Seattle City Council

Question 1

Public Safety: The DSA’s core mission is to create a healthy, vibrant downtown for all. Do you support recent downtown safety measures including increased police patrols, expanding the CARE department, implementing Stay Out of Drug Areas (SODA), and contracting for new jail space.? What further steps would you take to improve safety downtown?
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Adonis Ducksworth

As a City Councilmember, I will be committed to achieving better outcomes for District 2 and Seattle as a whole. I support and want to improve staffing for SPD and Care Team professionals by developing a recruitment plan to hire the next generation of accountable, representative, law enforcement and crisis intervention specialists. True public safety requires collaboration between law enforcement and the communities they serve, so fostering a local recruitment plan that hires people from the community they intend to serve will go a long way to improving collaboration and making our streets safer.

On the City Council, I will approach the drug crisis by doing what I can to partner with local, state, and federal allies to reduce access to fentanyl and opioids into our communities and providing rehabilitation centers for those who have fallen into substance abuse. I will also increase investments in mental health and substance abuse recovery programs and locations so people can start to recover and get reconnected with their loved ones. A prevention and rehabilitation strategy will help keep our communities intact and prevent senseless jailings that fill prisons and fail to solve the real problems at hand.

Beyond these policies, I am the most dedicated candidate when it comes to ending gun violence and creating safer public transportation. I will partner and scale up funding for proven gun violence prevention and restorative justice advocates. I will continue the work I do today to build safer routes to schools, playgrounds, and parks. I want to create a connected community in Seattle, where our roads, public transportation, and public spaces feel safe to move around and play in for all people.

Alexis Mercedes Rinck

We need urgent and effective interventions that improve safety and assist people in crisis. This includes additional resources for the CARE Team, LEAD, and other proven programs that navigate vulnerable neighbors off the street and into a safe and restorative environment where they can be cared for. We also must ensure downtown police patrols are engaged in the proactive work of investigating organized crime, international drug and retail theft rings, and sex traffickers.

With respect to SODA zones, I want to both acknowledge the legitimate concerns and frustrations of downtown residents, workers, and business owners with respect to street level drug use, and also express concern that drawing a line on a map will not address the root causes of the crisis. We need greater emphasis on interventions– which is another reason I want to see more investment in programs that help people recover, and not simply removing people into carceral or other settings that create a revolving door without harm mitigation and recovery pathways.

It’s not enough to respond to crime, but also to prevent it from happening. Gun violence prevention is a focus for my office, and that’s why I’m endorsed by Moms Demand Action and The Alliance for Gun Responsibility because they trust my approach to gun violence prevention. During this year’s state legislative session, I lobbied for Permit to Purchase legislation that would help keep guns out of the hands of people who want to cause harm.

Above all, we need to be open to strategies to realize real change in our Downtown core. At the same time, we need to assign the metrics and accountability goals to measure success and make sure limited resources are being properly deployed. As a councilmember, I will demand transparency to make sure we have a data-driven and urgent response to deliver public safety and public health improvements Downtown.

Dionne Foster

I believe we need to make downtown a safe and thriving community for the people who work, live, and visit.

I’ve joined the CARE team for a ride-along and visit to the dispatch center to witness first-hand how our alternative response system is working. I believe that we need to continue investing in and expanding the CARE team so they can work efficiently and effectively supporting people in crisis and helping connect people with services and treatment.

I’ve spoken with many small business owners, workers and residents about their legitimate concerns and experiences with public safety and I believe we need to continue working diligently towards meaningful and lasting solutions including prevention, enforcement, treatment and diversion. I’m deeply concerned the SODA zones do not address the challenges and crises people are facing and early data supports this concern.

On City Council I will be a voice for evidence-based strategies including on-demand treatment services to ensure we are delivering meaningful results for all of our residents. I will also champion the expansion of LEAD, Co-LEAD and other strategies including ensuring that we successfully implement community referral into LEAD.

