-We are at a critical juncture for our city.
-What does it look like to have social equity
through social policy?
-Retired King County Judge Cathy Moore
and social equity consultant ChrisTiana ObeySumner
beat out eight other candidates
for a chance to replace Debora Juarez
on the Seattle City Council.
-Nice to meet you. I'm ChrisTiana.
-A renter, ObeySumner says
housing is a top priority for District 5,
which stretches from Northgate to Lake City
and Greenwood to Bitter Lake.
-My name is Cathy Moore.
-A recent homeowner, Moore left the bench
to advocate for social change
in a city undergoing many changes.
Will D5 voters favor a longtime judge
or a small business owner?
-It is not humane, nor is it safe
to have people living in tents on our streets.
-The candidates debate.
-What I do oppose is sweeps.
-The race to represent North Seattle in District 5,
next on "City Inside/Out."
♪♪
Welcome to this edition of "City Inside/Out."
I'm your host, Brian Callanan.
The battle for the Seattle City Council's District 5 seat
yielded 10 primary candidates, more than any other district.
Former Judge Cathy Moore
and social equity consultant ChrisTiana ObeySumner
emerged as the top choices
to replace council president Debora Juarez,
who decided not to run for a third term.
The two candidates have very different backgrounds
and different stances on issues like public safety,
homelessness, and more.
This week, our focus is on North Seattle
and the race for D5.
-My name is Cathy Moore.
-Former Superior Court Judge Cathy Moore...
-I'm ChrisTiana.
-...and ChrisTiana ObeySumner, a social equity consultant,
are the lead contenders
for Seattle City Council District 5,
from Northgate to Lake City and Greenwood to Bitter Lake.
-I'm not a new face to City Hall.
-We are at a critical juncture.
-Moore led a 10-person D5 primary
with 31% of the vote,
and says she has a lot to offer the district
after three decades in public service.
-I would really like an opportunity
to take everything that I know and have experienced
and work upstream and proactively.
-ObeySumner earned 24% of the primary vote
and says in running their own consulting business,
they're well aligned with D5's working families.
-I have to work 40 hours a week in addition to campaigning.
There's a need to both have that knowledge of policy
and how to do this job,
and a wisdom of lived experience.
-That experience for ObeySumner
includes a career as a small business owner
and burlesque performer,
overcoming a life of chronic illness.
-I'd be the first openly autistic City Council member
in the country. -The former co-chair
of the Seattle Disabilities Commission
and Renters' Commission says housing is their top priority.
-It speaks to the economic justice issue,
the transit levy, even down to the contract
with the Seattle Police Department.
Everything, in a lot of ways,
has this sort of interconnectedness
through housing.
-Moore has chaired the Seattle Human Rights Commission
and has served as Seattle's interim city clerk.
-So, I have directly worked at getting legislation passed.
-She says public safety is the top priority
for her district and the entire city.
And while Moore supports 911 alternatives...
-I want to make sure that we actually get
those programs up and running.
-...she's calling for increased police hiring, too.
-So, right now, we don't have enough police
to actually adequately respond to priority-one calls.
-With District 5 incumbent Debora Juarez
deciding not to run again,
it's a longtime public servant
up against a social justice advocate,
with some different ideas on what it means to replace her.
-I would like to very much continue in her path
of being a strong and effective advocate.
-A natural part of life
that is important for progress is change.
-Well, here we are with the candidates for District 5,
Cathy Moore and ChrisTiana ObeySumner.
Thank you both for being here. Let's get started here.
We had a coin flip before the show.
And Cathy, you'll be speaking first in opening statement
of why you're running.
One minute, please. -Great.
Well, thank you very much for having me here today, Brian.
My name is Cathy Moore, and I'm running for Seattle City Council
for District 5.
I'm a lifelong Seattleite,
former King County Superior Court judge,
former Seattle city clerk, former public defender.
I'm a small business owner.
I am a community volunteer,
and I'm the mother of three Seattle Public School graduates.
