Tag: Shon Barnes

City Council, Mayor Wilson, Police, public safety

Police Chief Says No Plan to Slow Hiring Amid Budget Crunch; City Attorney Says “SOAP Orders Don’t Work” at Aurora Ave. Safety Event
Seattle City Attorney Erika Evans

1. Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes, responding to a question from PubliCola, said the police department does not plan to slow down hiring, despite a city council presentation this week that concluded, “SPD may need to slow hiring to live within its budget” because the speed at which it’s hiring new officers is outpacing the department’s spending capacity.

“I have not been notified that the police department will slow down on our current hiring plan for this year. We’re moving forward,” Barnes said. “I think we all share [the belief] that we need more police officers, but we also understand the constraints of a budget, and until I hear anything differently, we’re going to continue moving forward.”

A planned briefing of the council’s public safety committee, which was postponed due to time constraints earlier this week, found that SPD hiring will outpace the department’s budget by a projected $1.7 million this year. Recruitment has been up ever since a new police contract raised starting salaries, after training, to $126,000 last year, and the number of highly paid late-career officers leaving the department has declined. SPD is on pace to have just under 1,200 officers by the end of the year.

Mayor Katie Wilson has asked all city departments to come up with cuts of 5 to 10 percent to help close a budget gap of at least $175 million. The police department, whose nearly-$500 million budget is by far the city’s biggest general-fund obligation, was reportedly asked to come up with $20 million in potential cuts.

2. Barnes made his comments during an announcement about the city’s latest efforts to address gun violence and sex trafficking on Aurora Ave. N. City Attorney Erika Evans announced she would use Extreme Risk Protection Orders, a tool typically used to take guns away from domestic violence offenders, to remove guns from people accused of committing gun-related crimes, whether or not they have been convicted. (Violent gun-related offenses are typically prosecuted by the King County Prosecutor.) Evans also said she would seek funding for a full-time prosecutor to pursue the orders.

 

At the same press conference, Mayor Katie Wilson announced the Seattle Department of Transportation will install barriers on four streets that intersect with Aurora Ave. N to block traffic from getting through; residents who have demanded the city do something about increasing gun violence in the area have installed makeshift barricades in recent weeks.

City Attorney Evans broke with council members on one key issue, saying that she did not believe banishing men who pay for sex from the area around Aurora, which is designated as the city’s Stay Out of Areas of Prostitution (SOAP) zone, are an effective way to protect women and girls from pimps and traffickers. (Former Councilmember Cathy Moore, who sponsored the SOAP legislation, then skedaddled off the council, was in the audience for yesterday’s event.)

Noting that the city has had SOAP orders off and on for 30 years, Evans said, “If they were effective, Aurora and other areas of Seattle, including Little Saigon, would be safe, and they’re not. … SOAP orders don’t work. ERPO orders work.”

3. The press conference, which took place on the same day Wilson announced internally that she was reorganizing her office and that her communications director, Seferiana Day, was leaving, featured some internal drama of its own. According to sources, councilmembers frustrated with what they viewed as inaction on Aurora planned to hold their own press conference without Wilson at which they would criticize her lack of action on gun violence and sex trafficking in the area.

After a flurry of discussions, the mayor and council agreed to hold the press conference in the awkward, narrow space outside council chambers, rather than outside Wilson’s office. Councilmembers have repeatedly refused to participate in the mayor’s press conferences, despite being invited—an indication that council-mayor relations still have a long way to go after some dramatic early missteps by the Wilson administration.

Crime, Police

SPD Dedicates Three Officers to Magnuson Park, Citing Success with “Disorder” and Property Crimes During Pilot
City Councilmember Maritza Rivera and Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes

By Erica C. Barnett

Citing a “double-digit” reduction in crime since the launch of a pilot that added police patrols in and around Northeast Seattle’s Magnuson Park last summer, Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes announced that SPD will assign three full-time officers to the park. The officers will report to the North Precinct, and will essentially be on call there if needed, but otherwise, their jobs will involve patrolling the park and doing what Barnes calls “neighborhood-oriented policing.”

PubliCola first reported on the pilot expansion in January.

Barnes said SPD chose Magnuson Park, which is surrounded by some of the city’s wealthiest neighborhoods, “because it’s the second largest park in our city [and] we have housing on the property”—hundreds of low-income and affordable units run by Mercy Housing and Solid Ground.

“We also chose this location because I heard from the community about … the rise in disorder crimes” such as noisy parties and street racing, Barnes said.

