Podcast appearances and mentions of sydney brownstone

Nearly five years ago, in the wake of the George Floyd protests, Antonio Mays Jr. was shot and killed in the "CHOP," the autonomous protest zone that emerged on Capitol Hill. Antonio’s father still has no answers about what happened. We’ll talk to Seattle times reporters Sydney Brownstone and David Gutman about that time and Antonio Mays Sr’s pursuit of justice for his son. We can only make Seattle Now because listeners support us. Tap here to make a gift and keep Seattle Now in your feed. Got questions about local news or story ideas to share? We want to hear from you! Email us at seattlenow@kuow.org, leave us a voicemail at (206) 616-6746 or leave us feedback online.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For decades, a Washington law has empowered prosecutors to pursue felony charges against those who assault healthcare workers. Which, on a base level, makes sense. Healthcare workers don’t want to be harmed while doing their jobs. But some are worried that a potential felony charge – which would apply to both physical attacks, and typically minor offenses like spitting on someone – doesn’t prevent those attacks from happening and moves those with severe mental health challenges into a criminal justice system that worsens their condition. That’s led state lawmakers to propose an adjustment to the law broadening the penalties for those who assault healthcare workers – which would exempt people experiencing mental health crisis. The bill – HB 1220 – passed out of committee last week and is now headed to the full House. Seattle Times’ investigative reporter Sydney Brownstone has been following the story. Guests: Sydney Brownstone, investigative reporter for the Seattle Times Related Links: Health care worker assault law could see reform this year | The Seattle Times A law to protect WA health care workers keeps patients in crisis | The Seattle Times Find HB 1220 here 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.

For years, Grant County sat on enough clean hydroelectricity to power more than a million homes. Then came the tech companies, interested in the cheap and plentiful electricity. They built data centers all over rural Washington to help fuel the modern internet. The data centers use so much energy that in the next few years, Washington state could struggle to keep up with local electricity needs. Washington’s new governor, Bob Ferguson, has taken notice. Last week, he signed an executive order to evaluate data centers’ impact on energy use, state tax revenue, and job creation. The executive order follows a Seattle Times and ProPublica investigation into the impacts of the state’s power-guzzling data center industry. The report looked into the sustainability of data centers, the jobs surrounding them, and a controversial tax incentive that helps them proliferate. Guests: Seattle Times investigative reporters Sydney Brownstone and Lulu Ramadan Related Links: WA governor orders team to study data centers’ energy, tax, jobs impact - The Seattle Times Data centers guzzle power, threatening WA’s clean energy push - The Seattle Times Gov. Bob Ferguson’s Executive Order - WA.gov 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.

In Washington state, prisons are overseen by state officials, and are required to follow a set of standards. But city and county jails are not. A new proposal by state lawmakers would change that. We talk with Seattle Times investigative reporter Sydney Brownstone about how several deaths in Washington jails helped lead to this push for change. You can watch Governor Jay Inslee's final State of the State address here. We can only make Seattle Now because listeners support us. Tap here to make a gift and keep Seattle Now in your feed. Got questions about local news or story ideas to share? We want to hear from you! Email us at seattlenow@kuow.org, leave us a voicemail at (206) 616-6746 or leave us feedback online.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Across vast stretches of rural Washington, large boxy warehouses have popped up between fields of potatoes. They contain the humming infrastructure that the tech industry and users rely on to store documents in the cloud, access streaming videos, or perform internet searches.  It's easy to see why companies put data centers in this part of the state: cheap hydro electricity, available land, and a friendly legislature in Olympia that provides tax breaks. But now, all those data centers are gobbling up electricity, which will only intensify with the growth of AI technology.  And the growing demand is stretching the grid in rural counties, moving them farther away from green energy mandates from the state.  Lulu Ramadan and Sydney Brownstone are reporters at the Seattle Times who looked into the effects of data centers on the electrical grid and rural communities in a two part series. Guests: Lulu Ramadan, investigative reporter at The Seattle Times and a distinguished fellow with ProPublica's Local Reporting Network Sydney Brownstone, investigative reporter at The Seattle Times Relevant Links: Seattle Times: Data centers guzzle power, threatening WA's clean energy push Seattle Times: Data centers got a huge tax break to create WA jobs. Is it paying off? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the podcast "Lost Patients," journalists Will James, Sydney Brownstone ,and Esmy Jimenez explored why so many people with severe mental illness in Washington state are not getting the care they need.

In the final episode of Lost Patients, a partnership between KUOW and The Seattle Times, host Will James and reporter Sydney Brownstone look at stories of recovery. Soundside speaks with host Will James and reporter Sydney Brownstone about why they chose to end the series with this topic and how a date at a cemetery was the impetus for this project. We can only make Soundside because listeners support us. Make the show happen by making a gift to KUOW:https://www.kuow.org/donate/soundside

Soundside host Libby Denkmann talks with Seattle Times reporter Sydney Brownstone about "Deinstitutionalization," and how that effort in the 60's and 70's attempted to refocus mental health support with community care.

On this midweek show, Executive Dow Constantine fills Crystal in on why King County voters should support the Crisis Care Centers Levy by voting Yes on Proposition 1 this April. The proposed levy would raise funds to address our urgent behavioral health crisis by building five new crisis care centers across the County, stabilize and restore residential treatment beds, and cultivate the behavioral health workforce pipeline.  Crystal and Executive Constantine discuss how the levy is critical to our overall public safety and public health response in that people who currently may end up in jail or the hospital as a result of a mental health crisis would instead have an appropriate and effective place to go to seek help. The win-win of implementing this upstream resource is that people will receive much-needed care and our strained criminal legal and healthcare systems will be relieved of cases they are ill-equipped to handle. The conversation then digs into the practical details of building a sustainable workforce and shoring up community-based facilities for those with significant behavioral health challenges. 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 more information about the Crisis Care Centers Levy at https://yeskcprop1.com/.   Resources Crisis Care Centers Levy Fact Sheet   Building Behavioral Health | Yes on King County Proposition 1   “King County Council votes to put tax funding crisis centers on April ballot” by Michelle Baruchman from The Seattle Times   “King County measure would put $1.25 bn over a decade toward behavioral health crises” by Guy Oron from Real Change News   “To Help Kids Like Mine, Pass the King County Crisis Care Centers Levy” by Brittany Miles for PubliCola   “King County proposes moving people from Seattle, Kent jails to Des Moines site” by David Gutman and Sydney Brownstone from The Seattle Times   “ACLU sues King County over Seattle jail conditions” by Sydney Brownstone from The Seattle Times   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 almost-live shows and our midweek 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. So today I'm thrilled to welcome King County Executive Dow Constantine to talk about a very important levy that's going to be on all of our ballots this April - the Crisis Care Centers Levy. Welcome, Executive Constantine. [00:01:08] Executive Dow Constantine: Thanks, Crystal, for having me. [00:01:09] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. So what is this levy? What does this do? [00:01:13] Executive Dow Constantine: So there's a need - an unmet need in our community. We all see it - in our families and with our friends, in the streets, in the justice system. There is no walk-in treatment available for people - either mental health or addiction crisis - collectively behavioral health crisis. Further, we're losing the long-term residential treatment beds that were built, that were set up when the large state hospitals began to shut down in the '70s and '80s. And then we're really losing a lot of workers. Now I know this is a common story across the whole workforce right now, but behavioral health work has long been low-paid and it's always high stress. It demands a lot of you emotionally. And so people are not able to hang in there, especially on the wages that are paid. So we have a behavioral health levy - the Crisis Care Centers Levy - and it does three things. First, it builds five walk-in clinics - crisis care centers for those in behavioral health crisis - one of them exclusively for youth. The rest would be distributed geographically around the county so that everyone could have access. Second, it begins to rebuild the stock of those residential treatment beds where you can stay indefinitely as you get treatment and begin to chart a path forward in life. And third, it supports the workforce by increasing wages and bringing apprenticeships and training and other supports that people need to dedicate themselves to this important work. Because as we say over and over, it takes people to treat people - buildings and programs are not enough. You have to have the people - educated, dedicated people - to do this work. [00:02:49] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, and that's so important. And talking about the need - you summed it up - this is critical for our overall public safety and public health response here. I know I have been in the situation - so many people have been in the situation - where we see someone who's clearly struggling with a behavioral health issue, but it doesn't seem like police are the appropriate response. They're not breaking the law, but they're clearly in crisis. Maybe they're scaring people around them. Maybe they're going through an episode and scared themselves. In a situation like that, how would it work with this new system - instead of someone being diverted to a jail, or calling the police, or using that kind of response? [00:03:33] Executive Dow Constantine: Right. Right now, people may end up getting arrested and taken for booking - if in their crisis, they act out in a way that is illegal. They can end up being taken to the hospital emergency room - taking themselves, taking others - not the right place for people in behavioral health crisis, but many people end up essentially staying there and boarding - I call it - at the emergency room for long periods of time. They can end up often in the streets, and we've seen this time and again. When people are in crisis, they're no longer able to do the work that's required to stay housed and they can suddenly end up sleeping outside, which of course then just tends to exacerbate the problems that they're struggling with. We're putting together a system where whether you decide that you need to go in and get help, or perhaps you're picked up for a petty crime and the police determine that what's really going on here is you seem to have a behavioral health challenge, or your family is desperate and needs a place to find you help because they're afraid you're gonna hurt yourself or others - they have a place to take you. And it's a place where for the first day, the first 23 hours, you can begin to get re-centered. They have experts there who can help you get past the immediate crisis, and then move into the other wing of this crisis care facility - where for the next two weeks, you can get diagnosed, understand what kind of treatment's going to be available, begin to plan your path forward. And that's - it's a no wrong front door approach. Anywhere you enter the system, somebody can bring you to this place and you can begin to get the help you need. I will add one more thing, since you mentioned the criminal legal system. In Maricopa County, Arizona, they have a clinic like this - this is something that local governments are taking up in spots around the country because of the failure of the federal and state governments to step up. In Maricopa County last year, the police dropped off 28,000 people at the crisis care clinic - people who otherwise might have gone to jail or might have ended up out in the streets. And that is a really significant number. And we expect those kinds of numbers here as well. [00:05:37] Crystal Fincher: Those are huge numbers. And I think most people at this point are looking around in our communities and saying, "Yeah, I can see where there's that kind of need." Will these centers be able to handle that kind of capacity? As you've mentioned, this is a result of longstanding decisions and policies that have gotten us here - neglecting systems or not investing appropriately in systems over decades, really. So we have this large backlog of need, pent up need, and an increasing ongoing need. Will this be appropriate to handle all of the need that exists? [00:06:14] Executive Dow Constantine: I think it will be appropriate, but probably still insufficient - at least at the beginning. Remember, there's a lot of - as you say - pent up need. There's a lot of unmet need out there. Yes, in the streets. Yes, in the criminal legal system. Yes, in the hospitals. But also in homes across the county, in communities - rich and poor. Folks are struggling everywhere, and a lot of people find that they really have nowhere to turn. Even people of means, even people with insurance, even people with connections don't have a place for their loved one to go. So at the outset, it will not be enough - this is as much as we believe we can do as a county. I will say that two weeks ago, we were able to break ground on a new center in Kirkland that's modeled - it's on the same model. That one was funded by the state with some county money - ahead of this levy. And it's my hope that that will be able to - rather than being one of the five - that will be able to be a sixth clinic. But we're cobbling this together as best we're able - recognizing again that behavioral health challenges do not stop at city or county or state borders, and this should really be a national effort to meet a clear need of the people. [00:07:22] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I saw the news of that facility - the groundbreaking on that facility in Kirkland. It looks like all of the surrounding cities are very excited about it and eager to get it going because the need is so great in the area. [00:07:34] Executive Dow Constantine: Can I just mention something about that? 'Cause we often hear about communities or cities opposing the siting of human service facilities in their jurisdiction. And we're having battles over homeless housing, and battles over all sorts of things. But this seems to be a service that - across the political spectrum - is recognized as needed, as necessary, because everyone has this experience in their personal life. And I have to tell you that as I've been calling around raising support to get this levy passed, everyone I have talked to eventually gets to a personal story. My child, my sibling, my parent, my best friend had this thing happen to them - this crisis - and we didn't know what to do, we didn't know where to turn. Or we finally randomly found a lifeline and were able to get help for them, but that should be available for everyone. So the cities, like Kirkland and those northern cities, are really interested in having this facility sited locally. [00:08:27] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and I think - as you talked about in other situations - there have been varying responses to cities being excited or not excited about the location of services or hotels for the homeless. And developing that response and then having sometimes not positive feedback about where things are sited and located. But it seems like, with the five separate centers, that this is something that is gonna be geographically distributed and able to meet the needs of cities around this county. Was that part of the calculation as you were putting this together that went into looking at the variety of centers? [00:09:05] Executive Dow Constantine: Very much - the need is everywhere. The upsurge in mental health challenges coming out of the COVID crisis is everywhere - it's across the county - fentanyl, and before that the prescription opioid and heroin challenges everywhere. And although it's visible in the homeless population, it's visible in the people who come into contact with the criminal legal system, you cannot find a community where there aren't stories of struggle and suffering - and yes, tragedy - anywhere in this county or in this country. And so this is something that - yeah, again, cities are excited about and we were excited to make sure that this was not just centered in Seattle, but it was going to be able to serve everyone across the county - 2.3 million people. [00:09:48] Crystal Fincher: Now will this reduce strain? You talked about before - right now these people are winding up on the streets too often. They're also being caught up in the criminal legal system, which - with a behavioral health issue - doesn't really have the tools to address the root causes of behavioral health issues. Emergency rooms, and we hear all throughout our healthcare systems - they're being overburdened and people waiting longer and longer just for general or specialized appointments. Do you anticipate this easing the burden on some of those other systems? [00:10:20] Executive Dow Constantine: Yes, it has to. And this clearly is a logical and sort of utilitarian response to these overburdening challenges of the hospital system, the justice system, the emergency medical telephone system, and the challenges we're seeing on the streets. But it's not only about that, because there are an awful lot of people who have a behavioral health challenge who don't fall into any of those categories - who've not come into contact with any of those systems, but they also have nowhere to turn. And there is this - again, quiet suffering happening in families and communities everywhere. I will tell you that this is the obvious missing element in a lot of the other work, frustrating work, that we're trying to do. How do we reduce the jail population? A huge percentage of people in jail have either an addiction or a mental health challenge, or very often both. How do we reduce homelessness? A lot of folks who are on the streets don't have a diagnosable challenge, but a very large percentage do. And to be able to get them the help they need so that they can get centered, get clear, and begin to exercise agency over their lives again is absolutely critical to solving this. The hospitals are constantly asking us for help because they are really overburdened. They cannot provide the services they're supposed to provide because so many people, because of a lack of options, are showing up at their door. There's one crisis care center that is not open access in King County right now - it's run by the Downtown Emergency Service Center. You can be brought there by the police, or you can be brought there from a hospital - checked out of a hospital and checked in there. You cannot self-refer, your family can't bring you, your human services counselor can't bring you. And it doesn't have anywhere near the capacity that either the hospitals or the police would need to be able to deal with the challenge. I talked with an emergency medical worker - a firefighter - last week, and he was saying that just a huge percentage of the calls they receive are ultimately people who are simply in crisis. They're decompensating, as they say in the psychiatric world. They're having either withdrawal or overdose challenge. And these folks need somewhere to take people - they can't just continue to either bring them to the hospital or show up and then leave without providing them help. [00:12:42] Crystal Fincher: So I think those are excellent points. I actually think you're right on target that it will reduce reliance on hospital system - on so many of our systems - that are overburdened, that we're trying to manage and deal with. We did hear recent news about a lawsuit from the ACLU for King County Jails, a new potential SCORE - Des Moines facility - contract for some spillover capacity with the Seattle Jail, King County Jails there. Do you anticipate this helping to reduce the need for those facilities and the inmates that we're sending to those facilities? [00:13:19] Executive Dow Constantine: Yeah, yes. First of all, the highest priority is to relieve the suffering - to provide the help regardless of where you're interacting with the systems. But we have this enormous challenge with being required to accept people being booked into jail - ordered into jail by the courts, booked into jail by the cops from different jurisdictions - and we are overwhelmed. We don't have the personnel to be able to do what we agreed to 20 years ago under the Hammer agreement. Now we've been working with the ACLU - we believe we're in compliance with the agreement in the sense that we're doing everything we can to hire and accommodate people. But that has forced us to go out and try to rent more space - and the personnel that comes with it - to move people around in order to be able to comply with their demands. The fact is that we have about a hundred people in the jail on any given day who are supposed to be in state custody because they've been ordered over for evaluation and restoration of their competency to stand trial. But the state doesn't have the capacity to take them - so they, instead of being out of our jail within a week, as is required by law - some people have been there for 7, 8, 9, 10 months and they're not getting better while they're there, they're not getting the services to restore their competency to stand trial, and they're causing our jail to be overcrowded. And it is just unacceptable. It's also costing us $10 million or more per year to deal with that state failure. These are all results of the underinvestment in the behavioral health system. And also, if you want to broaden the aperture, underinvestment in the upstream measures that will cause people not to come into contact with the criminal legal system in the first place - including the work we're doing - Best Starts for Kids, diversion programs and other. It is - this is probably the single most obvious glaring void in the system - the lack of crisis care and long-term treatment capacity. And if we do this, I think we're going to be a long way down the road towards solving the problem with the jail system. [00:15:19] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Now you say - rightly - that you have to compensate and make up for the lack of capacity elsewhere, that is costing King County money. But with public health being such a core responsibility of the county, what went into making this a levy as opposed to funding it out of the budget? [00:15:38] Executive Dow Constantine: Yeah, there's just no money. This would raise $1.25 billion over six years - that dwarfs anything we can do in the tiny sliver of the general fund that is available for discretionary spending. Most of the general fund - three quarters of it - is devoted to criminal legal system work mandated by the State of Washington. So we're left with about a quarter of our discretionary money to use for the elections process, the assessor's office, all the public health work that we do, all of the diversion to move people away from the criminal legal system, sexual assault and domestic violence victims' programs - all of the things that we, collectively as a community, think are important to do instead of using the hammer of the criminal legal system. And yet those are the things that are on the chopping block if we don't have enough funding in the general fund - because they are not required by state law. [00:16:29] Crystal Fincher: How do you respond to people who say, "Okay, we're required to do some things by state law, but not everything. Maybe we opened up too many jail facilities, and maybe we're jailing too many people. Is there something that we can do with our sizable public safety budget to make some room?" [00:16:47] Executive Dow Constantine: Yes - first off, we're not in charge of that - the courts order us to hold people and that is our job. The executive doesn't get to by fiat decide that some people leave the jail - the exception being when we had to maintain the jail population at a certain level because of the COVID emergency that I declared. But absent that emergency and the need to prevent overcrowding to prevent the spread of COVID in the jail, I'm outside of my authority to send people home. What we need to do is create these alternatives - starting with making sure that people are getting behavioral health treatment instead of booking at the jail - but also diversion programs, sending people into a setting where they can actually deal with their underlying challenges, and perhaps compensate their victims rather than going through an empty process that doesn't change them or the outcome for the person they victimized. And if we have enough of that capacity, we can begin to get the cops and the courts and the prosecutors and everyone else to start reducing the demand on the jail system. I've said many times and I say it again - we have to close the downtown Seattle jail. It was opened in the 1980s. It was obsolete in terms of the model on which it was built the day it opened. It's very obsolete now and it is in the wrong place. You've got this jail - hulking jail - on one of the most valuable real estate opportunities in the entire Northwest. There could be hundreds of units of housing for people with varying incomes on that site. And instead there's this jail that adds nothing to the urban fabric and is built on the wrong model to start with - we've got to do better. And building this kind of capacity that we're talking about today is an essential, indispensable element of doing that. [00:18:28] Crystal Fincher: I see. And so I want to talk a little bit more about - you said this does three things - creating the five new regional crisis care centers, preserving the residential treatment beds that are necessary, and growing the behavioral health workforce pipeline, which is crucial and critical. We can build buildings, but if we can't staff them and don't have the appropriate people to provide the services, it's all for naught. So how does this go about increasing the workforce and preparing the workforce? [00:18:59] Executive Dow Constantine: So the idea is - first - that all of these human service agencies that receive government funding to provide behavioral health services are very strapped. They get reimbursed based on very unrealistic rates from the state and federal government - rates that often don't reflect the higher cost of living in Seattle and King County. So we will add to that funding to help raise up the floor for people and essentially change the standard for what the industry pays. This is the same thing we're having to do in childcare, for example, and elder care. All of these caring professions have been historically underpaid, historically disproportionately peopled by women and people of color. And they've been really not given the compensation that they need or deserve. And it is a matter of changing expectations. Changing expectations also means raising more money, which is what we're talking about doing here. It's not just the compensation. It is also the path into this. You shouldn't have to go deeply into debt to be able to enter this profession. You should have some certainty about - once you commit yourself to this, having a job that you can work in. You should be able to progress in the profession if you choose to do that. And so we want to provide apprenticeship programs - we've already begun one with Service Employees International Union 1199 - they represent a lot of these workers. They will have continuing education investment. And then in the implementation plan for this, we'll be looking at the specific conditions, talking with workers about - What is it you really need? Do you need housing subsidy? Is that the thing that's most important? Do you need to be near transportation? What - is it about insurance? What are the things that could cause you to be able to take up this work and be able to do it sustainably? [00:20:38] Crystal Fincher: And I guess follow-up question is that - that is all absolutely necessary. And these centers, in my opinion, certainly seem like they will help and help to fill this gap that so obviously exists. I have seen people question - okay, we get these centers and someone can get there and stabilize overnight. They can even potentially get a couple weeks of services, but some people are dealing with some significant challenge they're gonna take a while to work through. And so there needs to be some kind of handoff if we're gonna continue care and people are gonna get better. How does that process work, and does that capacity exist? Does this help address that capacity too? [00:21:17] Executive Dow Constantine: So some people who leave a center will be going home to their family. Some people who leave a center may need to go to just simply affordable housing - housing that has artificially been made affordable. Some people may need to go to long-term residential treatment. And I mentioned that - that's the second leg of this three-legged stool here. Those are the facilities that replaced the big hospitals as they began to close. And although Western State still exists here, it's not what it once was - and there used to be three state mental health hospitals. There were never enough of these community-based facilities built. Most of them are now 40 or more years old and they've never had reinvestment in the infrastructure. And so the little nonprofits that are running them - that are getting by day-to-day on inadequate compensation from the federal and state governments - aren't able to put the new roof on, aren't able to replace the wiring or the plumbing, and they're locking the doors and walking away. So the county, with help from the state, has been scurrying around trying to prop up this house of cards over the last few years to keep as many beds as possible. Still, we've lost a third of our capacity just since 2018 - half of our capacity over the last couple of decades. So this begins - this stops the outflow and then it starts to rebuild the capacity. And the immediate commitment here is to rebuild to the 2018 level, which was about one third, so it'd essentially be adding 50% to the base that we have now. [00:22:38] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, we gotta stop digging if we're ever gonna climb out of this hole. And 2018 levels are a good start - certainly we saw a lot exacerbated throughout the pandemic and more cracks exposed that were already there and just made worse over that time. But this seems like a good start. Can you talk to me about the timing of this? When would these centers be built and coming online? When will these services be available for the community? [00:23:03] Executive Dow Constantine: Yeah, so as I say, we advanced funding to get the Kirkland center started even before the levy is presented to voters or passes. Assuming it passes, my understanding is that we would be able to begin collecting this funding on January 1st of next year. We are in a very bad budget situation. The State Legislature has failed to act on the 1% lid on property taxes for the 20th year in a row. And with 8% inflation and a 1% lid, you can imagine that things are pretty dire. But we're gonna be looking for ways to jumpstart this even before the tax receipts start coming in. I am not committed to only building new - if we find a building that will work and that's cheaper and faster, we will go that direction. And that is true for the crisis centers, it's true for the residential treatment facilities. We want to be sensible, we want to act boldly and quickly. And I think still, as with the homeless hotels, one of the major impediments is going to be the ability to hire - that has just been a tremendous challenge in everything we do over the course of the last three years or so. And so we gotta get started on that with Service Employees International 1199 immediately. [00:24:09] Crystal Fincher: Makes sense. So this looks like it will cost the average King County homeowner about $10 a month, based on the assessment there. As they're considering this and thinking about their various obligations and commitments and bills, what do you say to them as they're pondering this decision - when they get their ballot - to just reinforce why this is worth it? [00:24:31] Executive Dow Constantine: First off, let's all acknowledge that Washington State has about the worst state tax system in the country. And I once again call upon the Legislature to fix it so that we are able to pay for what is needed with everyone contributing as they are able. Now, as - among the taxes that exist, the property tax is perhaps slightly more progressive than the others, like the sales tax. A person who owns an $800,000 house, which is the median home in King County, would pay about $10 a month. For that homeowner, I would ask - Have you ever had anyone in your life who's experienced a behavioral health challenge, an addiction or mental health challenge? Or in your community, are you seeing the results of the failure to provide service on the streets - in petty crime, et cetera? I think you can make a very clear, rational, unemotional argument that it just makes sense to invest this small amount of money to deal with what is obviously a huge societal problem. Because of that, I've actually taken on the responsibility of co-chairing a National Commission on Mental Health and Wellbeing on behalf of the National Association of Counties - met with the surgeon general and the president a few weeks ago. We're going to be advocating for a renewal of federal commitment to this challenge. And we have a national crisis of mental health and addiction and we just cannot afford to neglect it anymore. [00:25:55] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And with that, we will leave it there. And thank you so much for sharing all of the details about the Crisis Care Centers Levy that will be on our ballots in April - we'll be receiving our ballots here coming up pretty soon, so we're all getting prepared for it. Make sure we share the word just because - this is not when people are used to voting all the time - we really need to make sure that we are all turning out and spreading the word that this is a necessary vote and that these crisis care centers are helpful. Thank you so much, Executive Constantine. [00:26:27] Executive Dow Constantine: Thank you. [00:26:27] Crystal Fincher: Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is co-produced by Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek 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 episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

