has begun I exchange my brown alligator skin loafers and matching belt, linen slacks, and a silk dress shirt now reeking from sweat, for elastic-waist khaki trousers, a white t-shirt, and blue canvas slip-on deck shoes. Without my clothes I feel my identity slip away. It’s ten at night when I receive a roll of sheets, a blanket, and towel. Then I descend into my first housing unit. The rectangular building is a two-tiered shell of concrete and steel with hundreds of sullen prisoners loitering in the common areas. Some of the men stare at me. While walking through the riffraff inside, I’m struck by the level of noise. My thoughts wander. Who are these people? What did they do? Can I handle myself in a fight with them? I see a line for the telephones and make my way through the crowd. When my turn comes I call Lisa. Prisoners crowd around on all sides as I press the phone against one ear while holding my finger inside the other to silence the noise. Lisa’s voice reminds me of all that I’m missing. I mask my emotions, trying to appear stoic. Between her sobs she tells me that Raymond told her I have a court date scheduled in the morning. “I’ll be there,” Lisa promises. “Your mom is coming with me.” “You told my parents?” My question comes across more like an accusation. I’ve lost control over the moment of truth, and it bothers me that I’ll have to confront them. “I had to. Raymond said he wanted to show that you have family support. Your mom wants to talk to you.” During my 18 months as a drug dealer in Miami, the family business collapsed, devastating my parents financially and emotionally. I’ve repressed the guilt that my reckless ambition caused the business to fail, but it surfaces again with my confinement, and it’s heavy. My parents salvaged the assets they could and relocated to Miami, where my father’s family lived. Their marriage didn’t survive the disruption and my mother now lives with my younger sister in a Miami Beach condo. The stable family and household where my two sisters and I had grown up were in shambles, only a memory. “Don’t worry, Mom,” I say in an attempt to ease her distress after Lisa connects us. “I didn’t do anything and I’ve got the best lawyer in Miami. You’ll see. He’s going to clear me of all this nonsense.” “Oh, Michael...your father and I are so worried.” My mother sobs between her whispered words. “What have you done?” “Nothing, Mom. I swear. I didn’t do anything. You’ll see. My attorney is going to clear all this up. Give it time. We just have to trust him.” “What are we supposed to do? What are we supposed to say? I can’t believe this is happening!” My time on the phone ends, not with a good-bye, but when a guard presses a switch to disconnect the call. He marches me to my room and locks me inside.

Kevin Shinick is an Emmy Award-winning writer, author, comic book creator and actor, is the author of the young adult novel Star Wars: Force Collector! It's an original tale of both self-discovery and Star Wars lore, is set just before The Force Awakens. The book follows a restless teen, Karr Nuq Sin, scouring the galaxy to learn his place in The Force, while uncovering tales of Jedi past (and possibly future) as he sets out to discover who the fabled Jedi were and what they have in common with his mysterious emerging powers. Kevin is in the Pacific Northwest for two signings: Monday, January 6 @ 7:00 PM Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing: https://www.powells.com/book/journey-to-star-wars-9781368045582/2-1?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=Journey_to_Star_Wars Tuesday, January 7, 2020 - 7:00pm Third Place Books, Lake Forest Park: https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/kevin-shinick-rise-skywalker-force-collector For more info about Kevin's work, check out his website: https://www.kevinshinick.com/ Theme music used with permission from Michael Geissler. For music like it, check out his website www.bytormusic.com/ Alternate theme song written and performed by Lucia Fasano. Check out her work on her Patreon page: www.patreon.com/luciafasano MSRP show intro, outro, and bumpers produced by Dave Sanders. Check out Dave’s other projects: Beards Booze & Brutes football podcast, every Friday: anchor.fm/beardsboozebrutes Twiter: twitter.com/BeardBoozeBrute Facebook: www.facebook.com/BeardsBoozeBrutes/ Hear For It Podcast, every Monday: anchor.fm/HFI Twitter: twitter.com/HearForItPod Facebook: www.facebook.com/HFIPod/ If you're looking for help in giving your podcast or audio project a polished, pro sound, hit him up on Fiverr: bit.ly/2XB2cRc Like, Share, Rate, and Review the show wherever you find it, and help the show grow by giving a 5-star rating and write a review. Subscribe so you never miss an episode!

