Why police accountability efforts failed again in the Washington Legislature

For a second year in a row, Washington police accountability advocates have seen their priorities fall flat in Olympia.

They entered this year’s session wanting to grant the attorney general stronger oversight of local police departments. They also wanted to create an independent prosecutor to handle cases when police use deadly force; restrict when officers can pull drivers over; block law enforcement from lying during interrogations; and set new standards for police chiefs and sheriffs.

None of those proposals will become law this year. None even received votes from either chamber of the Washington Legislature, despite growing Democratic majorities.

“This is the saddest time of my life because this is the world I have to leave my children,” said Nickeia Hunter, an advocate from the Coalition for Police Accountability, whose brother was killed by police. “We have to stay on top of fighting for what we started.”

It’s a far cry from a few years ago when police accountability gained momentum in the Legislature in the wake of George Floyd’s murder by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020 and the social uprising that followed.

In the immediate aftermath, lawmakers passed a suite of laws to set additional guardrails for police. This included restricting when they could pursue people suspected of crimes — a move that drew such staunch pushback, lawmakers rolled back the policy last year.

They also banned police from using chokeholds, created a statewide use of force database and established a first-of-its-kind Office of Independent Investigations to look into deadly force cases.

Legislators’ biggest move on policing this year was acquiescing to Gov. Bob Ferguson’s ask for $100 million to hire more officers, a request that drew frustration from many progressive Democrats.

Steve Strachan, the executive director of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, noted that officials are still waiting to see how some of the big changes made in 2021 are playing out and called the shift since then “a more balanced approach.”

The difficult budget year also acted as a buzzsaw that sheared away police accountability bills that would’ve cost money.

Meanwhile, fears of rising crime have emboldened opposition to policies believed to hinder officers trying to do their jobs. In 2023, the last year with available statewide data, the state saw a significant decrease in year-over-year violent crimes after years of increases, according to the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.

More broadly, this has all powered a pendulum swing in the establishment conversation from fixing policing to helping police.

“Increased accountability helps everyone be able to do their job well, and to make sure that they have the supports and the infrastructure in place to do their job well,” said Rep. Darya Farivar, a Seattle Democrat and leading police accountability proponent in the Legislature. “It is, frankly, a little confusing to me why some folks don’t seem to understand that.”

A new sheriff in town

Ferguson’s rhetoric in his first few months in office played a part in the paradigm shift this year.

Starting on the campaign trail and in his inaugural address, the new Democratic governor, who supported police accountability efforts while attorney general, was steadfast in his request for a new $100 million grant program to bring on more law enforcement officers. He hopes the money will turn the tide on Washington’s long-held last-place ranking nationwide in police staffing per capita.

After not including the funding in their initial proposals, Democrats relented under threat of veto to include it in the final budget that’s now on the governor’s desk.

This sucked away some money that could’ve been used for police oversight measures, said Sen. Yasmin Trudeau, D-Tacoma.

Strachan said that the funding tracks with the public’s priorities.

“There’s a general consensus, I think, among a lot of residents in our state, that, yes, we want to make sure that law enforcement is doing a good job and is being fair and transparent, but also that we need more officers and we need to support public safety,” he said.

Departments can use the $100 million for more than just officers on the beat. Under House Bill 2015, the money can also go toward peer counselors, behavioral health co-responders, training and other broader public safety efforts.

While Republicans generally supported the idea behind the grant program, many of them believe Washington’s police staffing difficulties are caused more by the state’s perceived hostility toward law enforcement than anything else.

The money also comes with strings.

To access grant funding, for example, cities and counties need to either implement a new 0.1% sales tax for public safety or have already imposed a similar tax. They also need to follow state model policies as well as collect and report use of force data.

In a statement, Ferguson said increasing hiring and adopting police accountability measures “are not mutually exclusive.”

“They can, and should, go hand in hand,” the governor said. “For example, HB 2015 creates a $100 million grant program to hire more law enforcement officers and contains strong accountability conditions for agencies that will receive the grants.”

Ferguson has not yet approved the final budget or House Bill 2015. He has a couple weeks to do so.

Looking forward

Trudeau hopes once local law enforcement can address the staffing issue, the discussion can turn back to accountability.

Rep. Roger Goodman, D-Kirkland, plans to spend the interim before next year’s legislative session meeting with police officials. He wants to mend the relationship between Olympia and on-the-ground law enforcement.

“It’s, I believe, incumbent on me to do some repair work with the police community, because it’s been a pretty aggressive effort, all well meaning and I think good policy, but it needs to be done in a more collaborative fashion,” said Goodman, the chair of the House Community Safety Committee.

Hunter, with the Coalition for Police Accountability, described the path forward as “bleak.”

“But we’ll be damned if we sit down and be like, ‘Oh, we’re just going to have to have to accept it,’” she said.

With a short, 60-day legislative session in 2026, she isn’t hopeful for major gains. But she and others plan to keep telling their stories in hopes of convincing people about the importance of the issue.