I have made public service my life's work.
I have spent the last three decades in our community,
in the frontlines,
trying to improve people's lives and broken systems,
and I want to bring that lifetime of relevant experience
to the job of creating a city that works for all of us.
And to that end, my priorities in this race
are the priorities of my district,
which are public safety, homelessness, and affordability.
And I look forward to discussing that further today.
-And we definitely will do that.
ChrisTiana, if you wouldn't mind,
an opening statement. Please keep it to a minute.
-Thank you so much again for having me, as well.
I am running for Seattle City Council District 5
because I have worked in this city
for the last 13-plus years,
and I've done that in so many different ways --
as a case manager, direct social service worker,
co-chair of the Seattle Disabilities
and Renters' Commission,
and as a policy advocacy and social equity consultant.
What's really exciting is that I have been asked to run
about every two years for the last six
since I ran for the transparency seat in 2017,
and I am happy to amplify the toolkit
and the successes I've had,
and I know we'll be getting into more details about that.
So, I just want to give that little teaser.
-Okay. I want to expand, if I could, on your backgrounds.
You've both mentioned them to me.
I know in talking in the field and in our setup here, too,
you have some different stories to tell.
And, Cathy, could you expand on that a little bit?
A parent, a judge, an interim city clerk,
and why you think that experience is important
to bring to the City Council?
-Sure. Well, I mean,
a lot of what the City Council is dealing with right now
is the intersection between the criminal legal system,
the behavioral health system, and the social service system.
So, certainly as a public defender representing families
in the child welfare system,
representing individuals in the behavioral health system,
and individuals in the criminal legal system.
And then, as a judge, seeing -- working in all those systems,
making decisions that affected people's lives
and those decisions,
I have both the professional experience
of being an advocate for individuals,
but also the professional experience
of seeing what the unintended consequences can be of laws,
but also being in a position of having to uphold the law
and make decisions that affect people's daily lives
in very profound ways.
As the Seattle City Clerk,
my job was to oversee a staff of 30,
a budget of ¢3 million,
to make sure that the record of the council
was properly maintained,
to work with all nine council members, which I did,
in an effort to get
a reclassification ordinance passed,
which greatly increased the salaries
for everybody who was in that office.
And then as a parent, I also understand
the struggles of trying to raise children
in a somewhat -- not somewhat -- a very inexpensive city --
a very expensive city -- excuse me --
trying to find appropriate child care while also working
and just struggling to make ends meet day to day.
-Okay. Thank you for that.
ChrisTiana, I want to talk to you about this, as well.
You talked to us about this out in the field,
your background as a social equity consultant,
a housing coordinator,
a person with multiple disabilities,
a burlesque performer, too.
Talk to us about your life experiences,
how they've shaped you into being possibly
a Seattle City Council member.
-Yes, so, I grew up in a family that was very civically engaged.
Especially if one of those disabilities
is being autistic and being born in the early-mid '80s,
I was not given the benefit
of the Americans with Disabilities Act
going through public school.
And so, my mom really taught me about disability justice
and fighting for policy change
and fighting for what truly is equitable,
at the end of the day.
Before that was even something that I knew about,
that carried me when I came here to Seattle.
Of course, there has been a lifetime as a youth leader
before I came here to be able to do that work.
And through that, as soon as I hit the campus
and being able to advocate for changes,
amplify the needs of our communities,
especially when Seattle U is thinking
about banning same-sex marriages in St. Ignatius.
Having that go towards the work at DESC,
being a member of SEIU 1199
and talking about racialized ableism in the workplace,
that leading to epiphanies of equity,
working with over 250 businesses,
governments, and organizations across the country,
but concentrated here, and being one of those people
who are always called back-of-house,
policy strategists, policy theorists.
How do you put this in place?
How do you make this go?
What is actually going to lead to success
and effective success?
That's what I've been called.
And so, all of that lived experience
both that knowledge and that wisdom comes into it.