Super storyteller, and the very popular and prolific local author JA Jance is with us to reveal that a new Beaumont book (#26) is out on Monday. She has a number of local book events beginning Monday evening at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park. Check the website to find where they are happening, along with the details. This new book, Sins of the Fathers. is another gripping story that takes us on an intriguing ride, touching on my contemporary issues--grandparents raising their grandchildren, homelessness, drug addiction in the adults and babies; and DNA testing. These are all issues that Judith is passionate about and she is masterful in including them in the story. www.jajance.com

What steps can we take in order to better our country by protecting the common interest of our workers? Former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich arrived at Town Hall along with Washington’s 7th District Representative Pramila Jayapal for a Labor Day exploration of Reich’s latest book The Common Good. They offered their perspective on the state of American politics and the labor movement, and unpacked Reich’s powerful case for the expansion of America’s moral imagination. Rooting his argument in common sense and everyday reality, Reich demonstrated that a common good constitutes the very essence of any society or nation. Societies, he says, undergo virtuous cycles that reinforce the common good as well as vicious cycles that undermine it—one of which America has been experiencing for the past five decades. This process, Reich asserts, can and must be reversed. Join Reich and Jayapal for a chance to weigh the moral obligations of citizenship and carefully consider how we relate to labor, honor, shame, patriotism, truth, and the meaning of leadership. Robert B. Reich is Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written fifteen books, including the bestsellers Aftershock,The Work of Nations, and Beyond Outrage. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal represents Washington’s 7th District, which encompasses most of Seattle and surrounding areas including Shoreline, Vashon Island, Lake Forest Park, Edmonds and parts of Burien and Normandy Park. Congresswoman Jayapal is committed to ensuring that every resident of the district has economic opportunity; fairness and equity; and safe and healthy communities. Presented by Town Hall Seattle as part of the 2019 Homecoming Festival. Recorded live in the Great Hall on September 2, 2019. 

Dr. Bird is a clinical neurogeneticist with interests in a wide range of hereditary disorders of the nervous system. In 1974, Dr. Thomas Bird founded the first clinic for adults with neurogenetic diseases in the United States. For more than 40 years, he directed this clinic at the University of Washington where he saw thousands of patients and conducted pioneering research on conditions such as cerebellar ataxia, movement disorders, hereditary neuropathy, muscular dystrophies, and familial dementias. Over his career, he has been honored with numerous national awards and lauded for his discoveries about the genetics of hereditary neurological disorders including Alzheimer and Huntington diseases. Although retired from clinical practice, Dr. Bird still actively researches genetic diseases of the brain and neuromuscular system; collaborates with molecular biologists and others on genetics projects; and mentors physicians in training and research fellows. He earned his M.D. from Cornell Medical College and is board certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. He lives in Lake Forest Park, WA, just outside Seattle, with his wife Ros.

Andy Weir built a two-decade career as a software engineer, until the success of his first published novel, The Martian, allowed him to live out his dream of writing full-time. He is a lifelong space nerd and a devoted hobbyist of such subjects as relativistic physics, orbital mechanics, and the history of manned spaceflight. He also mixes a mean cocktail. Andy's new novel is Artemis. See him in the Northwest tonight at 7pm at Bellingham High School in conversation with Dr. Melissa Rice, Assistant Professor of Geology at Western Washington University, presented by Village Books. You can also catch him tomorrow at 7pm at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park in conversation with bestselling author Neal Stephenson. Info at AndyWeirAuthor.com

This episode is a piece called Lake Forest Park, written and narrated by Jessica McQuarrie. It chronicles my experiences working at the local farmers markets and explores themes of white suburbia through the lens of my childhood growing up outside of Spokane.

