What needs to happen for Fortson Square to finally become a safe, welcoming place to be?

On New Year’s Day, two Pioneer Square residents were brutally attacked after confronting drug dealers blocking the entrance to their apartment building adjacent to Fortson Square (2nd Ave + Yesler). Multiple calls to police regarding the drug activity were unanswered, which, unfortunately, is understandable, given that it was New Year’s Eve and — what’s new? There’s always drug deals happening in Fortson Square.

Regardless, what happened in the square that morning, and what basically what happens every single day, is not acceptable. I live next door to where the attack happened, in an apartment building above the Chief Seattle Club (CSC) and the Lazarus Day Center. Although we have never had problems with the CSC, we routinely have problems with the men who utilize the services of the Lazarus Day Center, and the drug dealers who prey on them.

There is a Seattle PI article from three years ago that talked about the very problems caused by the Lazarus Day Center and the men who loiter on the corner of 2nd & Yesler. The sad part is that everything in that article is still true today:

He thought the brand new studio apartment a couple of floors up was a bargain for $900 a month, but it’s no longer worth dodging the drug sellers and buyers outside the front door each time he goes to walk his dog.

“It’s the same people on the same corner every day,” he said, standing inside the building’s glass entry watching drug deals made and crack pipes passed around right outside the window.

And don’t forget about the article in 2006 where Harbor Loft residents put up a banner facing Fortson Square, welcoming people to the local open-air drug market:

A group of residents is meeting with the mayor’s office this week to talk about the issues faced in Fortson Square in particular. They have also set up an internal website to share information and resources with one another and are determined to make a difference. In a letter to the Mayor by one of the residents who was attacked, he stated:

This is not how anyone should have to live and I am sick of being told it is our fault for living in a bad neighborhood! Pioneer Square could be a great neighborhood with vision, leadership and support. There are lots of great people working really hard down here to make this place a wonderful place to live and work, but I don’t think we are getting the support we need from the city. I fear for Pioneer Square as rising unemployment brings more people of need at higher risk into the missions, in a neighborhood already ripe with increasing storefront closures. We could see a larger pool of poor and underemployed people becoming victimized by the drug dealers whom act with impunity on our streets.

We know that the police get it — they’re constantly watching that corner, and even made 27 significant arrests of the most problematic drug dealers. But what more can they do? You take one off the street, and two more pop up in their place.

And now, after years and years of drug dealers on this corner, two residents were actually attacked. Is this what it takes for change to happen? What will it take for other residents to get involved? Or for the Mayor’s office to finally listen?

Although we know it doesn’t solve our problems down here, I think it’s great the efforts from the Seattle police force to continually keep our neighborhood in check. I also love that the SPD blotter included a photo of the drugs and money that they confiscated:

On August 3rd, just before 9:00 PM, members of the West Precinct Anti-Crime Team (ACT) were conducting a narcotics surveillance operation in the area of Pioneer Square.  Two individuals were observed making narcotics transactions during this operation and were arrested.

Both suspects were later booked into the King County Jail for Investigation of VUCSA-Possession with Intent.

They collected a total of 15.7 grams of cocaine and $950 from the two “Drug Traffic Loitering” arrests.

This is a good time to remind everyone that although calling in drug use and sales may not net an immediate arrest, it does show where the biggest problems are, which can help the SPD know where to target.

Last month, the City of Seattle added crime mapping to their “My Neighborhood Map” on seattle.gov.

The “crime types” that are broken out on the map include the following;

• Crimes Against Persons
• Drugs + Vice
• Property Crime/Theft
• Transportation
• Miscellaneous (false alarm, disorderly conduct, treaspassing/loitering, etc)

By clicking on a symbol, you can get information on the date and time of the incident, as well as view the police report.

To read the FAQ’s on the site, such as “why are certain types of crimes not shown,” and the ever important “If a report about me is online, can it be removed,” click here.

The Seattle Times has a great report of a drug sweep that happened yesterday afternoon called “Operation Roll the Rock.” The operation began three months ago when undercover officers began slowly making cases against 27 crack-cocaine dealers that were noted to be frequently in the area.

