City Council, Drugs, Elections, homelessness

John Wilson Drops Out of Race He was On Track to Lose, We Heart Seattle Lashes Out Against Harm Reduction

1. King County Assessor John Arthur Wilson, who was arrested last week outside his former partner Lee Keller’s home for allegedly stalking and harassing her, ended his campaign for King County Executive yesterday, announcing the decision on Facebook.

Every single member of the King County Council, including the two frontrunners in the county executive race, Girmay Zahilay and Claudia Balducci, has called on Wilson to not just drop out of the race but to step down from his current elected position, which he will hold until next year unless there’s a successful recall campaign.

In his Facebook post, Wilson said he was dropping out because “personal matters have drawn attention away from critical issues” in the campaign. “I’m grateful for the support I’ve received and look forward to continuing to serve the residents of King County in my role as Assessor.”

Wilson, who was running as a law-and-order candidate, wasn’t likely to beat either of his better-known and better-funded opponents in the primary, so dropping out of the race with just a few weeks left was a largely symbolic act.

Wilson has been prolific on Facebook both before and after his arrest, posting subtle digs at Keller and writing darkly about enemies who are purportedly trying to take him down. In June, Wilson posted a photo he took with Keller during a brief reconciliation in May. “Shown recently to a member of the news media, the reporter said Ms. Keller looked happy and not at all afraid” in the photo, Wilson wrote. “As you can see from the photograph, Ms. Keller took the picture at 3:15 PM that afternoon.”

Keller has a protection order against Wilson barring him from contacting or coming within 1,000 feet of her. Earlier this week, the Snohomish County Prosecutor declined to immediately file criminal charges against him; a civil case, in which Wilson is seeking the termination of Keller’s protection order, is still moving forward.

2. During a council committee meeting to discuss a proposal from Council President Sara Nelson that would dedicate up to 25 percent of a forthcoming public safety sales tax to addiction treatment, We Heart Seattle founder Andrea Suarez showed up for public comment armed with what she described as “methamphetamine pipes and foil that are handed out” to drug users in Belltown, along with a rubber strip she described as a tourniquet for drug injection. “We have to stop handing out tourniquets and pipes and foil and cookers,” Suarez said.

Handing out safer smoking supplies is a form of harm reduction for drug users, who might otherwise use pipes contaminated with infectious fluids or unknown drugs or sustain burns from thin grocery store aluminum foil, among other risks. Opponents of these measures, like Suarez, say they enable people to keep using drugs.

Suarez, who stood behind Nelson at the press launch for her proposal last week, lashed out at two of the organizations that were about to discuss their work and take questions from the committee. We Heart Seattle is an anti-harm reduction advocacy group that “cleans up” occupied homeless encampments and directs people to abstinence-based treatment programs, including a high-barrier program in Oregon that kicks people out if they relapse.

Zeroing in on Purpose Dignity Action (co-directed by Lisa Daugaard) and the Downtown Emergency Service Center (headed up by Daniel Malone), Suarez said, “I ask my colleagues to stop [distributing smoking supplies] within your low-barrier housing. It’s not working, and I don’t hate the player. I hate the game. I hate that you have a fentanyl smoking shack in the back of your hotel, Lisa.” (The PDA has what amounts to a safe smoking site outside one of its residential buildings). “I respect you, the person, the colleague, but I can’t get behind that.”

“I toured the Canady House at DESC—the carpets are pitch black, rats, rodents, bugs,” Suarez claimed. The Canady House is a 15-year-old permanent supportive housing building that has been the target of regular outrage from right-wing personalities and activist groups like the Discovery Institute.

Daugaard won a MacArthur “genius” grant in 2019 for creating the successful LEAD diversion program, which has been replicated all over the US. DESC provides housing, shelter, and health care to homeless Seattle residents with complex physical and behavioral health care needs that make them effectively ineligible for other types of housing; they’ve won numerous national awards over their many years in Seattle, including several for their low-barrier “wet” housing on Eastlake.

During the presentation, Daugaard brought up the fact that the legislation says “up to” 25 percent of the proposed 0.1-cent sales tax increase could go to treatment. If the legislation was tweaked to say “at least,” Daugaard said, that would set a floor, rather than a ceiling. Nelson later said she heard a similar idea on a recent episode Seattle Nice, where both Sandeep and I agreed that it would be great to see 100 percent of the public safety sales tax go to behavioral health care.

