Woman interrupts Seattle Mayor Harrell's news conference on community safety
SEATTLE - A woman interrupted Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell’s news conference on Friday. The news conference was focused on community safety.
"Safety is the top priority of our administration, and it has been since day one," Harrell said.
The mayor issued an executive order to guide and define his administration’s approach to public safety moving forward, which included formally establishing the Downtown Activation Team, also known as ‘DAT’ to bring together city departments as well as service providers to coordinate cleaning and restoration responses, but that wasn’t all.
"We are submitting two pieces of legislation to the city council that will help protect the city staff, the contractors, the partners doing this essential restoration work, it will provide flexibility and the tools to address illegal street vending and trafficking of stolen goods," Harrell said.
The tone of the news conference quickly changed, after an unidentified woman started yelling "stop the sweeps, you’re murdering your own constituents." She interrupted the mayor as he was speaking, and she kept going for 15 minutes. As she yelled, the mayor kept talking, sometimes addressing the woman directly. "Hey ma’am I’m not killing anyone," Harrell said.
He went on and said ‘DAT’ has completed nearly 200 restoration actions downtown and 43 in Little Saigon which started earlier this month.
"That means graffiti removal, power washing, connections to services as we make our public services more welcoming to all," Harrell said.
He adds, they’ve seen a 27% decrease in crime in the Pike Place area and believes they can replicate the positive results they’ve seen downtown as they expand these efforts to the Chinatown International District and Little Saigon.
"My heart goes out to the victims and their families," Harrell said. Taking a moment to acknowledge last week’s stabbings in the CID, Mayor Harrell also tried to honor Sgt. David Sullivan who arrested the suspect, but the woman kept yelling.
"Ma’am if you have any decency, you’d let us honor this officer," Harrell said. He later talked with the woman off camera. The mayor’s office told FOX 13, that woman has a history of dealing with some mayors.
FOX 13 also caught up with the mayor after the news conference and about the interruption. "That’s part of what mayors sign up for," Harrell told us.
"What I wanted her to understand is she is demanding that we act with compassion and not just arrest people, she’s demanding we house people and, in her words, not just sweep them, and she’s right, but the fact is I have to clean up these streets for people to live and work and shop and for children to play, and so we will continue to do that work."
He went on to explain that they are essentially utilizing the existing resources, but in a coordinated effort with organizations, treatment providers and the county. The mayor adds, this boils down to an acronym he uses called ‘ACT,’ which means you arrest the bad people, clean the dirty areas and treat the sick people.
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This is a developing story. Check back for updates.