It's been almost a year since we got the scoop on the city's Drug Market Initiative, which focused police resources and community involvement to clean up the open-air drug sales in the area around 23rd & Union. Dealers were identified, cases were built against them, and they were given a choice: get help and stop dealing, or go to jail for a long time. More than a dozen dealers took them up on their offer and left the streets.

For about six months afterwards the comments from community members were glowing. Residents could walk to the post office without wading through crowds of users and dealers. Nearby streets that were once occupied at all hours were suddenly quiet. 

But things began to take a turn last month, where residents at the East Precinct Crime Prevention Coalition meeting reported seeing an increase in activity around 24th & Union. And based on reports from tonight's EPCPC meeting, the situation has only worsened since then.

A resident on Spring Street near 24th said that traffic is way up on that... (more)

It's a little ironic that on the night we were hearing about the success of the Drug Market Initiative, police were conducting another undercover buy/bust operation at 23rd & Union. Our friend Jonah at SeattleCrime.com says five more were taken off the street throughout the East Precinct:

We're told that police arrested five men and women during undercover buy/bust operations—purchasing narcotics from dealers and then arresting them, just like it sounds—at 23rd and Union, 12th and Jefferson, and Broadway and E John Street. Police also recovered 7.3 grams of crack cocaine.

SPD wasn't immediately able to provide much info about the arrests, but we know police arrested at least one person at 23rd and Union.

And in interesting out-of-the-neighborhood news, Jonah has a big scoop that the double murder in Northgate last month is believed by police to be an inside job.

Assistant Chief Paul McDonagh came to last night's East Precinct Crime Prevention Coalition meeting with hard data that shows a reduction in criminal activity since the Drug Market Initiative took sixteen drug dealers off the streets last August.

For the area around 23rd from Union to Jackson, arrests are down 22% and narcotics calls handled by police are down 38%.

In August sixteen dealers attended a "Call In" where they were given a choice: shape up and stop dealing, or face hard time for multiple strong narcotics cases that were assembled against them. Most of those sixteen individuals have stayed out of trouble since:

• Nine have accepted services for treatment, education, or other tools to help them lead a clean life
• Two are refusing services but have not re-offended
• One has been out of contact and not seen in the area
• Five have re-offended and four of those are currently in custody

The main focus of the program was around 23rd & Union, and neighbors near there confirm the success. One resident... (more)

There's been a lot of good reporting about the individual failures in the Drug Market Initiative, where so far seven of the original eighteen people have been arrested on drug offenses as part of the city's new program to clean up the open-air drug market along 23rd Avenue in the Central District. The program was designed to offer low-level drug users a choice: accept help and clean up, or else face serious jail time.

This morning I sat down with Kay Godefroy, Executive Director of the Seattle Neighborhood Group, to get the details on how the other program participants are doing. Her non-profit group is in charge of the social service side of the DMI program, hooking up program participants with whatever help they need to stay out of the drug business.

Overall, eleven participants are still in the program and have avoided further issues with law enforcement. Here's how they break out:

• Two are currently in drug treatment to work on addiction issues that they previously supported through drug dealing
• One...

Jonah at The Stranger has been all over the outcomes of the participants in the Drug Market Initiative, reporting today that the seventh of eighteen original low-level drug dealers has been picked up and now faces prosecution:

Another participant in the city's Drug Market Initiative (DMI)—an effort aimed at eliminating the open-air drug market along the 23rd Avenue Corridor in the Central District—has failed out of the program.

King County prosecutors have filed drug possession charges against Terrance Lee Jenkins, 51, after, police records say, he was caught carrying several crack rocks and a wad of cash late last month.

As we exclusively reported back in June, the DMI program is designed to give non-violent drug dealers a choice: accept help and clean up, or else face serious jail time. 

This seventh prosecution follows two who didn't show up for the call-in meeting, one who was picked up shortly after the program began, and three others that were reported last week by Jonah.

City deputy... (more)

It was a solid consensus among community members at tonight's East Precinct Crime Prevention Coalition meeting: the city's Drug Market Initiative seems to be making a difference at 23rd & Union.

As we exclusively reported back in June, the program is designed to take drug dealers off the street with a deal: work with the community to turn around and stop pushing drugs, or else face the full brunt of the law. 

The intersection at 23rd & Union has had long-term problems, and over that time a lot of the residents in the area have become the most frequent attendees of the precinct's monthly crime meeting. Each of them commented tonight that there's been a major transformation in the last several weeks, with fewer drug deals, less loitering, and overall a safer feeling in the area.

For example, two neighbors said that they're now able to walk to the post office and back and feel completely safe.  Another said that the improvement has spread up the hill to 21st and Union, describing it as having... (more)

Back in June we gave you the exclusive news of a new program that aimed to give low-level, non-violent drug dealers a choice: use the community's help to clean up and stop dealing, or face the full force of the law for their activity.

