‘It should be hair-on-fire urgency’: Ursula sounds off on Seattle’s drug crisis, treatment beds
Jul 14, 2026, 3:40 PM
King County is about to get a big boost in its capacity to fill drug and alcohol treatment beds, as a new center on Vashon Island will increase the number of beds for patients on Medicaid by 50%.
KIRO host Ursula Reutin explained why the beds are a massive need for the county, as drug addiction among the homeless has become an epidemic, and increased crackdowns on public drug use are a critical need.
“One of the things that we need to do better is increase the number of treatment beds,” Ursula said on “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio. “First of all, because I am of the belief that if someone is openly using drugs, or selling drugs on the street in Seattle, they should be arrested. We should be enforcing the SOAP and SODA policies that were just passed by the previous council.
“We need to have enough police officers to do the work and actually have charges filed when they do the work,” she continued. “I get it, drug addiction and the cycle of addiction, and all that goes into that. We need more mental health treatment, and we need more drug beds. If you arrest them, that is going to stop the cycle.”
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New center will significantly expand King County’s treatment capacity
The Thunderbird Treatment Center on Vashon Island will add 92 new beds for patients on Medicaid, increasing the current King County-wide total of 187 treatment beds.
Ursula noted that there is a dire need for action in cleaning up Seattle’s streets and moving more drug-addicted homeless people into treatment beds after a recent experience visiting Chinatown’s 12th and Jackson.
“It should be like hair-on-fire urgency versus, ‘Well, let’s just clean it for the World Cup, make it look good for now, and then they’re back,'” Ursula said. “What I saw yesterday on 12th and Jackson, that’s not compassion, that is complacency. That is just allowing chaos, and these people’s lives looked so sad. It was heartbreaking and also infuriating at the same time. It shouldn’t just be the norm.”
Watch the full discussion in the video above.
Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.
