Technically, what the mayor did was legal. But that doesn't make members of the Seattle City Council happy about it. In fact, they plan to write a letter of protest to the mayor about going behind their backs to install surveillance cameras at Capitol Hill's Cal Anderson Park without their authorizing the funds.
It's not that councilmembers are concerned about surveillance. No, at a May 2 meeting of the council Finance and Budget Committee chaired by Jean Godden, the seven councilmembers who attended agreed that park surveillance cameras are a great idea. They just feel the mayor violated their trust by paying for the cameras without their permission -- something they spent the meeting discussing how to stop in the future.
Last fall, during the city's budgeting process, the mayor asked for $550,000 in Parks Department funding to start a pilot camera project that would put three surveillance cameras apiece at Cal Anderson, Hing Hay, Occidental, and Victor Steinbrueck parks. Councilmembers allocated the money but put a budget proviso, or hold, requesting that the mayor give them information
on how cameras would be used, and who would get to see the tape, before they released the money.
In January, with the proviso still in place, the Parks Department went ahead and installed three 360-degree rotating surveillance cameras above the restrooms at Cal Anderson ("City outfits Cal Anderson with cams; downtown parks next," April 16-22). To pay the $170,000 cost for the cameras, the mayor simply authorized the money to come out of a different Parks budget item -- something council staff member Ben Noble said May 2 is within mayor's power.
The mayor's office said it was necessary to move without the council because of an emergent problem with drug dealing and prostitution at Cal Anderson. Last week, Councilmember Tom Rasmussen scoffed at that idea, noting that the proviso could have been lifted in as little as a week if the mayor had only provided the information the council requested.
Among other options, councilmembers discussed writing provisos to cover the entire budget, instead of one line item of funding, or the council could review every expenditure as part of its weekly payroll bill -- a cumbersome process. But no matter how many loopholes the council closes, Noble said he worries others will be found.
"We could potentially be headed for a nuclear standoff," council president Richard Conlin said. And, "the more we escalate, the worse it gets for everybody."