On this Hacks & Wonks week-in-review, political consultant and host Crystal Fincher is joined by defense attorney, abolitionist and activist Nicole Thomas-Kennedy! Crystal and Nicole discuss a number of news items this week, including new data showing a change in commute patterns for Seattle workers, as well as a new poll showing Republican Pierce County Executive Bruce Dammeier and Democratic Attorney General Bob Ferguson as the two leading candidates to succeed Jay Inslee as governor, should Inslee decide against seeking an unprecedented fourth term. They also delve into the details of the ACLU lawsuit against King County over Seattle jail conditions and examine the rising demand for the state's 988 hotline, how important non-police responses are for public safety, and the potential for new funding to help support mental health resource. Following Tacoma's State of the City address by Mayor Victoria Woodards, Crystal and Nicole also note the progress Tacoma is making in a more holistic approach to public safety with a Behavioral Health Crisis Response Team and an unarmed Community Services Officer Program, which would increase the level of response and bring support to non-emergency situations that are not an active threat to life or property. They review an encouraging update from the King County Regional Homelessness Authority about their work with the Right of Way Safety Initiative moving a total of 189 previously unsheltered people inside to a shelter or housing option that meets their needs. They also discuss a contentious debate surrounding the location of a new Sound Transit station. The conversation wraps up with a discussion of the recent train derailment on the Swinomish Reservation and the tribe's upcoming court case against the railway company for allegedly running trains in violation of a 1991 easement agreement that the tribe says limited the length of trains allowed to pass through. 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, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy at @NTKallday.   Resources How Highway 99 Removal Would Reconnect South Park with Mike McGinn and Coté Soerens from Hacks & Wonks    “Your old workweek is extinct, Commute Seattle data shows” by Mike Lindblom from The Seattle Times   “Bruce Dammeier (R), Bob Ferguson (D) lead hypothetical 2024 gubernatorial field in WA” by Andrew Villeneuve from The Cascadia Advocate   “The Exodus of Inmates from the King County Jail Continues” by Amy Sundberg from Notes from the Emerald City   “ACLU-WA, Director of Public Defense Call Out Conditions in King County Jail” by Alison Jean Smith from South Seattle Emerald   “ACLU sues King County over Seattle jail conditions” by Sydney Brownstone from The Seattle Times   “Washington state may boost 988 hotline funding as demand grows" by Taija PerryCook from Crosscut   “New facility will provide crisis response services for Washingtonians in north King County” by Shane Ersland from State of Reform   “‘Our best days are ahead of us.' Mayor Woodards relays optimism in State of the City” by Liz Moomey from The News Tribune   “Safety, homelessness, recovery top priorities in Tacoma State of the City address” from KIRO 7 News   “Identification Documents Open Doors” | King County Regional Homelessness Authority   “Constantine Backs ‘North of CID' Light Rail Station, Bypassing Chinatown and Midtown” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist   “Incomplete Analysis Overlooks Rider Delay Caused by Skipping Union Station Hub” by Stephen Fesler from The Urbanist   Coalition Letter opposing 4th & 5th Ave locations: WSBLE station location in the Chinatown International District    “Balducci Wants a Good Transit Option for Chinatown” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist “BNSF train derails on Swinomish Reservation as tribe readies court case against railway company” by Isabella Breda and Vonnai Phair from The Seattle Times   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 almost-live shows and our midweek 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. If you missed our Tuesday midweek show, I'm joined by Mike McGinn of America Walks and Coté Soerens of Reconnect South Park to learn more about their work with the Freeway Fighters Network. Mike shares a broad overview of the movement's efforts to remove crumbling highway infrastructure while addressing the climate, health, and equity issues that these concrete structures have caused. As a resident of Seattle's South Park, Coté reflects on the throughline of Highway 99 running through the middle of her community - connecting a history of redlining, displacement, and racism to the present-day impacts on the neighborhoods' livability, pollution exposure, and life expectancy. Mike and Coté call out the lack of imagination exhibited by the country's attachment to the highways, to our highways, and paint a compelling vision that replaces underutilized thoroughfares with vibrant, connected communities. But today we are continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with our co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: defense attorney, abolitionist, and activist, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy. [00:01:55] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Hi, thanks for having me. It's always - [00:01:57] Crystal Fincher: Hey, love having you - happy to have you back. We've got a bunch of news to cover today. One interesting story - starting out - was just new data showing new commute trends. We are not traveling in the same way that we did before the pandemic. What did you take from this report? [00:02:17] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: It seems that no matter how much some want everyone to come back to the office Monday through Friday, office workers don't wanna do that. And it looks like Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday is the day that people are primarily coming into the office. And it sounds like they're working remotely mostly Mondays and Fridays. [00:02:34] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and that has shaped and changed our commute patterns. Lots of people have noticed they're different - certainly midweek has the biggest impact. There continues to be this push to get people back to the office. We've seen Seattle's mayor, other people celebrate a return there. Certainly a lot of businesses that provide services and amenities to people who have traditionally worked downtown are happy to see increased traffic. Do you think we're ever gonna get back to a time where people are doing a regular Monday through Friday workday again? [00:03:11] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: I hope not - that's just my personal opinion. But people don't get paid for their commute time. And if you live in Snohomish County, or if you live - housing prices are so high right now that more and more people are forced to live outside of the City's core and travel in, which is part of our traffic problem, but it's also a quality of life issue. If people can work three days a week in the office and essentially get the same benefits that they would be for working five days a week in the office, why would we be trying to get people in there more? Obviously there are benefits felt by those workers, and I think reducing traffic is a huge issue. I understand that it doesn't necessarily benefit downtown businesses, but times have changed, things have changed, technology changes things, and I hope we don't get back to five days a week of intense and horrifying traffic. [00:04:04] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And I do also wanna mention that - being one of the people who does not have to commute every single day and can work from home, there is privilege attached to that. There are people predominantly in lower wage jobs, a lot of service jobs that don't have the option to not come into the office. Or people doing manual labor, which is every bit as skilled and takes all the talent that all the other types of jobs have, but they oftentimes are not able to have the flexibility to work from home or to take advantage of the saved commute time, which is really significant. If someone handed you back an hour, an hour and a half every day - there's so much more that can be done, or so much more rest that could be had, or just spending time with your family - it doesn't necessarily have to be productive in the way that we view work. But people finding balance is an important thing. So that's interesting and that has changed. Other interesting news that we saw this week - there was a poll fielded by the Northwest Progressive Institute that they wrote about in The Cascadia Advocate, their news publication, that showed if Governor Inslee happened to decide against seeking an unprecedented fourth term - which he has not announced any plans about - if that were to happen though, Bob Ferguson, our current Attorney General is viewed as the leading Democrat for the governor's race and Bruce Dammeier is the leading Republican. How did you view this? [00:05:38] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Polls are always interesting, right - we all wanna know what the future holds. But it's always who is responding to polls, what sort of choices or wording - which I think that poll actually went into a little bit, which is great - but at this point, I don't think a Republican is gonna poll all the Democrat votes. So it looks like they're even, based on the responses by - the people who respond - based on the people who responded to the poll. [00:06:04] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely - a situation where Democrats are splitting the vote. And to be clear, it showed if Jay Inslee were not to run again, who people were asked who they'd vote for, Bruce Dammeier - and I always forget whether it's Dammeier or Dammeier, so if I'm mispronouncing his name, I apologize - got 35%, Bob Ferguson 21%, Dow Constantine and Hilary Franz both polled at 7%, with 30% of the respondents not being sure. So really interesting to see the response to this. They also had breakdowns of the different regions of the state - notable there was Dammeier's home turf is in Pierce County, but he basically polled about the same there as he did for a statewide percentage. So there wasn't necessarily the kind of advantage that we normally see there. And swing turf continues to be swing turf. But really interesting as we move closer to the time where people expect to hear more from Jay Inslee about what his plans are or are not. Certainly a fourth term would be unprecedented - doesn't mean that he can't go for it - but certainly there's a lot of people waiting in line to figure out what's gonna happen and who's gonna be on the ballot. [00:07:20] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, it'll be interesting. [00:07:22] Crystal Fincher: Will be very interesting. Also this week, we see the ACLU suing King County over Seattle jail conditions. What's happening here? [00:07:32] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: So there was a decision - I can't remember how long ago - it was about conditions in the jail that was won by the ACLU. I think it was maybe in the late 80s? And basically the ACLU is saying is that they are not living up to the terms of that decision. There's also community groups that are not happy about what is going on in the jail. There's an astronomical suicide rate, especially compared to the national average in the downtown jail. It's old, it's antiquated, it makes it difficult for attorneys to see their clients. There's just a lot of elevated risk there. And Constantine said in 2020 that he recognized all of those things and wanted to shut it down. And so between the ACLU lawsuit and community groups' pressure, we are seeing a little bit of movement - but instead of finding alternatives to incarceration, what's happening is they moved 50 people from the downtown jail to the RJC [Regional Justice Center] in Kent. And now those people are double-bunked, so they took one thing and made another problem over here. Or the other thing that I think is being sought by the executive is a contract with SCORE, which is the South County Correctional Regional [South Correctional Entity] - I don't remember what it stands for - but which is really well understood to be the worst of our three jails here in King County. And so he wants to move people to SCORE, which obviously - people with the ACLU, with community groups are not excited about that because it doesn't do anything to solve the problem. It just moves it around. [00:09:06] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And to your point, the other facilities that they're moving inmates to already had their own pre-existing problems in this area that are being made worse with these additional inmates. It is just really a challenge and they are not, have not been able, willing or able - probably both - to adequately staff this. And so you can't just keep shoving people into this facility - that you're completely in control of - that is inadequately staffed, that doesn't have appropriate medical care, that has escalating rates of illness and suicide, where the corrections officers themselves have reached out and communicated via letter to the Executive to say - Hey, we are not staffed enough to keep our own selves safe and we're asking you to reduce the population because it's also unsafe for the corrections officers and staff that are there. Just this isn't working for anyone. And it seems like it's absolutely reasonable and appropriate for the ACLU to seek a court remedy for this. [00:10:17] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Absolutely. Something needs to be done. [00:10:19] Crystal Fincher: Right - and this also goes to the larger conversation we're having about public safety, about policing, about whether we want to return to more punitive, punishment-focus-based public safety where we're just locking up everybody - without realizing that that requires staffing, that requires administration. There is a cost to what we're doing and we don't even seem to be reaping any benefits in terms of increased public safety because of this. It is just a money suck that is harmful to everyone involved with the system and then makes us less safe on the other side. It just doesn't seem like this is working in any way, shape, or form. [00:11:04] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, it's true. And I think part of the problem is it's such a political question at this point. So many people have absorbed the idea that the only way for us to have public safety is to be as punitive as humanly possible. And we have mass incarceration in this country - we incarcerate more than any country in the world and we are not the safest. So clearly that isn't working, but I think that that's a - it's an easy flashpoint, fear sell to people that is actually making us less safe. And there's a lot of people that are pushing for alternatives, but it is an uphill battle. But it's being waged and I have a lot of hope that we will get there eventually, just hopefully sooner than later. [00:11:45] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And there are a lot of individual cities, organizations making progress in this area. In fact, this week we saw a story that the state's demand for the 988 hotline is increasing and they may receive new funding - this is an alternative response to just sending police out to every single call solo. And thinking that we can solve calls related to homelessness, or someone feeling uncomfortable with someone in their neighborhood, or someone going through a behavioral health crisis - which we see turn out tragically in so many other situations - to say maybe a more appropriate response to this, that if someone is having a behavioral health crisis, there are responders that maybe don't need a gun and a badge, but they're experts in handling this type of mental health crisis situation. This is what we're trying to get at. This is what poll after poll shows the residents know is necessary and want. And so we might be increasing capacity for that. How do you see the 988 hotline, the demand for it, and what's possible through it? [00:12:55] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: When I was a public defender, I constantly had family members, people in the community asking - who can I call when my uncle, or my son, or someone in the community - who can I call that's not just a police officer? Because a lot of times the people that are forced - they don't have a choice - something is happening and they need to call, they need help, but it's always been a police officer. And I've seen so many mothers have to call, and then their sons get locked up, and they have no contact orders with the mom. And it just becomes this whole mushrooming problem that makes everything significantly worse and - if not deadly. And so I have seen community, directly affected community asking for this for years. And I think this is definitely a step in the right direction. It's really encouraging that people know about it, that people are using it. I think that once that becomes more of a normalized thing, we can keep pushing in that direction because there's so little - police always say that they don't wanna be social workers, they don't wanna be mental health counselors, they don't wanna be domestic violence experts, but we have to build those alternatives - because it can't just be cops or nothing. So it's really encouraging to me to see these alternatives being built up. I hope they keep moving in the direction they are because a lot of times services like this end up getting co-opted for different means, where, it'll be like - oh, we didn't have police come to this X amount of calls and now we have police coming to every calls because that's something that they lobbied for. And so I hope that they can stay and keep moving in an independent direction because it is so necessary. So yeah, I think it's encouraging. [00:14:30] Crystal Fincher: Definitely encouraging. And I should note that the 988 system doesn't absolutely guarantee that there's not going to be a police person involved in the response - that is still a possibility. There may be frontline people who come and if they happen to call for backup, that could happen - some places like in Seattle, as we've seen, police are wanting to respond to every overdose call - even though that is not a public safety call in many, if not most, jurisdictions, that seems out of line with many practices, certainly best practices. It can happen, but as you say, building out these alternative responses are absolutely necessary. And I think the more we do that, the better, the more we accelerate moving on to more effective solutions that keep us all safer. Because you hear this - Well, if we get rid of cops, then what next? We call 911 and no one comes, and there's anarchy and wild stuff in the streets. And that's not it. Being a progressive stance on public safety and understanding that it takes a comprehensive approach and addressing root causes, or else we wind up with this revolving door situation that doesn't address any problems that we're trying to solve - accountability is a progressive value. We don't want to escape accountability. We just want it to be effective and productive, and the end result to be that the entire community is safer and people are victimized less often. And we have data from experts who study this. And by the way, police are not necessarily public safety experts - they're not paid to do that or be that in any kind of way - but there are a lot of criminologists, a lot of people who actually do study this, who have identified several more effective approaches. And so it would be just really good to see us getting this stood up and see how we can actually work through these models and processes to make us safer. 'Cause we do need that. Crime is bad - there is not anyone who disagrees with that. People being victimized is bad, but it happens - the context in which we discuss it just through policing, the things that we've decided to make it illegal or focus on enforcing is just such a tiny percentage of the story of how safe people are. And whether it's sexual assault and harassment, or theft, or wage theft - those kinds of things - there are some that make the headlines, there are some don't, there are some that just slip by unnoticed even though it's harmful to a lot of people. And the more we can get at that, the better off we will all be. And a bill is still alive in the Legislature to increase funding for that 988 system and help to further build it out. Also saw this week, Tacoma's State of the City from Mayor Victoria Woodards, there in Tacoma. A lot of the standard stuff that you would expect to see there and focusing on public safety. But I think one thing that I found notable about the State of the City address, in Tacoma and so many other cities, is how the City of Seattle sometimes it's thought - well, it's progressive - and people just say that and assume it's true, and so all the most progressive policy must be coming out of Seattle. And Seattle is actually behind a lot of other cities in the state on really crucial issues - on homelessness, housing affordability, and public safety - because we saw Tacoma talking about something that Seattle seems to not be very interested in. They're running behind on their alternate response plans. Mayor Harrell committed that he would be standing up alternatives to a police response and is behind his stated timelines on that. And now people continue to ask - Hey, where's that coming? You said public safety was one of your top priorities and this major piece of it is still going unaddressed that's really up to him to implement. And Tacoma is talking about implementing those. Certainly they're talking about incentives for new officers, but they're also talking about standing up alternative response programs, investing in youth violence prevention, and addressing root causes. And it seems like they're taking at least a more holistic approach, or moving forward, than Seattle in the region. And it just underscores to me that this really, to your point, shouldn't be a political conversation. It should just be about what makes more people more safe. And was pretty happy to see that Tacoma seems serious about investing in some of those things. [00:19:13] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, I think it's a really positive direction. When people talk about police - in Seattle we always talk about 911 response times without really looking at what, all the factors that influence those things. But one thing - if we wanted to actually increase the speed at which police responded, one thing we could do instead of hiring more officers - 'cause there's an officer shortage all over the country - is to take some things off their plate. They have said - We don't wanna do substance abuse counseling, we don't wanna do this. So fine - let's take that off. Why are they being asked to do those things anyway? And there has been a fundamental shift over the last, I would say 40 years, but also just - there's always a fundamental shift with the passage of time. But a lot of things that police officers do now are not things that we asked them to do when I was a kid in the '80s, or something like that. And there's a complaint that we have to do all these things now, and it's just - Okay, how about we listen to you and take some things off your plate? And that's one way to meet both the stated goals of each party - you want faster 911 response times, we want actual public safety or things that actually work. And that really building out those other services and other ways to respond to things, other than just an armed officer, really meets all of the goals. So it's encouraging, and I think Seattle definitely has a tendency to give lip service to things. And then when no one's looking, there's a slow walk. And that's what I'm seeing right now is - Oh yeah, definitely, we should do these things. And then we look away and it's just a casual, just slinking away without really doing anything, or without making any specific promises, or really having a plan. And so I really like that Tacoma is - Yeah, we're not gonna do that. [00:20:59] Crystal Fincher: Yes - not that I have no bones to pick with decisions that they make in Tacoma - but it really does seem like they are interested in moving the needle on more comprehensive responses that get closer to addressing root causes. And investing real money into doing that, because that really is the bottom line. If there is nothing invested in there, if it's not in the budget, then it's clearly not a priority. And it's so interesting, especially having you on the program with unique insight and insight beyond what most people have into the criminal legal system - also reminds me of talking to former Mayor Mike McGinn, who enjoyed one of the lowest crime rates in the past 40 years, but making a very similar point that you did in - Hey, okay, so they say we have a shortage - which I could go on a whole rant about - but okay, so say that there really is a shortage, which everyone is experiencing. Police keep saying that it's actually not a financial problem, that this is something that has to do with the perceptions of the culture and the perceptions of just the profession - the job of being a police officer - that lots of people have. And until that gets more effectively addressed, until there's more trust built there, that this is going to be a problem that continues. But since everyone is having a hiring problem, if you're pinning all your hopes on once we can get enough police officers hired - which no one seems to be able to do these days - then it'll be safe. So is everyone just supposed to sit around and accept not being safe until years down the line when there are enough officers - even when an officer gets into the system, a lot of times it's a year before they're actually deployed on the street. They've got to go through training and all that kind of stuff. So we have to stand up these other things if we're going to make a dent in public safety, if we're gonna keep people safer. And it really is confounding to me that we have police determined to respond to every overdose call, but they also made the decision that they were too short-staffed to investigate sexual assaults of adults. How does this make sense? If the goal is to keep people safe, if the goal is to take the "bad guys" off of the street, then would we be doing more investigating? Would we want to spend more time doing that stuff than accompanying EMT on an overdose call where no other cities - other cities are not doing this. Why are we utilizing these resources in this way? Why do they still want to keep parking enforcement? Why do they still want to keep doing these things and accompany encampment sweeps, where they're essentially just watching Parks Department? It just doesn't make sense anyway you look at it, even if you grant everything that they're saying, even if you agree with, "We need more cops," and, "They help keep people safe," and all that, then why aren't you doing the things to utilize them more effectively? I don't know, but it is frustrating. [00:24:04] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: It is frustrating because no matter how you look at it - if you're going to listen to police say, "We don't want to do these things," then you have to weigh that against the fact that they are actively fighting to do those things. Or if you're gonna believe that a reactionary police force is what's going to keep us safe, then why are they not reacting to things that are threats to public safety? And if you're gonna believe that they don't want to - yeah, I don't know - there's a lot to it, but there is a lot of, I think, talking out of both sides of things. But the bottom line is we've had fully staffed police before. We still have crime. They only react. Why don't we focus on prevention? I would like to see less crime. I don't want to be the victim of a crime. I don't want my daughter to be the victim of a crime. I would rather that didn't happen rather than have someone respond to it after it happened. And that's what I would like to see for myself, my family, my neighbors, this community - is that not only do we just feel safer maybe because we're told we should, but that we are actually safer, that we're not experiencing these traumatic things. And there's no guesswork in it. We are the only country that does things this way. There's been a million studies saying it doesn't work, or at least not the way it's proposed that it works. But we also have so many other countries that have taken different avenues towards public safety that have been far more successful than we are. So it's really not - there's no guesswork in it. It's just a matter of - can we get past this ridiculous narrative that we've all been fed in order to enact real solutions? And so people are working on it. I'm hoping we're getting there. More and more people are being open to the idea that it's not - the one cure-all solution for everything is more police. [00:25:50] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And for these alternative responses, like this 988 hotline - seems like there was pent-up demand for it. People have been waiting for something like this and wanting to use it. It's had a 25% to 30% increase in calls just since last July. 90% of calls are answered within 30 seconds. 