City Council, Elections

Former Councilmember Juarez Applies as “Caretaker” for Vacant Council Seat, Along with 21 Other Applicants

By Erica C. Barnett

Former City Councilmember Debora Juarez has submitted her application and resume for the open District 5 City Council position that was just vacated by Cathy Moore, who quit after just a year and a half on the council. Juarez reportedly already has the support of a strong majority (perhaps as many as eight) council members for the appointment, making her selection effectively a fait accompli.

Juarez—the first Indigenous Seattle City Councilmember—served two terms on the council, including one as council president, and was replaced by Moore in 2024. During her second term, Juarez repeatedly expressed frustration at the tenor of council meetings (frequently dominated by then-councilmember Kshama Sawant’s supporters) and the 2020 protests (which included repeated demonstrations outside her home).

No one has protested outside council members’ homes in several years, but Sawant and her supporters recently started showing up again at council meetings, shouting and marching around council chambers to protest legislation like a proposal to lower conflict of interest standards for council members.

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The city clerk just published the entire list of applicants for the appointment on the council vacancy website, which has been in heavy use over the past year and a half with the departures of Teresa Mosqueda, Tammy Morales, and now Moore, at the end of the day today.

In her cover letter, Juarez wrote:

“The question I am sure many are asking is, ‘why return?’. It’s simple: I was called to serve. I understand the challenges our city currently faces—from housing affordability to public safety to protecting residents from the harms of the Trump Administration and federal funding cuts. I am ready to step in immediately and work alongside my fellow Councilmembers to ensure that our city remains a vibrant, welcoming, and innovative place for all residents. I would be honored to bring my “Elder Auntie” experience, wisdom gained with no regrets, and vision to this important role once again, this time as a caretaker of the seat until a new Councilmember can be elected.”

The list of candidates for the position, which were just posted on the City Clerk’s website Friday morning, include three people who ran for District 5 in 2023: Nilu Jenks, Shane MacComber, and Justin Simmons.

The council will narrow down the list of candidates to a set of “frontrunners” over the next week. They’ll discuss the appointment and hear from candidates at meetings on July 17 and July 22; a public forum, which will reportedly be held at North Seattle Community College (although the city’s website still says “TBD”), will be held on Monday, July 21.

Under the city charter, the council has 20 days after the day a council member leaves office to appoint someone to fill that position. Because Moore’s resignation took effect on July 8, the council will take a vote on July 28.

Because Moore announced her resignation after the filing deadline for this year’s local elections, voters won’t be able to choose her replacement until 2026, the next general election. As a result, District 5 will be represented by someone people in the district did not elect for about 16 months, until Moore’s permanent replacement takes office in November 2026.

City Council, Courts, Elections, King County, Trump

Poll Tests Message that Katie Wilson is “Angry,” “Divisive,” and “Loud”; No Charges Yet for County Assessor Accused of Stalking
Screenshot from poll testing messages against mayoral candidate Katie Wilson.

And: Three City Councilmembers declined to sign on to an anti-Trump letter; guess which ones!

1. Two online polls that went out to voters via text this week tested messages for Mayor Bruce Harrell and against Transit Riders Union leader Katie Wilson, who’s challenging Harrell. While one of the polls included some messaging against another Harrell challenger, Joe Mallahan, the two surveys focused on anti-Wilson messaging. (Pollsters use messaging polls to see what kind of talking points voters find persuasive.)

Survey takers were asked to respond to each negative message by indicating whether it made them more or less likely to vote for Wilson, and how much each message moved voters away from Wilson. (The poll also included a handful of pro- and anti-Harrell messages).

The questions generally portrayed Wilson as an “angry and divisive,” Kshama Sawant-aligned socialist who wants to disband the Seattle Police Department and tax businesses and residents out of the city.

“Katie Wilson will raise taxes on working families and small businesses,” one test message said. “We can’t afford a self-described socialist who plans to raise taxes even higher when so many working families are struggling to make ends meet in our city.