When I first moved to the neighborhood, I was so naive about drugs and drug use that I had to have our community police officer, Lt. Fowler explain to me how to spot different drugs and how to know if I was watching a drug deal. After living in the neighborhood for almost a year, I can safely say that I know the difference between crack and cocaine and can spot drug deals from almost a block away.

As a resident who lives above one of the most difficult drug streets in Pioneer Square, it got to the point where I was recognizing the same faces selling drugs and smoking crack. They would hide in the entryway to the Chief Seattle Club or right around the corner from the Lazarus, and sometimes in a huddle right in front of our doorway so that we had to ask them to move to even get into our apartment.

We’ve had many conversations with the police about the problem and got to the point where we recognized the voices of the 911 operators. I was invited to attend the operations meeting with the task force for “Operation Roll the Rock” and was impressed at the dedication of the officers in getting a handle on the open air drug problem on 2nd Ave.

One of the things about this operation that I was particularly impressed with is that they decided to do these arrests a little differently than normal. Lt. Mike Kebba of the department’s narcotics section, said that there was an individual on the list that would flip on his dealer every time he was arrested. In return, he’d be right back out on the street, selling, buying, and using again. This time, with the 27 users/dealers identified, they decided not to allow it and to get these guys off of the street.

The city’s press release stated that “the dealers mostly live outside the area and they flock to Pioneer Square to sell and take advantage of those who can’t say no.” While I think that that is often true, I noted that almost half of the targeted individual’s last known addresses were from a few shelters in Pioneer Square. I contacted the police department, who said that after they finish the arrests, that they will get me more information on what neighborhoods these individuals are indeed coming from.

As was mentioned in the Seattle Times report, “there is a concentration of social-service providers in Pioneer Square…[and Lt. Kebba] is offended that dealers prey on people struggling with addictions, throwing temptation in their faces where they’re seeking help.” It is important to make sure that these drug dealers are made as unwelcome as possible, both on the street, and in the shelters.

“With the recent arrest we are trying to make Pioneer Square appear less attractive to drug dealers and users. We are trying to send the message loud and clear that Seattle street corners are not an open market. We have many active investigations and anticipate there will be more arrests”, said Lt. Chris Fowler, West Precinct Operations.

I know that it will change the perception of safety when the loitering on 2nd gets better and when the neighborhood is able to take back the street. Residents comment that they would feel safer if they saw more police presence on the street, but in this example of undercover work and arrests, the actions of the police are actually making the neighborhood safer.

As of last night at 10pm, SPD reported that 15 had already been arrested and that detectives would spend the next day or so rounding up the rest of the individuals on the list. This is a huge win for the police department, and an even bigger win for the neighborhood.

According to the Seattle Police Department, the Pioneer Square “west” neighborhood, which includes everything west of 2nd Avenue Extension (not including my side of the street) is on par with North Lake Union (Fremont/Wallingford) in terms of “major crimes” – 630-1718 total incidents per square mile, and is generally lower than the rest of downtown Seattle, which ranges from 1736-7876 total incidents psm.
Major crimes include Murder, Rape, Assault, Robbery, Burglary, Larceny/Auto theft.

This is due to several factors:

1. Occidental Mall and 1^st Avenue are generally very safe public areas
2. The firehouse and its associated vehicles and activity is a strong deterrent (seen as analogous to a police station)
3. Higher crime sub-area begins on east side of 2^nd Ave Extension (again, my side of the street) and extends into International district area at Jackson St. (from Lazarus then east up Jackson beyond 5^th)
4. Width of 2^nd Avenue Extension — 2^nd Ave is one of the widest 1-way streets in downtown Seattle- keeps people congregating on one side, and focused on east side.

But let’s take a look at how the crime stats have changed from 2008 – 2009.

Pioneer Square’s Urban Village:

Keep in mind as you check out the stats that we want to see the Dispatch numbers (calls from 911) decrease and the OnView numbers (crimes caught directly by police) to increase. Or best case scenario, all of the numbers decrease (meaning not as much crime is even being committed).

