In May I wrote about a pimp turf war that had taken over a specific neighborhood in Seattle. In just two years more than 95 shootings have taken place near Aurora Avenue in North Seattle, a hot spot for prostitutes. Residents have called on the city to do something about the prostitution and the violence but nothing has been done. This summer, some residents set up steel barriers in the street to limit the ability of the customers to cruise the streets that radiate away from Aurora Avenue.
The barriers are intended to stop gunmen from speeding through side streets during shootings connected to turf disputes among people involved in prostitution and human trafficking activity along Aurora. The rationale is spelled out on a sign posted on one of the barriers on N 97th Street.
Over the weekend, another round of violence erupted near Aurora Avenue N and N 98th Street, where Seattle police said officers recovered roughly 40 shell casings after a shootout. Surveillance footage captured about 15 seconds of sustained gunfire as groups fired from behind vehicles across the street.
The city’s response, both from the mayor and the city attorney who handles misdemeanors like prostitution, has been to do almost nothing.
Prostitution is a misdemeanor. That falls squarely under the Seattle City Attorney’s Office. It is not a felony. It is not a King County problem. It is Erika Evans’s job.
She is not doing it.
Evans campaigned on not enforcing the city’s Stay Out of Areas of Prostitution (SOAP) zones. She called them ineffective. She called them racist. She promised she would not file charges. She has kept that promise.
But this week most of Seattle’s biggest businesses signed a letter demanding that the city do more about public safety. The letter was sent to socialist Mayor Katie Wilson and to the members of the City Council.
In a sharply worded letter Thursday, 38 leaders, including Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith, Starbucks Chairman and CEO Brian Niccol, Costco CEO Ron Vachris, Nordstrom co-CEO Erik Nordstrom, Seattle Mariners CEO John Stanton and Alaska Air Group CEO Ben Minicucci, said voters want more urgent and measurable action from Seattle leadership.
“The clearest message” from an August poll of Seattle voters, the coalition wrote, is that residents expect the city “to act with urgency, fund the actions needed to improve safety, and provide a clear plan for measuring progress.”
The letter is addressed to Wilson, City Council President Joy Hollingsworth, Councilmember Bob Kettle, and the rest of the council.
The Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, Challenge Seattle, and the Washington Roundtable took leadership over the letter.
The letter includes a long list of public safety demands.
Among the business groups’ immediate requests is activating CCTV cameras in Pioneer Square, the Stadium District and other areas that host large events.
They also want the city to produce a public safety action plan within 100 days, including measurable goals and monthly progress reports…
The groups want the plan to include regular foot and bicycle police patrols in areas with persistent public safety problems, including Little Saigon. The letter cites 90% support for that proposal.
It also calls for recommitting to a seven-minute response standard for priority 911 calls and publicly reporting when the standard is not met…
Other proposals include directing city diversion specialists to offer treatment and shelter to people using illegal drugs before pursuing arrest and prosecution against those who repeatedly refuse help; establishing a policy for shutting down open-air drug markets; and banning camping within 250 feet of parks, playgrounds and schools while requiring encampments in those areas to be cleared within 72 hours. The letter cites support ranging from 79% to 82% for those proposals.
Simply put, business leaders want more law and order and less public disorder and homelessness. There was another murder in a park just this morning.
Seattle police are investigating after a 67-year-old man died following a fight with another man at Westlake Park Thursday morning.
Police were called to the downtown Seattle park around 6:45 a.m. after a passerby reported seeing two men fighting and hearing one of them scream for help.
Before officers arrived, the witness told 911 that one of the men had stopped moving.
Police are treating it as a murder and apparently have video of the attack, but none of the stories about it suggest a motive or indicate if one or both of the men were homeless. My guess is that they were but we’ll have to wait and see.
If Seattle wanted safer streets they may have elected the wrong mayor for the job. But it’s good to see the big businesses in Seattle, even the ones with a liberal reputation, doing what they can to make sure the message doesn’t get ignored.
Editor’s Note: The American people overwhelmingly support President Trump’s law and order agenda.
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