King County Executive Dow Constantine recent battle with Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison over incarceration of criminals is the latest proof that the 15-year incumbent is stubbornly holding onto failed progressive public safety and homelessness policies, which many now blame for making conditions worse.

Constantine appears stuck in 2020 as he continues to advocate combatting the drug crises with ineffective “harm reduction” programs, promote expensive “housing first” measures as the best method to reduce the number of homeless individuals, and seeks to reduce the number of people who are incarcerated for committing crimes. Yet many people, including some Democrats, point to the data to assert that these measures have been a public policy debacle and have brought considerable hardship to thousands of county residents.

Four years ago this summer, militant activists rioted in Seattle, setting fire to the East Police Precinct and illegally took over portions of the city. They demanded radical changes to our justice system and how we approach drugs and homelessness.

Instead of condemning the political violence committed by these extremists, Executive Constantine joined other Left-leaning local and state politicians who each quickly caved into the protestors’ extreme demands and quickly passed anti-police legislation, made it more difficult to remove large encampments, and reduced sentencing for criminal activity.

The results were skyrocketing crime rates (especially homicides and car thefts) and the homeless problem became even worse, increasing another 39.4% in four years (from 11,751 in 2020 to 16,385 this year) and a record number of people dying on our streets. Many of these people are also among the record number of people dying from a drug overdose.

Failure brings change

Because of these failures, many people became more skeptical of the policies Constantine has supported. His harm reduction drug policies took a blow last year when King County cities (including Seattle) reinstated drug possession laws which allow law enforcement to arrest and charge those carrying illegal substances such as heroin, methamphetamines, and fentanyl.

In 2023 Seattle voters demanded a change as seven of the current nine Seattle City Councilmembers did not vote on reckless 2021 anti-police measures. New Seattle Councilmember Rob Saka spoke for many of his colleagues when he recently stated, “The public safety challenges that we are facing today are a shameful legacy of the defund the police movement.”

At the state level, voters fought back against the anti-police measures passed in 2021 by restoring the police’s ability to pursuit suspected criminals through passage (with the approval of the legislature) of I-2113.

Constantine’s housing first policies have come under attack from such fellow Democrats as Burien Mayor Kevin Schilling who stated that Executive Constantine was “an obstacle” and that he was funding homeless policies which did not work. And while the county executive remains a strong supporter of the troubled King County Regional Homelessness Authority, the City of Seattle has reduced its funding, saying the money could better be spent elsewhere.

While support for progressive policies is rapidly decreasing, Constantine has stepped into controversy to support them.

During his State of the County speech last month, Constantine ignored the reality that is evident to nearly everyone when he said, “One widely held belief is that behavioral health issues, like untreated mental health or substance use disorders, are root causes of the homelessness crisis that we’re seeing around us. That is wrong.” He went on to assert that the homelessness problem was the result of a “housing market failure.” 

Evidently Constantine’s current soft-on-criminals strategy is to reduce the space available to incarcerate suspected criminals (besides reducing space to incarcerate suspected criminals, Constantine is also seeking to completely close the juvenile detention center)

Last week, Constantine’s refusal to increase the number of beds the City of Seattle can place suspected criminals in the King County’s downtown jails caused a riff with Seattle officials.  The county reduced the number from 200 down to 80 at the start of the pandemic and has never returned to pre-Covid numbers, citing staffing problems. This has hampered Seattle City Attorney Ann Davison’s ability to keep repeat offenders off the streets.

Instead of working with the city attorney to come up with a solution, Constantine’s staff chose to attack Davison’s office and blamed city lawyers’ inability to convince judges to give them exceptions to the county’s bed limits.  This fight is taking place as Constantine is aggressively seeking to close the county’s juvenile detention center and instead place most suspected teen criminals in homes across the county.

On public safety and homelessness issues, Executive Constantine has lagged behind nearly everyone else who has seen the data and realized that his policies were not delivering any improvements – in fact things have become far worse.

Sadly, while Constantine stays committed to these failed policies, many people will needlessly suffer as homelessness, drug overdoses, and crimes continue to increase.