Harger: Seattle removed the Aurora Avenue planters and installed barriers a driver can pass right through. The pimps and prostitutes were back by Thursday night.

This is the fifth piece I have written about the pimp war on Aurora Avenue in 12 days.

I am running out of new ways to describe it.

Ninety-five shootings in two years. Seven in the last two weeks. Bullets above a bassinet holding a five-week-old. Thirteen shell casings at a school bus stop. A Glock switch firing on a residential street. A father counting rounds instead of sleeping. A neighbor recording a video of his living room window for evidence.

Aurora Avenue has had its rough stretches for decades. Prostitution. Cheap motels. Street crime. The neighbors who live there know that history. They have lived it. What is happening now is something else.

Long-time residents I have talked to said they have never seen anything like the last two years. Pimps fighting over corners with automatic weapons. Drive-bys on residential side streets. Bullets through living-room walls. The loitering laws came off the books in 2020. Pimps moved in. The police department has shrunk from roughly 1,200 deployable officers to about 860. The neighbors say the math has produced a different Aurora. The body count says they are right.

On Sunday, the neighbors did what the city would not. They moved steel planters into three residential side streets near Aurora Avenue. The point was to break a driving pattern. Pimps and johns cruise Aurora, turn onto a residential side street, loop around the block, come back out onto Aurora, and run the route again. Side streets are part of the circuit. Close the side streets at Aurora and the circuit breaks. Alison Holcomb, Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson’s public safety advisor, came out. She told residents she heard them. She told them this was a top priority.

On Wednesday, the mayor’s office finally said it: this is unacceptable

A statement from the mayor’s office Wednesday evening:

The current situation along the Aurora corridor is unacceptable, and we share neighbors’ desire for immediate action to address safety concerns. As part of our ongoing efforts, the mayor has directed the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) to replace the resident-installed barriers with temporary traffic calming treatments at the three locations to reduce cut-through traffic and address the access needs of those living on the street.

The Seattle Police Department continues to add resources to the neighborhood.”

Two things I will say about that statement.

The word “unacceptable” is the right word. It is the word that has been missing for two years. And the patrols are real. Andrew Steelsmith, the resident who has been documenting the violence on Reddit, says they have seen increased patrols since the city’s response.

So the city did some of what it said it would do.

What the city replaced the planters with

SDOT removed the neighbors’ steel planters Thursday. They installed concrete barriers spaced wide enough that a car can drive between them.

A driver has to slow down. Maybe swerve.

That is the answer to a pimp war.

Steelsmith spelled out on Reddit why this misses the point of the original closures. The full closures on 101st and 107th worked because johns will not pull into a closed street, and pimps cannot flee other pimps or run from police into a closed street. So the pimps did not put their girls on those blocks. The closed entrance devalued the street.

A driver who has to swerve is still a driver who can cruise.

The Seattle Department of Transportation removed Aurora Avenue neighbors’ steel planters. They installed concrete barriers spaced wide enough that a car can drive between them. (Photo: Charlie Harger, KIRO Newsradio)

Thursday night, the prostitutes were back on 97th

We did not have to wait long to see whether the new barriers would work.

When the city reopened 97th Thursday night, Steelsmith said the prostitutes flooded right back in.

Same block. Same loop. Same problem the residents had spent three years documenting, and the planters had solved in a weekend. Reopened by the city, repopulated by the trade, within hours.
That is the evidence the city ignored when it decided permeable barriers were the answer.

The Seattle Police Department (SPD) is in the neighborhood. The cops are doing their job. The barriers SDOT installed are not doing theirs. Patrols help. Patrols do not change the economics of the corner. The full closure did.

Two weeks of study. Same corner. Different consequences.

The Wednesday statement said SDOT will spend the next two weeks working with the mayor’s office, SPD, and residents to determine whether the area would benefit from more permanent barriers, and at which locations.

Two weeks of study.

The neighbors have already studied. They studied for three years. They watched 95 shootings’ worth of evidence accumulate. They watched what worked on 101st and 107th. They installed the right answer on Sunday morning. SDOT pulled it out four days later.

I do not doubt the people at the mayor’s office want this fixed. The word “unacceptable” was real. The patrols are real. The Wednesday statement was a step.

The Thursday installation was not.

Maybe in two weeks, the city will come back with the right answer. Maybe the neighbors are happy. Maybe the shootings stop, and the mayor’s office takes a victory lap on Aurora. If that happens, I will be the first person in Seattle to celebrate it. I will say so on the radio. I will write it on this page.

I am not holding my breath.

That is the gap. Between the language and the steel. Between what the city says about Aurora and what the city puts in the street. Between unacceptable and acceptable enough to live with for two more weeks.

The pimps just have to swerve.

Charlie Harger is the host of “Seattle’s Morning News” on KIRO Newsradio. You can read more of his stories and commentaries here. Follow Charlie on X and email him here. 

Follow @https://twitter.com/kirocharlie