I also wish that more people would be arrested and/or harassed for loitering — I believe it’s what leads to a lot of the other crime on 2nd Ave Ext S. Because when there are people standing in groups, it’s easy to target them to sell them drugs, and it’s also easy to stand there to sell drugs and not look as conspicuous.

Or maybe Utilikilts could offer them a killer deal — even if they continue loitering in a group, there’s no way people can be as intimidated when they’ve all got skirts on (sorry guys, but I really haven’t picked on you in a while).

*A key for what is included in different crime categories is listed at the end of this post

Urban Village 5am – 8pm

Urban Village 8pm – 5am

Pioneer Square’s Stadium Area:

Stadium Area 5am – 8pm

Stadium Area 8pm – 5am

Violent crimes includes – Homicide, Robbery, Rape,Sex Offense, Arson, Weapons and Assault
Property crimes includes – Burglary, Theft, Shoplift, Carprowl, Auto Theft, Fraud, Alarm and Property Damage
Civility includes – Trespass, Liquor, Detox, Prostitution, Mental, Assist Public, Premise, Park Exclusion, Warrant and Suspicous Circumstances

I’ve just finished watching Steven Leavitt, the author of Freakonomics, present data at a 2007 TED conference on the finances of drug dealing. The title of his presentation is “Why do crack dealers still live with their moms?”

He worked with someone who had an inside track to not only the relationships between gang members, but also their financial records. The people on the street, aka the “foot soldiers,” made about $3.50/hr. In addition, being in this gang had an annual death rate of 7%. If you stayed in the gang for four years, you had over a 25% of being killed.

In comparison, he jokingly listed the annual death rate of inmates on death row, which is only 2%.

So, why would anyone stand on a street corner dealing drugs when they only make $3.50/hr and have a 25% chance of being killed?

1. They were fooled by history. It used to be that being a member of a gang was a right of passage — the young people controlled the gangs and as they got older, they thought they would drop out of the gang. The young ones became very very wealthy and then assumed that the next generation would take over and get the wealth (just like the internet boom). But what actually happened is that they never passed on any of the wealth and the “foot solders” became stuck at the $3.50/hr.
2. The gang leaders were very good at marketing and trickery. They drove fancy cars, and wore expensive jewelry. What the inside man found out was that they only rented those cars because they couldn’t afford to buy them, and they wore gold plated jewelry instead of actual gold jewelry. So they would trick the young ones to get them involved. For example, they would give a young 14 year old $100 and tell them they could make that selling drugs for them. It wasn’t his money, until he spent it, and then he would be indebted to the gang and become part of a dangerous statistic. (although to be fair, most of the drug dealers/users on our block are no spring chickens)

The last reason that he failed to mention is that often times, they become addicted themselves and keep selling the drugs to have enough money to take care of their own addiction. Down on our corner, that’s definitely the case — some of them are the drug leaders that I can tell don’t use, and the others are obviously using and just dealing “on the side.”

Levitt said that “selling drugs in a gang is possibly the worst job in America.” I think the second worst job just may be the cops that have to continually arrest them and see them out on the streets time and time again. I ran into a cop at the West Precinct the other day who said that he worked the “Pioneer Square beat” for about 7 years but became so burned out, he requested a different location.

So, what’s the solution — Do you take some people’s suggestion and add another day center for them to go to? I would counter that they wouldn’t go even if it were available. Many day centers are (supposed) to ban drug use and selling inside of the center, so why would they go there?

Levitt counters that under an economic principle of Game Theory — that every two person gang has a Nash equilibrium. Applying that principle to a gang member’s world, if you were to go shoot your gun in the air in another gang’s territory, everyone’s going to be too afraid to buy drugs there and they’re going to come to your neighborhood to buy.

One gang member responded that “If we start shooting around there [the other gang's territory], nobody, and I mean you dig it, nobody gonna step on their turf. But we gotta be careful, ’cause they can shoot around here too and then we all f****d.”

Obviously the answer is not for me to go down on the street and start shooting a gun in the air, although I’ve been tempted at five in the morning when the pigeons are having a party on our deck. I know that change takes time, but sometimes I get impatient. I know that Pioneer Square has so much promise and I sincerely enjoy walking around my neighborhood.