Sara Nelson

Yes, I either sponsored, co-sponsored, or supported each of these solutions for a safer downtown. When I ran for City Council four years ago, downtown was suffering the effects of years of failed policies – encampments covered large swaths of sidewalk, public drug use was ubiquitous, crime and overdoses were skyrocketing, and disorder reigned – and reversing the impacts of those policies has been my top priority since taking office.

Under my leadership, this Council passed a record number of public safety-related bills in 2024 including two that address criminal activity that’s particularly acute downtown. Although it’s been reported that Seattle Police Department (SPD) officers aren’t making many SODA arrests, outreach workers and West Precinct Capt. Brown report that it has had an immediate positive impact. And, spurred by the Belltown Hellcat and violence at illegal street races, Council reclassified the offense as a reckless driving gross misdemeanor.

As a result of Council’s public safety agenda, 9-1-1 response times have improved by 10%, major retailers and business associations have reported double-digit decreases in theft incidents since 2022, and along the Third Avenue and the Pike/Pine corridor, we’ve seen a 27% decrease in violent crime, a 14% decrease in emergency service calls, and a 30% decrease in emergency medical responses compared to 2023.

Moving forward, I’ll be holding the Executive accountable for implementing the recommendations of two recent audit reports presented in my committee, one on concentrations of overdose and crime, the other on steps the City should take to reduce gun violence. Additionally, I’ll be pursuing new ways to break the cycle of addiction that is fueling crime in hot spots like Third and Pike/Pine. Together with court alternatives and expanded addiction treatment, we can help reduce the number of people relying on theft and experiencing crisis in our streets.

Question 3

Investing in Downtown’s Revitalization: Given downtown’s importance to the city’s overall health, what actions will you take to support its continued revitalization—including efforts to fill vacant storefronts, boost street-level activity, and support small businesses?
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Adonis Ducksworth

Downtown is the heart of our economic vitality and civic identity. It houses our sports teams, Pike Place Market, and the Seattle Waterfront that are all keystones of our city. Revitalizing downtown Seattle starts with supporting small businesses, assisting people experiencing homelessness off the streets into temporary shelters and then permanent housing, and refilling vacancies.

I look forward to working with DSA, OED, and other partners to develop and implement policies to improve the health of downtown, and our goals of revitalization.

Alexis Mercedes Rinck

A great city is partially defined by the experiences of people who live and visit our venues, neighborhoods and cultural institutions. Seattle can and must remain a place where entrepreneurs can pursue their dreams, artists and musicians can create the next wave of Seattle’s cultural identity, and our waterfront, museums, theaters, concert venues, and stadiums draw in millions to experience our city and people.

Downtown is the vibrant arts and commercial core of all of Western Washington, and city government needs to be a partner in making it a great place to live, work, and play. This means continued public activations in the summer months in Downtown’s marquee open spaces like Westlake, Occidental, and, soon, the Waterfront Parks. It also means taking greater advantage in the winter of inspiring indoor gathering spaces where the City has public benefit agreements, like Benaroya Hall, the Cinerama, and the Convention Center.

To empower Seattle, I will work to expand city partnerships with small businesses– especially startups by women, BIPOC and LGBTQ+ entrepreneurs– throughout the City to lower barriers and costs to creating jobs and opportunities. We must protect music and nightlife venues throughout the city to maintain accessible, affordable, and culturally diverse music and performance opportunities for artists and fans alike.

We can also continue to promote the recently completed waterfront park and pedestrian/biking improvements, connecting this incredible redeveloped asset to downtown and other cultural institutions.We need a booster who spends time Downtown, enjoys Downtown, and will encourage others to come Downtown. We can all acknowledge that Downtown has problems, but we should never exaggerate those problems to create a loop that discourages investment, tourism, and new residents in the city center. Fundamentally, Downtown is a gathering place, and a gathering place requires people.

Dionne Foster

I am a strong supporter of downtown– the small businesses and restaurants that make it vibrant and diverse, the employers that bring revenue and jobs to our city, and the residents that make this a dense and dynamic urban neighborhood. These are all aspects of Seattle that must be cared for and not taken for granted.