95% of calls are resolved over the phone. Fewer than 2% of the calls end up involving the police or an EMS responder. And for the 5% of calls not able to be resolved over the phone, the speed of that response is critical - and that's what that bill in the Legislature is trying to target. It would increase funding for rapid-response teams. It passed the House and is now being considered by the Senate. It looks like the Legislature is trying to be responsive to their communities and their residents, certainly expressing that this is something that they want. Information is showing that it's being used, and so we will see there. Also, this week we got a press release from the King County Regional Homelessness Authority, and they're making progress. It took a bit to get spun up. They had to basically start from scratch in building a brand-new office that took a little bit more time than originally anticipated. But since they've been up and running, what they have been doing seems like it has been working and in line with the vision of the KCRHA. So they just announced 30 people previously unsheltered at First and Michigan are now inside. They've been working in conjunction with the Seattle, with the Washington Department of Transportation - our State Department of Transportation - to remove people from rights of way. Sometimes you see people camping under freeways or in other similar rights of way - and we talked last year about legislation and funding passed to try and address this. And it looks like it's going to good use - 30 people moved inside from one that a lot of people have seen there at First and Southwest Michigan. 41 people moved inside from sites in the Chinatown International District, in the CID - 27 people matched with shelter or housing options will be moving inside soon. Two weeks ago, they had an event with state partners to ensure that people had the IDs necessary for housing and all the paperwork, because there's a lot that goes into being able to qualify for housing, and so making sure that other stuff was done. They also resolved five encampment sites under the same Right of Way Safety Initiative, with a total of 189 people previously unsheltered having moved inside to a shelter housing option that meets their needs, according to the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. And other sites remain in progress - there's a contract to open an additional 113 units of emergency housing that's just about done. So they seem to be moving forward. Lots of talk about their recent five-year plan and the budget request attached to it, which is big and robust, but we're also trying to address this problem that is tied to so many other problems in our community. So how do you see this and the work that they're doing overall? [00:29:13] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Obviously, it's a step in the right direction. There was the homelessness - declared a crisis in the Ed Murray years - it's a clear step in the right direction. I think one thing that I often notice is that a lot of these different groups will be stepping on each other all of the time - not really not meaning to but the county is doing this, but the City Attorney is also putting people in jail for sleeping under an awning - which means then they lose their ID, then they lose everything they have, and then they're back to square one. Or, the City does encampment sweeps where same things happen - people lose all of the things that they need in order to get housing. They're back to zero. Then they have to go back to DESC, get a new tent - blah, blah, blah - it just is this compounding thing. So I'm encouraged by what they're doing, and my hope in the future is to not - we spend so much time and money getting one step ahead and then pulling it back two steps. And so I like that there's a coordinated effort. I hope that the City can get more on board with that because nobody likes it. The people who live outside don't like it. The people who don't live outside don't like it. It's a thing I think we can all agree on. And so my hope is that they can continue their work, but that that work isn't impeded by constantly enacting actions that have a detrimental effect on people's ability to stay sheltered - because obviously the problem is not going to go away unless we address it. So I'm happy to see that they are taking those steps. [00:30:41] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, and I agree. Also making news this week is something that has flown under the radar for a while, but seems to be garnering a lot of attention now and with a flurry of new activity. It's a new station that will be built that - the Sound Transit Board of Directors is going to be making a decision on on March 23rd - about some new Sound Transit stations, or a new Sound Transit station, in Seattle. For quite some time, they have been looking at a 4th Avenue alignment - that has had a lot of support from various groups for a long time - that would connect with existing infrastructure, have a Union Station transit hub that also helps with connectivity with the existing stations, the Sounder station, just kind of everything going on in that area in terms of just pure transit connection time and ease of use of the transit system in terms of speed for a lot of people around the neighborhood. However, there's a new alternative or some new alternatives that have popped up recently in response to concerns from many people in the CID saying, "No, actually, there are lots of problems with the proposed alignment that will create, once again, significant impacts and challenges for the CID, that could potentially displace a lot of people in businesses, and just create a lot of havoc on the streets after they have dealt with a lot of havoc over the past decade with challenges from dealing with everything from the deep bore tunnel to other Sound Transit stations. And a historical challenge that has been there for a while has been - as we've seen and talked about on the show forever - government entities' lack of engaging communities, especially BIPOC and lower-income communities, when it comes to alignments of light rail and other regional transit options through the City and region. This has been a long-standing issue, and even way back on the first segments that were entered, that were built, people from the CID have been saying - Hey, you have not been listening to us, and we're paying the price, and we're displacing a really important community. We're not considering the importance of landmarks to the community that are part of - some of them are saying they're part of our heritage. These landmarks are as important as the people. This is our community. All of the elements of it make our community. And yes, we can talk about how quick transit connection would be otherwise, but is it fair and equitable to only pay attention to that and disregard the needs of the community that exists there, or should we be looking at mitigating that impact, that - no, this may not be the first choice of a lot of people, and it may even come with some harmful outcomes that may need to be mitigated otherwise, but that is what this work really involves if you're doing it right. It's talking to everybody, considering all of those, and trying to come up with a solution that kind of, first off, doesn't seek to harm or destroy anything that can't be rebuilt. And I think that's the crux of where a lot of people are coming from. If you're trying to destroy a part of our community that can't be rebuilt or can't be reclaimed or is just going to be lost if you do that. I personally don't have a dog on the hunt, really, for preferred alignment. My interest is in making sure that the community is heard - and not astroturf efforts, not people seeking to use this to further a pre-existing political argument, or to just oppose development or oppose transit like some people reflexively do. If someone is at risk for displacement, if someone is part of a community that has been displaced and has seen a lot of what they have built and have been able to maintain despite historic attempts to destroy it in a variety of ways, that that's something that we shouldn't dismiss. That doesn't, that's not the same thing as a NIMBY opposing transit. These are people who are at risk of displacement and who are at risk at losing important parts of their culture potentially, and that should be listened to and valued. [00:35:02] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Absolutely. I think that BIPOC and low-income communities have always borne the brunt of this sort of utilitarian approach to transit, and I'm happy to see people speaking up and I would expect that. And I think you make a really good point. This isn't the regular sort of NIMBY - I don't want it, I don't want people in my neighborhood, I don't care about this, I drive every day or whatever. That there's different solutions being proposed here. And I think that's a really important distinction and the solutions are not do it in another neighborhood. The solutions are - yes, we want this here. We recognize the necessity of it, but how about we go about it in a way that considers our culture and what we've built here and the people who already live here. And I hope that conversation can be had and there's something that can be worked out with the actual input of the community that's going to be affected because that's really - it's the bottom line with everything really. [00:36:00] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And I don't know everything that went into the support of this - of some new alignments by, particularly the King County Executive Dow Constantine and Mayor Bruce Harrell. But I will point out that they have received frequent criticism, including from me, about not listening to residents of the CID - whether it's from previous Sound Transit alignments with light rail, or the deep bore tunnel, or homelessness service provisions and access. And again, it's not to say that these things shouldn't happen, but they certainly shouldn't happen without the input and participation of the people who live there. And that hasn't happened in a while, so a charitable reading of this late proposal and support for some alternative alignments - could charitably be read as responding to the desires of the community after hearing and taking criticism and admitting to falling short sometimes before. So I hope that that is genuinely what is going on. And we will see - obviously a lot to follow there. I know there was actually a Transit Riders Union meeting last night where they were discussing it, which I missed, but there are lots of people - I know people who have strong feelings on both sides of this. And again, my interest isn't necessarily in just the alignment, but in making sure that we don't discount the voice of the community as just wanting to oppose this, but we can dismiss it and keep moving on. These concerns should be listened to. They are valid. And if we can find a workaround, even if that means that it's not purely the fastest alignment from transit, then let's figure that out. To me, it feels very similar to people who are really focusing on - everything that you're doing is anti-car and this is anti-car if it slows me down five minutes to get to my destination, even if that five minutes means that other people will literally live instead of being killed by cars on streets that are designed and used dangerously. And just saying - It's not the fastest for me, therefore it is inefficient and bad. There are other considerations and we have to consider the whole community. I don't know how this is gonna end up. I don't know who's gonna wind up supporting what, but it seems like there are valid concerns all the way around that no one should dismiss. Also looking at other news this week, we saw another train derailment - this time on the Swinomish reservation - which on the heels of the East Palestine train derailment in Ohio, certainly people are paying more attention. Hear a lot of people saying - There are like a thousand derailments every year, this is normal, it's not a big deal. Something being normal and not a big deal are not always the same thing. Yes, it happens frequently. No, it should not be happening and we should be paying more attention to this and it should be bothering us more than it has, I think. And this is another example why - it's something that is considered to a lot of people that doesn't get a lot of attention, that perhaps this is a small source of contamination from this freight train that derailed. But this is their land, this is their water supply, and they have never consented to having that be spoiled and they knew the risk of this. In fact, there's a trial set to begin on Monday over a lawsuit that the tribe filed in 2015, alleging that BNSF trespassed when it ran thousands of trains filled with highly combustible crude oil over the reservation without the tribe's consent. The tribe says that the railroad was knowingly violating an easement agreement the two parties made in 1991, that the tribe has limited the length of trains allowed to pass through. And it looks like BNSF just ignored that, decided to put through longer trains, and now the things that they were warned could and would happen are happening. And this is just happening everywhere and we should be paying more attention. [00:40:06] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, absolutely. I grew up in a railroad family. My dad worked for Santa Fe, later at BNSF - and derailments weren't considered a "Heh, like they just happen" type thing. They shouldn't be happening. And do accidents happen? Yes, of course, sometimes they do, but it's not something that we should just be like, "Oh yeah, huh." It's not normal and it's not healthy. And I think one of the things that's really dangerous is that not only are we in a place where people who work on trains are saying, "Hey, it's not safe. We are not safe. We're not healthy. We're not well. We are put in danger. We're told to ignore danger," which was such a - to me, when I read things like, "Oh, they say just go ahead and run it even if a wheel bearing is." - just growing up the way I grew up with my dad - that was such a wild concept to be like, "Hey, there's something unsafe. We'll just go ahead and do it anyway." That is not how things have been done historically with the railroads. So we're seeing already this shift between worker safety and train safety and community safety. But the thing that's really scary too is that the railroads wanna keep moving in this direction. They want less staff on train, they want half of what they used to have on trains because they think it's gonna be automated and it's gonna be cheaper. And they want to move towards even more intense scheduling. And at the same time, benefits for workers have eroded. The union power has eroded - as we saw, the government step in and end the strike that was happening. And I think that there's, we're seeing the convergence of all of those things at once - and not just things are bad now, but they're going to get significantly worse if we don't pay attention to this problem. So I'm happy to see that there is coverage of these things. And I wish that we didn't have to do this thing where the Swinomish said "Hey, we're in danger of this." and they're like, "Whatever, do it anyway." And then the dangerous thing happens. We know what's going to happen. There's no need to have these constant reminders that are material harms that validate the concerns of the community that's there. And it's the same, not the same, but it's similar to what we were talking about with the CID. There has been communities - historically, communities of color, low-income communities, Indigenous communities - that have borne the brunt of utilitarian transportation design. And they are saying, "Hey, we don't want that anymore." And that's something that should be valued. Of course, I think it should be valued, but I hope to see some movement and I hope - I wish them well on their legal pursuits on that. But I think that we need to be - I don't care if there's 100 derailments every day. They need to be something that we should be paying attention to because we shouldn't just be settling for that. [00:42:57] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And there's a problem with just railroad regulation. And the problem is that they are subject to so little of it. It's absurd. And I don't think most people realize how much latitude we give railroad companies. It is almost obscene. I don't think most people realize that. So I live in Kent - the reason why I'm a little bit more familiar with railroad problems and policies because - Kent has two railroad lines crossing right through its downtown, which I live in the middle of, which is why sometimes you hear train horns if you're listening. But cities are actually not allowed to touch train tracks. They're actually not allowed to touch crossing arms and stuff, and so we have two separate railroad companies who have been so horrible about maintaining railroad crossings. If people are residents of Kent, they have been stuck behind, in a humongous traffic jam, on some of Kent's biggest thoroughfares that are just cut off by railroad track crossing arms that get stuck, or don't go down, or they're malfunctioning. That's been happening for years. And so many people are like, "Why doesn't the city do something about this?" And it turns out - yeah, the city is legally prohibited from touching the railroad tracks. The railroad company has to respond. The railroad companies don't share what hazardous material is on there and you basically have to wait for the railroads and the companies to show up and decide how they're gonna handle it, decide what they're gonna disclose, decide what the timeline is - and people have no control. And when you think about having no control over potentially hazardous substances going through your communities - these railroad lines are adjoining neighborhoods, schools, playgrounds - and it's just by chance that there's not a situation like in Swinomish and in East Palestine - this is what we're all signing up for and we shouldn't be, we should not be. Unfortunately, this is something that these lawsuits - I'm glad that the Swinomish tribe filed this lawsuit. This may be some of the only recourse we have aside from Congressional action to pare this down and to demand some accountability. Railroad companies don't even have to tell you if something highly flammable, highly hazardous, highly toxic is traveling through cities so that people can appropriately prepare emergency and hazmat responses. Cities can't even prepare for the type of damage that railroads can do, so we just need to change. I am glad a lot more people are paying attention and I hope people continue to hold our elected leaders' feet to the fire, but particularly our Senators and Congresspeople, to actually take some action to regulate and rein in the control and domination that these railroad companies have - that is really putting people at risk and that these companies haven't shown anywhere close to the type of responsibility, accountability to cleaning up these things or to being able to handle the type of world that they're putting us all into. So it's a challenge. And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, March 17th, 2023. Hacks & Wonks is co-produced by Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. Our insightful co-host today was defense attorney, abolitionist, and activist, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy. Thank you for joining us - always a good time. [00:46:27] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Always a good time. [00:46:27] Crystal Fincher: Yes! You can catch Hacks & Wonks wherever you prefer to get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can find Nicole Thomas-Kennedy on Twitter @NTKAllDay. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can find me @finchfrii, it's two I's at the end. 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 Hacks & Wonks week in review, political consultant and host Crystal Fincher is joined by the former Director of Progressive Majority who has now transitioned into public service but remains involved in numerous political efforts across Washington, EJ Juárez.  Crystal and EJ start the show discussing the challenges Washington's infrastructure faced over the last week because of extreme weather and violent actors. Seattle was hit with a major ice storm late last week that caused widespread transit cancellations that showed severe limitations in our infrastructure's resilience that need to be addressed through accountability and investing for future climate emergencies. Meanwhile, electrical substations in Pierce County were attacked on Christmas, cutting off power for thousands of residents in the area. These attacks, along with the arrest of a man suspected of placing a pipe bomb in a SODO parking garage, have not yet had motivations revealed by law enforcement officials, but they reinforce both the rise of domestic terrorism and the vulnerabilities in our state's infrastructure.  In infrastructure news further south, the team overseeing the replacement of the Columbia River highway crossing reported earlier this month that the cost of the project has increased by more than $2.5 billion, moving the projected cost to a range of $5.5 billion to $7.5 billion. This increased cost again raises the question of whether the original assumptions behind the project are accurate, and whether policymakers will be willing to rein in scope and cost of the plan.  A newly proposed King County measure would implement a modest property tax to provide $1.25 billion towards behavioral health supports. Unfortunately, the funding doesn't cover all of the county's needs, and it would be decided by an April ballot, which will be a challenge electorally.  To end the episode, Crystal and EJ discuss a Real Change News story revealing multiple instances over the past two years where city officials knew that there wasn't enough shelter to offer Seattle's homeless citizens, and, despite that, continued to sweep homeless encampments. The current approach of sweeping encampments without getting people into stable housing is widely recognized as ineffective, expensive and inhumane.  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 EJ Juárez at @EliseoJJuarez. Resources “Bus Service Suspended, Only Light Rail Forging On As Seattle Area Blanketed in Ice” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist   “Massive winter storm brings rolling blackouts, power outages” by Jill Bleed and Heather Hollingsworth from The Seattle Times    “What motivated the Pacific Northwest substation attacks?” by Hal Bernton and Sydney Brownstone from The Seattle Times    “Man arrested in connection to pipe bomb found in Sodo parking garage” by Daisy Zavala Magaña from The Seattle Times   “Washington State Is Losing Control of the Columbia Interstate Bridge Replacement Megaproject” by Ryan Packer from The Urbanist   “King County measure would put $1.25 bn over a decade toward behavioral health crises” by Guy Oron from Real Change News   “Earlier this year, encampment removals continued despite an acknowledged lack of shelter” by Tobias Coughlin-Bogue from Real Change News   Transcript Coming Soon

