Can latest prolific offenders initiative move the needle on public safety in Seattle?

The King County Prosecutor’s Office and Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison announced a new collaborative initiative this week to address the region’s repeat criminal offenders. But will it move the needle on public safety?

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Speaking to KIRO Newsradio’s Gee Scott and Ursula Reutin on Wednesday, King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg detailed the overarching goal of the nascent High Utilizer Initiative: to focus on the prosecution of those responsible for repeat criminal activity in Seattle, particularly in the downtown area.

“This is a something we’ve done over the years, but it’s probably never been a more important time to focus on that,” he noted. “There are parts of Seattle that just need to come back, and the vacuum that was left during the lockdown was filled by people who have decided that there are no consequences for them for things like theft or assault.”

In practice, it will coordinate high utilizer efforts between the City Attorney’s Office, Seattle police, the county prosecutor, King County Jail, and various service providers, occurring in tandem with increased patrols downtown.

And while it’s designed to address concerns cited by business owners and residents alike, the county’s public defenders argue that similar initiatives dating back nearly a decade have not had the desired effect. That includes a “High Impact Offender Program” introduced in 2012, as well as the “High Barrier Individuals Work Group” in 2019.

“Over the last several years, the City of Seattle has repeatedly announced initiatives that would focus more law enforcement resources on those already most policed as a strategy for addressing public safety, all with similar names,” the union representing King County public defenders said on Twitter. “This tired strategy of arresting, prosecuting, and jailing is expensive and clearly ineffective.”

The union cites data from the Seattle City Budget Office, which estimates that a night in jail costs taxpayers “more than $200,” while a month behind bars can cost upwards of $6,000.

Speaking to the assumption that more arrests and prosecutions would act as a panacea to Seattle’s public safety concerns, Satterberg clarified that people “should have realistic expectations about what’s going to happen to folks when they do get in front of a judge.”

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“When they do get convicted in a misdemeanor court, like Seattle Municipal Court, a lot of these people have deep behavioral health needs and have had those issues for decades,” he clarified. “And so just because you got a new conviction and now you’re on probation, it doesn’t mean that all of those issues go away.”

“It’s really about also tapping other resources within the community that can help people stabilize and not be out committing crimes every single day in broad daylight,” he added.

That’s being met with skepticism from public defenders, though, with the union emphasizing its hope to instead focus on addressing homelessness, as well as “the Public Health Crisis of Racism.”

“We’re disappointed that once again the system is working to perpetuate itself, not working to help solve real problems affecting people in dire need,” the statement continued.

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