In the expanded program, SPD will assign three full-time officers, working in pairs to do bike and foot patrols in and around the park, getting to know people who live in the area and “fulfilling our obligation of problem oriented policing and community policing, which is the hallmark of my leadership philosophy,” Barnes said. The officers will be assigned to the North Precinct and will still be expected to respond to calls from other areas if necessary.

Asked why the city didn’t expand the Magnuson pilot into neighborhoods that have experienced more crime, like Rainier Beach or Little Saigon, Barnes said, “It’s not always about [putting resources in] the highest-crime area. One of the reasons we chose this particular location [is that] it’s our second biggest park. It has homes here as well. We’re hearing from the community. It just seemed like a good place to start and kind of work through some of those bugs.”

SPD has assigned new police academy graduates “who are not quite ready for patrol” to the area around 12th and Jackson, Barnes added. Additionally, “We’re looking at a space now, I believe at Third and Pine, that could be available for us” in the future. An SPD spokeswoman declined to provide additional details about the space Barnes mentioned.

City Councilmember Maritza Rivera, who represents Northeast Seattle, said there are “people living in the park that I very much care about, and I want to make sure that our families and the kids that are living here at Mercy Housing and Solid Ground are living in a safe environment, as well as the surrounding neighbors and all the people that come to visit the park.”

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The “double-digit” crime reduction Barnes mentioned appears to refer to a drop in reported crimes during the 90-day pilot period compared to the same period in 2024.

SPD’s public crime database shows that the number of reported crimes in the Sand Point neighborhood, which includes Magnuson Park, shows that there were 113 fewer reported crimes during the pilot period than the same period in 2024. However, a broader look at crime trends in the area and in Seattle as a whole shows that crime was lower across the city last year, and continues to trend lower in 2026 than in 2025, indicating a more general reduction in crime than the success of a specific pilot in one area.

One of the most infamous incidents of police violence in Seattle happened in Magnuson Park several years ago, before former mayor Bruce Harrell hired Barnes away from his previous position in Madison, Wisconsin. In 2017, officers shot and killed Charleena Lyles, a Black mother of four who called 911 during a mental health crisis, in her apartment. Lyles’ killing was one of the incidents that spurred calls for unarmed first responders with social work backgrounds to assist people in crisis. Although the city never admitted liability, Seattle paid $3.5 million in 2021 to settle a wrongful-death lawsuit by Lyles’ family.

SPD’s press event took place about 700 feet from where Lyles was killed.

When a TV reporter asked about past “officer-involved shootings” (shootings by police) in the park, Barnes appeared confused. “Officer-involved shootings?” he said.

After the reporter, who did not mention Lyles by name, attempted to elaborate— “there have been some tense events that have happened in the past”— Barnes responded: “I think no matter if it’s Magnuson Park or any other area in the city, we want to make sure that we’re policing in a way that’s procedurally just and that’s according to the expectations of our community. … That’s what policing is to me—knowing the people who may be dealing with issues, the people who may be dealing with mental health crisis, because when you know them and you can communicate with them, you have better outcomes.”

Morning Fizz, Police

SPD’s National Recruitment Push Includes Police Chief’s Alma Mater; Chief Attended Tiny Desk Concert with Security In Tow

1. Seattle Police Department officers are traveling across the country on a college recruitment tour, including a five-day trip this week to the Central Intercollegiate Athletics Association (CIAA)  basketball tournament in Baltimore. The CIAA includes a dozen Division II Historically Black Colleges and Universities, including Police Chief Shon Barnes’ alma mater, Elizabeth City State University in Elizabeth City, North Carolina.

A spokesperson told PubliCola last week that the department also “plans one coordinated annual recruitment trip that includes multiple universities in close geographic proximity, including several Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). Consolidating multiple campus visits into a single trip allows for efficient use of travel resources while expanding outreach to historically underrepresented populations in law enforcement. These efforts are intentional, strategic, and aligned with our long-term workforce diversity goals.”

The SPD spokesperson said the inclusion of Barnes’ alma mater, which has about 2,300 students, was coincidental.

“The department prioritizes events that provide demonstrated applicant yield, and broad and diverse candidate pools,” the spokesperson said. “Our goal is to use our finite recruitment resources where they will produce measurable impact while expanding awareness of opportunities in Seattle.”

A majority of the CIAA colleges have fewer than 2,000 students, and several have student bodies in the hundreds. The spokesperson said SPD has no specific metric for measuring whether a recruitment event was an effective use of city resources, such as the number of people who applied after an event.

“Recruitment success is measured through overall applicant pipeline growth, diversity metrics, and long-term hiring outcomes rather than a single-event numeric target,” the spokesperson said. “Since implementing a more strategic and dedicated recruitment approach, SPD has seen applicant numbers reach historic levels.”