Note: In light of the growing body of news and evidence that the King County Jail is dangerous and ineffective at improving safety, the Hacks & Wonks team decided to re-air this illuminating episode about the harm that jail and the current bail system causes our community.   On this Hacks & Wonks midweek show, Chanel Rhymes, Director of Advocacy at the Northwest Community Bail Fund, joins Crystal Fincher to discuss our desperate need for bail reform. The NCBF is dedicated to ending cash bail and pretrial detention in Washington state. They do advocacy for reform, court watching to hold the system accountable, and they raise funds to provide bail for people who can't afford it on their own. Chanel explains the difficulties that jailing people prior to a conviction causes for people before they're even convicted of a crime, and dispels criticisms of bail funds as being dangerous for the community, rather than being a correction against systemic inequality. Crystal and Chanel also breakdown recent data on bail reform that shows that bail reform and eliminating pretrial detention for misdemeanors actually reduces crime in the long run, and doesn't negatively impact whether people show up to court. You can find information on the Northwest Community Bail Fund and resources for its court watching program in the links below. Chanel Rhymes Chanel Rhymes is the Director of Advocacy for the Northwest Community Bail Fund. Prior to joining the Northwest Community Bail fund, Chanel served as the Court Program Analyst for the Washington Supreme Court Minority and Justice Commission, executing the mission of ensuring that all courts in the state of Washington remain free of bias so that justice might be adjudicated in a neutral and fair manner. Previously, she was a Program Manager for the Freedom Education Project of Puget Sound where she developed and coordinated college courses for women seeking to attain their AA degrees while incarcerated at the Washington Correction Center for Women.   Chanel has worked with the Council of State Governments Justice Center, supporting their work on national criminal justice reform. She also has legislative experience as a Political Field Organizer and as a Legislative Liaison for the Washington Student Association, where she lobbied for the interests of students in higher education around issues of affordability, administration transparency, and accessibility. Chnel was raised in Tacoma, Washington, and received her BA from Evergreen State College with a focus in Law and Government Policy. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal, on Twitter at @finchfrii, find the Northwest Community Bail Fund on Twitter at @NWCBailFund.   Resources Northwest Community Bail Fund website   NCBF - Court Watch Resources and sign-up   “The Effects of Misdemeanor Bail Reform” from Quattrone Center for the Fair Administration of Justice   “No More Police: A Case for Abolition” by Mariame Kaba & Andrea J. Ritchie   Washington state court's Criminal Rule 3.2   “A Seattle man began the night in crisis. Then, a sudden death in restraint” by Sydney Brownstone and Greg Kim from The Seattle Times   “In a Sign of Worsening Conditions, Understaffed King County Jail Has Lacked Water for a Week” by Erica C. Barnett from PubliCola   “Public Defenders Union Joins Jail Guards' Call to Address COVID Crisis” by Paul Kiefer from PubliCola   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher and I'm a political consultant and your host. On the 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. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Thank you so much for joining us today. I'm very excited about this show, where we get to talk with Chanel Rhymes, who is the director of advocacy at Northwest Community Bail Fund. Thank you so much for joining us. [00:00:51] Chanel Rhymes: Thank you for having me. I'm really excited to be here. [00:00:54] Crystal Fincher: Excited to have you on. Have been a follower of the organization for quite some time. Obviously, this has been a topic across the country, and really globally. We're behind a lot of the globe on this. But in our country, a topic especially in the past few years, and looking at just what we're doing in terms of our criminal legal system, all of the challenges within it, and what can be done to make our communities more safe, keep our communities more safe, and really move towards a world and communities where we meet basic needs and we don't choose punishment over healing injustice. So I guess starting out, can you tell me just what the Northwest Community Bail Fund is and does, and what brought you to this work? [00:01:46] Chanel Rhymes: The Northwest Community Bail Fund is a nonprofit organization. We post bail for those during pre-trial detention. A lot of folks cannot afford to access the services of a bail bond agency, whether they don't have the means or collateral, so we are here to fill in those gaps. Ultimately we would hope to see an end to pre-trial detention and cash bail, but, because we know that is gonna take time, in the meantime we work to reduce harm. So we post bail as well as just, make sure that the community is not harmed and folks can fight their cases from a position of freedom, which they're entitled to through the constitution and the Washington state constitution. [00:02:33] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. [00:02:34] Chanel Rhymes: I myself came to this work in- I've been doing criminal justice reform work for a long- or, excuse me, criminal punishment reform work, for a long time. I, myself, am formally incarcerated. I am very passionate about those that have done their time and served their time be- the opportunity to go back into society and be a contributing member. I personally believe, though, that we need to stop trying to fix things after and start things from the beginning. Kind of like the, the babies in the river. I'm not gonna keep taking the babies out. I'd rather let's not put the babies in. So I'm trying to, we, myself and our organization, is trying to work to so that folks are just not incarcerated. And a lot of times folks are incarcerated just because of not having means. [00:03:25] Crystal Fincher: And this is such an important conversation. One, just as we talk about right now, we're sitting here in the midst of a crisis as defined by our public defenders, staff at jails. We had a historic letter earlier this year where both public defenders and corrections officers are saying, "hey, we can't handle the population here at the King County jail. It's unsafe. It's beyond what we can tolerate." And I don't think a lot of people realize that a lot of people who are in jail have not been convicted of anything. This is a pre-trial detention. They've not been sentenced. They're not serving a crime. They've not been found guilty of anything. It is simply because of a financial reason that they are sitting in jail and all of the challenges that, that presents. What does it mean and what kind of challenges does it pose when we detain people before their trials? [00:04:25] Chanel Rhymes: Oh, plethora. You could risk losing your housing. You can lose your children, custody of your children. You can lose your employment. And with all that comes, a rippling effect of other things, whether that be financial instability, just the trauma itself of going to jail. A lot of people that, say "lock them up," or "they just need to go to jail," never seen the inside of a jail. It's one of the most horrific places. On top of, with us being in a pandemic, you could potentially die, ultimately, from sitting in jail because there are still COVID outbreaks in jails every week. And so ultimately you could lose your life for something you haven't even been convicted of yet. And that's no way to bake it. That's not the way our system is designed. It's not supposed to be set up that way. Or at least they say that. [00:05:24] Crystal Fincher: At least they say that. It is certainly not what we've been sold. And so it's such a challenge. It is very destabilizing. And even in the case that someone does wind up pleading guilty or serving time, we're relying on them having the means to pay whatever fines they're going to be charged to do all that. And so if they don't have a job, if they have lost, as a result of being detained, all of the ability to fulfill the terms of whatever punishment they've been handed, that's a challenge in and of itself. And the bottom line is, a lot of people think putting people in jail makes us safer. If we didn't have this, they would be out committing crimes. And every now and then there's a case that gets publicized where they say, see, look, this is- bail reform caused this. Is that the case? [00:06:24] Chanel Rhymes: It's not the case. Number one, judges decide what bail is. Number two folks have a constitutional right to bail. The purpose of bail - and our Washington Supreme Court has said this - the state is not in the primary interest of collecting bail bond forfeitures. It is more concerned with folks showing up to court. That is what the purpose is. That, whether somebody is released or not, does not make us safer. There are tons of people who are arrested for violent crimes and don't spend a day in jail because they have the means to bail themselves out. Where are the folks asking about them? I think it's very interesting that bail reform and, nonprofits, people who don't make money off of this business, are the ones under the microscope, but yet bail bond agencies make millions of dollars every day bailing people out that sometimes do go on to commit new crimes. We don't hear about those in the news. We only hear about the less fortunate, which is those folks that are coming to a community bail fund or, mutual aid fund, and it's because we demonize poverty in this society. And it's just bizarre to me, in a sense, that we've gotten to this point. As if folks don't understand that wages have been stagnant for 40 years. The cost of living is going up. People can't make it can't survive. And so putting them in jail, and then if they are convicted or plead guilty just to get out, they now have a criminal conviction. So then that creates barriers to getting employment. And the other thing that you need, housing, that is the first, one of the major things that disqualifies most folks for housing, is a criminal conviction. So if we're also criminalizing homelessness, locking people up, then convicting them, and then they get out and they can't rent anywhere, and then we're like, "why are you homeless?" We are just creating this cycle and it's really a cycle of abuse. [00:08:38] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and one really has to ask is the offense that people really are in jail for whatever they've been accused of, or is it just that they're poor and can't afford bail? And even just the issue of bail overall, for some reason, we have landed in a place where we think that a dollar amount is indicative of whether or not someone is in danger or is safe regardless of what they have been accused of, regardless of what kind of flight risk someone may be deemed to be. Hey, if you have enough money to, if you're rich, and and you can pay for whatever, it really doesn't matter. You're not gonna be in jail. And, we have seen several examples of people who are, just a small misdemeanor accusation which, often can result in dropped charges overall for lack of evidence, for just not being worth it to pursue in the system, yet they have been in jail and have experienced, like you talked about, the loss of job, the loss of housing, and that being destabilizing. And in fact that increasing the chance that someone is likely to be involved in their criminal legal system in the future, as opposed to if they were able to maintain their connections in community. And then also on the back end, just about everyone we're sending into jail is going to come out on the other end. So don't we have an interest in making sure that we are doing all we can to set people up for success and to not drop them into another pit, which it seems this just sets up people to do. What do you tell people when they're like, "it's there to make sure they come back and if they don't have bail, then they won't come back. So bail is necessary and if they can't afford it, then you know, they could just leave and never come back anyway?" what do you tell people who just say bail is necessary to get people to show up? [00:10:48] Chanel Rhymes: They can find us anywhere. The world we live in now, if they wanna find you, they really can find you. But, ultimately, most people do wanna get this resolved. Nobody wants this hanging over their head. A lot of times people don't show up, not on purpose. People, don't FTA, or Failure to Appear, on purpose. Life happens. There's life circumstance. Also, too, people wanna get it taken care of because they probably didn't do it. People aren't really decking and dodging. I will add though that even if we have a lot of folks saying people they need to go to jail or they need to do this, a misdemeanor? It's max fine, like 90 days in jail. So I think too, people have a misconception of what our punishments, our sentencing structure is, and the difference between jail and the difference between prison, and misdemeanors, gross misdemeanors, and felonies. Even with our gross misdemeanor, the max jail time is a year, up to a year, but after that, okay, they serve their time, they're back out, what are we going to do to help folks? What I tell people is how is this solving anything? Why would you want your tax dollars just to be wasted to keep doing this? And wouldn't you want your tax dollars to be used to help people. So they're not back in this situation? The amount of money that we spend on criminal punishment and police is just ridiculous when you compare it to what we spend on education. So if we really wanted to make changes, we would be investing our money in education, healthcare, mental healthcare, reproductive rights, all of those things. Never in our 40 years of plus doing this whole drug war or anything, have cops, police, arrest helped make us any safer or do any type of harm reduction. There's tons of studies out there that show when you reinvest that many within the community and provide people's services, recidivism goes down. I think it's odd that we just keep having to have this conversation over and over again, because we obviously know what's not working, but we are very, afraid to try what some people or some municipalities and governments have done that work. [00:13:11] Crystal: Well. And it feels like, for people who've looked into this, for the people who are the loudest on this issue on either side, they do know what the data says. They do know that the evidence shows conclusively, repeatedly - there was just a new study that came out and reiterated this just last month - that bail reform, not relying on bail and releasing people pre-trial, not subjecting them to all of the harms that result from that, doesn't hurt people appearing in court over people who have been detained, doesn't hurt their likelihood of committing a crime again, over people who have been in bail. So there is actually no advantage safety-wise. There's no advantage in the court system. It's not, "hey, a lot of people were failing to appear - weren't failing to appear - now they are with bail reform. It is actually the opposite. This is working to keep people safer. This is working to help people show up and we are not contending with how expensive this is to us as a society financially and in terms of just our safety and our health within the community. My goodness, courts are expensive to run and administer. Prisons and jails are so expensive to run and administer. All of the staff, all of everything required to do that is so costly. We're sitting here talking about upcoming budget shortfalls here in, the city of Seattle, throughout the state in different cities, yet when you look at the city's budget, such a huge percentage of it and their county's budget, such a huge percentage is dedicated to locking people up. And especially pre-trial, what benefit are we getting out of it? Why do you think people are so resistant to saying, "wow. Number one, we aren't getting the results that we want from our current system. It would actually save us money that we could invest in areas that we all know need it." Yet, lots of people still aren't there. Why do you think that is? [00:15:22] Chanel Rhymes: Because people are being misinformed, and fear-mongered by their local news and reporters, who I'm shocked at the things that they write and put out. And it's clear that a lot of reporters locally here have no clue about criminal law or criminal procedure. They are flat out lying to the public. And so then folks see that on TV, they read it in their newspapers, they read it online and they think that the sky is falling. Everything is super dangerous. I also think poverty is a lot more visible now. So people, their senses seem to think "oh, it's bad, it's more." And it's no, just more people are hurting and you're seeing it more. It's not hidden. It's coming into your neighborhoods. I truly believe it's miseducation, misinformation, and 30 years of watching Law and Order that people think they know the system and how things work. I blame our media to be quite honest, because they're just not being truthful. And most of the information that, it seems to me, that they're getting are coming either straight from prosecutors or straight from police. They are refusing to talk to anybody from the other side. [00:16:42] Crystal Fincher: And even, not from either, quote unquote side, there are actual experts on crime. They're called criminologists. We have lots of them at our wonderful universities, research universities here in the area, who are able to speak on what the evidence and research shows is and is not effective and useful and working in terms of keeping people safe, keeping people from committing crimes. And over again, they are coming up with data that says detaining people pre-trial just because they cannot afford to get out of jail does not keep us safer. Does not do anything to help our system to help reduce crime. It just doesn't do that. In fact if it had, if it has, any effect, it's the opposite effect. It actually makes outcomes worse. It makes people more likely to do that because they have been made more unstable and put in a more precarious position because of that. So if you were to talk to a lot of the local media, what would you advise that they do? [00:17:53] Chanel Rhymes: Educate themselves on the way that criminal law, that criminal procedure, works before just going with conjecture and their feelings and how they feel. There are laws, there are court rules, reasons why things are done. Ultimately too, the fact that they're saying, "okay, so we're holding people because they can't afford it." If they were so dangerous, no bail would be set. Obviously, a bail has been set, so that judge has deemed them safe enough to go back into the community once they pay that money. So you can't have it both ways either, it's completely they're there because they're a danger or is it really they're there because they can't afford it? Because if they were such a danger, then why is there a dollar amount that they could pay that says they're not dangerous? It just doesn't make any sense. I mean the argument of it makes us safer- it just doesn't. And I just think we've just been recycling the same thing over and over again. And then also, too, people, the internet, your phone, every social media, people are getting lots of just different images and things like things are horrible. "Seattle is dying, oh my gosh, they've closed my Starbucks." And it's really like people are homeless and hungry and that's, what's really- The fact that too, we are still within a pandemic and we have a lot of people in charge that want folks to just keep on going just out. "No, everything's fine." people are still financially hurting. We also hear a lot about, I'll just say that, media's writing a lot about retail. Nobody writes about wage theft. More money is stolen in wages than it is in deodorant. What does that tell you? I'm reading a police report and somebody is charged with stealing body wash, deodorant, razors. They're trying to survive. Those are essential items. Like we need to look at that. Like what services can we get that person so they don't have to steal the basic needs just to be a human and live in this society? [00:20:12] Crystal Fincher: I'm with you, I'm with you. So as we look moving forward, right now, you and Northwest Community Bail Fund are filling in this gap in our current system. Obviously there's a lot of changes that would be more effective if we made them. In terms of bail, what is it that you would like to see changed about our current system? Would you like to move to a system where judges just make the decision as they have in some other localities across the country? "Hey we're not really doing bail. We are making the determination about whether we feel this person is a flight risk or a threat to society. And if yes, we're detaining them and if, no, we're not." And throwing the idea of bail out the window in lieu of that? Or something different? What would you like to see in terms of bail in the system we're in? [00:21:10] Chanel Rhymes: There should be no bail. There should be no pre-trial detention. Folks are innocent until proven guilty. There's no reason for anybody to be caged. That's what they are, is caged. Before they have been convicted by a judge or jury of their peers. They've just been accused. We should be moving completely away from that. I would say, even just to start, we could have judges actually, follow court rule 3.2, which says you need to use the least restrictive means to release people. So that would be a start. We do court watching in courts around the area, particularly Seattle Municipal Court. We watch arraignment hearings. We, we take, track, demographic data, race, perceived age, age, date of birth. But we also track if court rule 3.2 is brought up by judges, by the prosecutor, or by the defense. And we recently had our data analyzed and it was only 13% in all of the cases that we had listened to that it was brought up. That's a very low number for a court rule to not even be mentioned during arraignment. And that has to do with whether folks are, public safety issue or, the means to pay to get out. So I think one, first thing is if y'all going, institute these rules and create these policies, you should follow them first. You're not even following your own policies, so can you accurately say if it's working or not? I don't think so, but ultimately it's a no. I'm an abolitionist. Get rid of them all. I just got my no more police book. I just started on that. This, it's not working. All we're doing is harming people and it's not sustainable and it costs too much. We could be investing those dollars in so many other ways that would actually give us a better return on investment because all we're doing is churning out more debt, ultimately, because if they can't get a job, they can't get housed, we're still gonna end up having to pay for it another way. [00:23:27] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. We're paying for it no matter what, just depends on whether it's an investment that's gonna yield a return later on. If we're dealing in, education and health and mental health and behavioral health support and treatment that do yield benefits for our entire community or whether we are dealing in the aftermath of pain and harm and paying to keep people in prison and incarcerated, which is just so terribly expensive and costly financially, and to our community, to that person, to the community, to everyone involved. What would you say to the people who- Obviously we always hear examples of violent crimes, horrible crimes, some horrible crimes happen that should never happen. And they see what someone has been accused of. They hear evidence against them and they're like, "that person is not safe on the street." And say, "we're afraid of what can happen. That they're a danger to society and based on what they've done, they should be detained." What do you say to people in that circumstance? [00:24:50] Chanel Rhymes: You have no proof that evidence is actually evidence that is true, or that can convict him. People are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law, not public opinion. There's a process that you go through during criminal procedure where the judge gets to decide what evidence gets to come in and what doesn't. We don't just get to decide oh, that's true. That piece of evidence that the reporters said right there is true. Also, we all know police lie all the time. We're just gonna take the word of police because that's who most reporters are getting their information from, they're just reading it from police reports and statements or their, communications officer or whoever it may be. So how is it that untrained people in law, just the regular general public would be able to determine who's safe and who's not? I also think if a judge has set bail, who are you to say that, better than that judge about the case? I don't understand that. Either we believe in these systems and y'all want these systems to do their job, or y'all just want to do it out in the public. Are we going back to that? Where we just doing the public, in the public square, and then everybody we decide how things go? No. To me, it's just bizarre that somebody be like this is what happened. You really don't know that's just what it was reported. People have to be convicted in a court, not in public opinion, it's just not the way it works. [00:26:24] Crystal Fincher: Which is true. And once again, this most recent study in Houston, which backs up prior studies, under consent decree where more people had to be released within 24 hours of a misdemeanor arrest, there was a 6% decrease in new prosecutions over the three years that followed that they followed those defendants. They said, "okay, everybody's saying we need to see whether or not people, are really gonna show up. We need to see whether you letting people out is really going to, make things safer as these people claim, let's follow these defendants. Let's follow these people." Over a period of years, not even beyond, not even stopping at, okay this one case, their current case was adjudicated, whatever happened, they went beyond. Eliminating bail, taking that out as a factor, releasing them and not detaining them simply because they can't afford bail, resulted in a decrease over the existing system. Meaning that locking people up made it more likely that someone was going to commit a crime again. Made it more likely that things would be less safe in our community. I'm for what makes people more. We talk about all of these things. A lot of it is punishment related. And I think in so many of these conversations, we have to decide whether we are going to prioritize punishing people or whether we're gonna prioritize keeping our community safe, because they really are at odds. And punishment is not working for us, any of us, and it's really expensive. It is so harmful to the person involved, it's harmful to the community and it's so costly. And we talk about funding for jails. We talk about funding for police. There is only a certain amount of money in the whole bucket. So if we're giving more to one area, we're taking it from somewhere else or preventing it from being invested in somewhere else. And I'm sure everyone listening to this thinks, "hey, we need, we do need more behavioral health support. We do need more substance use disorder. Treatment and accessibility and availability. We do need to make sure people have access to these things without having to be involved in the criminal legal system to get clean or to get healthy." And so it's just such an important issue and I thank you for just being vocal about this. For helping people in this organization and doing something that is making our community safer. Really appreciate it. If people want to learn more or to get involved or donate to the Northwest Community Bail Fund, how can they do that? [00:29:11] Chanel Rhymes: You can go to our website, which is N-W- C-O-M-B-A-I-L-F-U-N-D.org So nwcombailfund.org. You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram. I'm so grateful to have this conversation with you and inviting me on to talk about the organization that I dearly love, and we truly do wanna make our community safer and we wanna stop harming folks. [00:29:42] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. Wanna stop harming folks. One thing that I do have to mention: I saw a report that you produced, and I feel like this was last year at some time now. You're not only doing this work, but you are, as an organization, being accountable, being transparent about the activity that's going on. You are showing results for what you're doing in a way that goes be above and beyond a number of others that I've seen. I appreciate that transparency in this organization. And then also wanted to mention, you brought up your court watching, also, earlier, which is such a useful and valuable tool. And just enlightening and informative because, to your point, lots of people don't know what happens in court. People have very limited experience, maybe someone contests a parking ticket or a speeding ticket or something. Lots of people have never stepped foot in one. And so have this idea from TV shows what it's like. It's nothing like what on TV shows. And so I sincerely appreciate that too. We're gonna link those court watching resources in the show notes, also for people to be able to access and follow. [00:31:05] Chanel Rhymes: Thank you. That is also available on our website, we're always looking for more court Watchers. We really need folks to go in person to courts. Seattle Municipal Court and Tacoma Municipal Court offer virtual courts so people can actually court watch from the comfort of their own home. If you're interested in court watching with us, please go to our website and fill out an interest form. [00:31:25] Crystal Fincher: Thank you so much for all of your information today, for what you do. It's been a pleasure to have you on Chanel. [00:31:31] Chanel Rhymes: Thank you. [00:31:32] Crystal Fincher: Thank you all for listening to Hacks and Wonks. The Producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler, our Assistant Producer is Shannon Cheng, and our Post-Production Assistant is Bryce Cannatelli. You can find Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks, and you can follow me at @finchfrii spelled F I N C H F R I I. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Just type Hacks & Wonks into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe, to get our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered right to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave us 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 episode notes. Thanks for tuning in. Talk to you next time.