On City Council I will work with all downtown stakeholders to continue working toward common ground solutions including but certainly not limited to:
Small business supports– from reducing costs to improving safety and peace of mind;
Transit and Transportation improvements- to help facilitate travel to and from downtown, as well as within the core of the city, with a focus on transit access, “last mile” solutions, and improved wayfinding.

Destination promotion and support– to bring more people into our downtown for sports, arts and culture, waterfront events, conventions, and other opportunities to show off our downtown and bring resources into our city. I believe as downtown continues to recover it is critical that City Council continue to visibly champion all that the diversity of downtown has to offer for our region and I’m excited to be an ambassador and champion on council.

Livability for residents- including continued emphasis on housing for all income levels, services that help people in crisis, investment in parks and green spaces, partnerships with SPS and childcare providers to make downtown more family friendly.

Public safety– discussed above and elsewhere in this questionnaire

Sara Nelson

Downtown’s revitalization depends first and foremost on improving public safety for workers, visitors, and residents. I’ve described some of the actions I’ve taken on that front and I will continue my efforts toward a safer downtown through place-based policing, especially along Third Avenue.

In addition, I championed Seattle Restored and the Business Community Ownership Fund to help boost small and storefront businesses. I strongly supported the Third Avenue rezone and the design review exemption to jump-start housing construction downtown and I advanced my Music Venue Parking Permit program to attract musicians and customers to downtown music venues like the Triple Door and Crocodile. I look forward to adopting legislation before us now that will make graffiti vandalism a civil infraction enforced through a $1,000 fine to better deter this downtown blight.

Going forward, I’m focused on fixing our broken permitting system which will go a long way in helping existing businesses grow and thrive and make Seattle more attractive to new businesses. I will soon introduce a package of legislation requiring that permits be issued in 60, 100, or 120 days, depending on the type of project; exempt interior renovations from SDCI permit review; and allow architects to self-certify code compliance.

On June 26th I hosted a roundtable discussion on brick-and-mortar retail in the downtown core with City Attorney Davison and representatives of Nordstrom, Pacific Place, DSA, Downtown Works, and the Washington Retailers Association to learn how the City can better support that sector and I will follow up on their recommendations.

Here’s the thing: we have a brand-new Summit Convention Center and Waterfront Park so city leaders must be all-hands-on-deck to nurture, through policies and funding, the revitalization of downtown sandwiched in between. I’m open to other initiatives DSA has on deck.

Question 5

Top Voter Concerns: What do you believe are the top three issues on voters’ minds right now, and how would you propose addressing them?
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Adonis Ducksworth

I believe that the biggest concerns for Seattle, and specifically District 2 voters, are advancing housing affordability and ending homelessness, improving public safety, and improving the reliability and safety of our city’s transportation.

To advance housing affordability, I will implement the Comprehensive Plan to equitably expand different types of housing in Southeast Seattle, advance anti-displacement policies to protect our diverse communities and maintain generational wealth opportunities, scale up services to provide unhoused people with safe temporary and then permanent shelter, and correct the historical injustices to marginalized communities in Southeast Seattle caused by zoning policies by working with organizations to support homeownership for marginalized people and improve infrastructure and community spaces.

For public safety, I will fund community-based organizations that work with victims of gun violence to help restore a sense of belonging and safety within the community. I will focus police recruitment on hiring people directly from the community, whose close ties will increase the care and safety of the community. For our kids, I plan to partner with gun violence prevention advocates to build programs that keep youth away from crime and will scale up safer routes to schools, playgrounds, and parks. Lastly, I will work to provide small businesses with protection from crime so they can stay open.