That program got underway last week when eighteen dealers were invited to a meeting at Langston Hughes and given that choice. Now three of the eighteen are facing drug charges for failing to live up to their end of the bargain. 

Gerald Allen Cowles, 39, attended the intervention meeting last week and agreed to suspend his drug sales activity. However, he was picked up again the next evening with a crack pipe and is now being prosecuted for his original offence, which stems from two controlled buys that were observed by police on May 13th. First, at 5:50pm, he allegedly sold $40 of crack cocaine to a witness who was cooperating with police. The transaction occurred in the witness's car after Cowles and an un-indicted female accomplice retrieved the drugs from an apartment... (more)

Madam C.J. Walker
Originally uploaded by that_ms_kgb

The Seattle Police Department's new approach to dealing with drug dealers was formally rolled out this week. Central District News told you the program was coming back in June:

Last night SPD Capt. Paul McDonagh and Deputy Prosecutor Tienney Milnor started to collect community feedback on a different approach that has seen success in a few other cities around the country. It would take people picked up for low-level drug dealing and give them a choice: stop dealing and work with the community to clean up your act, or else have the book thrown at you for your offences.

The program's first focus area will be 23rd from Madison to Jackson:

The Seattle Team selected the 23rd Avenue Corridor, located in the city’s Central District, for the initiative’s pilot area because of residential and business communities  ongoing concerns and requests for action; supporting SPD data; both the Seattle Police’s East Precinct Commander and the City Attorney East Precinct Liaison believed the project fit with the communities desire to  try a new approach;  the area contains many active community members, business, and social services providers who could be partners in the effort; and the area had all the attributes needed to best replicate the successes in North Carolina.

The program got started Thursday night with a session involving 16 suspected area drug dealers. CDNews, which has covered the development of the program extensively, was invited to take part in the community meeting but was unable to attend. The Seattle Times reports:

The Thursday night gathering at the Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center was an invitation-only event, where uniformed officers checked names at the door and a who's who of Seattle's criminal justice system sat alongside the dealers' families, friends and fellow community members. For an hour, a parade of speakers took the stage to encourage the dealers to take the first-of-its-kind deal to ever be offered in the state. The "candidates," as they are called, were told to listen without comment or question.

When the hour was up, everyone filed out except for the dealers and their "people of significance" — a parent, a friend, a spouse — who were asked to stay and ask questions of the neighborhood service providers who were there to help them change the trajectory of their lives.

"I've already bought drugs from you. These binders, these are the cases I've got on you," Capt. Paul McDonagh, commander of the Seattle Police Department's East Precinct, told the men and women seated before him. "We're not playing. You have to stop today. ... And if you don't stop, we will stop you and you will go to prison."

Despite McDonagh's tough talk, SeattlePI.com put another spin on the meeting, headlining its report on the night "Prosecutor to suspected drug dealers: Stop selling and we'll let you walk away."

Other headlines from around the city:

• Seattle drug dealers given one shot to clean up
• Drug War Ceasefire Comes to Seattle
• City Unveils Drug Diversion Program
• Seattle police round up drug dealers and release them

Finally, here's the full announcement from SPD about the new program:

Last month the city and the Seattle Neighborhood Group teamed up to distribute 1,800 surveys to a random sample of households in the Central District, with a goal of gauging people's perception of crime in the neighborhood. City leaders shared the preliminary results of the survey at the dual meeting of the East Precinct Crime Prevention Coalition and African American Advisory Council earlier tonight, showing that street drug use and drug dealing top the list of people's concerns, even higher than violent crimes and burglaries.

The surveys were designed to provide a baseline of neighborhood sentiment as part of the new Drug Market Initiative that is being spearheaded by SPD Captain Paul McDonagh and deputy prosecutor Tienny Milnor. They've been out gathering neighborhood support for the plan that would provide constructive alternatives for low-level street dealers who are picked up, using a combination of social services and community involvement to get them off the street and on a more productive path in life.... (more)

Police and prosecutors say they've seen it over and over again: low-level drug dealers are picked up, sent through a year of legal process, and are released back out onto the street where they quickly get back into their old routine. And like a tube of toothpaste, police enforcement and focus on one area only temporarily pushes the problem and the players over to a different part of the neighborhood.

Last night SPD Capt. Paul McDonagh and Deputy Prosecutor Tienney Milnor started to collect community feedback on a different approach that has seen success in a few other cities around the country. It would take people picked up for low-level drug dealing and give them a choice: stop dealing and work with the community to clean up your act, or else have the book thrown at you for your offences.

A key feature of the new program is the "call-in", an initial meeting between the offender, the offender's family, law enforcement, and community members. Law enforcement would let the offender know that they have a solid... (more)