The press release simply stated that a 63-year-old man was found unresponsive in his cell minutes after being booked. But reporters Sydney Brownstone and Greg Kim of The Seattle Times went beyond the press release — they dug into this story, and uncovered a lot more about who Michael Rowland was and how he died.

On today's week-in-review, Crystal is joined by staff writer covering Law and Justice at The Stranger, Will Casey. After another difficult news week across the nation and locally, Crystal and Will wade through the latest controversies facing Washington's police departments. They break down the revelation that SPD has not been investigating adult sexual assault cases, and why this is more of an issue of priorities rather than staffing. They also question Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell's accountability for the actions of the department, which he leads. Next they look into Pierce County Council candidate Josh Harris's shooting of a man Harris alleges stole from him and ask why Auburn's police department put the image of an officer accused of multiple murders on their recruitment banner. For housing news, Crystal and Will question the usefulness of Bruce Harrell's new Homelessness Data Dashboard and ask why landlords are enraged over the Seattle City Council's proposal to ask them to report the rents they're charging renters. Finally, the show wraps up with a check-in on controversy surrounding former Mayor Jenny Durkan's missing text messages, and how it's one example of why Washington's Public Records Act needs to be updated to meet our modern era.  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, Will Casey, at @willjcasey. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources “Seattle police stopped investigating new adult sexual assaults this year, memo shows” by Sydney Brownstone and Ashley Hiruko from The Seattle Times and KUOW: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/seattle-police-halted-investigating-adult-sexual-assaults-this-year-internal-memo-shows/   “Auburn officer charged with murder featured on department's recruiting banner” by Mike Carter from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/law-justice/auburn-officer-charged-with-murder-featured-on-departments-recruiting-banner/   “This Auburn cop killed 3 and injured others. His department didn't stop him — outsiders did” by Ashley Hiruko and Liz Brazile from KUOW:https://www.kuow.org/stories/this-auburn-cop-killed-3-and-injured-others-it-took-outsiders-to-stop-him   “Pierce County candidate with pro-law enforcement platform shoots at suspected car thief”  by Patrick Malone from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/pierce-county-candidate-with-pro-law-enforcement-platform-shoots-at-suspected-car-thief/    “Seattle greenlights minimum wages for app-based delivery drivers” by MyNorthwest Staff from MYNorthwest: https://mynorthwest.com/3499857/seattle-city-council-passes-payup-legislation/    “Harrell's New Homelessness Data Dashboard Invites More Questions Than It Answers” by ​​Natalie Bicknell Argerious from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2022/06/02/the-urbanist-podcast-harrells-new-homelessness-data-dashboard-invites-more-questions-than-it-answers/    “How Many Dashboards Does it Take to Build a House?” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2022/05/31/74506931/how-many-dashboards-does-it-take-to-build-a-house   “Pedersen Pisses Off Seattle Landlords: Is the rent too high? The City wants to know, but landlords don't want to say” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/news/2022/06/01/74545296/pedersen-pisses-off-seattle-landlords “Did Our Last Mayor Commit a Felony? Washington's Public Records Act Needs An Overhaul” by Will Casey from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/news/2022/06/02/74581748/did-our-last-mayor-commit-a-felony   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 during 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 are continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a cohost. Welcome to the program for the first time today, today's co-host: staff writer covering Law and Justice at The Stranger, Will Casey. [00:00:55] Will Casey: Thanks for having me, Crystal - excited to be here. [00:00:57] Crystal Fincher: Hey, excited for you to be here - excited that you're at The Stranger covering Law and Justice. We all need great coverage of law and justice and wow, there is no shortage of law and justice news this week. So want to start by discussing a revelation that made my jaw drop, and made me gasp, and made me absolutely infuriated and perplexed - the news that Seattle police stopped investigating new adult sexual assault cases this year. What is going on? [00:01:34] Will Casey: Well, the mayor would like you to believe that a staffing shortage at the Seattle Police Department is responsible for their inability to process these new allegations of sexual assaults. To be specific, they are still investigating cases that involve children, but these are for new allegations of assault against an adult. And unfortunately, the mayor's not really telling the whole story there because other police departments in our area and nationally are also dealing with the labor shortage, but they have not made the same decisions in terms of how they allocate their existing staff out of the unit that's supposed to be handling these kinds of cases. [00:02:19] Crystal Fincher: That's right. And even within our department, every type of department has not seen decreases. They have moved people out of these investigative positions into other roles. What does that look like in the police department? [00:02:37] Will Casey: Well, so you probably heard a lot last year, during the mayoral campaign, about 911 response times. This is the frequent calling card of the more-law-and-order folks who want to conjure this image of - this resident's in distress, trying to get help and not having it come, while they're presumably being made the victim of a crime. Well, here we have actual victims of real crimes who are trying to ask for help from the Seattle Police Department and getting basically silenced. So, while they've shifted deputies and investigators out of this unit, they're moving people into things like these hotspot policing efforts or other just general patrol duties in attempts to presumably reduce those 911 response times. [00:03:24] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely. And operation support has seen an increase, actually, in the amount of personnel allocated to that in the past couple years, despite the shortage - as they're calling it and dealing with it - the shortage of police that we have here. And just what is the rationale behind saying these other things are priorities more than investigating violent sexual assault? [00:04:00] Will Casey: Honestly, I can't personally vouch for the rationale that's backing this up. The only comment that our City leaders have offered on the record to The Seattle Times here is just that the mayor finds this situation "unacceptable." They noted that they tried to interview several other City councilmembers about the issue - they all ducked from being interviewed on the record. Chief Diaz says that - if we don't have an officer to respond to the sexual assault, then we're never going to be able to have the follow-up to investigate it. And so that's - and at least from him - why they seem to be maintaining the patrolling staffing levels rather than this investigative situation. But that doesn't really seem to be offering much comfort to the advocates for survivors of sexual assault who are bringing these criticisms to the public's attention. [00:04:54] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And beyond that, it continues to be perplexing to me how the mayor is finding himself becoming aware of this right now. As the executive of the City, he is in charge of this department - the police chief reports to him. Lots of people - I hear talking about the Council - the Council can pass policy, they can fund things. But operationally, administratively - all of that falls under the control of the mayor's office. So how - one, either how does the mayor not know this is happening, or are they doing this despite different direction - which we've seen examples of that happening before - where is the disengagement? How is it okay that policy like this is being enacted and the mayor doesn't know? Are there any steps taken to get answers about that, to address that? How are they saying they plan to increase monitoring of what's going on within the police department if stuff like this is happening without him being notified of it? [00:05:58] Will Casey: It's hard to say, honestly. And I think that there's some other details here in The Seattle Times report that really call into question the mayor's surprise - that at least that he's expressed - about this issue. Because it seems as though he doesn't have any difficulty getting SPD to allocate resources when he does have a policy interest in something - so notably the department's alternative response team, which is the unit that responds to homeless encampment removals. Monisha Harrell on the show a couple of weeks ago - that unit is now staffed by twice the number of officers on the sexual assault unit, after an additional seven patrol officers were added to that unit. And then you also have twelve detectives, compared to the four in the sexual assault investigation units, devoted to property crimes. So that's three times the number of detectives we have - looking at things like catalytic converter thefts, as opposed to sexual violence. So I don't know, maybe the mayor has an explanation for that, but it's not one that's been heard by the public thus far, at least. [00:07:07] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and it's perplexing, especially as we're hearing plans from the City Attorney for people who would previously be eligible for Drug Court or other court - that they're cracking down harder on them. How is it that we are finding ways to invest more, change policy, apply resources in different directions when they have an initiative, when they have an idea - but stuff like this has to be uncovered by reporters outside of the City to even begin to get answers or to see what's happening. It's just really, really perplexing and outrageous, especially given so much work done legislatively to make sure that all of the things downstream, especially when it comes to sexual assault, are being investigated, are they taking rape kits and processing those in a timely fashion. And I don't think anyone anticipated that the next problem we were going to be encountering is just police deciding not to investigate sexual assault at all. And if you're trying to project a safer image for the City and that you're taking action to make people safer, which is absolutely necessary, it seems like this would be a critical component of that. So it just feels very disjointed, very disappointing, and really infuriating that these decisions can be made that are so at odds with public safety. Another thing at odds, seemingly, with public safety that we saw this week was with Pierce County Council candidate, Josh Harris, who's running on a pro-law enforcement platform. People may be familiar with his name from a while back when he bailed out the police who had killed Manny Ellis - very, very problematic. Well, just recently he decided to go into an encampment where he felt some things had been stolen and engaged in an altercation with someone. The altercation escalated, police were - the story's murky - police were there, told him to stand back and stand by, somehow the person who they were engaging with got into a car. They're saying that the car went in the direction of Josh Harris and potentially charged at him. Josh Harris, then in front of police, fired into this car - does not seem like police fired into that car - really confusing what happened. And then somehow this person was not stopped, wound up back in the encampment - where Harris and a partner went in and took some things they said were stolen. They didn't say they were stolen from them, they didn't say how they knew that there were stolen, they were just a variety of things that evidently they're characterizing as stolen and we're not questioning this yet. But it just seems like we have seen more incidences of people feeling like they can go into encampments and communities where people are living, who don't have other shelter, and just assume that they're places of crime - to have no problem victimizing people, don't seem to have to substantiate whether or not something was indeed stolen, and hey - if something's stolen, someone should be able to get it back. We have processes for that that people should follow. But seeing this escalate to violence, seeing people go into these encampments armed with guns is just asking for a violent situation to happen. It's asking for people to get shot and killed. There have been several examples of this happening and why is this person running for office - who seems to have some kind of a complex that he needs to go and do this macho thing - it just seems really problematic. This is someone running for office in Pierce County right now, and I hope more people start talking about this and examining this and really getting to the details of this situation and his prior situations. 'Cause there seems to be a history of problematic or questionable activity here. Just really concerning. [00:11:37] Will Casey: Yeah, and the only thing I have to add to that is - this is not an isolated trend, data point here, right? We're seeing across the country, in contested Republican primary after primary, this is just becoming part of - this vigilantism is becoming part of their mainstream rhetoric. And I think that that's - frankly, very deeply troubling for our ability to continue to maintain our democracy and yeah, not the kind of moral leadership you'd like. But the sad fact is I doubt there are very many of his base voters who are going to have a problem with this behavior. [00:12:16] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and that's the challenge. And I just hope that, as these things that happen are covered, that they're covered critically and that facts are verified and that accounts are verified because the framing of this sometimes seems really problematic. And it's just also worth mentioning the fact that although we have some real troubling characterizations and narratives about unhoused people and crime, the fact is that there are few people in society who are more frequently victims of crime than the unhoused population. It's a very, very vulnerable place to be - there was talk this week about potentially - Reagan Dunn, actually, introduced the idea of basically mapping where every unhoused person is and stays. And there's just a ton of concern by a lot of people about that. Because one, as we just said, unhoused people are already extremely vulnerable, are frequently victims of crime, are much more vulnerable than most of the rest of us. And we have seen, from reporters who have been very inappropriate in the way that they have tracked down and covered and photographed and videotaped folks in these encampments, and people feeling like they are entitled - if they know where one of them is - to walk in, to harass them, to assault people there. We've seen this happen several times. And so anytime you target a group and just point a big red arrow at them and say there they are, while simultaneously dehumanizing them with rhetoric and talking about how much of a problem they are - we know that's a recipe for violence, and we know that's a recipe for targeting. So no, we don't want to do that and that's a bad thing, Reagan Dunn - among the number of variety of bad things that Reagan Dunn seems like he's doubling down on doing. But aside from that, also - Auburn, City of Auburn, featured a police officer - who is currently charged with murder - who is featured on the department's recruiting banner. They were at an event, banner sitting here - big picture, officer's smiling - well, it's an officer who's charged for murder. What is the deal here, Will? [00:14:43] Will Casey: When you literally have a poster boy for your department being someone who's currently facing an accusation of murder and has a history of killing several other civilians while on duty, that's a problem. And I think, especially in this atmosphere of new-found focus not just on big city police departments, like Seattle's, but also how these same dynamics are playing out frequently with far less oversight in these smaller towns and cities throughout the state. And I think - what this shows is that there's a culture issue here in Auburn, at least in their police departments, with not being concerned, apparently, with the image that they're projecting into the community. And this is not someone who, at least from my perspective, it seems like you'd want to be holding out as a representative of the kinds of officers you're looking to hire, if you're really interested in changing the culture of the police department. KUOW has done a fantastic investigative series documenting all of the various moments throughout this officer's lengthy career - where he's been involved in violence repeatedly, has not found not been held accountable for any kind of discipline. And frankly, you shouldn't have to look at anything other than his own hands to tell you that he's someone you should be worried about. He's got tattoos that show - frankly, very common slogan - I guess, is the right word, motif - among the more extreme police officers that refer to being judged by 12 - meaning 12 jurors in a courtroom, presumably for reviewing some sort of act of violence that they engaged in, rather than carried by 6, which is - or 8 sometimes - referred to pallbearers bearing a coffin. And this is kind of warrior mentality where you're always under threat, the people who you're supposed to be protecting and serving are a constant possible source of danger to you, and if you "fear for your life" - that really does need to shift. This particular officer also has a combat veteran background, and there have been reports from within the department of people trying to get the Auburn PD to take some practice steps, get him some specialized counseling that may be necessary for someone adjusting to a civilian, law enforcement position. And it's just apparently never stuck. So, we have a lot more work to do in following the story and keeping everyone's attention trained on it - that pending murder charge will next be at issue in the public, possibly this September, because the judge overseeing that case just had to issue a continuance in the scheduled trial date for June. [00:17:56] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and just the family dealing with this - it's really hard. The family is very disappointed, very dismayed that - one, this officer did have a history, it was not addressed before. Unfortunately, he killed their family member and egregious enough - we all know how high the bar is for a police officer to get charged - he is charged. He's just waiting to go on trial, and unfortunately this trial keeps being delayed, which is very painful for the family. And just - there are people attached to this, these are real stakes and real people who are being impacted by this. And it just makes it that much more insulting that all of this is there - that we talk about wanting to keep people safe and healthy and whole, and treating people with dignity and respect - and wow, how this is not happening in the operations. And I just cannot - I cannot imagine being a family member of this person and then reading that he's literally the poster boy for the department. Just very, very disappointing. The department did say - well, hey, this is an old poster, this was before this happened and before he was charged with murder. It didn't happen before he killed other people - he has killed two other people, injured others aside from that. And so, they are putting that kind of behavior and history and record up on display. And so the question is, so who are you actually looking to recruit with this? What message are you sending? What does it say about the culture of the department? And I just hope that we begin to grapple with those questions as a community because it's absolutely necessary. In some better news this week, Seattle City Council passed PayUp legislation. What does this do? [00:19:56] Will Casey: Effectively, this is going to give a whole slew of app-based gig workers - finally - a minimum wage, which is a huge, huge deal. There's a little bit of back and forth in the final version of the law that got passed - Councilmember Alex Pedersen introduced a late amendment that did exclude a certain category of workers from the legislation, which was strange because he was the original sponsor of the bill. So it's not often you see - [00:20:26] Crystal Fincher: Andrew Lewis! [00:20:27] Will Casey: Oh, I'm sorry - did I say - yes, yes, yes - sorry, I made the frequent mistake of confusing him with the two other squishy progressives from the Council - my apologies to Andrew. But yeah, so anyway, he did undermine his own bill here in a relatively strange move that he said was to "take down the temperature on the issue." But that didn't really seem to happen because advocates for the workers are very upset that that exemption was inserted last minute into the legislation. But the large takeaway here is - this is still a significant step forward for a large class of employees who - Uber and Lyft, and these similar-style companies have been fighting tooth and nail in every state that tries to do this - to keep these people from getting a fair wage. So, let's not look a gift horse in the mouth here, I guess. [00:21:21] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. This is a step forward - it does meaningfully help a lot of drivers in the City, so this is a good thing, this is helpful. It would have been nice if it could be good for more people - we talked about that a lot last week. Councilmember Tammy Morales did offer an amendment that was passed that says they will take up legislation for the people left out of this bill - the marketplace workers who were excluded from this bill in that amendment that you just spoke about - that they will take that up by August of 2023. So there is now a date attached to it. One of the issues last week was - yeah, we'll get to it. But there was nothing concrete following that, there was no - well, when are you going to get to it, when are you going to address it if it's not here. And so now we do have a date, so hopefully app-based, or marketplace app-based workers, will also be included. But that's a very positive thing, very helpful. A number of these app-based service companies were very much in opposition to this, certainly were pushing for the amendment that Councilmember Lewis eventually passed for this bill. But it is a step forward, and I do not think it is too much to say that everyone deserves to make the minimum wage. And that just because you have figured out some technological loopholes does not absolve you with the responsibility for paying people who you're profiting from - to be clear, who you're profiting very handsomely from - a minimum wage. It's the least that should be done. So this week also, in City of Seattle news, Mayor Harrell introduced a new homelessness dashboard. What happened here? [00:23:09] Will Casey: Well, we've got a bunch of the data we already have now being aggregated into one place with some data visualization that made a tech worker friend of mine send me a long string of Twitter DMs talking about how terribly organized and poorly visualized the data is. And so - and his criticism is not the only one. My colleague at The Stranger, Hannah Krieg, had an excellent piece talking to some of the folks at Tech 4 Housing, who are experts in this field, and included an excellent breakdown of - that basically this dashboard presents the point of view that homelessness is a problem for the people seeing it, rather than for those who are experiencing the lack of shelter. And for me personally, I think this is going to be - a little bit of background here - part of the reason that the City is so concerned with visualizing this data and proving that they have the shelter capacity is that there's a federal lawsuit out of the Ninth Circuit, which is where Seattle resides, that effectively makes it illegal to do the encampments sweeps that the administration has been engaging in, unless there's adequate shelter available for everyone who's being forced to move. And so that's why you'll hear City officials so focused on this idea of referrals and saying that they had available capacity, without really ever getting into the details of - are you actually getting these people housing? Just - it was available, technically. And so we can't be punished by the courts for sweeping the problem to some other part of the city. [00:24:50] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it is - it is a challenge. And we've certainly talked about before, talked about even last week, the issue with that shelter - just because we're hearing shelter is available, an offer of services was made, does actually not mean that those services were applicable to the person who they were made to. Someone may have a job that requires them to work hours later than the shelter will accept people. Well, the offer was made - that person couldn't accept them - and you're making someone choose between having a job and spending a night somewhere. And to be clear, many of these shelters, it is a night. This is not housing. This is oftentimes a bed. If we're talking about congregate shelter, those for a variety of reasons can - not be safe places, not be places that help people become more stable. And oftentimes in these shelters, you have to leave early in the morning with all of your possessions - it's not an easy thing to do. Anyone suggesting that people who are unhoused are somehow getting by in the system, or doing this because it's easy, or because they're lazy - does not understand what being out on the street is actually like. It's a dangerous place, it's a scary place, it's a very destabilizing place. And to help people get back to the point where they can find stability for housing requires stabilizing so many things in their lives that are made worse by the trauma and experience of being on the street. So it is actually important - if we're going to solve this issue, there has to be housing for people, not a shelter bed. I am pretty fed up with just talking about shelter bed capacity. Is it better than nothing? Sometimes, actually not all the time. And we actually need, we do need to have capacity to get people out of extreme heat or extreme cold, those situations, but we are doing nothing to address the problem. And in fact, making it worse if we just force people to start over and over and over again, get the little bit of their lives and stability that they've gotten, and the bit of community that they've built to help them try and - one, just stay alive and two, get things together enough where they can just get a little bit more and get more stable - to just keep sweeping and moving and sweeping and moving. And it just is not working, and for as much money as we're spending on all of this sweeping, on all of the resources going into this - we could be spending that on housing, we could be spending that on services. We are throwing a ton of money at this in ways that are only moving people around and not getting anyone actually off the street, or very few people off the street, while more people are falling into homelessness. So it's - if you listen to this show, you know how frequently frustrated this is. But I - yes, this is a dashboard. Yes, we are tracking this. I want it to be more than checking off a box to justify sweeps. And I think that's the bottom line. And I am hoping to see some evidence that this is coming online. There has been hopeful talk. There has been talk about providing services - there've been too many sweeps that have not had them at all. And so when is it going to start? I would like to see that more than a dashboard in terms of this. But we will continue to follow how this progresses - it has just been frustrating to continue to watch us relocate people and not do that. Also want to cover - this week, an interesting situation with talk about requiring landlords to disclose the rent that they're paying. What is happening here? [00:28:49] Will Casey: Well, it seems like Alex Pedersen - I'm getting my white male councilmembers correct now - might've pissed off a few members of his base in pushing forward this legislation. It actually caused a relatively interesting 5-4 split among the Seattle City Council. It wasn't your traditional divide between conservatives and progressive factions. On the conservative side, you had Sara Nelson and Debora Juarez voting No - each of them had their own reasons. Dan Strauss and Teresa Mosqueda also voted No - Mosqueda mostly due to the budget concerns with implementing this bill. But he did get support from Andrew Lewis, Lisa Herbold, Tammy Morales, and Kshama Sawant - who are all in favor because in their perspective, if you're already doing the paperwork to advertise the units and pay taxes on the income that you're gathering from these investments - passively I might add - it shouldn't be that much more of an effort to collect some of that data and report it to the City on a regular basis so that we actually have an idea of what it costs to live here. It'd be very, very helpful for a lot of things the City's trying to do. [00:30:10] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. A number of cities across the country are moving in this direction - Seattle is not unique in doing this. And originally I misspoke - I said the rent that landlords are paying, I meant to say the rent that they're charging - but this is good and useful information. And absolutely will help inform policy and determine what is appropriate, what is not appropriate, and what action could or should be taken to help address this affordability crisis which we are absolutely in the middle of. And so having this happen is - having landlords at the table is perfectly fine, but we need all of the information. If they're giving us input on how this might be onerous or how this is affecting their ability to do this or that, then let's see the data for that. We ask that for so many other people and so many other ways - hey, to get rent assistance, we make people divulge lots of things about their income and living situation and personal life - and the hoops that they have to jump through just to do that. They're asking for a ton of information from renters about their qualifications, they're running background checks. We're only asking for them to divulge the rent that supposedly they're advertising what they're charging - they may be unhappy for people to see if they raise the rent in exorbitant amounts. I know a number of people who've had their rent raised by over 30%. Someone close to me had their rent raised by over 45% - it's egregious, and so this is an issue that I'm sure that they may not want lots of visibility on, but - hey, everyone else is required to put in a whole lot of information, to divulge a lot of information - we're in a crisis. This is the least they could do. And to the point that Hannah Krieg covered, and that you mentioned, they're already doing it. We're just organizing it in the same place - for a dashboard - we know how much the City loves the dashboard. Let's get a dashboard together. But I think this is a good situation, I commend Alex Pedersen for stepping up to address this crisis, for talking about this very common sense, really low-effort step that can be taken to help get more information on how we can solve this. And understanding that his constituents are his residents and people who are afraid of being priced out of the places where they're at. The City has - about half of its residents are renters. This is a pressing issue for so many people, so commend him and the rest of the councilmembers who did vote to support this. It's really important. And people really are expecting action to be taken. And so I'm happy that they're heeding that call. Another issue this week that we've talked about before and that you covered was - hey, what's going on with those texts that were deleted? Was that a felon - like it wasn't supposed to happen. They're saying it's a crime, a serious crime - a felony in fact - for things like that to happen. And so the question has been, are you going to refer this for investigation? Who can do this? Why isn't it done? What is going on? [00:33:34] Will Casey: Well, this was a very wonderful deep dive into a realm of a lot of people not wanting to admit anything was their fault, which is a lovely place to be. And as - I cannot believe I'm about to say this, but this is the cost of not having an effective opposition party - because if King County had a Republican Party that was remotely capable of winning any elections, we'd have a partisan incentive for someone to dig into the truth of what's going on here. And we'd actually benefit from a little bit of competition, but currently everyone who's involved. [00:34:14] Crystal Fincher: Well, the Republican Party has resources that make them effective as an opposition party, but there could be other opposition parties that were stood up - technically it wouldn't have to be a Republican Party, although they are more integrated statutorily into our system. But anyway - keep going. [00:34:29] Will Casey: Yes, yes, yes - trust me, I'm the last person who's going to wish for success for any Republican candidates. But my point being that this is a situation where - normally, this is where the political realities of government tend to work towards the interests of people actually finding out what's going on. Instead - here, we have a bunch of political allies - Bob Ferguson at the Attorney General's office, Governor Inslee, Dan Satterberg - all kind of just doing the Spiderman meme of pointing at each other and saying - it's your responsibility to kick this off. But actually, in reporting this out this week, what I learned is that the real culprit here, I think, is just a lack of stewardship at the Legislature in how this law is written. So the Public Records Act has been updated several times, it's something that voters put onto the books through initiatives at various points in Washington State's history - that part of the law is very well tended to. However, it only really includes civil penalties for agencies who fail to produce a given record on the required timeline, or if there is some other - hey, they're being overly aggressive about the redactions that they're making in providing these sorts of records. So there's a specific grant of civil action authority for any private person to sue a government agency and say - hey, you were supposed to get me this record by X date. It's now Y date. Where's the paper? The problem is there's also a separate law on the books in a different part of the RCWs that makes the willful destruction of a public record a felony. And that's what the publicly available information suggests Mayor Durkan and/or former Chief of Seattle Police Department Carmen Best may have done with their messages. That law was last substantively amended in 1909. And in speaking with legislative staff, they agreed with my guess - which is that this was something that's a relic of back in the pioneer days - when one small town would lead a raid onto somebody else's records office and burn all of the deeds so that they could just take over their farms or mining stakes or whatever. So what needs to happen, in the next legislative session, is for the Legislature to specifically grant the authority of - either to the County Prosecutor or the Attorney General - but basically make it very clear that if we ever encounter a situation like this again, there's a very specific person whose job it is to investigate. And so we don't end up with this farcical game of hot potato that's going on right now. [00:37:15] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and it is farcical - to be clear. And even - you touched on in the article that you wrote, which we will be including in the show notes, along with the other articles that we've discussed - was that - just incentives for accountability aren't there, they're actually pointing in the other direction. And so if there is no expectation that - hey, if I do something that I shouldn't do here, or if there's no record of other people being held accountable for those same things. And - hey, it would be easy for me to do this thing that I'm not supposed to do, and then just cover up that I did the thing that I'm not supposed to do - because the penalties of doing what I'm not supposed to do are greater than just covering it up and all that kind of stuff. And this is what we see. And especially that it was not just one person, it was multiple people involved in these incidences, and so it seems like - hey, we are trying to get rid of a record of what happened. And so many troubling things that happened - this is around the time when the precinct was abandoned. And again another issue of just - we find out that either there is no control or negligence or a refusal to own decisions that were made from the Mayor's office - but very troubling things that are happening that the public is owed - is literally owed - and just no accountability for that. So there needs to be, this should not be a my-team-versus-your-team type of thing. As we've seen in so many different instances, if we let this go now and even if - hey, well, that's my buddy, that's my team, that's my party, whatever it is - someone else is going to get a hold of it that you don't like and do worse. We have seen so many different examples of this. These are just good governance things that should not only apply to people who you are in opposition to politically - they're best when they apply to everyone, and they serve everyone better when they do apply to everyone, and we should find out what happened with these and there should be accountability attached to that. And I just wish we would take that more seriously. It would do a lot to create more trust in people in institutions. We're at a time right now where there is a crisis of confidence in all of our institutions, and only bad things happen in society when people lose trust in the institutions that are supposed to provide an orderly way of resolving disputes, find out information, talking about who has power and how they're able to wield it - all of those things. If we don't trust, if the public doesn't trust how that happens, then people start to take things into their own hands and use their own means - and that never turns out well, it never ends peacefully. [00:40:22] Will Casey: Yeah, and I think that there are some people who I think are looking at this as - oh, there's just a couple of people who've got it out for Mayor Durkan and they just don't want to let this go or move on - and we need to unify and heal after the 2020 protests. And I cannot disagree with that strongly enough - because in criminal law, we talk all the time about how we have to have these harsh sentences as a deterrent for criminal behavior, as if someone who has no other way to put food on the table except for stealing that food is going to think about the consequences of like - oh, well, down the line, this is going to mean X, Y, or Z for me. But here - these are sophisticated actors, right? These are people with power and leverage and public office who have the ability to make a cold, calculated decision about whether or not - how likely it is - they're going to get caught. And if they are, how bad are the consequences going to be, really? And we've already seen this trend continue in a disturbing way. This didn't make it into the piece that I wrote this week, but it's been reported elsewhere. We've seen similar issues with deleting texts at the Washington Redistricting Commission when they just blew past their midnight deadline. And voted without actually having maps in front of them. And so I think that this is a live issue, this is a real problem for people's faith in government, as you pointed out. And it's frankly, not that hard to fix - one-line amendment to say it shall be the responsibility of the Attorney General's office to investigate whenever there has been a destroyed public record - would solve this entire problem. [00:42:03] Crystal Fincher: It would, and it certainly needs solving and we certainly should have some accountability to this. I'm sure we'll be talking more about this subject more in the future as developments unfold, but it's just a challenge. There's lots that's been challenging this week, lately. We don't even get into the national stuff here - that's enough. And then just to see these types of events and headlines on a local level is challenging, but it is possible to create positive change. There are some good things happening and ways that we can all engage to make this better. And part of what we want to do in talking about this is to - like we say - understand what's happening, and why it's happening, and what we can do about it. And we see what's happening, and got further insight into the why this week and the levers that we can use to fix it. And so certainly is something that people need to do - is to advocate with their legislators that - hey, this is something that is an easy fix, a quick fix, and that should be fixed, and that we're expecting to be fixed. So hopefully that does happen. And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks today, this Friday, June 3rd, 2022. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler with assistant producer Shannon Cheng and help with Bryce Cannatelli. Our wonderful co-host today is staff writer covering law and justice - and if it wasn't clear to people, who is also a lawyer who is a reporter, which is helpful when reporting on law and justice and it shows - Will Casey. You can find Will on Twitter @willjcasey - that's C-A-S-E-Y. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii. Now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, wherever else you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks & 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 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 - talk to you next time.

