As we (and everybody else) reported this morning, Mayor Mike McGinn just appointed interim police chief John Diaz as permanent chief, ending months of speculation about his plans for the position.
Some, including local blogs and city attorney Pete Holmes, have criticized Diaz for his leadership during two recent, high-profile incidents involving use of force.
Holmes explicitly called out the police department for a “void of leadership at the top”—a thinly veiled criticism of Diaz, who has been interim chief since last March. Diaz responded by telling the Seattle Times that he “vehemently disagreed” with Holmes, and the head of the police officers’ union called Holmes’ statements “highly inappropriate.”
Today, however, Holmes gave a far more measured response to McGinn’s announcement, congratulating Diaz on his appointment and vowing “to work tirelessly with him to increase the safety of everyone in Seattle while safeguarding our cherished liberties.”
Holmes’ calm statement was appropriate. And criticism of McGinn’s choice now—a choice made, incidentally, between three candidates who were selected by a panel of 26 community leaders, and headed by Downtown Seattle Association director Kate Joncas—seems premature.
If McGinn had reopened the search process, as some suggested he do, the void in leadership at SPD would have continued even longer—it took the search committee more than six months to reach a recommendation—and it’s far from clear that an even longer search would have dredged up a new crop of superior candidates.
If he had appointed East Palo Alto police chief and national racial-profiling expert Ron Davis, clearly his ideological preference, he would have risked failing to win confirmation by the city council. And Davis, who heads up a department with just 39 sworn officers, would have been ill prepared to manage the SPD’s 1,338.
Amid all the debate over whether Diaz, Davis, or someone entirely different McGinn should have appointed chief—a debate McGinn drew out longer than was probably necessary, even upping the drama by sending out a maddeningly vague press release that didn’t say what this morning’s announcement would be about—the real story has been lost.
That story is: The most qualified candidate for the job, Sacramento police chief Rick Braziel, dropped out of the running, saying the job didn’t seem like “the right fit” (a poor reflection on Seattle’s political climate, by which Braziel was reportedly alarmed). That decision left McGinn with a choice between Chief Underqualified and Chief Good Enough. Under the circumstances, he made the best pick he could.
