A new citywide group has formed to try to get the city’s public-safety plans aligned with community priorities. The group is called Community Leaders for Public Safety, and one of its founding members, West Seattle’s Pete Spalding, shared its proposal with WSB. On the list – a strategy to fight graffiti vandalism, including bringing back the Seattle Police graffiti detective position.Here’s the full list of the CLPS priorities – remember, these are citywide, but many are certainly applicable to West Seattle:
Seattle Public Safety Initiative
Facilities
* Find a suitable alternative for Rainier Beach Community Center during the two-year closure, such as Rainier Beach High School, with a seamless transition to ensure continuity for critical programs.
* Fund the North Precinct facility. If existing building cannot be fixed, the precinct should move to a site like the Seattle School District facility on Wilson and Pacific. Parking for employees and the public must factor into the decision.
* Re-examine neighborhood substations and drop-in centers.
Community Policing
* Prioritize community policing in training programs and best police practices.
* Develop neighborhood engagement strategies so officers understand a place and its people. Reimplement Neighborhood Action Teams. Ensure that the City’s neighborhood plans reflect public safety principles, and that the City of Seattle honors the neighborhood plans.
* Fund current Crime Prevention Coordinator and Park Ranger programs, and re-examine using Community Safety Officers.
Community Programs
* Youth Initiatives: Build on current programs, with community-based advisory panels, emphasizing a long-term generational model. Support activities at playfields, schools, and community centers. Seek corporate funding and partnerships.
* Nightlife Initiative: Prioritize a socially responsible, vibrant nightlife, with clubs funding solutions to problems that originate in clubs.
* Public Alcoholism: Support successful models to house chronic street inebriates. Working with the Washington State Liquor Control Board, create an Alcohol Impact Area for Beacon Hill.
* Gangs and Graffiti: Implement a city-wide strategy to address gang-related crime, including prostitution, and a coordinated graffiti plan that reinstates the SPD graffiti detective.
* Social Services: Distribute facilities equitably throughout Seattle, with a moratorium on subsidized housing for neighborhoods that have reached capacity.
Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED)
* Apply CPTED principles in public playfields, parks, and other green spaces, and to DPD building permits, neighborhood zoning, and landscape decisions, and the Urban Forest Management Plan.
* Work with the Washington State Department of Transportation to incorporate CPTED principles into state road development and maintenance projects.
Cooperation
* Leverage existing assets and interagency taskforces to address specific issues, and establish a public safety adviser in the Mayor’s office to lead interagency coordination and policy development.
* Schedule SDOT projects to allow for public safety response and more efficient emergency access.
* Fund programs that use Washington State DOC work crews and Seattle Community Court and Pretrial Diversion service workers, to support street cleanups, environmental restoration, vacant lot mitigation, playfield safety, and graffiti removal.
Policy
* Enforce the no trespassing ordinance, nuisance housing ordinance, and encampment protocols.
* Ensure citizen oversight, a comment period for proposed policy changes, and public notice of meetings by committees working on public safety-related policies.
* Establish a quarterly meeting between the Mayor and Community Leaders for Public Safety
Spalding says many of the founding members are from Precinct Advisory Councils (he chairs the one for West Seattle’s Southwest Precinct) or crime-prevention groups. They’ve already sent this proposal to Mayor McGinn, CIty Council members, City Attorney Pete Holmes, and Police Chief John Diaz; the cover letter, which you can see here, summarizes, “We believe the return on investment in community programs – that address the needs of youth, that counter gangs and graffiti, that encourage service and safe housing for homeless people and others at risk – will make a sustainable difference in the quality of life for all Seattle residents.” We’ll keep you updated on where this goes from here.
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