“Katie Wilson is an advocate for the ‘defund the police’ movement that is out of touch with what our city needs,” another survey question said. “We can’t afford a mayor who thinks policing is unnecessary.”

One question asked respondents to weigh in on messaging about Wilson “supporting former city councilmember Khama [sic] Sawant” and “the politics of shouting, accusing, and undermining fellow Democrats.” Another message claimed Wilson is “more interested in being the loudest voice in the room and less interested in bringing Seattle together and actually solving our problems.”

If Harrell (or his independent expenditure campaign) decides to paint as Wilson loud, angry, and divisive, that will be news to anyone who’s ever met her. A soft-spoken, thoughtful policy nerd, Wilson’s chief political flaw is that she prefers long policy explanations to easy soundbites and is incapable of adopting the glad-handing, style-over-substance approach of lifelong politicians like Harrell.

2. The Snohomish County Prosecutor’s Office has declined so far to file charges against King County Assessor John Arthur Wilson, who was arrested last week for stalking and violating a protection order obtained by his ex-partner Lee Keller. The prosecutor is still weighing the evidence and could file charges in the future.

Wilson is running for King County Executive. The King County Prosecutor’s Office handed the case over to Snohomish County to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest.

Keller went to King County District Court on Monday seeking an extension of a restraining order from May that prevents Wilson from contacting or coming within 1,000 feet of Keller. According to Keller, Wilson has repeatedly violated the restraining order by texting Keller and showing up at her house, church, and events where she is present.

However, a court commissioner denied that request and granted a 90-day continuance on the case, which leaves the restraining order in place for at least 90 days but offers no guarantee that Keller will remain protected after the court takes up the restraining order again.

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The Snohomish County prosecutor has not given any timeline for considering additional evidence, and can decline to press any charges against Wilson if they choose. Wilson was arrested when he returned to Keller’s home after showing up there earlier in the evening last Wednesday night; he stayed overnight in jail but was released the next day after paying bond on $50,000 bail.

3.  On Tuesday, City Councilmembers Sara Nelson, Maritza Rivera, and Bob Kettle declined to sign a letter denouncing the Trump budget, which will take health care, cash assistance, and food benefits away from millions of Americans while giving massive tax breaks to the rich and spiking the federal budget deficit to unprecedented levels. So far, the letter has been signed by 80 elected officials from across the Puget Sound region.

The letter, which progressive Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck distributed and sent to local media last week, also calls out “austerity measures” advanced by Governor Bob Ferguson and imposed by state legislators earlier this year. It calls on state and local leaders to “develop meaningful solutions to protect residents,” including progressive revenue measures like the “Seattle Shield” business and occupation tax increase Rinck and Harrell proposed last month.

Kettle said that as someone who has spoken about the need to preserve and de-politicize federal disaster relief, “I appreciate the intent of this,” but said he is “not one to sign on letters like this… just as a matter of fact of how I do business.”

Rivera echoed Kettle, saying that while “I agree with the spirit of the letter,” she was also choosing not to sign it. “I wanted to, for the record, state that I do not agree with this federal administration… it is just gross and disgusting,” Rivera said.

Nelson gave the most detailed explanation for her decision not to sign on to the letter: “I feel uncomfortable calling out the governor when he signed legislation that came from, obviously, the legislature,” she said. Nelson also said she wasn’t sure about putting the city of Seattle seal on the letter (alongside those of a dozen other cities) or about encouraging other governments to enact progressive revenue like the Seattle Shield proposal, which Nelson has raised skeptical questions about.

Like Kettle and Rivera, Nelson took pains to say that she doesn’t support the Trump budget either. “I’m not going to sign the letter, but I do want to express that I share in the spirit and the thoughts that are that I believe are motivating the expression of this outrage,” Nelson said.

Police

In First Four Months, Seattle’s New Police Chief Spent Most Weekends Out of Town

By Erica C. Barnett

Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes, selected to lead SPD by Mayor Bruce Harrell earlier this year, has spent most of his weekends out of town since taking the $360,485-a-year job earlier this year, according to his schedule, social media posts, and sources familiar with his travel.

Between February 1 and June 20, the last date for which PubliCola obtained Barnes’ schedule, Barnes’ schedule is blocked out almost every Friday afternoon, either completely or starting in the early or midafternoon. Usually, this is represented by a blank space after 3 or 4pm; on a few occasions, the afternoon is marked as “admin block” or “travel.”

