Last week, Mayor Katie Wilson announced that the city will turn on the CCTV cameras in the Stadium District for the World Cup. In response to questions from The Stranger, the mayor’s office confirmed that they expect to turn on the cameras on Friday, June 12. When asked when they will shut off the cameras, they declined to provide a date. The mayor’s office replied: “That will depend on the security environment. If FIFA goes smoothly it should be shortly after the tournament is over.”
In January, Wilson said she would pause the new expansion in Capitol Hill and near Garfield while the city partnered with New York University to investigate the risk of the data being misused by the feds. She authorized the cameras near the stadiums, but said they would only be used in the event of a “credible threat.”
In a statement last week, Wilson wrote: “I received an updated briefing from the Seattle Police Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation on the current global and local threat environment. The breadth and depth of intelligence gathering that informed the briefing identified general but credible threats to safety and security during the games…[T]his information has persuaded our law enforcement, emergency management, and FIFA security partners that we should be operating at a heightened risk level. Given this information, the Stadium District cameras will be activated during the FIFA World Cup tournament.”
The new cameras span from Yesler Way to South Holgate Street, between First and Fourth Avenues.
This all follows a rather unhinged few weeks in City Council’s Public Safety Committee, where Councilmember Rob Saka wore his Boston Marathon jacket and his 2013 finisher medal while calling on the mayor to turn on the cameras. “Security cameras play a critical role in the investigation of crimes, including unthinkable mass casualty events,” he said, holding his medal up for the whole speech. “I know this firsthand as a runner in the 2013 Boston Marathon. I had just crossed the finish line waiting at the family meetup location two blocks away when the planted bombs exploded.”
Then Public Safety Committee chair Bob Kettle wrote Mayor Wilson a letter, saying that she doesn’t have the authority to pause the CCTV program, saying that according to the letter of the legislation they passed, the cameras should only be turned off if they are (or might be) being used to track people seeking reproductive or gender affirming healthcare, or if the feds ask them to turn over the footage.
The Mayor’s Office disagreed, and still has not approved the expansion into the Capitol Hill nightlife district or around Garfield High School.
