Seattle’s Alternative to Police

With a murder rate comparable to Chicago and twice as much property crime, life in many parts of Seattle is far from safe.  But the defund-the-police movement is still strong in Seattle which is currently implementing “policing alternatives,” including having “crisis responders” rather than police respond to 911 calls, as reported by Lindsay Kornick of Fox News.  Seattle City Councilwoman Lisa Hebold who spearheaded the program announced last Friday that she is “really, really happy to report that the city is hiring for the six positions for its first pilot alternate response team. It’s going to be a way for 911 operators to dispatch calls to somebody other than police, somebody other than fire, a crisis responder who is unarmed.”

When dispatchers receive a 911 call involving a person in a “behavioral health crisis” a mental health professional will be the first responder.  Councilwoman Hebold voted to defund the police in August 2020, and also publicly supported legislation that would eliminate consequences for misdemeanors committed by drug addicts, the homeless and people with mental health problems.  Not surprisingly, that same year she made a 911 call summoning the police after a man through a rock through her living room window.   Everyone knows that progressives pursuing righteous causes are allowed to be hypocrites.

It is likely that many of the 911 calls regarding someone in a “behavioral health crisis” will be domestic violence incidents.  These are among the most dangerous calls police officers make.  A recent CNN story cited FBI data indicating that “an average of 4,194 officer assaults occur annually from domestic violence calls. Between 1980 and 2006, a total of 113,236 officer assaults occurred at these calls and 160 officers died as a result of these assaults.”

Seattle is spending an initial $1.6 million to kick off it’s “911 Dual Dispatch/Alternate Crisis Response” program.  Let’s hope that the city provides exceptional health care benefits to the unarmed mental health professionals participating in this experiment.