In fact, recruitment spiked shortly after the city signed a labor agreement with the police guild that boosted starting salaries to nearly $120,000, and more than $126,000 after a six-month training period, making Seattle one of the highest-paying police departments in the country. The raises represented a 42 percent pay boost over just five years.

The recruitment tour has included other stops outside the Pacific Northwest. This month alone, according to SPD’s recruitment events page, SPD has sent recruitment teams to a women’s softball tournament in Clearwater, Florida, as well as a Rutgers University event in Piscatawy, New Jersey; the University of Idaho; Brigham Young University; Utah Valley University; and Utah State University.

With the exception of the CIAA schools and Rutgers, most of the colleges and universities where SPD is holding recruitment events, including those in the Pacific Northwest, have student bodies that are more than 70 percent white.

The spokesperson said Barnes did not participate directly in the recruitment events.

Conservative talk show host Jason Rantz reported today that SPD was the “corporate sponsor” for the CIAA tournament and wrote the group a $25,000 check. We have reached out to SPD to ask whether they believe this sponsorship complies with state law prohibiting gifts of public funds.

Screenshot via YouTube.

2. Barnes did take a trip to Washington D.C. recently, accompanied by his security detail, where he attended a recording of a Tiny Desk Concert by Jill Scott, part of the long-running NPR series. A photo Barnes posted on Facebook shows him in the crowd, along with two members of his security.

SPD did not immediately respond to a question about how much it cost to provide Barnes with security while he attended the NPR concert. A spokesman told us late Wednesday afternoon that Barnes was in D.C. last November to attend the Active Bystander for Law Enforcement conference, “a nationally recognized program that trains officers to intervene when they spot officer misconduct and provides resources for officer health and wellness.”

Police, Women

In 2025, 90 Percent of New SPD Hires Were Men
Social media image for SPD’s ongoing “Come As You Are” recruitment campaign.

“We acknowledge we must do better to meet the 30×30 commitment but as we move into 2026, we will continue our work to resemble the community we serve,” a department spokesperson said.

By Erica C. Barnett

The Seattle Police Department hired just 17 women in 2025, according to figures provided by the Seattle Police Department—just 10 percent of 165 new hires last year. That’s a significant dip from SPD’s already dismal numbers in 2024, when just 14 percent of the 84 people SPD hired were women. It’s also less than half the average for police departments across the US, according to stats from the 30X30 Initiative—a pledge, which SPD has signed, to work toward a recruit class that’s 30 percent women by 2030.

The 17-woman total was bolstered by relatively strong hiring of women—six total—in the fourth quarter of 2025; in the two quarters encompassing April through September, SPD hired just 6 women, and the total percentage of female hires dipped to less than six percent in the second quarter of the year.

SPD, in other words, not only isn’t improving its lopsided gender balance—it’s backsliding. To achieve the goal of 30X30, SPD would have needed to hire an additional 33 women last year. Put another way, they’re currently two-thirds shy of their hiring goals.

It’s unclear how many women are leaving the department, which is currently the subject of several simultaneous gender discrimination lawsuits and allegations. In the past, SPD has provided a breakdown, by gender, of the number of men and women who left the department on numerous occasions in the past—an important data point that shows how many women are leaving the department compared to men. The department did not provide this information when PubliCola requested it, citing unspecified data issues.

However, they did provide the total number of people who left this year—69, down from 83 in 2024. We also know that as of April, 21 percent of the people leaving SPD were women. If that departure trend stayed consistent for the remaining eight months of the year, it would translate to about 14 women leaving SPD in 2025, for a net gain of just three women. We’re hoping SPD will eventually provide these numbers, which would give a clearer picture of SPD’s gender makeup.

Former Mayor Bruce Harrell said that he chose Barnes, in part, because he “brings proven experience advancing the Madison Police Department’s inclusive workforce initiative that has resulted in 28% of officers being women.” But Seattle’s new recruit classes have only become more overwhelmingly male since Barnes took over at the department.

In a statement to PubliCola, a spokesperson for SPD said, “The Seattle Police Department remains committed to increasing the hiring rate of women. We acknowledge we must do better to meet the 30×30 commitment but as we move into 2026, we will continue our work to resemble the community we serve.”

City Council

SPD Chief Barnes Hires Two Harrell Staffers to Executive Positions, Saka Hires Ex-Cop Who Ran for Council

1. On Monday, Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes announced permanent replacements for the two civilian command staff members he fired late last year, along with a newly created position of deputy chief of staff. The two fired staffers, ex-general counsel Rebecca Boatright and ex-chief operating officer Brian Maxey, have filed a tort claim against the city alleging Barnes retaliated against them for giving advice he and his inner circle disagreed with, and discriminated against Boatright based on her gender.