-ChrisTiana, I want to stick with you,
and let's talk about public safety.
So, this summer, the Seattle Police Department
put out a report that showed the time that it took officers
to respond to crimes in the North Precinct,
which includes District 5,
was longer than any other precinct --
the worst in the city.
Priority-one calls, like robberies or shots fired,
took more than nine minutes to get a response.
The SPD aims for seven or less on those calls.
What do you make of those numbers?
Does Seattle need to hire more officers?
Tell us about your plans
to improve public safety in District 5.
-Yeah, I think it's absolutely terrible
because I really -- if I'm having, for myself,
a priority-one call,
I really want a police officer to show up.
What I have seen, however,
is because there have been these growing issues
that we've experienced, as well as growing concerns,
we've relied on the police a lot.
Not only has the community sort of been saying this,
but the police have been saying this,
that they are working out of purview,
they're working out of scope,
and that there's so much that we're asking them to do.
So, in a lot of ways, when I talk about,
let's see what those areas and services are
that are out of purview and scope
and reallocate that to existing community services,
alternative community services
to priority, you know, three, four calls, right?
Co-responder, perhaps.
And priority three, priority two.
And then police directly in priority one.
That's actually out of respect for police.
When I read the Police Enforcement
Research Foundation's report,
they said the number-one reason
for the issue of recruitment and retention for police --
so, going all the way back to 2016 --
was wellness and burnout.
So, we want to make sure that we have police
until we can increase that recruitment.
And that's really what I think is going to increase
our community safety, at the end of the day.
-Thank you. Cathy, some thoughts about this?
Maybe about what your opponent is saying?
Your approach to public safety might be a little different
in terms of hiring officers, etc.
What have we got? -Right.
So, I'm the only candidate in this race
that has consistently said from the beginning
that we need to hire more police officers.
We need to hire at least 300 to 400 additional officers,
because we are not in a position where they are able to respond
to priority-one calls in a timely manner.
I would note that my opponent told Real Change
that they supported cutting the police budget.
They also said that they supported that we needed
to reassess our over-reliance on police and the police model.
They have also supported the position,
which was with the solidarity budget
that was put forth in 2020,
with the defund movement.
And the purpose of that budget was
to reallocate funding out of the police department
into what we're seeing now with the care department.
While that's certainly a valid approach,
the ultimate goal
is to completely defund the police budget
and have only money for non-armed responders.
The problem with that is that
we are always going to need armed response.
And also, the problem is that
while it's incredibly important to amply fund
this alternative co-responder model,
by doing so, we are not going to lessen the police need
to be able to respond to priority-one calls.
They are not overburdened because they are responding
to priority-three or -four calls.
They are overburdened because they don't have enough staff
to respond to the actual violence
that is happening in our community,
and the only way to resolve that
is to increase the police numbers.
-Yeah. ChrisTiana, please.
-Yeah, I just want to say, to clarify a couple of things,
number one, we have --
the city of Seattle in 2019 actually proctored a study
that showed that, depending on who you ask --
even Chief Diaz spoke on it --
between 40 and 60% of the calls at SPD
don't actually have to be responded to by SPD.
The second thing I think is really important
is when I talk about reallocating the resources,
or really reallocating the purview,
it's not for the defund.
I will say that if we're just slashing the budget by 50%,
but we don't have a plan in place, you know,
yes, it's going to give money to the communities,
but that's not necessarily going to address
this issue of community safety directly.
When I talk about reallocating purview,
I would be looking at the average cost of the services
when they respond to those services,
and it would be from that estimate
that we would look at the average cost of them
responding to those services
for priority-three, priority four calls
that would be reallocated.
It wouldn't be a hack-slash.
And finally, when I talk about
having a community-responder model
or having a reimagining of police,
I talk about the county I grew up in,
which is Camden County, New Jersey,
which was considered the murder capital of the world.