For now, I’ll keep calling 911 every evening as I come home, and hold out hope that programs such as 1811 Eastlake will continue to receive funding and that people might learn something from Vancouver’s handling of drug addiction.

p.s. If you haven’t read the book Understanding Addiction, I highly recommend it. It definitely gives more insight to drug use/problems, and as he says “once you understand the what, you will figure out the why.”

Dog  For Sale
Free to good home. Excellent guard dog. Owner cannot afford to feed him anymore, as there are no more drug pushers, thieves, murderers, or molesters left in the neighborhood for him to eat.  Most of them knew Jethro only by his street name, Holy  Shi*

(sigh) If only. Such a nice, easy solution to our problems at Fortson Square.

If you live in P², check out the following polls:

Back in December, I wrote a post to “kick off” discussions about Donovan Rykpema’s presentation to the Mayor’s Pioneer Square Revitalization Committee. It took a little while to break up the clip and transcribe it, but I’m finally ready to go. For those who can’t stream the video on YouTube, here is the link, and if you still can’t watch it, send me a note, and I’ll email you the transcript.

Rypkema talked about four “Forces of Value” – things that push the value of a given commodity. For Pioneer Square, he defined these as Social, Economic, Political, and Physical. He said that “if the purpose of Pioneer Square revitalization is to increase the value, and if the forces of value increase it, or change value, then it makes sense to look at the challenges and priorities in those four forces.”

So let’s get it started with what seems to be the hottest topic for Pioneer Square: Social. This includes social service providers, homeless, drug dealers, and people’s perception of our neighborhood.

Take a look at what Rypkema has to say:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-S2CSi8YOo[/youtube]

One of the statements he made that originally upset me was that “social service providers were here in Pioneer Square long before any other business in Pioneer Square, and they’re not going anywhere.” I used to disagree with that statement, but after my conversation with Bill Hobson, Executive Director of DESC — he agreed that there is a slim to none chance that any will actually leave the neighborhood. So what next?

Here is one of the questions from the Q&A:

“Pioneer Square appears to be unusual in that we have a really high concentration of low income and homeless people in a progressive city, with a complicated history with law enforcement. There is a push/pull.”

• My evaluation is that it’s always in flux – crack down/ease up/tolerate/less tolerance. To try to put the issue resolution or mitigation solely in the hands of the police is the wrong approach – they need to be PART of the solution. Perception and reality are also an issue. Perception magnifies the issues.

Here’s where Rypkema suggests we start:

Rypkema said that “the issue isn’t crime, but a bunch of people hanging around scaring people.” I know that the issue also comes up for how safe women are in our neighborhood — when I’m walking down the street in the evening and there’s a group of people just standing on a corner, that’s when I start to feel a little nervous.

The real difference between this and a neighborhood like Queen Anne is that there are lots of other residents out on the streets that will make you feel more comfortable, even if the group is standing there. What does it take to get more residents to move down here and balance out the social problems? Will Rypkema’s solutions to the “social” problems help?

After attending a lecture on “Understanding Addiction,” many of us left Town Hall wishing that there had been more discussion on what’s happening in Seattle right now regarding “street addiction” and how to face it as a community.

Bill Hobson has been the Executive Director of DESC (which prefers to be known as its acronym over it’s name… just like KFC) for 25 years now, and has been involved in Pioneer Square for over 30 years. He was the founding board member of a few different neighborhood boards and associations and has a real passion for the downtown core of Seattle.

In his experience, Pioneer Square and Belltown have the largest numbers of homeless — Hobson says that his organization is “committed to getting people out of Pioneer Square.” DESC is now located in 6 different Seattle neighborhoods from South Seattle to Belltown, with a new building planned for South Lake Union. “Neighborhoods for the most part are understanding and willing to listen when our clients do something that’s injurious to the neighborhood,” he said. “They just want to hear how DESC is going to fix it when it does happen.”