Beatriz Williams is another NY Times best-selling author, who has her roots right here in the Puget Sound area, though living on the other coast now. Her work is historical fiction, and "Cocoa Beach" is an intriguing journey back in time to WWI, Prohibition, the 1920s in Florida. It's a great summer read. Beatriz comes to Seattle, home, for her first ever local book event, happening Saturday July 8, 6:30, at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park. www.beatrizwilliams.com

Washington State Senator David Frockt sat down with us just after the 2017 regular session ended. Senator Frockt represents the 46th District, which mostly encompasses North Seattle. He walks us through how he got into politics, what he's been focused on this past session, and where he might go next. David Frockt represents the Washington State Senate’s 46th Legislative District, which comprises North Seattle, Lake Forest Park and Kenmore. Elected to the House of Representatives in 2010, David was chosen early on by his Democratic Caucus colleagues as Assistant Floor Leader. He is in his third term in the Senate, and has represented the 46th District in the Senate since the untimely passing of Sen. Scott White. David has served in caucus leadership as Democratic Floor Leader, as Deputy Democratic Leader, and as the top Democrat on the Higher Education Committee. He now serves as the Democrats’ lead writer for the state’s capital construction budget responsible for building and maintaining public buildings and parks.

Never has a family been so in need of "Healing Time." By Paul Beckman, copyright 2015, used with permission. Visit Paul's website. "Suebelle's Homecoming" may not be all it's cracked up to be. By Helen Grochmal, copyright 2014, used with permission. Read Helen's bio. People have the oddest way of telling you to "Stay Away." By Thom Young, copyright 2016, used with permission. Visit Thom's website. The rules all change when you reach "Autumn." By Fred D. White, copyright 2016, used with permission. Read Fred's bio. NEW THIS EPISODE, our Writing Spaces segment featuring two former No Extra Words contributors. Sarah Mitchell-Jackson was featured on Episode 39 last March, Episode 67, and Special Episode #5. Click here to see her writing desk. Click here to see her library. Edith Gallagher Boyd was featured on Episode 54 in July. Click here to see her writing space. The bookstore I mentioned in this show was Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park, Washington.

