OPINION | Hey, South Seattle: There's Still Time to Take a Public Safety Survey

by Jacqueline B. Helfgott and Ella Vermeire

For too long, Seattle's understanding of public safety has been shaped by data that measure incidents, not experiences. We know where crime happens, but the reality of crime is based on how people feel about safety, trust, and fairness in their neighborhoods, which is not captured in official crime statistics. That gap leaves some of Seattle's most diverse communities — whose residents live the realities of inequity and resilience every day — underrepresented in the decisions that shape public safety.

Nowhere is that clearer than in the city's South Precinct. Each year over the past 10 years, Seattle University's annual Seattle Public Safety Survey (SPS Survey) has invited every person who lives or works in Seattle to share their experiences and perceptions of safety. The survey is offered in 11 languages: Amharic, Arabic, Chinese, English, Korean, Oromo, Somali, Spanish, Tagalog, Tigrinya, and Vietnamese. 

The Seattle Police Department posts the survey results on its Micro-Community Policing Plans site, and it uses the results to identify precinct and neighborhood-based priorities and strategies, as well as a focus of community-police dialogues. A decade of SPS Survey data tells a story of shifting concerns about crime and public safety, reflecting local and national movements and dynamics. Yet, South Precinct neighborhoods consistently have had a lower number of responses to the survey compared with other precincts.

Why should Seattle residents take the survey? Because it provides data on what matters to community members in all Seattle neighborhoods, from issues of crime and public safety to neighborhood quality of life. Public safety is more than just policing: True safety encompasses trust in police and neighbors, connection and involvement, opportunity, and the ability for every resident to feel seen and supported and to thrive.

The experiences of people who live or work in South Seattle are critical to understanding community perceptions of crime in the city's most diverse neighborhoods.South Seattle represents nearly every racial, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic group in the city, including one of the most diverse neighborhoods in the United States. When these voices are missing from the data, the picture of "Seattle's safety" is incomplete.

Rainier Beach offers a powerful example of what happens when community voice drives public safety work. The Rainier Beach: A Beautiful Safe Place for Youth (ABSPY) initiative has been redefining public safety for more than a decade. Rainier Beach ABSPY focuses on community-led strategies: youth events, community art and activities, restorative circles, and crime prevention through environmental design. Results from last year's SPS Survey show that the top concerns voiced by Rainier Beach residents — traffic safety, police capacity, property crime, community capacity, and violent crime — reflect the realities of daily life and the hope for solutions rooted in collaboration rather than control. 

Rainier Beach residents, and the South Precinct as a whole, have consistently reported lower levels of trust in police compared with other neighborhoods and precincts. But last year's results show increased trust in police, high levels of social cohesion, and a willingness to get involved to increase public safety, while fear of crime and perceptions of social disorganization in the neighborhood have remained relatively steady over time — proof that community action has an impact on public safety.

Every survey response is a voice, a story, a lived experience that helps shape how city leaders allocate resources, design prevention programs, and engage with the community. As one South Seattle resident put it in a recent community-police dialogue, "I appreciate the fact that this effort's being made. My thing is it has to be more inclusive; the efforts … for inclusion need to be stronger and include those who are here." When the South Precinct's voices are undercounted, the risk is clear: Policies are made for the city but not necessarily by or for the people most affected by them.

For many in the South Precinct, distrust of institutions runs deep — and with good reason. Neighborhoods face structural inequalities that shape lived experiences of public safety. Consequently, surveys connected to police can feel risky or irrelevant, especially in communities that have less trust in police. But the SPS Survey is completely anonymous and analyzed independently by Seattle University researchers. Its purpose is to amplify community voices, not filter them.

The call this year is simple: South Seattle deserves to be heard. If you live or work anywhere in the South Precinct — Brighton/Dunlap, Claremont/Rainier Vista, Columbia City, Genesee, Georgetown, Hillman City, Lakewood/Seward Park, Mid-Beacon Hill, Mount Baker, New Holly, North Beacon Hill, Rainier Beach, Rainier View, SoDo, or South Beacon Hill— take 10 minutes to share your experience.

When every neighborhood contributes, we move closer to a city where safety isn't defined by the numbers, but by the trust, strength, and voices of every neighborhood.

The Seattle Public Safety Survey is open through Sunday, Nov. 30, at PublicSafetySurvey.org.

The SPD Micro-Community Policing Plans also hosts precinct-based community-police dialogues (May–August) and Before the Badge (BTB) community-police dialogues with new Seattle Police recruits (September–April). The next dialogue is on Dec. 1. Sign up: BTB Community-Police Dialogues.

Jacqueline B. Helfgott, Ph.D., is the Seattle University Loyola Endowed Professor of Criminal Justice, Criminology, and Forensics and the Director of the Seattle University Crime & Justice Research Center. She is Principal Investigator of the Seattle Police Department's Micro-Community Policing Plans, the Rainier Beach A Beautiful Safe Place for Youth, the MCPP Little Saigon Evaluation, the Before the Badge Longitudinal Evaluation, and the Before the Badge Community-Police Dialogues.

Ella Vermeire, BA, is a Seattle University Master of Arts in Criminal Justice student. She is the Seattle Police Department's Micro-Community Policing Plans South Precinct Research Analyst.