The Issues Mayor Wilson Chose Not to Address

On February 17, Mayor Wilson gave her first major speech since defeating incumbent Bruce Harrell in last November’s elections. From the moment she stepped on the stage at the Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center, it was evident Wilson’s inexperienced team had failed to perform basic advance work as the new mayor had technical issues with both her microphone and teleprompter.

From the awkward start of her first “state of the city” speech and the lack of specific proposals, to her failure to understand basic business expenses, it is evident that Mayor Katie Wilson has much to learn about leading the City of Seattle. While the speech was without many details, the mayor’s rhetoric clearly revealed her governing philosophy – if bad government policies create problems, then the only solution is bigger and more expensive government.

While most politicians come into office with a slew of “action items” to install their political agenda, Mayor Wilson’s speech showed she was not prepared to take this course of action.  Instead, she often announced that her “team was looking into solutions” or that she has “instructed department heads to develop a plan.”

The mayor did provide a wish list of undeveloped city responsibilities (such as government-operated grocery stores and imposing universal daycare). This surprised many critics since the city has yet to demonstrate it can fix the problems it currently oversees. From a worsening homelessness crisis to one of the nation’s most severe pothole problems, the city has struggled to find success tackling many important issues.

Here is a synopsis of Mayor Wilson’s thoughts on the major Issues facing Seattle residents.

Homelessness

While acknowledging “I don’t think that anyone can really argue that our overall approach to homelessness has been successful,” Mayor Wilson’s homelessness plan appears to be nothing more than increasing spending for previously ineffective Housing First policies, which increased homelessness by 70% in the past decade and resulted in hundreds of deaths every year on Seattle’s streets.

The key component of Wilson’s homelessness strategy is to significantly expand Seattle’s housing bureaucracy by adding 1,000 new public housing units by the end of this year. She did not elaborate on how she will prevent these facilities from becoming the drug and violence centers that other housing projects have become or how she will pay for the units.

During the speech Mayor Wilson claimed that her team had moved a woman and her three dogs into a tiny home. Yet this week, Jonathan Choe found the woman and her dogs still living in a drug encampment because the tiny home offered to her was filled with black mold.

Not once in her speech did Mayor Wilson even acknowledge the significant role of addiction and mental health issues that are the primary root of Seattle’s homelessness crisis.

Drugs

Mayor Wilson made no comment on how her administration would be handling the city’s record-breaking drug crisis, which causes deaths daily on Seattle streets and spends precious police and fire department resources.

Crime

Like nearly all recent Seattle mayors, Mayor Wilson believes more gun laws are needed to stop the increase in violent crime. Responding to the recent slew of murders in Seattle, Wilson stated, “My office is working to develop a robust and multi-pronged gun violence strategy.”

In her speech, the mayor did not mention the city’s severely understaffed police department, the failed diversion programs, or the revolving door justice system, even though each is a source for the increase in violent crime. Those in Bellevue have just as much access to guns as those in Seattle, but those on Lake Washington’s Eastside have a more accountable criminal system, which leads to lower crime rates.

Overlooking Seattle Police Department’s (SPD) dangerously low staffing levels is especially noteworthy since anti-police leadership is the top reason for why officers do not want to work in Seattle. There are also rumblings inside the SPD over Wilson including several anti-police activists in her administration.

Downtown Seattle’s Record-Breaking Vacancy Rate

The mayor did not speak on Seattle’s historic vacancy rate (35.6% in 2025 Quarter 4 and was 11.4% in 2015) or on a plan to bring businesses, employees, and consumers back to Downtown. Public safety and high business taxes are often mentioned as why people no longer want to come to Downtown Seattle. This suppressed commercial market is forcing residents to pay a higher share of the county’s property tax (from 65% normally to 83% in 2024).

Seattle Budget Deficit

Wilson made no mention of the city’s looming $127 million budget deficit or how she plans to pay for the expansion of the city’s services (child care, housing,  small business loans, education, etc.), which she is proposing. She did say, “You may have noticed I didn’t put budgetary price tags on a lot of the items I mentioned today.” Then she informed everyone that her plan is to figure out everything the city needs, then figure out how to pay for it.

Taxes

Mayor Wilson made no mention of raising taxes, but did state twice that Seattle “is a very wealthy city.”

Small Business

The mayor asserted that when she talks to business owners, “they don’t start by talking taxes, or minimum wage.” Instead, they are concerned with affordability. Evidently, Mayor Wilson isn’t aware that taxes and employee costs are the top affordability concerns for most businesses.

Food Deserts

Wilson stated that recent closures of a couple of grocery stores is leading to concerns of fresh food deserts in areas of Seattle. She failed to mention that many Seattle retail stores have closed due to the government failing to reduce retail theft or remove encampments which keep customers away.  And like all small businesses, grocery stores have to compete with stores in nearby communities who do not have high taxes or government-mandated high wages.

Wilson stated, “We’re looking at a public grocery store.”  Hopefully, this is a short “look” for this approach has failed every other place it has been tried.

The fact is the stores often close because the city failed to protect the businesses and then imposed taxes/mandates that made it difficult for the store to compete. The city’s failure is not a reason to give government more responsibilities and power.

In most functional avenues of life, when one succeeds, they are given more authority and responsibilities in the belief that they will perform well completing the added assignments. This is not the case with the City of Seattle, for it appears that Mayor Wilson wants to expand government powers to solve the problems government created. Maybe a better plan is to demand that government adequately solve a problem before forcing taxpayers to pay more money into wasteful and ineffective bureaucracies that have a track record of making things worse for Seattle residents.