270 votes
Fund and Hire More Police
The streets where I live (Ballard) and work (U District) are dangerous; every week brings a report of violent cirme. We don't have enough police, haven't hired them in years. We need them.
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Erik
the LAST thing we need are more ego driven, pistol packing, fools.
Clayton Smith
lets work on reducing causes of crime (substance abuse, youth programs, employment, poverty) as we add more police.
Kellan
I read that we are recuiting internationally ($$) and having trouble. Then I read that we send police officers to fight fire in Bellevue. Do we have that many extra cops or not?
Del Mar
We definitely need to fund and hire more officers. But in the mean time, we can make better use of the officers we already have - like less admin positions, more beat patrols; trim the Harbor unit back to just law enforcement and put the extra officers that frees up back in our neighborhoods.
Civicus
Revise crime stats to show the number of various crimes per 1000 citizens in all patrol sectors in the city. Show the REAL picture rather than couching crime rates in politically correct terms. Include police calls in all city parks to show where the problems are.
SPG
There was a story in the Stranger a while ago about how understaffed the SPD is compared to most cities of this size. It's time to stop policing on the cheap and put an end to the nuisance crimes like chronic car prowling and burglary that impact just about all of us.
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/the-very-thin-blue-line/Content?oid=541750
The Raven
Joe, I think the we mostly don't see the police being useful, but they are. Also, an understaffed, overworked police department is much more apt to be hard on citizens, because the work is so frustrating.
Joe Gaugler
I would be up for this if the police we do have were being useful. It seems the thing that they do best is stand around and harass the innocent.
The Raven
It's the whole city, except for the very wealthy neighborhoods.
steveb
Belltown is similar. Deceptive b.c of all the nice restaurants, but darn scary after dark.