City Council President Joy Hollingsworth Redirects Surveillance Funding for Violence Interrupters

Seattle City Council President Joy Hollingsworth passed an amendment to the supplemental budget redirecting $250,000 in unused funding, originally set aside for an unrealized surveillance camera expansion, to pay for Community Violence Interruption ambassadors from We Deliver Care (WDC).

Hollingsworth, a supporter of last year's controversial surveillance expansion, is, through this amendment, acknowledging reality: The mayor will not use all of the surveillance funding the council rushed through last year, and there are other—some would argue better—strategies to make neighborhoods safer. It's a refreshing perspective compared to the business owners, TV news personalities, and some of her council colleagues who seem to have developed a brain-eating virus that compels them to advocate for expanding surveillance at every opportunity.

As no local news follower could forget, Mayor Katie Wilson partially paused former Mayor Bruce Harrell's controversial and premature expansion of the Seattle Police Department's (SPD) untested Real Time Crime Center (RTCC) pilot after pressure from her left-wing base. During the pause, the NYU Policing Project will audit the technology to assess advocates' concerns about privacy and security before Wilson decides the future of the RTCC. Until then, nine SPD positions tied to the surveillance expansion remain unfilled, leaving $435,000 in funding unused.

In the Tuesday meeting, Hollingsworth described the amendment as her "last attempt to get eyes on the street" while the mayor's pause remains in effect. The paused expansion would have included new cameras in the Capitol Hill nightlife district and near Garfield High School. Instead, the WDC violence interrupters will patrol Capitol Hill, First Hill, and the Central District.

According to the group's website, WDC hires ambassadors from marginalized communities and trains them to administer nonviolent de-escalation, prevention strategies, mental health first aid, naloxone administration and CPR. 

The proposal aligns more closely with what anti-surveillance advocates have long argued: that money the city spends on reactive, punitive strategies like surveillance could instead be invested in prevention and alternative responses.

But don't mistake Hollingsworth for an anti-camera convert. When Council Member Bob Kettle threw a hissy fit over the amendment, framing it as a concession to the mayor's "unconscionable" delay of the RTCC expansion, Hollingsworth reaffirmed her frustration with the pause.

"I'm literally trying to be practical, and I cannot rely on a study to come out or on wishes about whether we're going to turn the cameras on or off," Hollingsworth said from the dais Tuesday. "Are we going to purchase them? Are we going to put them up? Are we going to get them turned on, rolling, and running? I have no clue about that."

She continued:

"What I do know right now is that the last two shootings have been on Capitol Hill next to our East Precinct. What I do know right now is the constant gun violence going up and down 23rd in the Central District. At this moment in time, I think this is the best way to approach this effort and the work that we've been doing."

Besides, Hollingsworth's amendment doesn't siphon off all of the $435,000 allocated for surveillance-related SPD positions. As Budget Director Aly Pennucci told the council, with more than half the year already gone, the mayor would not need the full amount budgeted for those positions even if she decided to move forward with the expansion before year's end.

Hollingsworth is also not asking to permanently redirect funding from the SPD positions to WDC. After the one-time funding runs out, Hollingsworth said King County will pay for the ongoing program as part of the mitigation plan associated with the new Crisis Care Center.

Hollingsworth and Council Members Maritza Rivera and Dan Strauss voted yes. Council Member Rob Saka abstained, and Kettle voted no. Kettle also plans to vote against the entire supplemental budget next week in protest of redirecting money (that would otherwise go unused) toward violence prevention. At this point, the devotion to surveillance is starting to feel more and more like a voyeur fetish.