Morning Update Show | Tuesday, January 11, 2021 Sydney Brownstone of the Seattle Times | LIVE Being homeless in Seattle with chronic illness City Council hearing on SPD Proud Boy hoax Antonio Mays Jr. murder remains unsolved

Today Crystal is joined by candidate for King County Council District 3, Sarah Perry. They discuss Sarah's vision for community involvement in the district, how Sarah would work with communities that have been fully ignored by the incumbent Kathy Lambert, and her opponents outrageous take on sexual assault (among other things), supporting small businesses, and much more.  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 guest, Sarah Perry, at @perryelect. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources Night by Elie Wiesel: https://bookshop.org/books/night-9780374500016/9780374500016 “'Don't go to a hotel room' with a drunk man. Councilmember Kathy Lambert's full KUOW interview” by Sydney Brownstone and Isolde Raftery from KUOW:https://www.kuow.org/stories/word-for-word-this-is-what-kathy-lambert-said “Seattle Times Rescinds Kathy Lambert Endorsement Over Racist Mailer” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2021/10/12/seattle-times-rescinds-kathy-lambert-endorsement-over-racist-mailer/ “About the GMA [Growth Management Act” from Future Wise: http://www.futurewise.org/growth-management-act “2018 Small Business Profile” from the U.S. Small Business Administration: https://www.sba.gov/sites/default/files/advocacy/2018-Small-Business-Profiles-US.pdf “Washington trails the nation in mental health treatment” by Drew Atkins from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/2016/07/how-washington-is-failing-the-mentally-ill “Chicago attorney, activist picked as King County's new director of Office of Law Enforcement Oversight” by Mike Carter from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/chicago-attorney-activist-picked-as-king-countys-new-director-of-office-of-law-enforcement-oversight/ More information about Sarah Perry's campaign for King County Council: https://www.electsarahperry.org/   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. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, I'm very excited to have Sarah Perry joining us - candidate for King County Council. Welcome! [00:00:46] Sarah Perry: Thank you - I'm so happy to be here. Thank you for having me. [00:00:49] Crystal Fincher: Yeah - I am thrilled and excited - this is another race outside of Seattle. Sometimes we can get so Seattle-centric and focused on that, but man, there's a lot going on outside of Seattle that is hugely important to our region - impactful to the City, to the County, to our State realistically. And this is one of the most consequential races we face because this isn't just two people on the margins who agree on a lot of stuff. This isn't one of those - this may be a blowout race. This is highly competitive. You're running against an incumbent Republican - Kathy Lambert. This is in an Eastside district - so Issaquah, Redmond, Sammamish, some unincorporated King County - and wow, this is one of the premier races this cycle. What made you decide to run? [00:01:45] Sarah Perry: I am so committed to civic engagement. I have a background in nonprofit and government sectors. I was the first Eastside - I was the first executive director for Eastside Housing, which is now Springboard Alliance at the base of Avondale and Redmond. And went from there to Seattle University and then to Social Venture Partners International. When I was at Social Venture Partners International, I went to Birkenau - Auschwitz-Birkenau - on the Rick Steves tour with my husband. And I was reading Elie Wiesel's Night - it was two weeks before the Holocaust survivor passed away. I was standing in Birkenau - Auschwitz-Birkenau - where he stood. And that was '16. And I knew in every fiber of my being that she was going to win that election. I just knew it - I felt it in my bones. But if for some chance she didn't win, all I could see were trains of Muslims this time, or trains of immigrants, or trains of people with brown skin because of the rhetoric from the candidate at the time - our former president. And I felt like I had to do something when I got back - something was so moved in me in that experience. And it's still with me and I knew I had to do something. So I came back home and went to the single most unorganized experience of a 1,000 people - called the Democratic caucus. It was ridiculous. There were people booing with Hillary and with Bernie - it was ridiculous. Five people talking for one minute, one person talking for five minutes - and everybody's upset. And I'm an organizer in my sleep - and so I decided after four hours, I was going to get up and go home, or I was going to go and offer help. So I decided to do that first, and I did. He didn't know if I was friend or foe. I didn't know there was a Legislative District 5. I'd been involved in politics for campaigns - for presidential campaigns - throughout with my family, growing up with my family and my current family, but I had not been more involved. And so I didn't quite understand all of this and this man invited me to come and help with that - with selecting speakers. The next week, he asked me to come to an executive - what turned out to be an Executive Board for the 5th Legislative District Democrats. And they nominated me as PCO chair on the spot. And I said, "That's great. That's great. What do they do?" And they said, "We don't know. We've never had one." I said, "Okay. Okay." So I was committed. I'm still committed in my marrow. And so I started calling people that were alternates and delegates. I started calling - I wanted an equal balance of people that identified as men and people that identified as women, and people who were supporting Bernie and supporting Hillary at their highest value. I wanted both at their highest value. So we pulled together a group of 24 leaders in '16 and in '17, and we started recruiting volunteers. And then in 2018, we had over 150 canvassers to activate - who knocked on 50 doors once a month for that entire year. And we flipped the 5th District and elected Bill Ramos as State Rep, Lisa Callan as State Rep, and then Kim Schrier also - a big part of the 8th Congressional District is the 5th District. So that experience was electric for me - seeing people, a whole bunch of people, giving a little bit in a way that works in their life - it was just electric. And I was inspired. And after that I came home - when Bill Ramos was looking like he was going to win, I left Social Venture Partners International, came home and began my work again. I'd started work with Perry Consulting - decade before, two decades before - and I built that up again. And as I was doing this volunteer work - so it was 30 to 40 hours of volunteer work each week - while I had my day job. And as I was doing that, I just continued to be deeply connected to the House and the Senate and the Governor and Bob Ferguson and all these different candidates. So once that happened, the House and the Senate hired me to do the same kind of thing in Puyallup and Vancouver, Washington - and that was amazing. And then pandemic - doing this in the middle of phone calls was a completely different experience, but still the bones were in place. During that whole time, people were saying, "When are you going to run? When are you going to run? When are you going to run? This is all great. Thanks for organizing. When are you going to run? And when are you going to run specifically for this position?" And I've been thinking about it because what I am at heart is a coalition builder - I love to mobilize people and engage people in shared values. And so I looked at this position very carefully and I realized there are many, many voices that are not being heard from. We have a huge community of Hindu and Muslim, secular Indian and African. We also have Latinos, the Hmong community, African-American community. Many of these voices are not at the table in discussion with our current King County representative. Many have never ever seen her - many, many. There are areas around the environment and around transit that desperately need support and need attention and need complex thinking, not simple singular solutions. And I am ready to take that on and I am thrilled with the opportunity. And the first thing I did was I called Bob Ferguson and I said, "I'm thinking about doing this. Am I nuts? What do you think?" And he said, "If you do this, I will move everything in my power to help you get elected." I said, "That is amazing. Why would you do that? I mean, thank you, but why would you do that?" And he said, "Because we've been looking for someone for years who could run in this position and represent the values of this district and where we need to go. And if anybody can do it, you can do it." So that just continued to move forward, continued to move forward - and I got a similar message from so many people and yeah, I am completely, completely electric about this opportunity for coalition building so we have civic engagement throughout KCD 3. [00:08:25] Crystal Fincher: And that's what makes me so excited about you. I had mentioned to you before - a mutual friend of ours was who first turned me on to you. And it was just like, "You know what? There is this woman in Issaquah who," - and Issqauah was not organized in any way - in the Democratic party, outside. Many people had kind of written off in terms of organization or engagement - the Eastside. Certainly that County Council district is represented by a Republican - it's purple if not red. Hey, let's go focus somewhere else. And there, there wasn't much going on there. And you basically said, "Yeah I'm just going to do this." And knocked on doors in neighborhoods, found Precinct Committee Officers who are critical to increasing turnout and to helping people get out the vote for Democratic candidates and left-leaning candidates - critical, especially in districts represented by Republicans. And just did the work. I appreciate people who just do the work. [00:09:38] Sarah Perry: I appreciate people who do the work too. [00:09:43] Crystal Fincher: So that's what got me so excited - because not only were you willing to do the work, but you were effective - you were highly successful in recruiting PCOs and reaching out to members of all different types of communities and bringing everyone together. And as you said, you were - I feel that you were critical - you were a critical component in flipping the Legislative District. And certainly the coalition that you are continuing to build is certainly propelling you in this race and wow, what a competitive race it is. And just in case people have not been paying close attention to this district race with Kathy Lambert. Kathy's a problem. Kathy is a proud Republican - praised Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, voted against storing guns safely, voted against pro-choice causes. Joe Fain, a former Senator - State Senator in the 47th district - was credibly accused of rape, ended up losing his seat - that certainly contributed to it. And she blamed the victim and went as far as saying, "Hey, when I was younger, slapping a woman on the butt was a compliment." Now to be clear - Joe Fain was accused of much more than that, but just that - like who does that today? You know - just take it as a compliment, who should know - and just blindly defending Joe Fain. It's just problem, upon problem, upon problem. And so the values that she represents are so far away from where people are at today. Looking at how the district has been voting, it's been trending far away from that and getting further away. So the primary was interesting - it was a competitive primary and who is going to be the Democrat who comes out to face Kathy Lambert. This is a top two primary, but it is a Democrat and a Republican. And so you wound up being the choice of the community and of progressives to go up against Kathy Lambert - and wow. How do you begin to address the needs and the issues of the community when you have someone so extreme, and so problematic, and out of touch with people? What's it like to run against that? And what are you focused on getting accomplished first? [00:12:34] Sarah Perry: Thanks. You know - she is who she is, she's who she's always been. And we can no longer afford to have simple solutions. And part of the challenge is that she's been here for 20 years since Bush was in office. And our district has changed so much since then - 68% of our district voted for Biden. Bob Ferguson, Mike Pellicciotti - they're at 65% - it really is very strong in that direction. But that aside, she is a strong supporter, as you say, of Betsy DeVos - I'm a strong supporter of public education. And when I look at the district and because of the work that I've done in Issaquah - so I've lived in Issaquah for 21 years, North Bend for six years, worked and played throughout the district - I love this district. I love the cities of Issaquah, Sammamish and Redmond. We have unincorporated Woodinville, we have these beautiful towns of Duvall, Carnation, Snoqualmie, Skykomish, Fall City. One third of our district is unincorporated, and when you look at the primary, that's where she had any of her strength and the 40% that she received of the vote was from that area - 60% between me and the other Democratic challenger, Joe Cohen, who turned around and endorsed me - for which I'm very grateful. You know - I feel that with the work that we're doing at the doors, with the support that we've been able to raise, the endorsements that we've been able to raise - I have a few folks that would have otherwise voted for her and supported her, but feel so strongly that she's just not able to get the work done anymore on council. They don't feel the same way about the others, but they feel this way about her. And so, essentially, we need a fighter in this position. And I think people know that - I think people are also - they get tired of the same person for so long, especially in a district that has shifted so much. So many new families have moved in and so much more diversity. And we just have a lot of work to do here. So when I'm talking to the environmental community, they just come right in - and they're excited that I am focused on Growth Management Act and keeping the growth in our urban boundaries. They're excited that we set up zoning laws to protect our farmers and our farmland - not so that somebody can come along and allow businesses to be set up, favorite friends or whatever, and not have the mitigation for the sewer, so that the sewage runs into the farmland and into the waterways. And it's those businesses, but not these businesses - so I'm a middle child and things have to be fair. And so it really - I'm really okay with what we do, but we have to do it together. We have to have this conversation together - look at how all of the communities are impacted, make sure there's an environmental impact statement, and go from there. We do need to upgrade the Growth Management Act - it's absolutely true, but we have five forests and four watersheds. We have federal, state, county, city and private forest. We have so much space - 500 of the 1,500 miles of unincorporated roads are in this district. People come out here from all over the place and because we're the second fastest growing district in the next 10 years next to Bellevue - Claudia's is also in there. We have so much to protect if we're going to meet our environmental impact goals. So people - it's resonating with the environmental community, it's resonating with the transit community who understands that we need to make it very convenient for people to get out of their single-use vehicles into electric shuttles or the bike lane or walkways. And also that we are focusing on safe communities from a collaborative standpoint, so that we have folks working together who are most impacted with the Office of Law Enforcement Oversight, with the new Sheriff - making sure that the people who feel most impacted by any bias that might be going on are in that conversation together. And we do it together. And when we lean in, things only improve. And so having more civic engagement is a very exciting thing to me. And I think when we have these conversations one after the other, it just seems to be resonating with people and they're coming on board. So she raised a $100,000, she spent a $100,000 in the primary. She's got another $140,000 from 20 years of not being seriously challenged that she's bringing into the general. And I spent so much of my money - I've got half of that right now. It doesn't look like that on the PDC, but I've got half of that to be able to meet all of the challenges for these next three weeks before the ballots arrive. So I'm just working really hard to shore up that support so that we can have the digital and cable and mailings that we need, 'cause I know that that's her focus - digital. [00:17:53] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. [00:17:53] Sarah Perry: Yeah. [00:17:54] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. Now there's a lot that going to be on your plate, if and when you get elected. We're facing so many crises that are converging and making each other crisis worse. We're still in the middle of this pandemic, we're still dealing with COVID - and it's a huge problem. And negotiating through how this is being handled at schools, at local businesses, just in the community. There's an eviction cliff coming and getting the assistance out that has been provided for at the County has been a major problem. And getting the funds that are already earmarked to help people prevent eviction hasn't quite been happening. And so there's still a massive risk of people who are behind on their rent - most of them multiple months. We've got people struggling - the have-nots have less, the haves have even more throughout this pandemic. And so there are people who are really at the margins just struggling - who've been put out of work, who've had hours reduced - a lot of uncertainty with businesses as we continue to negotiate through COVID and more. How do you address all of that? What is the plan? [00:19:26] Sarah Perry: That is a great question. One of the first things that I'm going to do is build a KCD 3 community coalition. So what I want is I want people at the table. I want people looking at current practices and policies from each of our communities, from education and business, environmental, from our secular Indian and African communities, our Hindu, our Muslim communities, our Sikh, Latino, African-American. I want everybody at that conversation so that we can look at where King County is impacting with the tax dollars - all of its residents and where it's completely missing it. I'm also very appreciative of the work that Senator Manka Dhingra and Claudia Balducci have done. They've met with business owners from the communities of color every month all year - throughout the pandemic - all year last year, and into this year. And the current incumbent in this district has not attended one. I just don't understand that. And so I'm very excited to work with communities of color and businesses. I believe that when our small businesses thrive, our communities thrive. I know they provide half the jobs in this country - they're the second most trusted institution in this country and in every community they need to thrive. And that's why we're doing a small business Saturday video - I'm going to continue to do a highlighting of businesses and work to see what we can do to streamline fees and regulations across all seven cities that can be cumbersome and inhibit the success of our small businesses at a critical time - that part's important. I'm very interested in women - in strengthening women and women's self-sufficiency. I want to see transit options that are working with childcare, that support people in childcare, and needs for elder care. I want to see the support coming in more and more for our labor industry, for women, and for communities of color - in internship programs to strengthen these spaces, to promote a middle-class income. I want to see our housing really focus in on what we can do. I know that we - the seven cities had to figure out how much housing and the jobs and transit through 2044 - that was a few months back. And Redmond requested the majority - the lion's share of housing in this district through 2044, and that is because of light rail. So there's going to be huge development in Redmond for affordable housing, workforce housing, many different kinds of housing centered around light rail and mass transit opportunities. In Issaquah, there's 8,000 apartments and townhouses coming in. In the foreseeable future, there's just a lot of development of this kind of housing. And I want to make sure that it's not just affordable, but that it's attainable. I want to see people be able to live, work and play in the same community if that is their choice. That impacts our social texture, it impacts our environment, it impacts all of the areas that are of most critical concern. And because this is one of the two fastest growing region, districts in all of nine districts in King County, we have to get a hold of this. We have to pay attention to how we're going to do this together in a smart way. So I want to be in that conversation, but I'm not going to wear the white cape and step up and say, "Thanks for waiting. Here's the solution." I'm going to bring in people who are closest to the issue at hand and experts in the area - in these different spaces and have that dialogue together so that it is informed by the communities. That is what is critically missing in this district - is that things are not informed by the communities. There's a solution that's too simple, that's brought up and moved forward, and nobody will vote for it on council, and it goes nowhere, and it's talked about over and over and over for years and nothing happens. So we need to shake that up and do it differently and act as if every single resident, the voice of every single resident, matters. And I mean whether they agree with each other or not - I want a good balance of people who are grounded in their values. Like my husband and I, we don't always get along and I can be strong, he can be strong - but we put the marriage in the middle of that conversation. It is the health of the marriage that we look at when we are moving forward. And I want the health of our community as the thing that we look at when we are moving forward. But I want people who feel strongly and have divergent viewpoints and they're grounded in their values - I want those folks at the table - not for the fight, but for the movement forward. . [00:24:20] Crystal Fincher: Well, and that's an interesting point that you bring up. And one that - in talking with a lot of candidates - there's wanting to get community and put - absolutely necessary and needing to make sure that you are including people who are impacted in solutions. If you don't, they're not going to work - they're certainly not going to serve everybody. But at the end of the day, you have to make a decision one way or the other. How do you parse hearing different viewpoints, talking to different communities, having sometimes competing interests, sometimes just different interests that aren't necessarily competing - just different? How do you parse that at the end of the day? And I guess - what is your North Star, when you're saying first and foremost, I have to make sure that I deliver this for the community - how do you parse that? [00:25:15] Sarah Perry: Greatest good is always my North Star - what is the greatest good? What is the least suffering? Who is suffering the most? So when everybody does better, everybody does better, right? So I want to make sure that we are looking at our communities that are struggling the most, that are in the most vulnerable situation. And look at that as the guidepost for how we get to better - because better is determined by your weakest space. And weakest not being the people - people are often very strong, but they are not listened to or deliberately ignored. And we need to make sure that we are hearing what is best for each of the communities and engaging. And at the end of the day, I'm going to look at the greatest good - what's happening for our children, what's happening for our seniors, what's happening for our women. These are things that sit with me - women really rock the communities. They hold the communities and they need to be supported in raising their families and in supporting elder parents. And what does that mean? That means when they need to be supported - it means recognizing that childcare and eldercare is not women's work. It's the work of our future collectively. So it's really a telltale that so many of our women have had to leave the workforce because they're paid less in the partnerships, they're paid less for the same job. They leave the workforce to take care of the children or to take care of their elder parents. And the challenge there is that they're then sacrificing their advancement, their financial prosperity in the future, their children's education and advancement in the future. There are so many dominoes to that - that fall. And so, you know, I'm really focused on how we take care of our children and our elderly and our most vulnerable first - as a society, as a people. [00:27:21] Crystal Fincher: Well and we're in a situation where we're seeing the most vulnerable suffering in ways that are heartbreaking and frankly unnecessary - they're results of policy decisions - whether it's looking at our sizable unhoused population, people dealing with mental illness and mental health issues, which has certainly been aggravated by everything that people have had to deal with throughout this pandemic. And people just wanting to feel safe in their neighborhoods and not necessarily feeling that way - that those who currently are in charge of policing don't always serve the goal of public safety for everyone. How do you address that? [00:28:08] Sarah Perry: Yeah. Homelessness - not having housing - is a complicated issue. And you might have folks who are struggling with behavioral health - we, in my family, have had the opportunity, the unfortunate opportunity, to see the acute failure of our state in this area - in our family. And seeing that firsthand - watching what's possible, watching how it works with a family that can have choices - as we had the privilege of choice to go to other states. Others don't have that option. This affects all of us and people could be - they could not have housing because they had behavioral health issues that Washington State really does not have the training and the resources and the personnel and the psychiatric hospital beds to address. We are below Tennessee. We are below Mississippi. This is a great state. Why is that? Why is that, right? And Manka Dhingra has done amazing work. She's moved us up - we were 48th. We're now like 35th - something like that - because of her work. She's such a Trojan, such a champion in this area. It could be because somebody has a behavioral health issue and is not getting the medication, the counseling, the psychiatry, and the support they need to get through that blip in their life - and it becomes a catastrophe rather than a blip, and where they can then go on to live a meaningful stable life. Or it could be substance use disorders - so addiction is serious and real and heavy. It's opioid, it's alcohol, it's other drugs - sometimes that's used to self-medicate with behavioral health needs. Sometimes it's just the pure addiction unto itself - it needs its own set of complicated, not simple solutions - complicated, not simple solutions for mental health, for behavioral health needs as well. And then you also might just be - you've got your kids, you're living in a car because why - well, you're working - but you have to pay childcare, which costs the same as another mortgage or rent. So you can scrape that together to keep your kids stable and you're working and you're living in your car - first, last and deposit without behavioral health issues, without substance use issues - just plain too expensive without enough support. These are complicated issues, but we are a smart people. We are a smart, smart people, and we can figure this out. But the only way we can figure it out is if we own it as our issue. Yeah, 1% or 2% are given a bus fare from Florida or somewhere else - one-way to Seattle - that is true, but it's a phenomenal thing. Phenomenology thing - it's 1% or 2% - the rest start in the zip code that they end up in. These are our people - they're my weird Uncle Al, or they're our kids, or they're our siblings, or they're parents. All of these are our people, and until we embrace that as a solution that cannot be swept away - people don't - human beings don't go away. It's not going to go away until we lean into it and engage and embrace and look at these solutions together and own it together. It's complicated, but it's only through that complicated, sophisticated work together that we can come to a solution and we can do it. And I am excited to be in a district here that can support folks being safe, finding housing, feeling safe walking around in their communities, walking into businesses, not having to walk on needles and excrement, feeling safe in that way. Knowing that they have law enforcement who are not the bad apples, but the good apples that have stuck around and they want to understand their own racial bias and they want to comply with the accountability and transparency. They're the leading edge in those conversations because they know it's critical and they're in it and they welcome it - like our new Director of the Law Enforcement Oversight. He knows - he knows that he has to lean into the community and if the community doesn't work with him, it won't work. He knows that. Well, that is an amazing first start. And he's Muslim. That's a lovely thing too. [00:32:18] Crystal Fincher: Well, I appreciate the thoughtfulness that you've taken in your approach and just how you've involved the entire community. If people want to learn more about your campaign, get involved - how do they do that? [00:32:34] Sarah Perry: ElectSarahPerry.org is the website, and there are opportunities for weekend canvasses or canvases during - we go every single day - I'm knocking on 50 doors a day. But people can go knock if they're comfortable - we show them, we take all safety protocols - only vaccinated folks and still wearing masks. But they can do that - we are doing phone banks, we are doing text banks. They can make a contribution to support our campaign. We'll be doing sign wavings. We got lots of opportunities with labor to do sign wavings as well and lit drops - all of those things are in place and they can check out our website, give us a call. We would love to get anybody involved at the level - lots or little time - they like to do it - to make, to be effective and to feel like they're contributing to changing democracy because this district needs that change. And we need you with us to win. [00:33:28] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, it does. Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us. We're going to be keeping our eye on this. It's one of the biggest opportunities this cycle to make a big change from a Republican district to a Democratic one. And in one of the biggest, most prosperous districts and the biggest county in the state - that's incredibly impactful. Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us today. [00:33:55] Sarah Perry: Thank you for having me - really, really appreciate being here and you elevating this and letting folks know what's happening on the Eastside. [00:34:03] Crystal Fincher: I thank you all for listening to Hacks & Wonks on KVRU 105.7 FM. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler with assistance from Shannon Chang. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii, spelled F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I and now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, 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 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 officalhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - we'll talk to you next time.