They did completely overhaul their police department
and had a decrease of 70% in homicides and crimes,
to the point that as municipal police,
they had more police at the end of the day
than they did when they were originally
in the police department.
So, as long as we are working
towards the police having wellness,
that they're able to focus on the calls
that we need them to focus on,
and if we have the ability to do something different
and transformative, why not?
-Okay, Cathy, a quick rejoinder, if you could.
-So, I think if you look at the Camden police model,
you'll see that they, as ChrisTiana has just noted,
they actually doubled their police department.
They restarted over. They didn't eliminate police.
They now have twice as many police officers.
They are in the community.
They're doing, you know,
barbecues and outreach to the community,
which certainly we should be doing in our community.
But they're also heavily reliant on surveillance.
They're basically doing soft policing.
There are a lot of concerns about enhanced surveillance
as a way of policing people.
Additionally, I think the record is clear
that my opponent stated to Real Change
they supported cutting the police budget,
and reallocation
is basically a repackaging of the defund philosophy.
-Here's another issue that I think might draw
some differences here.
I want to talk about the issue of public drug use,
drug possession.
There was a drawn-out battle over this.
As you know, the City Council
passed a measure this fall allowing the city attorney
to prosecute these cases as gross misdemeanors.
The mayor says he wants to lead with treatment and diversion.
Resources, of course, there are limited, as always.
Cathy, I just wanted to ask you this.
Did the city get this right?
-I hope so. I mean, I think that ultimately
that was the intent of this legislation
was to make sure that we have an additional tool in our tool belt
to deal with the incredible fentanyl epidemic
and methamphetamine epidemic
that we're seeing on our streets.
So, the one thing that I think is important about this bill
is that at every juncture, the instruction is
to pursue diversion into treatment.
And so, that is incredibly important
that the council makes sure that there is sufficient funding
to create a treatment infrastructure.
And one of my criticisms of the current council
is that they had two years or longer
to actually create such treatment infrastructure,
and they did not do so.
They did not go down to Olympia
and advocate for an additional part of the pie,
which they could have done.
So, and I want to point out that in a recent study
that just came out recently,
you know, 81% of people surveyed believed
that the council's hands-off approach
to the public drug use
has actually been contributing to the exponential explosion
in street crime and just basic public misery.
And so, it is something that we need to deal with.
It's also important to keep a close eye
on what the the racial enforcement stats are.
And I was really pleased to see
that there are very robust reporting --
data collection and reporting requirements
in the bill that was passed.
It's important that we keep the city attorney coming
and talking to the council about that.
-Thank you. ChrisTiana,
I think you might have a different tack on this
when it comes to public drug use.
Can you break that down for us, please?
-Yeah, I think what's really important is,
you know, we talked before this that my background
is in social psychology and community mental health, right?
Although I didn't take the sitting exam,
I took all the classes. -Got it.
-And so what's really important to me, right,
is that if we truly want the community safety element,
we want to make sure that we're not just seeing public drug use,
but we're actually putting in solutions
that are going to help folks get treatment.
We have to use what works.
And so, with this current public drug use bill,
what I saw was a letter
that was signed by dozens of psychiatrists,
therapists, social workers, that was like,
"This is not the way, but there is a way."
And there are international models
of overdose prevention centers. There are...
You know, making sure also that we have staff
to actually run these programs.
-You don't support the arresting model,
it sounds like, when it comes to public drug use.
-We know that carceral beds cost
at least twice as much as anything else.
And we also know that the King County Jail
has one of the nation's highest suicide rates.
And we know that the jail model, it's hit or miss.
This is you know, we've already went through the war on drugs.
I remember as a case manager, taking my clients to ITA court,
you know, mental health court, and in some cases, that worked.
But if there was more of a human-centered,
peer-led, and empirically proven model
that's actually going to get folks in the door,
that's what really I would be going for.
-Got it. Cathy, quickly, a rejoinder, you have?