This is in contrast to Barnes’ schedule on other weekdays, which is generally fully booked during regular work hours.

For example, his schedule for a typical Monday in March includes meetings with the head of the state Criminal Justice Training Commission, Fire Chief Harold Scoggins, Washington State Patrol Chief John Batiste, and Office of Police Accountability Interim Director Bonnie Glenn, along with a briefing on the city’s new 911 AI technology and a ridealong with the city’s Downtown Activation Team. From Tuesday through Thursday, Barnes’ official schedule is similarly busy.

On Friday of that week, Barnes’ schedule looks like this:

 

Barnes’ schedule, combined with his social media posts, either confirms or suggests (by the absence of scheduled events on Fridays) that he was out of town 13 of 18 weekends between February and May. Barnes’ absence from Seattle is documented in his public schedule or on his public social media posts, or both, for nine of those 13 weekends.

Police chiefs are generally expected to be on call for incidents that happen outside regular working hours, including on weekends. Historically, police chiefs have often showed up on site at events that involve a major police response, such as mass shootings and protests that result in clashes and arrests, among other types of high-profile events.

However, Barnes has been out of town for a number of such incidents, including a recent anti-trans rally in Cal Anderson Park that led to the arrests of 23 counterprotesters. At the time, SPD told PubliCola it was “unrealistic to expect that any individual in the police department can be available around the clock for unexpected emergencies.”

We sent a list of detailed questions about Barnes’ schedule to SPD earlier this week. We wanted to confirm the specific dates when Barnes has been out of town, along with other details, and to find out what contingencies SPD has put in place, if any, for the times when Barnes is not in Seattle.

Barbara DeLollis, Barnes’ new chief communications officer, responded:

Here you go.

“Since taking the helm of Seattle’s police department in February, Chief Barnes has been tirelessly working to protect the Seattle community. So far this year, crime is down 9 percent compared to the same time last year and SPD has hired 94 officers,” said Alex Ricketts, SPD’s Chief of Staff. “The Seattle City Council’s 9-0 unanimous confirmation of Barnes last week as Chief of Police underscores his commitment to making the department a model for policing excellence by prioritizing transparency, collaboration, and accountability.”

Thanks for your interest in SPD.

When we wrote back to again ask for responses to our questions, noting that the police chief’s availability in Seattle is a matter of public interest, DeLollis responded, “The statement you have addresses your questions.

Barnes’ schedule isn’t always completely blank on weekends. In some cases, it shows that he was attending a conference, delivering a keynote speech, or attending a personal or family event (Barnes’ family lives in Chicago). For instance, from April 4 to 6, Barnes was attending a gathering of his college fraternity, Kappa Alpha Psi, in Greenville, North Carolina, where he delivered the keynote address. A schedule note in May indicates he attended a graduation ceremony for one of his children out of town. And on the weekend of May 30, which is blank, a social media post by Barnes shows that he was attending a Freemason meeting in Philadelphia where he was inducted as a 33rd degree Mason.

On other occasions, Barnes was busy attending conferences, often as a panelist or keynote speaker.

From Thursday, February 27 through Monday, March 2, Barnes attended the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives CEO Symposium in Glendale, AZ, where he was part of a panel called “Law Enforcement CEO Roundtable: From Chaos to Control: Best Practices in Critical Incident Response.”

Between Sunday, March 23 and Sunday, March 30, Barnes’ schedule shows he was at a conference in Kingston, Jamaica held by the Police Civilian Oversight Authority, where he delivered a keynote speech on March 26. (Barnes’ schedule is blank beginning on March 21, a Friday.) The schedule notes that the event was a “prior commitment.”

And from Thursday, April 24 through Monday, April 27, Barnes was at a public safety summit held by Leadership for a Networked World at Harvard, where he was the keynote speaker. According to its website, the group “creates transformational thought leadership and learning experiences for executives building the future of outcomes and value”; it’s headed by Antonio Oftelie, the federal monitor for the consent decree between the US Department of Justice and SPD.

PubliCola’s unanswered questions to SPD included how much, if anything, Barnes was paid for delivering keynote speeches at events like the conference he attended in Jamaica.