At the beginning of the pandemic, Seattle and King County tried a new approach to get people living in homeless encampments into stable housing. They started putting people up in hotels, with the ultimate goal of keeping people off the streets. Some new data suggests that approach may not be a silver bullet in solving the issue.Seattle Times reporter Sydney Brownstone has been reporting on the efforts of a coalition called JustCARE. She told KUOW's Kim Malcolm about what happened to the residents of an encampment at Eighth Avenue South and South King Street in Seattle.Join your host Sean Reynolds, owner of Summit Properties NW, and Reynolds & Kline Appraisal as he takes a look at this developing topic.https://www.kuow.org/stories/how-did-one-seattle-unhoused-to-hotels-program-work-the-results-are-mixedSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/seattlerealestatepodcast)

Today on the show Seattle mayoral candidate Colleen Echohawk joins Crystal to talk about her plans to tackle the homelessness crisis within 14 months, how she will reform public safety, and why indigenous perspectives and leadership are so important in our country. 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 guest, Colleen Echohawk, at @ccechohawk. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources “The COVID pandemic split the King County homeless system in two. A year later, the differences remain stark” by Sydney Brownstone: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/homeless/the-pandemic-split-the-homeless-system-in-two-a-year-later-the-differences-remain-stark/ “COVID-19 and the overwhelming demand for basic needs” by Andrea Caupain Sanderson: https://crosscut.com/opinion/2021/02/covid-19-and-overwhelming-demand-basic-needs “How Compassion Seattle could shape the mayoral race” by Joni Balter: https://crosscut.com/opinion/2021/05/how-compassion-seattle-could-shape-mayoral-race “Echohawk Emergency Housing Action Plan” from the Echohawk campaign: https://www.echohawkforseattle.com/emergency-housing2 Community Police Commission Recommendations tracker: https://www.seattle.gov/community-police-commission/current-issues/recommendations-tracker “Where Seattle is on police reforms, one year after protests” by David Kroman: https://crosscut.com/politics/2021/05/where-seattle-police-reforms-one-year-after-protests “Afternoon Fizz: ‘A Dictator Posturing As a Mayor,' Another Preventable Disease Outbreak, and CPC Challenges Cops' Crowd Control Plans” from Publicola: https://publicola.com/2021/04/22/afternoon-fizz-a-dictator-posturing-as-a-mayor-another-preventable-disease-outbreak-and-cpc-challenges-cops-crowd-control-plans/#more-17527   Transcript Crystal Fincher: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hacks and Wonks. I'm your host, Crystal Fincher. On this show, we talk to political hacks and policy wonks to gather insight into local politics and policy through the lens of those doing the work and provide behind-the-scenes perspectives on politics in our state. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes.  Today we are so excited to have joining us, candidate for Seattle mayor, Colleen Echohawk. Thank you so much for being here. Colleen Echohawk: [00:00:59] Thank you. I'm so glad to be with you today, Crystal. Crystal Fincher: [00:01:01] Yeah. Okay, so I'm excited. What actually caused you to want to join this mayor's race at this time? Colleen Echohawk: [00:01:10] Well, thank you for asking the question because if you had told me like a year ago that I would be doing this, I would be surprised. I think that there's two things that really propelled me into this race. Number one is I work with our homeless community, I've supported our homeless community for many years now - believe in them deeply. And I am just so frustrated about what has happened. We've had almost six years of a state of emergency and the crisis has only gotten worse. There were moments through the pandemic - the second thing that just really pushed it - where our homeless community, our larger community, was just in pain and in agony because we were shutting down libraries, we were shutting down community centers, we were shutting down my own Day Center. Then we were telling people, "You have to wash your hands. That is sanitation. That's how you're going to keep COVID away." And then our homeless community was just left out in the rain to just have to poop on the sidewalk because there is no bathrooms. And it just got to a point where I just felt like - if I have some skill in this role, and I do, and if I can bring that to the mayor's office and offer that kind of leadership to actually solve this problem on behalf of the 12,000 plus people who are experiencing homelessness, then I should step up. There's just a real crisis of Black, indigenous, and people of color communities are vastly overrepresented and we haven't had enough leadership that represents our community. So that was the other part of just-- I was raised to step up to situations and that's what I'm doing. Crystal Fincher: [00:03:00] Well, you certainly bring up a lot of correct and valid issues that - man, this pandemic really did lay bare the inequities that already existed and then made them worse - and specifically with our unhoused community. There's an initiative right now, Compassionate Seattle that - frequently, initiatives are responses to a failure of leadership and as you said, we've had this crisis for quite some time. This initiative is now up. We've talked about it before on the show. I guess I'm wondering, one, do you support Compassionate Seattle? And if not, how does your vision differ? Colleen Echohawk: [00:03:39] Yeah. Well, I think that what we're seeing, and you've talked about this already, is that this is what happens when you declare an emergency and the problem only gets worse for the next five years. We have people trying to fill the vacuum that was created by years of inaction at City Hall. I, in some ways, and, well, in many ways, I appreciate that someone is trying to get something done. I appreciate that. That is a good thing. I think something that's really hard for me with Compassion Seattle is that people that I have worked with for years and years, people who are national leaders around homelessness, they helped really craft this. I saw the very first draft, and then I saw the last draft. We all can see the last draft, and it's night and day from what it looked like. But I think there's some very significant problems. The number one thing is that the funding - that is not at all adequate funding just to solve this crisis that we're in, so that's the number one thing. The second thing is it's weird to change the City Charter. I don't think that's a good way to do governance - it's like amending the Constitution. I just don't think that's the right way of doing it. And then, third and probably the most important piece, is that they did not spend enough time working with our Lived Experience Coalition. There were a couple of people who had lived experience of homelessness, who did give their opinions and were part of the final design, but I think that we have a very strong Lived Experience Coalition. I think they should have a say in this.  So, I am struggling with it because of all those factors. I don't think I will personally vote for it. But I am supportive that people want to do something and have pushed this forward - and we'll see what happens. I think that there is a lot of opposition - even on the right - to it, which is fascinating. But what I hear and I see from Compassion Seattle is that people are frustrated and angry that we have not done this work in the way that we should, and they want to get something done. Crystal Fincher: [00:06:00] Okay, so what I heard from you wasn't quite a No - you're struggling with it, and you've certainly identified some of the issues that a lot of people have with it. I guess one of the opportunities that you have is - if you're elected mayor, that you get to fill that leadership vacuum that created this initiative anyway. So why not just vote no and then do what you should be doing in the first place? Colleen Echohawk: [00:06:23] Well, I just said that I'm not going to vote Yes on it. I think that the hard thing for me, like I mentioned earlier, and we actually talked about this before starting - is I have some really good people, friends, who were a part of it and I see why it's so hard. But I think the funding mechanism is the main reason that I'm not going to vote for it. I think we have to have more robust funding mechanisms. In our plan, that we have on our website, and invite people to take a look at it - in fact, we're going to drop some really nuts and bolts things today - goes far beyond what the Compassionate Seattle initiative has. We're calling it 22 steps to get all the people that are outside into housing in 14 months. I think that having 1,000-2,000 emergency housing units is not enough. These are human beings, these are children, these are elders. We have to have initiative right now - treat this truly like the emergency that it is - and get people inside. And that's what I'll do if elected mayor. Crystal Fincher: [00:07:35] What are some of those steps? What are some of the specifics that people can see you take - that demonstrate you're treating it like the crisis that it is - and that actually work to solve the problem and you're laying out in 14 months? That's ambitious. Colleen Echohawk: [00:07:48] Yeah. Well, it's ambitious and it comes from years of experience of working with our homeless community. The number one thing, the moment that I am elected, we will use the transition period to identify hotels, identify unused land, identify - if it's tiny homes or whatever - find those spaces immediately so that the moment we get into office, we can just hit the ground running on getting this work done. We know that we're going to have to have an all-of-the-above approach on the emergency housing. And I do want to say something quickly - one of the answers and the biggest answer to homelessness is permanent housing. That's just the reality. We have to have that in our minds and recognizing that as a goal. But while we're doing that, we also have to have the emergency housing that gets up and running. And so, we will use all-of-the-above approach, find the land so we can move all the RVs onto that land, and offer really good services.  We have a plan for a 100 outreach workers to build those relationships. The outreach workers we help to hire from the Lived Experience Coalition and other folks with lived experience, and build those relationships. We saw, through the pandemic, the program Just Cares. I was honored to participate in that program. We were able to build those relationships in those encampments, move the entire encampment into a hotel. And they went willingly - we weren't sweeping people. They were just going because it was a better option. And so- Crystal Fincher: [00:09:37] Well, that's a good point. Colleen Echohawk: [00:09:37] Yeah. Crystal Fincher: [00:09:38] Do you ever see a reason to sweep people? Colleen Echohawk: [00:09:41] No. No. I think that with good engagement - with talented and good outreach - you don't have to sweep. You can go out there and build that relationship and get folks into housing and security. These are human beings. Let's not forget that. That's the other thing that I think - the reason I'll be a good mayor is that these are not numbers to me. These are people that I know, and love, and appreciate - and I'm willing to get out there and take the responsibility to find the kind of housing that's going to work for them. This is an opportunity for Seattle - we either can create the right leadership in the mayor's office or not. We have to do something. These folks deserve for someone to fight for them, and I will be that person to fight for them. Crystal Fincher: [00:10:39] When you talk about - certainly, permanent housing is the ultimate solution to homelessness - we also have an affordability crisis. How do you address that? What's the answer? Colleen Echohawk: [00:10:53] Yeah. We are quickly moving towards - only the very, very rich can enjoy this city. Honestly, that really bothers me. This is a Native city, this is a Coast Salish city. We have legislation in 1865 that said Native people cannot be in the city limits. We pushed out our Muckleshoot community, whose land we're on right now - the City of Seattle is. And so, we have to find ways to stop the gentrification and to bring back our community into Seattle. We need to really understand the affordability crisis, and that's going to be rezoning. There's just no way around it. We, in our campaign, are talking about the middle. What does that look like? How can we get there? There are ways that we can do the rezoning work with the neighborhoods, with public space designers, and make sure that we are doing it in a good way. But we cannot continue as we are. Crystal Fincher: [00:12:04] What is that way? We hear about NIMBYism. We hear people vehemently opposed to changing the culture of the neighborhood and wanting things to maintain exactly the way that they are. And people - they're afraid of their property values and all of that - so what is the answer? How do you see you can come to - what is that middle ground? Colleen Echohawk: [00:12:29] Yeah. You're hitting the proverbial nail on the head. I think a big part of what we are missing is vision. That has been something that was frustrating for me from our current mayor and the previous mayor as well - not communicating effectively about what this city should look like, and even not communicating what the plan is around homelessness or whatever issue that we're dealing with. As mayor of the City, I will be communicating - I will let people know what the plans are, and I also hope to really help people understand a vision for equity and racial justice in our city.  We have to realize - I drove through Ballard the other day. There's Black Lives Matter signs in so many houses all through Ballard. If you believe that Black Lives Matter, then you believe Black people deserve great housing in our city. If you believe Black Lives Matter, then you believe that that kid in the South End who has high rates of asthma and going back and forth into the emergency room all the time because of the air quality, you believe that we have to make changes and implement our climate policies. I am going to help our region - help Seattle - understand what it truly means when we grab onto these slogans. That will be my vision. That will be what I will be very clear about from the get-go and through this campaign. And so, we have to just understand, and if we really want to be a progressive city and live out these values, then we're going to have to change. Crystal Fincher: [00:14:26] You talk about that - so many people do have those signs in there. I've talked about before - allyship is a verb - and does raise the question, "Are you acting like those Black lives matter or is that just a convenient sign to have in the yard?" I do think that that value is shown through zoning. I also think that value is shown through how we keep each other safe, and protect our neighbors, and relate to each other. That certainly has to do with the conversation around policing and public safety here. You were appointed by the former mayor to the Community Police Commission. Just looking at the work that you've done there and the insight that you have - what do you think was positive - from what you did from the Community Police Commission? Where do you think we need to go, specifically policy-wise, with policing in Seattle? Colleen Echohawk: [00:15:21] Well, I love that you said the positive part of it. That's important. I want to recognize that. There are some incredibly dedicated people in the Community Police Commission - Reverend Walden. There's just a tremendous amount of people who have ensured that our police accountability that is in place right now through the consent decree - that it happened. We have certainly had rousing meetings. If you've never gone to a Community Police Commission meeting, they're lively - let's say that - because the issue is so close to home. As leader of the Chief Seattle Club, we serve the family of John T. Williams. It is very close - many of the people that I know and love walked alongside John T. Williams all the time, and they are petrified and afraid of Seattle Police Department. We have many people, and I don't know if folks recognize this - in our homeless community - sadly, we have physical and sexual assaults that happen. They will not report. They do not want to talk to Seattle Police Department and they continue to have to deal with so much trauma that we can't actually wrap our arms around because of the fear of Seattle Police Department. And so, the work there has to change. I'm also really proud of the Seattle Community Police Commission - that we stood against the 2018 contract. I personally went with members of the Commission to the mayor's office and we pleaded with her to not move forward with this contract. And now we can see, over the summer, the terrible outcome of that. I have competitors - opponents - in this race who voted for that contract. As we move forward in police accountability, we need to have a leader who is going to be courageous and take a stand. That's going to be with-- the two most important things we're going to see come out in the new mayor's office is hiring the chief of police and, of course, the contract. Both of those places will require community-led focus and work with the Community Police Commission. One of the things that has been hard as a Community Police Commissioner - is that we often are ignored by the mayor's office - time after time after time. In fact, there's now a dashboard on the Community Police Commission website that shows all the times that we've been ignored. I am committed to that commission. I'm committed to actually, having been there, increasing the power and authority of that commission. And not just the commission - I want to be working with the community as well. The commission can only represent so much. But we are committed, and you can see this in our plan on the website, to bi-monthly meetings with community around policing and making sure that we are understanding where we're headed as a city. Crystal Fincher: [00:18:48] Well, and you mentioned the two big things - they're huge - in terms of the Seattle Police Officers Guild contract, in addition to hiring a new police chief. With that contract, I mean, that dictates so much - even beyond the police chief's control. I guess the first question is, would you need the 2017 ordinance to be included in that contract? If it didn't include those elements, would you sign that contract? What are the bright lines for you when it comes to that negotiating and what you need to see from that contract - to make sure that it's going to serve the residents - all of the residents of Seattle? Colleen Echohawk: [00:19:25] I think that the crowd control issue is something that is on top of mind for our residents in Seattle. Demilitarizing the police. Those are the things, to me, that are top priorities when it comes to the contract. We cannot relent. We have to have better outcomes when we - we will have other protests. That is clear. We're going to have more protests. I am behind that. I know it can help, that it can make change. But we have to make sure that crowd control - what happened over the summer - never happens again. And so, those are two places in the contract that are going to be key for me. The other thing, and the state legislature has pushed some of this far, and hopefully we can go even further in future legislative sessions - but we have to hire a chief of police that will truly hold our police department accountable. And what I mean by that is that right now, when a chief... Which by the way, chief... That, to me- Crystal Fincher: [00:20:45] Yeah. You know what? Yep. Colleen Echohawk: [00:20:47] ... it's weird. It's weird. I think Toronto has changed that from a word that has been co-opted from the Native community. It's a very weird thing, but it is what it is. Crystal Fincher: [00:21:02] We could do a whole show. There is so much language that even just internally, in my business, that we've talked about, that is so common in business language and common language, that is just co-opted there. Colleen Echohawk: [00:21:15] It is. Crystal Fincher: [00:21:16] It really is discomforting. Colleen Echohawk: [00:21:20] It is discomforting. It's not something that is helpful in our work towards equity. But anyways, it is what it is. The chief of police will need to be holding folks accountable - that means disciplining and not being afraid of disciplining. That means when we fire someone, and then it goes to the arbitration board, and they come back and they say, "You know what? You have to keep this person in the department." Our plan says that person never goes near public. And I can tell you from personal experience about that - is that I have seen with my own eyes a Seattle police officer follow a native homeless man who is - he jaywalked in Pioneer Square. Everyone jaywalks in Pioneer Square. He's jaywalking and eventually they take him to the ground and I saw it, I put in my protest at Office of Police Accountability. They said, "No, sorry. The officer was fine. He was doing his job." But what was weird to me is that later on I had someone in our organization, another staff member say, "Hey, Colleen, look at this video." It was a YouTube video - that same exact officer and that same exact man - going at it again and taking him down to the ground again. I cannot believe that that was not intentional - that jaywalking, with the same guy, same officer. And so, when we know that an officer has been disciplined for something like that, that officer doesn't get back on the street. I'm going to hire a chief of police that