For transportation reliability, I plan to prioritize and invest the 2024 Transportation Levy dollars in improving the safety for cars, pedestrians, and bikers on two of Seattle’s most dangerous roads: Martin Luther King Jr Way S and Rainier Avenue S. I want to speed up construction on sidewalk and road projects so that transit, both private and public, can move swiftly. I plan on working with the Transportation Levy dollars to make our buses, light rails, and other public transportation infrastructure more consistent, faster, and safer for all riders

Alexis Mercedes Rinck

#1: Affordability is rapidly approaching a crisis level in Seattle. Nobody should have to work two or more jobs to afford a studio or one-bedroom apartment, but housing scarcity and restrictive zoning and development policies have made high-rents the new normal. I hope to help shape Seattle’s Comprehensive Plan to make room for people of all income levels to find an affordable place to live in our city and access home ownership opportunities to build generational wealth. This will require not only bold leadership in planning, but reforms in permitting, stronger public/private partnerships, and greater coordination with the state to make it easier to build, utilize sustainable building materials, and support for affordable housing incentives.

#2: We need to honestly confront our public safety challenges and demand evidence-based approaches that are tracked by identified metrics. We need to reduce 911 response times by increasing the size of Seattle’s new CARE Department and increase the independence of their responders. Investing in alternative responders will free up the police to respond to calls only they can respond to while providing responsive care to public health-related calls for service.

#3: Safeguarding our city from the most harmful impacts from the Trump Administration. In times of national strife, Seattle must stand as a beacon of hope and resilience. As we confront a MAGA regime determined to attack our rights and protect the wealthy at the expense of working people, I spearheaded the city’s fight against this fascist power grab creating and chairing a new council committee focused on combatting federal policy changes. Further, I have partnered with the Mayor on a tax proposal that would serve to backfill federal funding to ensure more people can remain housed and fed.

Dionne Foster

Affordability – Based on the many conversations I have had with neighbors and business owners, I know that affordability is the top priority. Seniors are struggling to afford to age in place, young families are being priced out, and employers are sharing that their employees are having to come in from far distances because they can’t afford to live and work in Seattle. On Council I will work to get the most out of our Comprehensive Plan to shape affordability in our city for the decades to come. I will also protect dedicated affordable housing funds, pursue Transit-Oriented Development, and enact zoning reforms that expand housing options for all income levels.

Homelessness – We need to do more to help our unhoused neighbors get permanent housing and shelter. On Council I will prioritize getting people indoors by working to invest in treatment on demand, permanent supportive housing, and emergency shelter solutions like tiny homes.

Safety – We need to make real progress on making Seattle a safe and liveable city for all residents. On Council I will advocate for smart workforce development policies that attract and retain the officers we need while advancing our 30×30 goals to increase women’s representation in law enforcement. I’m excited to work to support making SPD a department that more closely reflects the communities it serves. Lastly as someone who has had to call SPD for emergent and non-emergent calls I believe we must continue to focus on shortening response times and efficiently deploying our crisis response to free-up SPD resources.

Sara Nelson

1. HOMELESSNESS: We need more shelter/transitional housing even if it comes at the expense of permanent supportive housing which takes much longer to produce and often lacks sufficient wrap-around services to help people get back on their feet or into addiction treatment. We must also: a) expand access to comprehensive, on-demand treatment and require outreach workers to strongly encourage those struggling with addiction to seek it, especially after overdosing, b) dedicate a percentage of funding to sober housing, c) exert greater oversight of all homelessness service provider contracts. I pushed for greater King County Regional Homelessness Authority accountability through reorganizing its governance structure and if it doesn’t deliver better results soon, it’s incumbent upon us to reevaluate its utility.

2. PUBLIC SAFETY: To improve public safety, officers should be deployed in a targeted manner at. I support more proactive policing and doubling down on public drug use and drug dealing. The expanded CARE team should be focused on getting people in crisis connected with behavioral health resources, including treatment. As a result of policies I’ve supported, 86 percent of people now say that they feel safe walking Downtown during the day, 25 points higher than before these policies were passed. We’re turning a corner, and we must keep up our momentum on public safety.

3. HOUSING AFFORDABILITY: We’ve made historic investments in affordable housing but we’ll never be able to subsidize our way out of our housing affordability challenges. We must also make housing easier and cheaper to build by improving permitting and removing unnecessary regulatory barriers and zone for more housing capacity. I’m proud of my initiative to allow up to 990 units in the Stadium District, 50% of which will be affordable and, in general, I support the One Seattle Plan.