Everett police seek to keep zones banning drug offenders

EVERETT — Special zones that ban people charged or convicted of drug crimes are proposed to stay intact in Everett.

People with a drug-related charge or conviction can be arrested if they violate the ban.

Police Sgt. Chris Bennett on Wednesday asked the Everett City Council to keep the current nine stay out of drug areas, called SODAs. The council could vote on it June 21.

Everett had 1,958 calls related to alcohol or drug use in 2021, counting both 911 calls and those initiated by officers, according to city data. In 2022, it grew to 3,073. Not every call results in an arrest or conviction, Bennett noted. There were 1,318 drug-related arrests between the two years, according to city data.

Maps provided by the city show a heavy concentration of calls for service and arrests related to substance abuse are in the stay out of drug areas.

Fatal and non-fatal overdoses have hit a three-year high just halfway through 2023, according to city data. In 2021, there were 90 such reported incidents, then 72 last year. Through May this year, there had already been 95.

The Everett City Council first approved SODAs in 2007. It expanded them in 2017, and Everett Police Department staff are required to review them and report to the council every two years “due to the evolving nature of open-air drug markets” and “to account for areas of the City that become or cease to be areas of drug trafficking.”

Substance use reports grew despite the zones being in effect. The 2021 state Supreme Court ruling, called the Blake decision, that police could not arrest people for simple drug possession and a state law that required two documented jail diversion programs led to the plummet in arrests between 2021 and 2022, Bennett wrote in his report to the City Council.

Now many people “frequently contacted” for drug use have gone through those diversion programs and more misdemeanor drug possession arrests are happening, Bennett wrote.

People who lead addiction recovery programs have criticized the zones for pushing people further away, and potentially into residential areas.

At times the law chafed with people trying to serve people with addiction, such as a church pastor near Clark Park.

The zones now span a broad swath of the city.

They include:

• Broadway north of 41st Street;

• A 44-block area that includes Clark Park and Everett High School;

• Hewitt Avenue from the 1000 block to the 3200 block;

• Smith Avenue from the 3100 block to the 4000 block;

• Rucker Avenue and Evergreen Way from the 4000 block to the south city line;

• Everett Mall Way between Evergreen Way and Highway 526; and

• West Casino Road between Evergreen Way and Airport Road.

Evergreen Way from about 112th Street SW to Airport Road “has one of the highest concentrations of drug activity in the city” that recently moved to the 8500 block of Evergreen Way, Bennett wrote.

Drug reports have also increased in the Casino Road SODA to the point of “open air drug use,” he wrote.

The Smith Avenue SODA had seen fewer drug incidents after “countless enforcement operations,” according to the report.

Ben Watanabe: 425-339-3037; bwatanabe@heraldnet.com; Twitter: @benwatanabe.