Tacoma Pays $3 Million to the 3 Cops who Killed Manuel Ellis
Seattle News:
First off, I have a new piece in The Urbanist all about what to look for in the new SPOG contract we’re expecting to see sometime this year. New information about the Executive’s bargaining priorities was recently made public in a report from the Court Monitor, and I discuss that as well as explaining the various accountability provisions that are currently missing from the contract and referencing other considerations to take into account when analyzing and understanding the contract.
We now know the new CM members of the Labor Relations Policy Committee: CMs Nelson, Rivera, Kettle, Moore, and Strauss. These CMs will be able to potentially set new bargaining parameters with SPOG. If they decide to set new parameters that are more favorable to SPOG, this could expedite the negotiation process and cause us to see a new potential contract sooner. More favorable parameters could include increased compensation of various kinds and/or decreased accountability measures.
Meanwhile, the process to select the vacant CM seat on the City Council continues. The Council selected 8 finalists on Friday. The leading contender is Tanya Woo, who ran for the D2 seat in the most recent election. Insiders were saying at one point she had six of the eight votes for the seat.
However, Vivan Song, a current member of the Seattle School Board, was selected by CM Strauss and is also in the running. She was just endorsed by the MLK Labor Council.
Business interests and the Mayor’s Office seem to be aligning behind Tanya Woo. As Publicola reported, Tim Ceis, an insider at City Hall, emailed supporters of the independent expenditure campaigns that funded the moderate slate that had so much election success last November, telling them that said election success entitles them to a say about the vacant seat, saying, “I don’t believe all of you worked so hard and gave so much to let unions and the left decide who gets this seat.”
Much speculation abounds about who will run for the seat this November. You can read more analysis on the current politics at play here.
A public forum for the 8 candidates will be held on Thursday, January 18 from 5:30-7:30pm at City Hall and also streaming on the Seattle Channel. The City Council chose the Seattle CityClub to host the event, passing over the Transit Riders Union. The final vote on the appointment will be on Tuesday, January 23.
January 23 is also the anniversary of the death of Jaahnavi Kandula. The King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office has still not publicly stated whether they will be filing criminal charges against the officer who hit and killed Kandula with his vehicle. The complaint against Daniel Auderer, the SPOG vice president and SPD officer who was recorded laughing about Kandula’s death, is also still pending.
PROTEC-17, which has over 2,700 members in the City of Seattle, has reached a tentative agreement with the City that will cover 2023-2026. They will receive a 5% cost of living adjustment (COLA) for 2023, a 4.5% COLA for 2024, and for 2025 and 2026 they’ll receive a COLA tied to the local consumer price index between 2-4%.
Tacoma News:
The news broke this week that in an internal Tacoma Police Department (TPD) investigation, the three Tacoma police officers involved in the killing of Manuel Ellis were cleared of violating rules and using excessive force, with the exception of one officer failing to be courteous. The officers will be paid $500k each to leave their employment with TPD voluntarily. They were also paid a cumulative $1.5 million in pay (and accrued a lot of vacation days to boot) while being on leave since June 2020. This means they each received around $1 million for the last three and a half years while doing no work. And because they were cleared of violating any rules, they could theoretically be hired elsewhere as police officers.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office is opening a federal review of the legal case against the three officers. As The Seattle Times reports: “It’s not clear from the U.S. attorney’s limited statement about the review whether it will be confined to the actions of the three officers, or more broadly examine the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department’s initial investigation of Ellis’ death, or possibly the court case.”
At the Tacoma City Council meeting on Tuesday evening, councilmembers discussed a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with the Tacoma Police Union Local #6. Wages are being increased 6.5% in 2024, 7% in 2025, and in 2026 they will be increased 100% of the local consumer price index to fall between 1-5%, with an additional guarantee of remaining the current first place ranking in the market.
The Body Worn Camera (BWC) and In-Car Video policy is being removed from the CBA and placed in the police manual. Language has been removed from the CBA that required the City to delay compelled statements until after criminal investigations and charges are complete.
One of the most interesting changes is that officers charged with crimes that, if sustained, would cause them to lose their commission, will be placed on an investigative suspension without pay. This includes felonies, gross misdemeanor domestic violence charges, or an offense with sexual motivation.
Advocates are criticizing the new CBA, saying it doesn’t contain anything having to do with police oversight or conditions for firing police.
WA State News:
The state legislative session continues!
You can watch the hearing for SHB 1045, the bill to establish a basic income pilot program, here. Its companion bill, SB 6196, has been introduced in the Senate, and a hearing is expected sometime around the end of the month.
You can sign in PRO for SB 5975, a bill that would allow the Housing Trust Fund to provide loans and grants to social housing. The deadline is 9:30am on Friday, 1/19.
You can sign in PRO for HB 2065, a bill that would make last year’s legislation to cease using juvenile points in sentencing retroactive.
Three accountability bills are currently moving through the House:
HB 1445 would give the attorney general the right to investigate and sue law enforcement departments for systemic discriminatory practices.
HB 1579 would establish an independent prosecutor for pursuing police misconduct cases who is free from the conflict of interest inherent for County Prosecutors, who work closely with law enforcement.
HB 2027 would close a loophole to make sure all law enforcement personnel are subject to the same certification, background checks, and training requirements.
Five gun control laws are currently being discussed in session. You can read more about each of the five proposed bills in the second half of this newsletter.
The Washington Observer also discusses HB 1479 at length, which deals with student confinement and isolation. I highly recommend reading this piece to learn more about this issue.