With SeaTac Police Chief’s recent presentation to City Council on crime statistics for the City, City Manager Carl Cole discusses the nature of crime.
Cole is a subject matter expert on crime because he served the City from 2016 to 2019 as Police Chief. His experience comes from over 27 years working for the King County
Sheriff’s Office. While some crimes, like those against people, increased slightly during the second quarter, property crimes were down. The ebb and flow of crime in the area
make it hard to pinpoint a root cause. Nevertheless, City police continues to work on crime prevention.
“You don’t have to live your life scared,” Cole said. “Most crime is preventable.”
Some crime is down, why?
Cole emphasized that there are a lot of theories about why crime increases and decreases but that some of it can be linked to economic factors. Between inflation and lingering
effects of the pandemic, there are several possibilities as to why crime has increased in some areas.
“Every pandemic since the bubonic plague has shown an increase in crime shortly after,” Cole said. “That might be a component.”
Cole also highlighted that recent SeaTac police emphasis patrols have likely had an impact on crime as well.
Why do emphasis patrols?
An emphasis patrol means that police are patrolling more frequently looking for specific infractions. These can be done for speeding, human trafficking and most other crimes.
“An emphasis patrol is about slowing down crime,” Cole said. “They work for a period of time.”
Is there more crime in South King County?
“We know that crime is higher in low-income areas, but that doesn’t mean low- income people are criminals,” Cole said. “South King County has more people in lower income
brackets and crime is often centralized geographically into small areas.”
Cole also said that the community in South King County, which has a large immigrant population, some of whom left countries where it is common to mistrust government authority
including police. This could lead to an underreporting of crime.
“As a City, we are working to break down barriers between government and the community” he said. “So we hired a community engagement officer in hopes of building that trust. We
have to find a way to connect with hard-to-reach communities.”
What can residents to help prevent crime?
Cole said that people should focus their efforts on getting to know their neighbors and neighborhoods and to install alarm systems and cameras if possible. People should be aware
of their surroundings and what seems out of place.
Original source can be found here.