-Yeah, so my rejoinder is that
as a King County Superior Court judge,
I often had people come before me who had committed crimes
because of an underlying addiction.
We were given an opportunity
to sentence people to alternative treatments,
and those alternative treatments were drug treatment.
So, it was a mandatory participation
through the carceral system in drug treatment.
Those programs were, in fact, very effective.
I have had people come back to me and say,
"But for being put through the criminal justice system
and being mandated to do treatment, I would be dead."
So, I think we have to stop this narrative
that there's only one way to deal with this.
Anybody whose life has been affected by drug use
knows that intervention is required,
and there are various approaches to intervention.
And the last thing that I will say
is that my opponent supports supervised consumption sites
as the alternative to putting people into treatment.
-I want to make sure that you get a chance
to respond to that, please. -Yes.
You know, one of the things that's really important here
is that if we are talking about someone who, say, is arrested
because they committed a crime,
burglary, something like that, that's getting, you know,
that's different than someone who is outside
and they're using,
and then we make it a misdemeanor,
and then they are arrested for drug use
without any sort of crime of impact on other folks.
That overdose prevention site
is internationally and empirically proven direction.
But the thing is, it's not about just that.
There's nothing about my platform or my policy proposals
that's "You have to be this" or "You have to be that."
It's about what the multiple pathways
towards shared goals look like.
And so, if there is someone who, say, has been caught,
you know, in a robbery, who's for, you know,
also using drugs and through that system,
we also have a pathway
that's actually going to lead to effective progress,
does not continue to traumatize,
actually doesn't have high levels of recidivism.
Great. But until then, we need to make sure
that we have alternative pathways
for folks who need help right now,
and that overdose prevention center
provides a space for folks to go
so they aren't outside using the drugs.
-Briefly, if you could. -Right.
So, that is the model that Portugal has used.
Portugal has recently really backtracked on that
because it has been ineffective, and it is not --
the problem with the supervised consumption sites
is that people continue to use -- this is documented --
they continue to use rather than getting into treatment.
The goal is to get people into treatment and recovered.
-I would love to try to move on to another topic
if I could, here with you,
and ChrisTiana, I'll start with you.
Your platform talks about helping people
who are homeless in the short term and long term,
especially reaching out to the most vulnerable.
So, short term --
I talked with Council President Juarez not too long about this.
She's not running again for a D5 seat.
She put out a study this summer that showed D5
only has about 8% of the city's total tiny house village units.
There is a plan to add a village in Maple Leaf
by the end of this year in D5.
I guess I wanted to ask it this way.
Does D5 need more tiny house villages?
Maybe tell us about that and other plans you have
to deal with homelessness if you're elected.
-Yes, I was really excited
to go to an event at Nickelsville
where they were showing an eco village model,
and it was so cool to see that they had solar panels.
That was really, you know -- they had rainwater collection,
they had gardens, and it was a beautiful moment
to be able to really speak to that group
and for them to say in that meeting
that Nickelsville was a preferred sort of alternative
to being outside on the street.
I don't know if you've ever spent time in a shelter,
whether it's volunteering, working, or otherwise.
There's a reason why folks don't want to go to the shelter,
and it's not because they don't want housing,
it's because they also want to be safe.
And especially since the staff is overworked and overburdened,
we need to make sure that we have those
alternative solutions.
We have seen an increase
not only in unhoused folks in District 5,
but also a diversity of people in District 5.
More permanent supportive housing, which is great.
Being able to have multiple types of housing
for multiple stages of life
and being able to have growth opportunities,
that's what I believe can be healing and transformative,
so that we can have a neighborhood
where we're all interconnected in a community.
-Thank you. Some thoughts about homelessness, Cathy?
Maybe about what ChrisTiana is saying
or your plans, as well.
Tiny house villages,
other options for dealing with this crisis.
-So, absolutely.
So, I think we have to start from the point
that we say it is not humane, nor is it safe
to have people living in tents on our streets.