Between March 3 and March 13, Barnes was attending the lateral police academy, a condensed training for police transferring from other agencies.

Barnes, who is being sworn in Wednesday afternoon, has brought on at least five new high-level staff, including DeLollis, Ricketts, and a second deputy police chief, Alan Sayles. (Former interim chief Sue Rahr appointed Lieutenant Yvonne Underwood to deputy chief last year.) According to publicly available data, DeLollis and Ricketts each make $221,562 annually; new assistant chief Nicole Powell makes $294,757, and both new Executive Director of Crime and Community Harm Reduction Lee Hunt and Sayles make $302,016.

City Council, Mayor Harrell, Police

Council Advances Bills Expanding Power to Prosecute and Fine Graffiti Taggers, “Nuisance” Properties

A Rob Saka amendment expands the violations for which police can crack down on property owners, to include violations of a King County law regulating septic tanks and county animal control rules.

By Erica C. Barnett

The Seattle City Council’s public safety committee, headed up by Bob Kettle, advanced two bills their advocates argued are critical to public safety in Seattle on Tuesday.

The first would further criminalize graffiti, which is already illegal and subject to significant fines, by giving the city attorney (currently Republican Ann Davison) the power to bring a civil action against graffiti taggers and fine them up to $1,500 per violation, meaning that a prolific tagger could owe tens of thousands of dollars to the city.

The second will make it easier for the city to bring abatement actions against property owners, up to and including shutting down a business or tearing down a residential property, by expanding the list of offenses that count toward a “chronic nuisance property” determination and making property owners legally liable for things that happen outside their property, such as drug use, prostitution, or—under new amendments added in committee—littering, violating county health regulations, or noise violations.

The council has been discussing how to deal with graffiti, which they argue elected officials are more than capable of distinguishing from “art,” for years. It’s an obsession shared by Mayor Bruce Harrell and Davison, whose presentation on the proposal last month focused on the fact that graffiti artists show off their work on social media (see screenshot above).

Graffiti, Nelson said Tuesday, is “probably the single most common complaint I get from my constituents as a citywide council member, and so I am in strong support of any legislation that will make it easier to make people accountable for their actions.”

Kettle and committee vice-chair Rob Saka both supported raising the fine per tag from $1,000, the amount Davison originally proposed, to $1,500, on the grounds that—as Saka put it—most prolific taggers are “well-heeled.” Kettle piled on, adding that the people who throw up graffiti “used to be the younger white males, teenagers, 20s, but they’ve grown up to be 20, 30, sometimes even 40, and, as noted, with careers of their own.”

It’s unclear where Kettle and Saka got the idea that taggers are mostly older adult men with well-paying jobs. During her presentation last month, Davison presented some data about graffiti referrals to the City Attorney’s office showing that over the last five years, 85 percent of the 200-plus people referred to her office for graffiti violations were male, and 79 percent were white.

The evidence that these men are well-to-do appears to have come from the fact that a majority of the 17 people prosecuted in county court for graffiti last year hired their own attorneys (as opposed to using a public defender because they were indigent) and paid any court-ordered fines.

As a point of comparison, the fine for animal cruelty in Seattle is $500.

The original bill would have allowed the city to go after people who “encouraged” taggers by, for example, praising their posts on social media. During a presentation to the committee last month, Davison repeatedly denounced people who “promote themselves on social media,” showing slides with Instagram posts to demonstrate that, “sadly they have people that are encouraging them.”

An amendment from Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth stripped out the language about “encouraging” graffiti, which Hollingsworth pointed out could raise First Amendment concerns. Hollingsworth did vote for the underlying bill, however, agreeing with the rest of the committee that the threat of large fines could serve as a deterrent to prevent people from tagging small businesses and churches.

Hollingsworth agreed with comments from Nelson, Saka, and Kettle about the supposedly clear differences between “art” and graffiti (Kettle noted that he likes the sanctioned “Henry” cartoon murals all over town), saying, “I am a big fan of art and the and graffiti in places that it’s supposed to be at, where it’s invited” by property owners.