Among the advice Boatright and Maxey gave Barnes and his chief of staff ewre a suggestion that they take concerns from the LGBTQ+ community more seriously including pushback over police raids at a longstanding nude beach. To that suggestion, Barnes’ chief of staff Alex Ricketts allegedly responded, “We’re not here for the gays.”

Two of the new staffers will join Barnes’ team directly from former mayor Bruce Harrell’s office.

Maxey will be replaced by Sarah Smith, a public safety advisor to Harrell who previously worked as a policy staffer for Jenny Durkan. In addition to her time at Harrell’s office, Smith’s resumé includes a brief stint at the fire department, where she “ideated, organized, and executed EMS staffing for events,” according to her LinkedIn page. Before that, she worked as a program manager at the YMCA and a manager at Specialty’s, a now-defunct bakery in downtown Seattle.

Another Harrell staffer, Cindy Wong, will become deputy chief of staff under Alex Ricketts, a new position. Prior to former chief Adrian Diaz, SPD had not had a “chief of staff”  since 2001, when an assistant police chief held the job as an informal secondary title. Wong is the author of a children’s book with a background in human resources who had worked for Harrell since 2023.

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SPD did not respond to questions.

Boatright will be replaced by her former deputy, Cherie Getchell. “Please join me in welcoming each of these women to their new roles,” Barnes wrote in an email to all SPD staff. “Their extensive experience and deep commitment to public safety in our community will be instrumental in guiding us through SPD’s next chapter.”

Combined with the five new positions Barnes added when he came on as chief last year—Ricketts, new Assistant Chief Nicole Powell, executive director of crime reduction Lee Hunt, new Deputy Chief Andre Sayles, and Chief Communications Officer Barbara DeLollis, all making well over $200,000—Barnes now has the largest executive staff of any police chief in recent memory.

Mayor Katie Wilson’s office had no comment on Barnes’ hiring of the two Harrell staffers.


2. Across the street at City Hall, the new year began with two departures from City Councilmember Rob Saka’s office, where no staffer (other than chief of staff Elaine Ko) has lasted longer than 16 months. On Monday, a new Saka staffer started work—former SPD lieutenant Brendan Kolding, who will be Saka’s policy director.

Kolding’s name may be familiar. In 2019, he ran for City Council against then-incumbent Lisa Herbold and later endorsed Phil Tavel, a conservative two-time candidate for the position, on a platform that included setting up FEMA-style camps and moving unsheltered people into them. (He lost in the primary). Although Kolding told reporters he quit SPD to run for council, the Seattle Times reported that he actually resigned in lieu of termination after an investigation concluded he had harassed a coworker and lied about it to the police chief.

Some of Kolding’s political views appear to be at odds with some of the lofty rhetoric Saka adopted when he voted against the Seattle Police Officers Guild contract last year. His most recent post on X, from 2024, is a reposted SPOG endorsement for then-Republican gubernatorial candidate Dave Reichert. Kolding has also reposted content from SPOG leader Mike Solan,  Turning Point USA activist Jonathan Choe, and former city councilmember Sara Nelson. 

Kolding was also fond of posting photos of his ballots, including votes for Nelson, former city attorney Ann Davison, and—whoops—Phil Tavel, who ran against Saka in 2023.

Courts, Drugs, Mayor Wilson, Police

SPD Chief Sent Email Overstating New Drug Diversion Policy, Sparking False Narrative in Right-Wing Media
Police Chief Shon Barnes speaks at a press conference last year.

Chief Shon Barnes apparently didn’t consult with LEAD or the city attorney’s office before telling police they should start referring every drug arrest to LEAD.

By Erica C. Barnett

Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes sent a memo to officers last week directing them to refer most people caught using or possessing drugs in public to LEAD, the pre-booking diversion program that provides case management and other services to people accused of low-level criminal activity.

“Effective immediately, all charges related to drug possession and/or drug use will be diverted from prosecution to the LEAD program,” Barnes told officers in an internal email. “All instances of drug use or possession will be referred to Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD)—a program designed to redirect low-level offenders in King County from the criminal justice system into supportive social services.”

The announcement by Barnes appears to have been a dramatic overreaction to an internal memo from City Attorney Erika Evans directing her prosecutors to refer drug use and possession cases to an internal team to determine if they are eligible for LEAD. This represents a shift from the policy established by Evans’ predecessor, Ann Davison, who allowed people charged with misdemeanor possession or drug use to avoid charges by getting an addiction assessment and not getting arrested again for six months—the opposite of a therapeutic approach.

