- Josh Kelety
- Council Member Kshama Sawant raised her hands in solidarity with today's protesters.
Things got rowdy at a Seattle City Council briefing this morning as Seattle Police Department leaders triedâamid shouts from protestersâto answer questions about their response to anti-police-brutality demonstrations over the last two months.
Council Member Kshama Sawant requested the meeting in December, after the police department estimated it had spent about $586,000 in overtime on protests from mid-November (when the Ferguson grand jury decision came down) through December 2.
Since then, the SPD has updated its totals to reflect that more than $1.6 million in overtime was spent responding to protests through December 16.
This morning's meeting started with public comment. Protesters took to the microphone for half an hour to criticize the department for the number of officers it sent to protests, the gear they wore, the arrests they made, and, as Socialist Alternativeâs Jess Spear put it, âpolice using their bikes as weapons.â The crowd erupted in applause after almost every speaker and then stood, some with their hands up, as the council tried to move on to other businesses it had scheduled between public comment and the SPD leadershipâs presentation. Soon, some in the audience chanted âI canât breatheâ (a reference to Eric Garner, the unarmed black man killed by a police chokehold in New York) and âBlack lives matter,â and then began singing. In response, Council President Tim Burgess briefly adjourned the meeting and most council members left the room. Among the few who stayed was Sawant, who held her hands up in a gesture that's become a major symbol of this movement.
During the adjournment, protesters considered holding their own meeting without the council, but then Council Member Bruce Harrell (who chairs the councilâs public safety committee) told them he still wanted to have a public conversation with the SPD. Within a few minutes, Burgess and the others were back and joined by Chief Kathleen O'Toole, Deputy Chief Carmen Best, and Assistant Chief Nick Metz.
Harrell, Sawant, and Council Member Nick Licata peppered the SPD brass with questions about pepper spray, riot gear, and âflash bangâ grenades.
âThereâs been a general concern about protesters just being harassedâbeing followed around, being spied upon ⌠just being harassed,â Harrell said.
Sawant turned to âa larger question of accountability here.â
âHow do you decide this much moneyâ$1.6 millionâis justified to harass peaceful protesters?â she asked, questioning whether SPD could have spent that time and money on crimes like wage theft, hate crimes, and sex trafficking. (OâToole assured Sawant the department takes wage theft âvery seriously,â which she demonstrated by showing off a brochure SPD created about it.)
Throughout the meeting, some protesters shouted from the crowd while others shushed them. OâToole fought to get her answers out, and a visibly frustrated Council Member Jean Godden repeatedly said she was having trouble hearing.
OâToole, who called herself a âgreat advocate of the Bill of Rights,â told council members that the SPDâs âoverarching philosophy ⌠is one of public safetyâ for protesters, residents, visitors, and commuters. While she agreed with protesters that the marches were overwhelmingly peaceful, OâToole defended the departmentâs dramatic response because of some disruptions at the November 24 protest, where some protesters threw rocks at police and a man carrying a handgun was arrested.
âWe donât want to spend any more overtime money than we have to, [but] itâs difficult to project what to expect at any of these marches,â OâToole told the council. âAfter night one, we became more concerned. We staffed up.â
In defending the SPD's strategy, O'Toole said officers "certainly never told protesters where to march," which drew shouting from the crowd. Protesters have repeatedly been directed onto certain streets or away from downtown.
One use-of-force complaint stemming from the protests is being investigated by the SPDâs Office of Professional Accountability, according to OâToole, and a total of 25 people were arrested over 17 recent protests. (Some in the crowd said 23 of those arrested were people of color; OâToole told them she didnât have a breakdown, but would provide one. UPDATE: The SPD now says "14 were white, seven were black, one was Asian or Pacific Islander and three were unknown.")
In response to council concerns about why the SPD responded to a small protest at a mall in Bellevue, OâToole said Bellevue police had requested help after hearing the protest would be significantly larger than it turned out to be.
Then the conversation turned to the intelligence the department gathered throughout the protestsânamely, photos of protesters taken by plainclothes officers.
âI talked to people in our shop and all the photos taken had been destroyed,â OâToole told the council. âThe auditor assured me all [the photos] had been deleted.â
Ansel has been writing about the work of that auditor, who is supposed to be keeping an eye on the departmentâs intelligence gathering and is maybe not doing his job. Because of that reporting, the council is now considering strengthening the rules that govern what cops can gather and how much they keep.
Again, Sawant went to the big picture.
âLetâs assume the best case scenario, that [the photos] are always purged," she said. "The fact that your plainclothes police officers show up there to photograph [protesters] has a chilling effect. The people whose voices we need to hearâyoung people, black youthâtheyâre the ones who are going to feel that intimidation the most.â
Sawant told me after the meeting that sheâll continue to push for more civilian oversight of the SPD and hopes to schedule another public forum or meeting, hopefully on a weekend or evening, about the SPDâs response to the protests and some of these larger issues.
âThese are urgent questions,â she said, âand the public deserves urgent answers.â