After moving the anti-graffiti bill forward, the committee turned to legislation to dramatically expand the list of offenses that will allow police and prosecutors to declare a business or residence a “chronic nuisance,” a designation that allows the city to take action against a property owner such as shutting a business down.

The legislation, proposed by Mayor Harrell, already proposed making property owners liable for violations that happen “in proximity to” a business or residence, if police can establish a “nexus” between whoever commits the violation and the property, such as a patron who leaves a club and uses drugs outside. If a property has three or more nuisancely  violations within 60 days, or seven within a year, police can take action against the property owner, including by revoking their business license.

Saka proposed two amendments to expand the penalties and scope of the already-expanded nuisance law. The first, much like his amendment increasing the fine for graffiti, boosts fines for nuisance violations by 50 percent, so that violators can be fined $750 per day (up from $500) and up to $37,500 for failing to cooperate with police attempts to abate the nuisance (up from $25,000). These 50 percent increases, Saka said, were necessary to keep up with “inflation” since the original nuisance bill was adopted in 2009.

An second Saka amendment added several items to the list of serious offenses that could give police an opening to shut down a business or fine a residential building owner for activities on or near their property. The new reasons for abatement include selling, buying, or possessing stolen property; illegal dumping; noise violations; and a number of King County Health Code violations that the Seattle police are not in charge of enforcing.

These King County laws including provisions on illegal dumping,  rodent control, sewage, and hazardous waste contamination. (Note: This sentence originally referred to the wrong section of the King County Code, linking a section on animal control instead of the section of the health code pertaining to hazardous waste. PubliCola regrets the error.)

The section of Saka’s amendment about sewage violations is even more confusing (so much so that Nelson told Saka she didn’t know what that part of his amendment was even about); the section of code it refers to, “On-Site Sewage,” is almost exclusively about on-site sewage systems, also known as septic tanks, which don’t generally exist in Seattle

 

Addiction, podcasts, Police

Seattle Nice: Sara Nelson Proposes Funding Treatment With New Public Safety Sales Tax

By Erica C. Barnett

On this week’s podcast, Sandeep and I discussed Council President Sara Nelson’s “Pathways to Recovery” resolution, which—if passed—will commit up to 25 percent of a planned local sales tax increase to addiction treatment services.

Flanked by treatment providers and business representatives, along with more politically outré groups like The More We Love and We Heart Seattle, Nelson announced the proposal last week. At a press conference in Pioneer Square, the council president—who’s up for reelection this year—said she was committed to funding treatment of all kinds with the 0.1 percent tax increase, which is expected to raise more than $35 million a year.

The state legislature gave cities and counties the authority to pass the sales tax for public safety earlier this year.

We took a close look at what the council president is proposing to fund and the backroom politics swirling around the proposal (including Mayor Bruce Harrell’s tepid response). And we discussed at how this proposed new public spending fits into the city’s overall budget picture and priorities.

The public safety funding doesn’t have to go to police, and it does not include any rules against “supplantation,” meaning that the city could use it to fund existing public safety programs and free up that money for other services. King County is considering its own 0.1-cent sales tax increase that could theoretically free up county funding for human-services programs most at risk from local funding shortfalls and federal funding cuts.

Sandeep and I agreed that if the city is going to increase the sales tax—a regressive tax that falls hardest on the poorest Seattle residents—it should all go to expanding treatment options, not more funding for cops.

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However, given city officials’ current fervor for hiring more police, it seems likely that any plan Harrell proposes for the tax will include new funding for SPD, even if Harrell agrees to some amount of treatment funding. There’s also the question of what kind of treatment will get funded with the potential windfall. The presence of many evidence-based treatment providers and referral agencies—including Evergreen Treatment Services, the Downtown Emergency Service Center, and Purpose, Dignity, Action—offered some reassurance that Nelson’s plan will help people with addiction, rather than funneling more city dollars to high-barrier programs.

We also debated whether the city’s projected $250 million revenue shortfall really represents a budget shortfall of that size. Sandeep argued that the city has tons of money left over at the end of every year, while I cautioned that declining revenues (from sources like the JumpStart payroll tax and taxes on real-estate sales) represent a real problem regardless of whether city departments could, and should, spend their budgets more effectively.

The mayor and city council will likely take up the sales tax proposal as part of their budget discussions this coming fall.