On tomorrow’s City Council Introduction and Referral Calendar is a resolution sponsored by Councilmember Kshama Sawant, which modifies Mayor Durkan’s executive order authorizing hiring bonuses for SPD officers and 911 dispatchers. The resolution guts the authorization for SPD officers, while leaving intact hiring bonuses for 911 dispatchers.
The Mayor’s original executive order contains parallel provisions for SPD officers and 911 dispatchers:
A. The Seattle Community Safety and Communication Center may offer dispatch candidates a hiring incentive of up to $25,000, depending on experience level, to be paid after beginning employment with The City of Seattle.
i. Incentives provided to lateral dispatch hires shall not exceed $25,000 per hire.
ii. Incentives provided to new recruit hires shall be provided one time and shall not exceed $10,000 per hire.
iii. If an employee who has received this incentive leaves the department, that person may not receive an incentive to return.
iv. Half of the hiring incentive will be paid in the first paycheck and the second half upon completion of any probationary period established by law.
B. The Seattle Police Department may offer police officer candidates a hiring incentive of up to $25,000, depending on experience and training level, to be paid after beginning employment with The City of Seattle.
i. Incentives provided to lateral police officer hires shall not exceed $25,000 per hire.
ii. Incentives provided to new recruit hires shall be provided one time and shall not exceed $10,000 per hire.
iii. If an employee who has received this incentive leaves the department, that person may not receive an incentive to return.
iv. Half of the hiring incentive will be paid in the first appropriate paycheck (e.g., after completion of the academy or lateral equivalent) and the second half upon completion of any probationary period established by law.
Sawant’s modified version removes paragraph B, keeping only the authorization for hiring bonuses for 911 dispatchers.
Strangely, the Summary and Fiscal Note inaccurately describes the resolution’s effect, saying that it authorizes hiring bonuses for both SPD and 911 dispatchers (or if perhaps that was meant to describe the Mayor’s executive order, which is not “legislation,” then the Summary and Fiscal Note doesn’t provide any description of Sawant’s resolution):
The legislation would authorize the Mayor to use unexpended fund balance from salary savings in the Seattle Police Department (SPD) and the Seattle Community Safety and Communication Center (SCSCC) to offer hiring incentives for new police officers and dispatchers. Fund balance is fungible General Fund that may otherwise be expended or carried forward into 2022 for other eligible uses.
Sawant’s modified version of the Mayor’s executive order reads like a quick-and-dirty edit without much forethought; it leaves intact a set of recitations in direct conflict with the order itself, most notably:
WHEREAS, The City of Seattle recognizes the need to hire additional 911 dispatchers and police officers responsibly and quickly to meet community expectations;
Sawant probably doesn’t want to approve an executive order that recognizes the need to hire additional police officers; that flies in the face of everything she has said and done for the past year and a half.
It is yet to be seen how the other Councilmembers will respond to Sawant’s proposed rewrite; last month they asked tough questions about Durkan’s budget proposal for $1.09 million for SPD officer hiring bonuses in 2022, and proposed either cutting the fund sentirely or redirecting them into a hiring bonus program for all city departments. This will be an interesting test of whether last week’s elections, in which a majority of voters seemed to send a strong message in opposition to defunding the police, had an impact on the sitting Councilmembers. Further, allowing a hiring bonus program just for 911 dispatchers would still undermine the Councilmembers’ argument that such a program should apply equally to all departments, and would make it more difficult to justify denying one to address SPD’s staffing crisis.
Ordinances may not be voted on the same day they are introduced by the Council, but resolutions may be. Currently Sawant’s resolution is not on the agenda for Monday afternoon, but Sawant may try to “walk it on” to the Council’s agenda at the meeting. However, she would need a majority of the Councilmembers — four more of her colleagues — to do so.
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