Welcome, friends, to episode 7 of Drunk Booksellers! We’re here with Sam Kaas, Events Coordinator at Village Books in Bellingham, WA.   Epigraph Bitches in Bookshops Our theme music, Bitches in Bookshops, comes to us with permission from Annabelle Quezada.  Introduction   [0:30] In Which We Reminisce About the Good Ol’ Days and Emma Only Has Time to Read Books About Productivity Currently drinking: Left Hand Milk Stout from Longmont, Colorado. Emma’s reading The Girl Who Raced Fairyland All the Way Home by Catherynne M. Valente, The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories by Etgar Keret, The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande (also mentioned: Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen, The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More by Chris Anderson, Naked Money: A Revealing Look at What It Is and Why It Matters by Charles Wheelan)   Sam’s reading Clinch by Martin Holmen (pubs 7 June), Goodnight, Beautiful Women by Anna Noyes, A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth L. Ozeki   Kim’s reading Eruption: The Untold Story of Mount St. Helens by Steve Olson, A Life Apart by Neel Mukherjee (also mentioned: The Lives of Others), Curb Stomp by Ryan Ferrier   New/forthcoming books we’re excited about: Welcome Thieves by Sean Beaudoin Dodgers by Bill Beverly (pubs 5 April) The People in the Castle by Joan Aiken (pubs 26 April) Scarlett Epstein Hates It Here by Anna Breslaw (pubs 19 April) Tuesday Nights in 1980 by Molly Prentiss (pubs 5 April) The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone by Olivia Laing (also mentioned: The Trip to Echo Spring: On Writers and Drinking) All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation by Rebecca Traister (also mentioned: Spinster: Making a Life of One's Own by Kate Bolick) Jane Steele by Lyndsay Faye   Chapter I   [18:04] In Which We Discuss Radioactive Bookworms, Lawnmowers, and What Makes a Good Event     Chuck Robinson wrote a book about opening Village Books & Paper Dreams: It Takes a Village Books: 30 Years of Building Community, 1 Book at a Time Shout out to Watermark Books in Anacortes, WA. Another shout out to Third Place Books (opening a new store this year in Seward Park). If Tom Robbins requests a pocket road map of Venezuela, don’t question it, just get him one. Len Vlahos is a rockstar. Here’s proof:   Shit. Wrong image. I meant this:   See? Rockstar. I mean, he’s also a bestselling author and co-owns a little store in Denver, CO called The Tattered Cover. NBD. In other celebrity news, check out Chuckanut Radio Hour. Our favorite events tip: People shouldn’t be calling to ask if there’s an author event tonight, they should be calling to ask what the event tonight is. (hat tip to the fine folk at Elliott Bay Book Company [Kim pumps her fists in victory, even though she has absolutely nothing to do with events at EBBC]) Originally posted by mtv   So, yeah, you should check out Village Books’ event schedule, ‘cause it’s pretty great. Chapter II   [33:37] In Which Sam Builds Us His Wheelhouse, Discusses e-Reading, and Emma and Kim think dedicated e-readers are necessary for e-reading. You can buy one here.    [sign from @wordbookstores​] Kim can’t count. “A novel trying to answer big difficult questions and not necessarily succeeding but at least giving it a go.” = 19 words, not 16, but Sam still succeeded in the 20 Word Wheelhouse Challenge   Emma will read anything blurbed by Kelly Link. Sam will read things blurbed or compared to George Saunders or Sara Vowell. Also books about musicians. (Emma recs Rob Sheffield. Kim recs Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl by Carrie Brownstein) Chapter III   [43:25] In Which We Discuss Book Problems in the Apocalypse, Kim & Emma Learn About Cities in Canada, and Sam & Emma Get In a Fight Sam’s Station Eleven book: Ulysses by James Joyce, assuming Shakespeare has been saved by wandering bands of theater nerds Sam’s Wild book: Lyrics & Poems 1997-2012 by John K. Samson (songwriter, rhythm guitarist, & singer of The Weakerthans) Emma and Kim are embarrassingly uninformed about Canadian geography, so in case anyone was wondering, here’s Winnipeg:   Sam’s Reader Confession (a la Bookrageous, Episode 85): Sam believes he might be the only millennial to not finish the Harry Potter series. Emma has lost all respect for Sam. We move on (kind of).   Sam’s go-to handsells: City of Thieves by David Benioff and The Financial Lives of the Poets by Jess Walter Sam’s impossible handsell: A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James Epilogue   [53:50] In Which Sam Has Never Met a Bookstore He Hasn’t Liked and Discusses His Luddite Cynic Award Sam’s favorite bookstore (aside from Village Books): Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park, WA Sam’s favorite literary media: LitHub, BookRiot, The Paris Review’s Art of Fiction interviews, and old-school physical magazines (such as The New Yorker) Despite the fact that Sam has the Luddite Cynic Award hanging on his fridge and is the last bookseller on Earth not on Twitter, you can hang out with Sam and his mom on Facebook. Or email Sam at sam@villagebooks.com. UPDATE: Just before we posted this episode, Sam made himself a Twitter account. Go welcome him. You should probably follow us on Twitter @drunkbookseller if you’re not doing so already. We’re pretty okay. Emma tweets @thebibliot and writes nerdy bookish things for Book Riot. Kim tweets every few months or so at @finaleofseem. Make sure you don’t miss an episode by subscribing to Drunk Booksellers from your podcatcher of choice. Also, if you read this far in the show notes, you should probably go ahead and rate/review us on iTunes too. Share the love, y’all.

“I’d Walk With My Friends If I Could Find Them,” is the first novel from writer and Air Force officer Jesse Goolsby. Wars impact lingers. It shapes a nation’s life. It also shapes the lives of the combatants, their friends and family. Goolsby wrestles with the ways the war in Afghanistan has shaped his characters and how their characters are reshaped by the experience. Jesse Goolsby has published a number of short pieces of fiction and non-fiction. He holds an English degree from the United States Air Force Academy and a Masters degree in English and Creative Writing from the University of Tennessee. He is working on his PhD from Florida State University.Here is an interview I conducted with Goolsby when he was in town in July for a reading at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park, which is where we talked.-Steve Scher

Welcome to the first Capitol Ideas podcast of 2011. It’s a new year, a new session, and we’re speaking today with a new member of the Legislature, Washington state Representative Cindy Ryu. Cindy was elected in November to represent the state’s 32nd legislative district, a north King and south Snohomish county district that stretches from Edmonds in the northwest all the way down to Kirkland in the southeast. In between, the district includes Lake Forest Park, Kenmore, and Shoreline, Cindy’s home. Representative Ryu is new to the statehouse, but this isn’t her first taste of public service. She’s a former president of the Shoreline Chamber of Commerce, and served on that city’s city council for two years before her election as mayor in 2008. Two months ago she became the first Korean-American woman elected to serve in the state House of Representatives.