So, my opponent's position is that people should be allowed
to live in tents on the street
until affordable, permanent housing
becomes available to them.
I do not support that.
I support moving people from tents into shelter.
There are many ways that we need to improve our shelter capacity.
We need to improve the barriers
that keep people from wanting to utilize shelter,
such as not being able to bring pets or be with their partners.
We need to make shelter access available 24/7.
Right now, you can't get into shelter on a Saturday or Sunday.
You need a social service referral.
People ought to be able to show up on their own to the shelter.
So, there are many ways that we can improve that.
I would say that I would look
at the Auburn Director of Anti-Homelessness' approach
who said, "For homelessness, per se,
we need to be more proactive.
We need to consolidate our outreach,
expand our shelter options,
stop the pipeline, and provide essential services
to people in the shelters themselves.
-Thank you. I'd like to give you
about 30-plus seconds to respond to that, please.
-Sure. I just want to clarify,
I don't think anyone needs to be outside at all.
I'm formerly unhoused,
and that has been everything from literally
in the middle of a doorway to a car to a shelter.
That's completely inhumane.
What I do oppose is sweeps, especially winter sweeps,
because it's just sort of moving folks from street to street.
But I really take to heart what was said at Nickelsville,
that if we were to have more of those sort of spaces,
and if that is the alternative, the preferred alternative
for folks who are currently outside on tents,
then that's what we should do
until that housing or that shelter becomes involved.
Yes, we need more shelter beds. Yes, we need more housing.
Yes, we need to make sure that the social housing PD
is fully funded for folks
who are not able to go through the other pipelines,
but no one should be outside.
-We need to start wrapping up here.
And Cathy, I'm sorry we are out of time.
I wanted to make sure I talked about this.
Your campaigns raised about $92,000 as of mid-October.
Tell us about your top three endorsements,
what you think voters should draw from that.
I can give you about 45 seconds.
-Okay. My top endorsements are Mayor Harrell, MLK Labor,
and also personally important to me, as well,
is Everytown for gun safety.
I think that those endorsements demonstrate
that I have a broad base of support
from established, respected,
elected leadership to organized labor
to gun safety advocates
who recognize that I am going to be thoughtful,
evidence-based, and utilize an approach of good governance
that's going to make the city work for everyone.
-Thank you very much. ChrisTiana,
your campaign's raised about $104,000 as of mid-October.
Here, your top three endorsements,
a final call to voters. 45 seconds, please.
-Yes, I have the sole endorsement of both the 36th,
the 46th Legislative Democrats
as well as King County Democrats.
I have been endorsed by Noel Frame,
Rebecca Saldaña, Chipalo Street, Girmay Zahilay,
and also have the endorsement of the bus drivers and operators
at ATU as well as UAW
in solidarity with their fight right now.
The thing that's really important
about my fundraising numbers is that
everything except for $3,000 has came from community.
We have nearly doubled the individual donors
that anyone has had.
And you know, it's really because of
the Democracy Voucher Program I've been able to do that.
So, my call to voters is,
I want to say just really quickly
that I think it's really important
for our new city council to be folks who are focused
on the goals of how we move forward.
And throughout this interview or this debate,
I think what's really important is that,
you know, there's different sort of approaches.
But if you see,
my focus is not about what Cathy does
or does not believe or does or does not do.
My focus is on the policy and how we help people.
And so, that's who I would be if elected.
-Fair enough. Thank you both for your input here,
and we will be right back.
What are people saying on social media about the two candidates
for Seattle City Council District 5?
One person writes...
Another person comments...
We'd like to know what you think.
Send us an e-mail contact@seattlechannel.org,
or find us on social media.
Coming up next week,
first term Council Member Dan Strauss
faces challenger Pete Hanning,
executive director of the Fremont Chamber,
in the race to represent Ballard, Green Lake, Fremont,
and West Magnolia on the Seattle City Council.
The District 6 debate on the next "City Inside/Out."
I hope you join us.
♪♪