The favorite child of the “harm reduction approach” in Seattle is 1811 Eastlake, a project that has received extreme positives and negatives in the news (all archived on DESC’s site). Before 1811, drunks would pass out on the street, be taken by ambulance to an ER, treated, and kicked out on the street, only to repeat the cycle again and again. After 1811, the cost to the public was drastically cut, and 1811 has experienced major successes.

Myth: The only way to approach an addiction is abstinence
Hobson gave me a statistic that makes the above statement very difficult. If you take an individual over the age of 45 who has a history 15 years of chronic “street alcoholism” and who has had 6 or more failed attempts of conventional treatment, they have a less than 5% chance of achieving sobriety. It’s important to not lose sight that there’s a small subset that conventional treatment simply does not work for.

Myth: Alcoholics wouldn’t accept housing even if it was offered to them
When this idea began back in 1998, DESC asked the city for a list of 200 names of the most expensive individuals that frequented Harborview Medical Center. They had 75 spots to fill, and only needed to ask 79 to fill the need. Two of the individuals who turned them down simply didn’t believe that they would be able to drink onsite. After vacancies opened up, they changed their minds and moved in. Even social workers who feel that this is a population that doesn’t want to be housed, DESC has proved that you can house anyone, given the right circumstances. Other centers/housing projects will ask an addict to move in, on the condition that they stop drinking or using – and their automatic response to “no” because it’s not something they’re willing or able to do. 1811 allows them to drink in a safe environment, and works to help them reduce and potentially to quit.

DESC’s approach and how they measure “success”
DESC’s approach to drugs and alcohol is as follows: “If you’re using in the privacy of your own room and that’s all you’re doing – we want to treat that as a clinical issue instead of a property management criminal justice issue.” Hobson feels that drug laws are a little over the top and that it should be a public health problem instead of a criminal justice problem, even if it would increase the levels of addiction – at least it was being dealt with in a different manner than criminalizing the addiction.

They also don’t track a “success rate” as far as how many people they get off of the streets – he says that it’s meaningless to do that. Instead, they just continue to provide services and wait for more affordable housing to show up so that they can place people.

1811’s real success
Hobson gave an example of their approach – say someone comes in who is used to drinking a certain amount of hard liquor – they try to take them from hard liquor to 6 beers – then to 6 light beers – then to 4 light beers, and so on. He said he didn’t want to go all mushy on me, but they “let them start to feel life and to think about what life was like when they were healthier.”

The goal for this project was never to save the taxpayers money – but they have. By $4 million. But that’s not the most surprising outcome – Hobson was even surprised that some of the 1811 residents are getting better. In a study of 95 residents over a 24 month period, alcohol consumption was reduced by 30% and even 11% achieved sobriety. Hobson says this says a lot about conventional drug/alcohol treatment and that it challenges the opinion that abstinence is the only way to get over addiction.

Creating more responsible neighbors
One of the items that is included in the lease of any DESC resident is the stipulation that they don’t panhandle in the neighborhood or “piss in a planter box.” (although probably not in that exact language). Hobson says they are strongly encouraged to recognize the fact that it is their neighborhood now and they should take care of it. He is not an advocate of excusing crimes just because they are homeless, an alcoholic, or on drugs. “They should still be held accountable for their behavior, under the influence in particular.”

New project coming to SLU
Hobson is working with the SLU neighborhood to build an 84-unit complex that will target the mentally ill (50-55% will have co-occurring substance abuse problems). He says that South Lake Union has been wonderful to work with – to the point that they have even written letters of support for capital financing options for the new project.

Typically neighborhoods cause major problems when they announce locating a complex in the area. 1811 took 7 years from start to finish because of all of the obstacles they faced. When looking for where to locate a new project, they look for a place that will help stabilize people’s lives – and the best place to do that is a stable neighborhood (aka not Pioneer Square or Belltown).

What can members of the community do?

1. Hobson was very adamant that one of the most important things is to vote for politicians that promise to increase taxes and use a portion of that to create permanent, “supportive” houses. Because the reality is, and Hobson is willing to admit this – having them on the streets degrades the livability of the neighborhood. “Human service advocates don’t want to admit that, and I find it sad that they won’t.
2. They can help by insisting that the community develop proven, responsible responses to this issue.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m sold on the idea and I definitely support more of these centers being built (just not in Pioneer Square. And you can’t get mad at me because Hobson agrees – it’s too concentrated and not stable enough). In the meantime, remember that “once you understand the what, you will figure out the why.”