will say, "You know what, I'm going to follow the direction of the mayor. We're not going to have bad cops out there on the street. We just cannot do it." That's something that is doable right now, right? Because the contract is the contract - I believe in arbitration, we've got to support our unions. But we can actually do something to keep bad cops off the street. And that's one of the key components of our plan. I feel it so deeply - I've experienced it myself and we have to do better. We have to change. Crystal Fincher: [00:23:33] So I just wanted to clarify - do you support the 2017 Police Accountability Ordinance and including that as a minimum or requirement in a new police contract? Colleen Echohawk: [00:23:46] Yeah. Absolutely, and I appreciate you saying a minimum because there are things about the 2017 accountability that we need to take further. I mentioned in our earlier conversation that I've put in my own complaints to the Office of Police Accountability, and I did not get responses that were adequate. So we need to change some of those things there. I think that the next contract - we should make it even stronger, have more accountability. Also, one thing that I really care tremendously about is that we find ways to ensure that the Community Police Commission has a stronger voice. That's something I would also be advocating for in the contract that's coming up. Crystal Fincher: [00:24:30] Well, we are also still in the middle of a pandemic. Colleen Echohawk: [00:24:32] Yeah. Crystal Fincher: [00:24:34] We can see the end, hopefully - and Seattle's doing a job that's better than most in terms of vaccination rates. Still, definitely, improvement can be made. But there's still a lot of people struggling. There's still a lot of people out of work. We saw where a lot of the haves didn't really feel much pain throughout the pandemic. But, man, the have-nots have been hurting, are hurting worse, and they're still hurting. People in Seattle, from service workers to artists, are still out of work. A lot of our small businesses are still trying to figure out a way to stay afloat, if they haven't already been forced to close. What do you see as the path forward? I guess, starting with, do you support the JumpStart Tax? Colleen Echohawk: [00:25:24] Absolutely. Yes. We have to have further revenue and we have to do better of ensuring that our communities - I come from the Native community - the Black community, the other people color communities, that we are accessing these resources that are coming out of City Hall. The Office of Economic Development - they had grants. But those grants - I'm dying to do an audit on those. I am almost sure that our small businesses who are BIPOC did not have fair access to those. I asked - I get my nails done, and I went and was talking to my friend who owns the business. She's Vietnamese, English is the second language - she's an incredible, incredible human. I said, "Well, did you get a grant?" And she said, "Nope." I said, "Did you get PPP?" "No." I think that as mayor, because I come from a place of working for some of the most vulnerable people in our community - that's my lens. Those are the people that I'm going to be thinking about and wanting to hear their voices, wanting to see their leadership, and make sure that that person out there in this nail salon and suffering through this crisis. I'm so glad that her business is up and running, but it is still - there's a lot of people who were getting their nails done who aren't back.  So that, to me, is of utmost importance. I am eager to get in there and be supporting communities of color. The other thing I'll add, just around the pandemic, is health equity. One of the things that just really pushed me into doing this, as well - is understanding how COVID impacted communities of color - understanding that as a Native woman, I was much more likely to be hospitalized If I contracted COVID, much more likely to die of COVID. That was something that was just so hard for us when we were working with our homeless community, who are Native - was we had people out there who their first language was their Native language, and there's not many people like that anymore. We had people who know the culture in a way that no one else knows because there's so few of us left. Keeping those elders alive was such a big priority for me during this pandemic. So health equity will be of utmost importance. I've been meeting regularly with Black birth workers and talking to them about what our plans could be in the mayor's office, and we'll continue to flesh out those policies. But I can tell you that health equity will be a lens for me. One of the folks that are endorsing me, that I'm very proud of, is Dr. Ben Danielson. I will be asking for his advice and mentorship through this process of what we should be doing to understand the health impact, and the long-term health impacts of COVID on our community, and especially some of our communities that were hit the hardest by it. Crystal Fincher: [00:28:53] Well, there are a few Seattleites with more credibility when it comes to health equity and just overall community health than Dr. Ben Danielson. So it would be great to know that he would be an advisor to the mayor's office. I guess, looking at that - what do we need to do, moving forward, in terms of - you talked about disparate impacts to BIPOC people in communities. Pollution - lots of times people think of climate change - in addition, pollution, are two big issues facing all of our community, but particularly the BIPOC community. How can you impact that? What plans do you have as mayor to reduce pollution and the effects of that - that are literally taking years off of the life of residents here in the City? It's very different, depending on what your zip code is. What can you tangibly achieve? Colleen Echohawk: [00:29:57] Yeah. There's a lot out there that is super exciting. We're working around food access and food sovereignty systems, working with the Muckleshoot tribe. We have Valerie Segrest who's supporting our campaign and is helping lead some of that policy. Public transportation is a big part of what we need to do in order to change our outcomes around carbon emissions. 60% of our carbon emissions right now are coming from cars. So I am a huge proponent of more transportation making Seattle truly workable. Right now it's too hard to connect to things. In 2018, my family and I were able to go to Japan. That city - man, it just - that country, Tokyo specifically, works. You can just be on public transportation. And so, we have to have vision for that. But beyond all that, there's a lot of policies out there - we're pushing out our own policies, everyone on the campaign trail right now is pushing out policies. But we've had policy after policy after policy - and every year, our carbon emissions get worse. I'm curious what 2020 will look like because of COVID. But there's a disconnect, and what we have to realize is that we need courageous leadership. We need someone who is going to say, "We are going to get there. We are going to become denser." That's the other issue - we have policy, we know what the policies are - but will we have the courage to change, is something that I am thinking about all the time. My whole career has been about making change. My whole career has been about standing up and saying, "Hold on a second. How can that be, and how can we ensure that our communities of color, our Native communities are going to thrive in these situations?" And so, I will bring that same lens to the mayor's office. It is time for us to get serious about climate change. And the other thing I'll add to that is - I'm really excited about working with our tribes who have a government-to-government relationship with the city of Seattle, which is Suquamish and Muckleshoot. I like to say that we'll know that we have turned the corner on climate change when you look at a Puget Sound and it's abundant, full of orcas - because then we know that our salmon are in clean water and they are thriving. And then we know that our kid out in the South End is breathing clean air - and it is a part of a whole system. That's where I want us to get to. That's my vision. We have to be able to make those changes, and have the vision for it, and make it happen. Crystal Fincher: [00:32:58] You mentioned that the proportion of pollution that is directly attributable to cars and vehicles - at least one of your opponents is highly in support of free transit for all. Do you also support that? Colleen Echohawk: [00:33:15] Yeah. I'm worried about the funding. But absolutely, I think that there is such - it would make the difference. I think that people would get out there and get on public transportation if it was free, but I don't know exactly how we're going to pay for that. But we do have - we have a friend in the White House, at last. And looking at those federal dollars is something that I will be aggressive about. I have a pretty good track record of raising money. My agency at Chief Seattle Club - we're raising tons and tons of money. I have gotten very good at doing that - and I will do that at the federal level, I'll do that at the local level - and get those dollars in. I'm sorry, I got a little sidetracked about raising money there because I get excited about that. But yes, free transit is a really, really great idea. But as the CEO of the City, the mayor of the City, you've got to know where the dollars are coming from, and that's the only concern. I would love to see that. And we already are doing some good things there. The ORCA LIFT program is really powerful, it's doing good things. And I think finding ways to make sure that that is more accessible to our community should be a priority of our mayor. Crystal Fincher: [00:34:39] So you wouldn't stand in the way of the policy, but finding funding for it may not be a priority of a Echohawk administration. Colleen Echohawk: [00:34:48] My first priority of an Echohawk administration is to solve the crisis of homelessness. Having 5,000-6,000 people sleeping outside - I feel like it's immoral in a city like Seattle. And so that will be my first priority. That's where any funding that we have out there - it's got to go towards that. And then, once we get that settled, we have a 14-month plan for getting folks who are living outside inside. Then I'll be looking at other priorities like free transit, because it is a beautiful idea and I would love to see that happen. Crystal Fincher: [00:35:26] So in a sea of candidates who are saying that addressing the homelessness crisis is also a priority, what will - from a voter's perspective, from a resident's perspective - how will an Echohawk administration be visibly, tangibly different than all of your competitors? Colleen Echohawk: [00:35:45] Well, I think number one is that I have a proven track record of solving homelessness. In the past seven years at Chief Seattle Club, we've housed 681 people. We're building $180 million of affordable housing. I'm the only candidate that's built affordable housing. It's also the main reason I'm jumping into this race. I am not going to be a career politician. I am jumping in this race because I am frustrated, I care about our homeless community, I care about our larger community, and I have the skills to get it done. I think that is something that truly sets me apart. No one else has ever been successful at actually housing people, and I care about them. I was taught to jump in when there is people who are hurting. I grew up with parents who literally would pick up hitchhikers off the side of the road, and then they would live in our house if they were homeless. That is where I come from. And so, that's what I'll bring to the mayor's office. Crystal Fincher: [00:36:57] I mean, and you say you don't want to be a career politician, so do you have a term limit in mind? I always wonder that when people say that. Is there a maximum term that separates you from being a politician to a career politician? Colleen Echohawk: [00:37:10] I don't know. This is hard. Everyone was like, "Colleen, campaigning is hard. Being in this world is hard," and it is. And so, I don't know how much of this I want to do. I think that if we're successful in our first year, which I think we will - in our first four years, which I think we will be. I think that the City of Seattle needs to have a two-term mayor. We haven't had one in a really, really long time, and we need some consistency. It's part of the reason that our climate policy hasn't gotten to where we want it to get. So that could be it.  But I don't have any ambitions to be a Governor or a Senator, or - I like Seattle. When I was thinking about doing this, I had an opportunity come up in DC. And I was talking about my sister who lives in DC - she's like, "Colleen, why would you do that? You love Seattle. That's your place." And I was like, "Okay." That was helpful for me. Seattle's my place. I look forward to - I have a lot of other things I want to do in my lifetime. But if I can support our community now, I really believe that you should do that.  Well, and the other thing that's exciting for me is that - to be the first woman mayor, indigenous mayor of a major city is really cool for me. I have a daughter who has the most incredible leadership skills. When she was three, she told me she wanted to be the leader who's in charge of the other leaders. I love that. I'll never forget it. I mean, she should be President of the United States someday. If she can see that her mom, a Native woman, was able to be the mayor of a major city in this country, and is willing to take on the hard parts of it - because it is hard. She's saying to me sometimes like, "Wait, you're not getting done with work until like 8:30?" or whatever. But I want her to see that Native leadership and indigenous perspective's important for our country, and I love that part of it. It's something that we need. I want my daughter to see that you can do it, and that you should do it - if you have a call for leadership and you have a call to serve the community, so that part is pretty cool. Crystal Fincher: [00:39:49] Well, thank you so much for taking the time to join us today and have this conversation, and look forward to seeing how the race unfolds. Colleen Echohawk: [00:39:56] Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. Crystal Fincher: [00:39:59] Thank you for listening to Hacks and Wonks. Our chief audio engineer at KVRU is Maurice Jones Jr. The producer of Hacks and Wonks is Lisl Stadler. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii, spelled F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I, and now you can follow Hacks and Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Just type in "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. You can also get a full text transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced during the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in. Talk to you next time.

Another week, another shot at making sense of what life is like now with KUOW's Adwoa Gyimah-Brempong and Seattle Times reporter Sydney Brownstone.Support the show by making a gift to KUOW: bit.ly/seattlenow

Journalism has played a prominent role in the #MeToo era. Since the revelation in the New York Times of the accusations of sexual assault against movie producer Harvey Weinstein, more and more survivors have spoken out publicly about their experiences. And many of those have turned to reporters with their stories. For this episode of Crosscut Talks, we invited three journalists who have investigated some of those allegations to discuss the challenges of that reporting, the responses to it, and the impact that the #MeToo movement has had on their work and our culture at large. Featuring the Washington Post's Emma Brown; Sydney Brownstone of the Seattle Times and, previously, KUOW; and Rachel La Corte from the Associated Press. This conversation was recorded on May 4, 2019 at Seattle University as part of the Crosscut Festival.

Our correspondent Sarah Szczypinski talks with educator and mentor Esther Wojcicki about her strategies for raising successful people (3:06). Chief Correspondent Steve Scher sits down with Neal Stephenson to discuss his new book Fall; or, Dodge in Hell, exploring digital afterlives in the far future (12:18). Host Jini Palmer shares a segment from our event with Rachel Louise Snyder and Sydney Brownstone discussing the epidemic of domestic violence (19:41). Get an insider's look and stay in the know about what's going on in this moment at Town Hall.

Our correspondent Sarah Szczypinski talks with educator and mentor Esther Wojcicki about her strategies for raising successful people (3:06). Chief Correspondent Steve Scher sits down with Neal Stephenson to discuss his new book Fall; or, Dodge in Hell, exploring digital afterlives in the far future (12:18). Host Jini Palmer shares a segment from our event with Rachel Louise Snyder and Sydney Brownstone discussing the epidemic of domestic violence (19:41). Get an insider's look and stay in the know about what's going on in this moment at Town Hall.

Whether we call it domestic abuse, private violence, or even intimate terrorism in America domestic violence accounts for 15 percent of all violent crime. The World Health Organization deemed it a “global epidemic,” and yet too often it remains locked in silence, even as its tendrils reach unseen into so many of our most pressing national issues. Acclaimed journalist Rachel Louise Snyder took the stage to deliver a reckoning with this urgent and widespread problem with insight from her powerful new book No Visible Bruises. She was joined onstage by KUOW’s Sydney Brownstone, and together these two journalists reveal the scale of domestic violence in our country. They framed key stories that demolish common myths—if things were bad enough, victims would just leave; a violent person cannot become nonviolent; shelter is an adequate response; and the insidious notion that violence inside the home is a private matter. Through the stories of victims, perpetrators, law enforcement, and reform movements from across the country, Snyder and Brownstone took us on a sobering exploration of the real roots of private violence, its far-reaching consequences for society, and what it will take to truly address it. Rachel Louise Snyder’s work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post,the New Republic, and elsewhere. Her books include Fugitive Denim: A Moving Story of People and Pants in the Borderless World of Global Trade, and the novel What We’ve Lost is Nothing. She has been the recipient of an Overseas Press Award for her work on This American Life. Sydney Brownstone is the online editor for KUOW, and a contributor to The Stranger, Fast Company, Mother Jones, and Village Voice. Brownstone’s writing covers topics of general news, the environment, and sexual assault, and in 2017 her coverage of the Seattle porn scammer Matt Hickey was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Recorded live at The Forum at Town Hall Seattle on May 21, 2019.

Greg, Brian, and Colin discuss Mayor Durkan's turn towards Safe Seattle and broken windows policing with her unilateral deployment of "emphasis" patrols in seven neighborhoods, and we delve into the decline of the Stranger in light of Sydney Brownstone's revelation at Crosscut Fest w/r/t reporting on Dave Meinert, and the recent "coverage" from Katie Herzog on the Mike Rosenberg saga.

Guest host C.R. Douglas reviews the week’s news with KUOW online editor Sydney Brownstone, Podcast Editor for American Public Media, and former NPR Northwest Bureau Chief Phyllis Fletcher and Seattle Channel Civic Cocktail's Joni Balter.

Bill Radke reviews the week’s news with KUOW’s web editor Sydney Brownstone, co-chair of the Washington Independents Chris Vance and Crosscut’s politics reporter Melissa Santos.

Bill Radke reviews the week’s news with KUOW’s web editor Sydney Brownstone, The C is for Crank writer Erica Barnett and host of Civic Cocktail on the Seattle Channel Joni Balter.

C.R. Douglas reviews the week’s news with KUOW’s online editor Sydney Brownstone, KIRO 7 government and politics reporter Essex Porter and Seattle Channel’s Civic Cocktail host Joni Balter.

Town Hall is excited to invite you to a live taping of Trust Issues, a podcast about facts gone wrong. Each week, journalists Sydney Brownstone and Heidi Groover dive into conspiracy theories run amok, fake news stories, shady health claims, or chain emails sent by our grandparents. They took us down the rabbit hole to find the strange ideas we construct, and try to understand why people believe they’re true. Sydney and Heidi are reporters at The Stranger, where they cover city politics, the environment, labor, housing, and other topics. Heidi previously worked at The Inlander in Spokane and Willamette Week in Portland. Sydney moved to Seattle from New York, where she wrote for the Village Voice and Fast Company. Recorded live at Washington Hall by Town Hall Seattle on Friday, April 20, 2018. 

Gyasi and the gang are joined by a Sydney Brownstone, a reporter from Seattle's alternative weekly paper The Stranger. This week they're taking on news, fake news, Republicans & drugs & underage boys, plus a few other tidbits.

Episode 5: Seattle Indivisible's Aaron Brethorst & Iga Koslowska; The Stranger's Sydney Brownstone by Stephan Cox

Wesley Roach and Sydney Brownstone hold down the dopest Native podcast on the interwebs while Gyasi is out at Standing Rock holding it down for the cause.

Kate Raphael talks to journalist with Sydney Brownstone about the case against feminist Punk Band, Pussy Riot. Then Eryn Mathewson speaks with author and Media Advisor, Joan Ryan about her book, Little Girls in Pretty Boxes: The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnastics and the current state of elite women's athletics. The post Women's Magazine – August 13, 2012 appeared first on KPFA.