Seattle has a big problem, like a really big problem.
Staffing guidelines call for a minimum of 1,400 deployable officers on the street, preferably 1,500.
With roughly 500 officers having left over the last two years, 122 already this year, they are sitting at about 62 percent of proper staffing levels.
Bad Times
Currently, Seattle only has 877 deployable officers.
On the low end of the scale, that is 62 percent of staffing expectations.
Former King County Sheriff John Urqhart put it very bluntly… “We’re screwed.”
Seattle Police Officers Guild President Mike Solan added, “There’s been a mass exodus of policing. The profession itself is almost on its last breath.
“And what happens is that criminals fill the void when there’s no law enforcement.
“And when you connect to funding, and then you connect the reform laws that were just absolutely catastrophic to our communities, this is the sad result.
“And who ends up paying the price? Our communities.”
Seattle was never a city that saw a lot of violent crime, but that is changing quickly.
For instance, in August, there were 11 homicides.
I know… that seems laughable when that many occur on the weekend in Chicago, but that is a number the city has not seen since 2008.
The bad news for Seattle… they have another 350 officers that will qualify for retirement by the end of this year.
The city could literally be down to 33 percent staffing if they all put in their papers.
When you dump on officers and paint a broad picture that is really only a few bad apples, this is what you get.
I have zero sympathy for that city right now.