In the meantime, there are incredible people out there who have already figured out the “how.”

I went to Town Hall last night to listen to bestselling writer and physican Gabor Maté talk about his book “Understanding Addiction.” I said on the “About Us” page that I was basically doing this blog for me — to understand things and people that I don’t already understand. Hopefully I will take some of you along this journey with me.

Maté started his presentation by telling the audience about 2 myths regarding addiction:

1. People have to hit rock bottom. He asked “what is rock bottom? These people have lost their homes, their families, their jobs — you tell me. What is rock bottom?”
2. Drug addiction is a choice. Maybe they made a choice when they first tried drugs, but for many, it is no longer a choice.

He continued by giving an example of individuals with ADHD — If you look at the drugs that physicians prescribe for ADHD, they elevate dopamine levels. His example was of a teenager who smokes marijuana in school; if they have ADHD, they will most likely tell you that they became more focused. He gave this example to show that people use drugs for different reasons, but many use them to self medicate, whether it’s depression, anxiety, or social phobias.

He said that when trying to understand addiction, that “the first question of addiction is not why the addiction, but why the pain.” As someone who works with the severely addicted on skid row in Vancouver, BC, he said that every single addict that he has ever met was abused as a child, whether it was sexual or emotional abuse.

To bring it all home for me, he gave an example of a single mom who wanted to go out every night to party. Her idea of a babysitter for her son (a current addict that Maté works with) was to place him in the dryer with something heavy on top. Every night.

Genes don’t specifically determine if you will become an alcoholic or a drug addict when you grow up. Although there have been studies that show that tendencies towards alcoholism/addictive behaviors are genetic, Maté said that if that child is raised in a nurturing environment, they can handle the genetic predisposition.

For many of these addicts that were abused as children, they experience such dysfunction as they get older. Someone asked him about abused children that have “dead eyes.” He said that if he were to attack an individual in the audience right now, they would have three options — to run, to get help, or to fight back. Children don’t have that option, he said — so their brain protects them by shutting down. In turn, their emotional growth can stop at a very early age.

“Any addict will tell you that the first time they did drugs is the first time they felt normal. Once addicted, however, their pain is magnified by the way society treats them.”

In his opinion, how to approach drug use in our society would not be to legalize drugs necessarily, but instead to offer them to people who “need them” in a supervised setting (compassionate care) and work with the ultimate goal of weaning them off of their addictions. This is what many know as “reducing the harm of addiction.”

Unfortunately, there is proof that brain matter actually shrinks with long term drug use. Using drugs physically changes your brain and there comes a point for many addicts, where they have to keep taking drugs (even minimally) for the rest of their lives. Of course, this isn’t the case for every addict, but this is a common occurrence. And one that Maté is constantly dealing with up in Vancouver.

Once we hit the Q&A session, one woman got up and asked what people can do as individuals to help. Maté responded that if you are a parent, let kids feel your happiness, and not your stress. Also, something that needs to be done is to start helping before the abuse happens. Ask the the question “How can we help the parents?”

Socially, it has to be on an individual level — you can work to support the homeless, work in shelters, provide community support. Help counter the “not in my backyard” attitude (of which I’m guilty of at times). “No matter where you fit in the social game, there’s something you can do.”

He finished up, to resounding applause, by saying “Once you understand the what, you will figure out the why.”

My mind is definitely opened by these ideas — I only wish that there had been more conversation on changes that can be made locally. I have written about 1811 before (a project run by DESC), so I gave the Executive Director Bill Hobson a call. What started as a brief conversation to get his input on Maté’s ideas turned in to an hour long phone call about these very issues in Seattle and how to address them.

Instead of adding commentary in this post, I am going to do a feature on DESC later today. Lots of exciting information and really great viewpoints that individuals should take into account before making up their minds on these issues.