{"id":1395798,"date":"2023-08-10T23:20:00","date_gmt":"2023-08-11T03:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1395798"},"modified":"2023-08-10T23:20:00","modified_gmt":"2023-08-11T03:20:00","slug":"seattle-mayors-office-demanded-fewer-officers-who-are-white-for-new-police-hires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/seattle-mayors-office-demanded-fewer-officers-who-are-white-for-new-police-hires\/1395798\/","title":{"rendered":"Seattle Mayor’s Office Demanded Fewer ‘Officers Who Are White’ For New Police Hires"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seattle Mayor’s Office Demanded Fewer ‘Officers Who Are White’ For New Police Hires<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Seattle Mayor Bruce Harnell’s office demanded that the Seattle Police Department (SPD) hire fewer white men <\/strong>and those with “military bearing,” according to a memo obtained by the Jason Rantz Show<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

While the Mayor’s office initially refused to turn over the document through a public disclosure request, it was provided to Rantz by a confidential source.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

The memo, part of a larger effort to hire fewer white men, may be illegal according to the source.<\/p>\n

Ben Dalgetty, a Digital Strategy Lead from the Mayor\u2019s office, took control of SPD marketing efforts. In a March 2023 memo to SPD human resources staff titled \u201cSPD Marketing More and Less,\u201d Dalgetty asked for \u201cless\u201d images and videos of \u201cofficers who are white, male,\u201d and \u201cofficers with military bearing.\u201d <\/strong>In their place, Dalgetty asked for more \u201cofficers of color,\u201d \u201cofficers of different genders,\u201d and \u201cofficers who are younger.\u201d <\/strong>–KTTH<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

“I thought, \u2018Are you kidding me? You put this in writing?” one source told the Jason Rantz Show<\/em> on the condition of anonymity. “It shows not only a lack of respect for officers, but a lack of respect for the military. They have no understanding of someone willing to put their lives on the line for their fellow man. They don\u2019t have respect.”<\/p>\n

Contained in the memo were “guidelines \u2026 for relative terms compared to previous SPD marketing efforts,” designed to “shift the proportions of our photo\/video collateral” away from featuring white male officers, and instead showing younger officers of color with different genders.<\/p>\n

After the controversial memo began attracting negative attention, Dalgetty, the digital strategist, edited the memo – effectively destroying the record<\/strong> that the city is obligated to maintain for public disclosure.<\/p>\n

In one edit, Dalgetty removed language asking for fewer images and video of white men. In another edit, he removed references to officers with military bearing. Finally, Dalgetty removed: \u201cThis doesn\u2019t mean no officers who are white or male or only young officers of color, but guidelines to shift the proportions of our photo\/video collateral to more of some things and less of others.\u201d -KTTH<\/em><\/p>\n

Edited memo:<\/p>\n

via KTTH<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

More via KTTH<\/a> (emphasis ours):<\/em><\/p>\n

Legality of memo<\/h2>\n

According to the police source, several within the SPD were livid with the memo.<\/strong> Their jobs were already hard enough and they were uncomfortable with race-based hiring. As maddening, one said, the \u201cless\u201d portion was completely unnecessary. But did it describe illegal discrimination?<\/p>\n

Joshua Brittingham, a labor & employment attorney with Carney Badley Spellman, said the memo could haunt the city of Seattle should anyone make a legal claim of discrimination.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe SPD Marketing More and Less memo focuses on images for marketing purposes. It does not appear on its face to contain rules for hiring or promotion<\/strong>. The narrow focus of the memo could potentially inoculate the SPD from legal liability, at least based solely on the creation and distribution of the memo,\u201d Brittingham tells The Jason Rantz Show on KTTH. \u201cThat said, employment laws prohibit refusing to hire, terminating, or discriminating against any person in wages or in other terms or conditions of employment based on race and veteran\/military status. In the event of such discrimination \u2014 for example, an officer demoted or fired because he was white or a veteran \u2014 the memo might be used as evidence to demonstrate illegal discriminatory intent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Police union weighs in<\/h2>\n

Officer Mike Solan, president of the Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG), calls the memo unnecessarily divisive. He notes that \u201c95% of what is listed in this recruiting document SPOG fully supports.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I condemn and will forever continue to push back on is the verbiage within the recruitment document that calls for less of white male officers. Less of people in leadership positions, and less of humans with military backgrounds. This is flat-out discrimination.<\/strong> Period. It is an affront to decency, reasonableness and further divides our communities,\u201d Solan wrote in a statement to The Jason Rantz Show on KTTH. \u201cWhen politics is intentionally inserted into the public safety policing conversation, we all lose. It is embarrassing, shameful, and detrimental to a healthy functioning society.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Seattle Police Department, via a spokesperson, did not deny the memo caused a stir for staff. Instead, the spokesperson said in a statement that the department is committed to hiring staff that represents \u201cthe full diversity of our city.\u201d<\/p>\n

Memo was seemingly destroyed<\/h2>\n

It took the Mayor\u2019s office months to supply the memo via a public disclosure request. In the initial disclosures, the original memo was not provided. Instead, the updated<\/em> memo was supplied.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter speaking with Ben [Dalgetty], my understanding is that the record you\u2019ve referred to was shared as a \u2018live\u2019 OneDrive link and was not attached to an e-mail,\u201d the public disclosure officer emailed on July 10, over three months after the initial request. OneDrive is a cloud-based service for online collaboration, editing, and storage. \u201cAs with OneDrive documents shared out for collaboration, edits were made to the \u2018live\u2019 OneDrive link that was still in draft form on March 22, 2023 and March 23, 2023. The only version that we have of that record is the version that has already been provided to you.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear if Dalgetty knew that OneDrive files track the history of edits made to a document. After The Jason Rantz Show on KTTH informed the public disclosure officer of the OneDrive history feature, the memo was belatedly turned over.<\/p>\n

Staying silent<\/h3>\n

Though there\u2019s no indication Dalgetty willfully withheld the document, a point the public information officer made in a statement to the Jason Rantz Show on KTTH, it doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n

The memo edits weren\u2019t properly saved to be turned over for a request that clarified<\/strong>, \u201cThe [Delgatty] emails should include all documents attached or linked to.\u201d<\/strong> This incident begs the question: how often is the Mayor\u2019s office withholding information (or not traditionally saving them) by using \u201clive editing\u201d on documents that they are legally obligated from maintaining for public records? If asking for \u201call documents\u201d attached to emails isn\u2019t interpreted as desiring all documents<\/em> prior to being edited, what requests haven\u2019t been properly fulfilled?<\/p>\n

Dalgetty did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

The Mayor\u2019s office, via spokesperson Jamie Housen, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. The mayor\u2019s strategy, according to a source, is to ignore requests for comments as they wait to see if other outlets pick up a controversy. But given the allegations, it\u2019s the reaction of police officers that they should pay attention to.<\/p>\n

Listen to The Jason Rantz Show on weekday afternoons from 3:00 p.m. \u2013 7:00 p.m. on KTTH 770 AM (HD Radio 97.3 FM HD-Channel 3). He is the author of the book\u00a0<\/em>What\u2019s Killing America: Inside the Radical Left\u2019s Tragic Destruction of Our Cities<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em>Subscribe to the podcast<\/a><\/em>. Follow @JasonRantz on\u00a0<\/em>Twitter<\/a><\/em>,\u00a0<\/em>Instagram<\/a><\/em>, and\u00a0<\/em>Facebook<\/em><\/a>. Check back frequently for more news and analysis.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nThu, 08\/10\/2023 – 19:20<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/political\/seattle-mayors-office-demanded-fewer-officers-who-are-white-new-police-hires<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

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