Downtown Seattle Association hires private security guards amid police staffing issues
SEATTLE WA Feb 4, 2022 – In response to rising crime and other safety issues, a downtown Seattle group has hired private security guards to do the work police officers aren’t able to do amid SPD’s staffing crisis. Those guards will help protect Third Avenue between Stewart and Union streets, according to the Downtown Seattle Association.
Businesses and locals are claiming this extra security is needed along that stretch of downtown that’s overrun by the homeless and drugs.
“Tourists, don’t go there. Don’t walk on Third Avenue. It’s not safe,” Victrola Coffee Manager Alexa Baehr stated. She’s urging people to stay away from the same street where she manages the coffee business. “There was a shooting [nearby] a couple weeks ago.”
“These people are going into the businesses and stealing from them and police hardly ever come around,” Teri Marble from Seattle told KOMO News as she walked near 3rd Ave and Pine St.
To help, the DSA is paying unarmed guards from the private security firm Iron and Oak, who have a focus on de-escalation. DSA has been contracting for security patrols for years around the parks they manage, like Westlake Park and Occidental Square. But in an emailed statement, the group says the Iron and Oak patrols are new because they’re” filling the gaps in shifts because of SPD staffing issues.”
Locals have noticed what they’re calling a dwindling police presence.
“Things have just gone to Hell between the riots, COVID, the shortage. It’s all just kind of come together to create this vacuum that enables all of this,” Ian Henry of Seattle stated.
DSA says it paid about $314,000 in the last fiscal year for private security, and about $250,000 to Seattle Police to work overtime there. The group is expecting to dish out even more this year, already doubling the number of private guards from two to four with patrols seven days a week.
Baehr says the extra presence from Oak and Iron is needed to help prevent property crime or to keep the homeless from harassing her customers but says more needs to be done to help this area.
“I don’t think security is going to deter gun violence or drug use,” Baehr said.
As KOMO has reported, Seattle police lost a few hundred officers since 2020. It has since filled some of those spots, and the city’s budget allows for SPD to hire 125 officers this year.
KOMO
