(The Center Square) – Seattle City Councilmember Bob Kettle said Friday that Mayor Katie Wilson has no public safety plan and called on her to take immediate action to deliver results to better protect Seattle residents.
“We have to understand what we are doing on public safety as it relates to the executive. What is the mayor and her team doing?” Kettle said. “How do they respond to a crisis like the shooting at the Bite of Seattle?
Kettle has been extremely critical of Wilson following the Bite of Seattle food festival shooting on July 26 that resulted in three deaths and four persons being injured. Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes resigned after the shooting at Wilson’s request.
Wilson and most of the other nine council members have expressed displeasure with Barnes’ departure.
Kettle said Friday that an independent investigation by Seattle’s Office of Inspector General, which normally has jurisdiction only over police matters, will be broadened to include the mayor’s role in delaying the press conference that was scheduled to brief the public on the shooting.
While the shooting happened at around 6 p.m., the press conference was not held until around five hours later, leaving the public in the dark about information on the shooting.
Kettle said he has had several conversations with Lisa Judge, who heads the Office of Inspector General, and she has assured him that the mayor’s role will be examined.
Kettle and other City Council members have blamed Wilson for the delays. Wilson, for her part, has accepted some responsibility but has refused to provide detailed information pending the OIG review.
The review was ordered by the mayor.
At a separate press conference Friday held to discuss actions to reduce traffic fatalities in Seattle, Wilson insisted she had a public safety plan but did not respond to Kettle’s comments.
“Public Safety is an extremely high priority for our office,” she said, citing the pedestrian safety plan as an example.
She said her office continued to make progress on public safety issues each day, without going into detail.
Wilson also said she was hiring a gun violence coordinator in the coming weeks and that details would be forthcoming.
Wilson was silent Friday on the issue of expanding the city’s surveillance camera program, a topic Kettle has used to attack the mayor for months.
In March, Wilson paused an expansion of the city’s surveillance camera program, citing concerns that federal immigration agents could use the tapes to arrest undocumented Seattle residents.
Kettle has been a strong advocate for the surveillance camera program, which was implemented in 2025 under the administration of former Mayor Bruce Harrell.
Wilson has ordered an audit of the cameras, which is expected to be released in mid-September.
Kettle said Friday that he believes the cameras should be reactivated before the audit is complete.
“We built in these [privacy] considerations, and so I have full faith in what we’ve done because we’ve done our job,” Kettle said. “This is less to do with the system and more to do with those that oppose the system and those that have the ear of the mayor.”
Kettle declined to comment on polls this week that Wilson’s favorability rating has dropped, as well as a recall effort against the mayor.
But he did say the mayor could improve her standing by “doing the job.”
Kettle said the city council has had a public safety plan in effect for the last two and a half years.
“We cannot remain a city of two minds,” Kettle said, referring to the mayor’s office and the Seattle City Council. “We need to have the laws that we have done with our plan implemented.”