The City Council voted 6-3 today to approve final legislation on crowd management guidelines for the Seattle Police Department (SPD). The updated guidelines include several amendments intended to provide additional oversight and accountability, including checks on the use of blast balls.

“The crowd management guidelines we passed today strike an important balance of giving our police officers flexibility to keep people in large gatherings safe, while also adding in clearly defined accountability measures,” said Public Safety Committee Chair Bob Kettle (District 7). “I want to thank the Mayor’s Office and Seattle Police Department for their work in aligning the legislation with best practices so we can end the consent decree. I also want to thank all those that reached out to us on this bill and especially our accountability partners.”

“Today’s passage of new crowd management guidelines for Seattle police is another major achievement for this Council,” said Council President Sara Nelson (Position 9). “Public safety is our top priority, and we continue to deliver. With the end of the federal consent decree in sight, it’s important we continue to lay the groundwork for the Police Department to play its key role in building a safer Seattle for everyone, while holding officers accountable.”

Background

The City of Seattle currently has no specific regulations governing the use of less lethal weapons for crowd control in the Seattle Municipal Code. In 2020, the City Council passed an ordinance banning less lethal weapons, however, the ban was overturned by a federal court overseeing the city’s consent decree and an interim crowd control policy has been in place.

Seattle’s consent decree has been in place since 2012. It’s an agreement between the Department of Justice and SPD providing oversight on a number of mandated reforms.

Additional background is available in the agenda packet materials.

What’s next

Once adopted and signed by the mayor, the new SPD policy will be submitted to the federal court overseeing the city’s consent decree. If consistent with best practices, Seattle will have the ability to file a motion to end the consent decree.

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