“The LEAD Liaison Team will assess previous attempts at engagement with the referred individual in consultation with LEAD,” Evans’ memo, which PubliCola received from her office, said. “If the referred individual has failed to demonstrate a sustained level or engagement with the LEAD program or has refused to engage with a LEAD case manager, the LEAD Liaison will assess the most suitable subsequent action in consultation with the Criminal Division Chief.”

Barnes responded to Evans’ memo by sending an email blast to all SPD officers saying that “Effective immediately, all charges related to drug possession and/or drug use will be diverted from prosecution to the LEAD program,” an inaccurate description of Evans’ directive to her staff. Barnes continued:

If an individual fails to comply with the LEAD program, traditional prosecutorial measures will apply. As you know, LEAD is a familiar alternative-to-arrest program that we have been utilizing for some time. This change aligns with Seattle City Ordinance 126896. Please note that this diversion does not apply to individuals who are ineligible for LEAD or to those arrested for selling or delivering controlled substances. User-quantity cases may be diverted; sell-and-deliver cases will not.

My expectation is that officers will continue to charge individuals for drug use or possession when appropriate-for example, when the activity occurs in public view or when probable cause for arrest is established.

The announcement quickly blew up thanks to an inaccurate story by KOMO, which reported—apparently without speaking to LEAD, Wilson’s office, Barnes, or Evans—that Wilson herself had “ordered officers to stop arresting people for open drug use.” (The origin of the accusation: Bombastic police union leader Mike Solan, who recently announced he won’t run for reelection). Right-wing social media accounts ran wild with the fake version of the story, forcing Wilson to issue a statement: “You’ll know when I announce a policy change, because I’ll announce a policy change.”

(Apparently, it didn’t help: Wilson was mobbed by TV cameras after Evans’ inauguration Monday afternoon at City Hall.)

In her statement, Wilson affirmed that her public safety policy includes “enforcement of the possession and public use ordinance in priority situations and ensuring that the LEAD framework and other effective responses to neighborhood hot spots are implemented with an appropriate level of urgency, sufficient resources, and a commitment to results.”

This, in effect, is what the city’s policy toward low-level drug crime was prior to 2023, when Davison and then-mayor Bruce Harrell pushed to change city law to empower SPD to start arresting people for simple drug possession and public use.

Although Barnes insisted that the policy hasn’t changed, he also referred to “this change” in the same email email. Many officers interpreted Barnes’ contradictory memo as a directive to no longer arrest people for drug use and simple possession but instead refer them straight to LEAD.

The police chief didn’t bother seeking information or feedback from the organization that runs LEAD, Purpose Dignity Action, before emailing officers about the change in policy, and he exaggerated the policy change by portraying as a kind of blanket amnesty for misdemeanor drug crime. Even if the PDA wanted to take on “all charges related to drug possession and/or drug use” they couldn’t afford to. LEAD had to stop taking community referrals into the program after the drug law passed in 2023, and a $5 million budget boost last year will only fund another 500 to 600 slots in the program this year.

LEAD co-director Brandi McNeil said that’s “a significant number,” but it’s well “below the total number of people who would qualify and be appropriate candidates for LEAD. We will need to strategize with police, prosecutors, the Mayor, the Council, and County officials (our funders) to focus that capacity on high priority situations and individuals.”

LEAD tries to take on clients who are likely to benefit from their services, as opposed to everyone who has been accused of a particular misdemeanor. “Part of our job is to accurately forecast what capacity we will have, and to work with our partners to decide which, among the pool of people who chronically commit law violations related to behavioral health issues or poverty, should be prioritized for our available slots,” McNeil said.

Barnes also misstated the criteria for LEAD eligibility, saying people arrested for selling or delivering drugs are ineligible for the program; in fact, LEAD began as an effort to benefit this specific group of people, who were cycling through courts and jail without getting any assistance for the underlying issues that were causing them to earn a living through illegal means. LEAD still serves people accused of selling up to 7 grams of drugs, which means almost anyone involved in low-level drug sales is eligible for the program.

Finally, Barnes’ description of the conditions in which “officers will charge” people for public drug use are confusing and ambiguous: “Probable cause” is supposed to exist before officers make any arrest, and it’s unclear what distinction Barnes is making between “public drug use” and drug use that “occurs in public view.”

SPD did not respond to questions sent last week attempting to clarify what Barnes meant by these distinctions. However, they did send out an email to media in response to the right-wing blowback on Monday. “To be clear, nothing has changed when it comes to police continuing to make drug-related arrests in Seattle,” Barnes said in the statement (emphasis in original), adding that police will “continue to make arrests for drug-related charges if they have probable cause.”