Seattle, WA
Seattle mayor breaks silence on KTTH exclusive, calls homelessness authority ‘one tool of many’
Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell is probably seeking to cut back funds to the King County Regional Homelessness Authority, the impartial company that started in 2021 to centralize the county’s homelessness response.
Mayor Harrell signaled in latest weeks his curiosity in transferring funds away from the KCRHA, even because it asks the county and the town of Seattle for a further $90 million on prime of its base funds of $208.4 million.
“I didn’t set these things up,” Mayor Harrell stated of the KCRHA in a speech in entrance of Seattle Law enforcement officials, in line with KTTH’s Jason Rantz.
Rantz: Seattle mayor privately blasts homelessness teams, ‘inexperienced’ council
“I get one vote out of 9, and so they criticize my elimination efforts,” Harrell stated. “So I’m funding a corporation that appears to be working towards what I’m making an attempt to do.”
“So now we’re seeking to revisiting that as a result of my public security technique that I’m funding … they criticize that,” Harrell continued. “So why would I then, as mayor, make investments $118 million into a bunch that’s actually working towards me? That’s the hand that I’ve dealt.”
Harrell delivered these feedback behind closed doorways. Wednesday, the mayor had the chance to contextualize that assertion in entrance of the general public in a information convention he delivered to announce extra funding for the Seattle Parks and Recreation Division.
“Sure,” Harrell stated when requested whether or not he would suggest a funds lower to the KCRHA within the coming weeks.
“We’ll current our funds in a couple of weeks … you will note our clear recognition of numerous the good work they’re doing … However let me say this. That’s one instrument of many,” he continued.
The pinnacle of the KCRHA is Marc Dones, with whom the mayor has clashed in latest months as Harrell pushed for encampment removals in the course of July’s warmth wave.
“(The Regional Homelessness Authority) doesn’t assist displacement,” the authority’s communications director Anne Martens wrote to the Seattle Occasions in response to the elimination of a SoDo encampment.
“It’s a startup group,” Harrell stated Wednesday, replying again to the KCRHA.
“They’re owed the chance to succeed, to have measurable outcomes. However the conversations I had privately, after I met with Marc Dones and King County Government Dow Constantine, to speak about our expectations … I really feel very optimistic. I’m very optimistic. However I’m not going to take a look at any of the work we’re doing within the metropolis by rose-colored glasses. I can’t try this.”
The Metropolis of Seattle is more likely to face a funds shortfall of as much as $140 million yearly over the subsequent 4 years, in line with the Seattle Metropolis Council’s funds committee. Towards that backdrop, the council and the mayor will deliberate how and the place to make funds cuts, probably introduced within the coming months with Harrell’s 2023 funds.
Editor’s word: A spokesperson for the mayor’s workplace wrote to MyNorthwest, saying “the mayor was merely acknowledging the query together with his ‘sure’, not indicating that he’s searching for to scale back funding.”