Mayor Bruce Harrell talks SCOTUS homelessness case and SPD culture

How would you rate the CARE department at this point?

I think they’re awesome. And I think Chief Amy Smith is doing a magnificent job of both recruiting the right people and the employees there are. I think they understand the significant role they play. They’ve eliminated a need for the police to go out often. They’ve de-escalated so many situations. Now there’s other safety type of people around that we’ve started under my administration. We’re taking the park rangers out, for example. I think I want to say up to, like, 26 or 28 park rangers from two, I believe, and my numbers might be a little off.

In park situations, which should be open and accessible to all, I don’t need police going out there and just apprehending people when perhaps they are doing some stuff they shouldn’t be doing. We will call the police if we have to, but that’s not a desired approach.

We have community service officers, many are hired from the communities that they serve, and they can be a liaison between the Police Department and the city of Seattle. So again, we’ve increased the CSOs in our approach. And so when I say we’re looking for a holistic approach, I have new types of employees out there doing new kinds of things to take some of the pressure off of our police officers.

You mentioned the numbers are down with officers and recruitment, and I want to dig into that. It’s been a slow progress, but there have been bonuses and incentives to entice those potential officers. So that said, do you think these higher wages will secure more people who want to become a Seattle Police officer?

I think compensation is always an interesting question, as to the role compensation alone plays into someone’s career choice. Certainly in retention, we know that plays a significant role. So we put forth a very attractive package for officers to be compensated. And I think they should be. We’re the largest city in the state and it’s a very demanding job with the challenges, and I think they should be compensated to the highest. And I’m willing to put that in front of the City Council as I have. But there’s so many other intangibles.

And so we met with private employers that are recruiting, you know, in the high-tech industry or in the educational industry, in the social media industry. How do you entice your employees? Is it compensation alone? And so we’ve come up with some new ideas. One example would be if someone’s coming from another city. Perhaps they have a spouse or partner that’s interested. How do we make it very easy for that person to have at least a pathway to employment as they relocate?

I’m an outdoors person. So if I weren’t working every single day, I’d either hike or fish or swim. So I sell Seattle. I say in 45 minutes you could snow-ski or scuba-dive, or you could hike or camp, or go to a river and do some steelhead fishing. You have all this beautiful outdoors here, and we are a multifaceted economy. We are part maritime industry, high tech, biotech and a great university system. So Seattle has a lot to offer. And I do a lot of that. I’ll actually do that tomorrow morning to a group of folks who may consider moving here. And I’m not selling snake oil.

I’m selling the fact that we are one of the most rapidly growing cities in the country; that is just a fact. And people are coming here. So it’s not just compensation. Yes, that’s a component of it, but it’s also what this area has to offer. I’ve been to other cities. I’ve been to every major city … I wouldn’t put Seattle below any of those cities. It’s an awesome city.

Certain communities that have experienced trauma, especially BIPOC communities, have in some instances had negative relationships with law enforcement. What do you say to people who have experienced mistrust of officers at points in their lives? And what are you doing in terms of, or what could you say in terms of, reassuring them about the police who patrol our streets?

Well, the first thing I would say is I don’t have to go far to talk to that community. I just have to go to a mirror. I grew up in these streets, grew up in this. I’m half Black and half Japanese. I grew up around the Black folk of the Central District. But it wasn’t just Black folk. There were Filipinos and Native Americans and white folk. But it’s primarily people of color because that’s where we lived in the Central District back in the 1960s. And if you look at my background again, I was president of a Black fraternity, and I was vice president of the Black Bar Association. And I’ve been involved in Asian and other BIPOC organizations throughout my life.

I understand mistrust; as I said earlier, I’ve cross-examined police officers. Police officers are human beings. We all have biases. I didn’t change when I became mayor. I’ve successfully won four elections in the city. What I say to communities that mistrust the police, all I can say is, I get it, man. I don’t trust government and I’m the mayor of a city.

I’ll tell you a funny story. When I was on the City Council, there was a camera that was positioned right outside my office, and it zoomed in on my office. And I said, “Hey, who’s on the other end of that camera?” They said, “Don’t worry, it’s blacked out. Your office is blacked out.” And I said, “Well, how do I know that?” I mean, I’ve never been to the police. It was a Police Department camera, and it was, I think it was, like, 180 or 360 [degrees]. And I said, “Man, I don’t trust that stuff in my office.”

So I get the mistrust. And so now it’s incumbent upon me as an executive. I was the author of the privacy surveillance statute, like how we use technology, to make sure that at least you have people in positions of power and influence to build community trust.

Give us a try. Trust is not something you should give freely. As I’ve told my three kids, trust has to be earned. We have to earn it as members of government in everything that we do. We’re human. So this is ongoing work.

We’re going to put a button in that and get to another pressing topic facing the city: homelessness. And currently the U.S. Supreme Court is weighing a class-action lawsuit about whether to criminalize the unhoused for sleeping in public. What are your thoughts on what that could mean for the city?

From my standpoint, it’s not going to have a significant effect. The reason I say that is we will always lead toward offering shelter first. And I believe that the issue of housing and sheltering so many is solvable, and that we go about it in a very compassionate approach. I don’t want anyone sleeping in a tent and dying in the extreme heat or the extreme cold.

It’s as simple as that. I want to give people permanent, supportive housing, but in the meantime, I may have to put someone in a temporary kind of shelter, whether it’s a tiny home or some kind of congregate shelter, with other types of supportive services. I don’t want someone having to live in those conditions, and I won’t criminalize poverty.

The legal flexibility or restrictions are not going to alter our approach, because I believe in a humane approach. Now, I don’t believe someone has a fundamental right to live right where you’re blocking a person’s wheelchair. Accessibility. As an example. I made that point when first taking office, in looking at the route to the courthouse. All of the sidewalks were cluttered with tents, and someone in a wheelchair literally could not use the sidewalk and was going to be forced to go on the street. To me, that’s a safety issue. But in terms of sheltering people, we will always lead with compassion and with the need to shelter them. That is our Housing First policy that I was a supporter of when I was on the City Council.

Next year, the city will face a nearly $250 million budget deficit. What measures are you considering to close those shortfalls?

Well, I tell everyone it’s my problem, not yours. And I’m pretty darn good at budgeting, whether it’s zero-based budgeting or target-based budgeting. I don’t want to prematurely talk about what we’re doing to address it, but it will be addressed. I’ve asked each department head – who are quite capable, you know – what a certain percentage looks like, 15% or 8%, etc. I put a hiring freeze on jobs. We’re looking at where there’s duplications in departments. My goal is to not reduce in any way essential services of the city – safety as an example, or housing. And so, we’ll present a balanced budget. We have a plan and will unveil the plan at the appropriate time. What we need to understand is why the budget reached almost $8 billion, right? We’ve grown exponentially in our spending. And I think, quite honestly, we can be more efficient in city government. And that’s what we’re going to do. We will unveil our plans toward the end of this summer.

Mayor, before I let you go, in your state-of-the-city address, you alluded to a major development that could take place here in the city. Is an NBA team on their way to return home?

You know, it’s not a huge secret that both Seattle and Las Vegas are the most attractive markets for an NBA team. And, full disclosure, even as soon as last night I had dinner with two people who have both the means and the resources to put this together. And so, yes, there are discussions underway. Hopefully we’ll have some announcements here in the near future, but I am not going to get in front of my skis. But it looks very, very promising here. Very promising.