Northwest now is supported in part by viewers like you.

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After losing a bid for sheriff, but then jumping across the street to Tacoma PD to serve for more than a year as the interim chief of police, Patti Jackson finally got the job for good.

Near unanimous approval is rare these days, but Jackson's appointment to the job seems to be pretty widely applauded by city leadership, department management, and the rank and file.

Patti Jackson is next on northwest now.

this is a pretty typical pattern in leadership.

First, there's a long term stable leader in place who leaves.

Then a new outside person comes in with much fanfare and fails.

Then finally, somebody who people think maybe should have gotten the gig in the first place ends up in the job.

Some might argue that somewhat parallels the story with Patti Jackson, a local law enforcement officer who worked for 35 years with the Pierce County Sheriff's Department before coming to Tacoma PD.

Jackson was part of the cleanup on several recent departmental messes, messes that resulted in the city writing half million dollar checks to employees, including to a former chief of staff and former police chief Avery Moore, who got put on administrative leave and then was allowed to resign with a big payout.

All of that, of course, followed the 2020 death of Manny Ellis and more than $1 million worth of city payouts to the three officers involved, and a $6 million payout to Ellis's family.

It's been a very difficult period for the department, and even more so if we travel back into the early 2000 and the whole David Braim tragedy.

Now, however, the hope is that the Tacoma Police Department can enter a new rebuilding phase with the department's first ever female chief in charge.

Patti, thanks so much for coming to northwest now.

Great to have the new chief of police for the City of Tacoma here on the program.

You're a local person.

Talk a little bit about where you were born and raised and how you how you came up.

Just give us a little background first.

Thank you.

Thank you very much for having me.

It's absolutely my privilege, my honor, to be here and to serve the community of Tacoma.

So I you know, I've spent my entire young, you know, kind of early adults all the way through.

So really, I consider myself from Washington.

I was born in San Diego, California, to, you know, parents in the military, served the U.S.

Navy and then moved around a lot for that one when my dad transitioned to work for the government.

So anywhere from San Diego, California to Japan, Hayama, Japan, and then landed in Washington and have stayed here ever since.

Do you think any of that experience I asked this to of, another guest recently.

Do you think some of that experience of moving around, even living internationally to some degree informed?

Does that inform your job at all today, do you think?

Absolutely, 100%.

I think that really just having that experience and growing with that experience, right.

Not not later on after kind of setting your your life and your real life experience within your growing with that, I think that it has a great impact on how you view people.

So when did you say lunch or try to recall the moment you said, I'm going to do law enforcement and talk a little bit about how you matriculate it up through law enforcement, right?

So, law enforcement was something that that never even was hitting my radar.

It was, I came I graduated from high school and went out to battle and was doing, you know, college and, and, I decided that, I'm going to I'm going to do something.

Right.

But whatever it is, I'm going to give it my all.

And if things were, if I became part of a negative, you know, aspect of that, then I was going to look for something that that I wouldn't bring that till I was working in banking.

I was working as, a teller worked my way up to, you know, at a very young age, worked my way up to one of our branch, you know, managers.

And when there was no unions or any type of, you know, labor groups like that.

And when I found out that that as a female branch manager, I was making almost $5 an hour less than a mill teller was like, okay, I've got two choices.

I can be a horse's behind, or I can be that person that makes a difference and find something.

Find a new room to go to that I can grow.

Law enforcement was hiring.

I decided, I think I can do that, and I have loved it ever since.

I will posit this theory.

I like the fact that somebody who didn't dream of being a police officer when they were a kid found their way into police work.

I'm not saying that it's always bad, but when you're a kid and you're kind of playing cops and robbers, I would say that there's a certain mentality that goes along with that where you're, you know, you've got the authority, you've got the power, you're going to do these things, you're going to wrestle the bad guys, which is good.

We need that.

I, you know, but by the same token, I think having somebody who adapted kind of their values to the career as opposed to trying to learn the I think, I think there's some value of that.

Am I nuts or what do you how do police officers view that?

I don't think you're nuts at all.

I think, you know, it depends.

It depends on what emotion you carry with you.

Right?

I mean, I've run the spectrum, right?

Females not a place for, you know, law enforcement, a place for females.

You know, I'm not that big, you know, not a place for that.

My career grew up, you know, on the corrections bureau of the sheriff's department.

Not not somebody to start kicking down doors.

And so you always have those.

Not not not.

Yeah.

Right.

But I think that you just keep bringing forward kind of the talents and the skill set that you do have, and you use your ability to lean on the subject matter experts that you do have in any agency that you look for and you say, okay, what is it that they need from me?

And if I have that skill set, which I do, I bring that forward and we become, you know, a well-rounded and a well functioning department.

I'm going to pull the curtain back and talk to you about my process in writing for this show.

I was sitting there writing, you know, just a discussion with Patti Jackson.

I found myself trying to write a couple times.

Tacoma, a troubled police department.

Right.

And I started challenging myself on that.

Are they a troubled police?

Are they not a troubled policeman?

I could argue both sides of the coin.

And my cop out was, is Tacoma a troubled police department with a question mark?

That's part of the discussion.

So I just copped out of it for myself.

Right.

I want to ask you, though, is that fair or not?

Is do you consider Tacoma to be a troubled police department?

I don't I consider Tacoma to be a very well functioning professional department.

And I, I speaking to that a little bit with troubled.

I think the profession in and of itself can be considered troubled.

Right.

And it's just like any other thing.

If you look at what happens in society, let's take the other side of the spectrum far and away from law enforcement.

Often, you know, you have this, something happens and you find out who done it and you go, I would have never seen that coming.

The best neighbor I ever had, the best father.

It was so quiet.

Yes.

Right.

Do you fill in the blank?

Yeah, right.

Does that happen in law enforcement?

It absolutely does.

Does it happen?

And doctors, pilots, you know, you name it.

So I think that that does is a profession though, that speaks to write a group of men and women who go through.

I'm they're very professional because of all the training that they must the mandates must right go through to be able to get you to the the level of the right to where they're going out on their own in answering calls.

But there's a little something extra, right, in law enforcement and that's that authority to really take somebody's civil rights from that.

And so you have to make sure that the men and women that going out are trained and that they are somebody that, you know, you will hold accountable if we take, you know, your foot comes off the curb a little bit.

Yeah.

And so, you know, just in making sure that I really answer that question for you, do I think that we're a troubled agency?

I do not.

Okay.

Yeah.

So I think that we've had troubled people.

I do okay, and we've handled that.

Another piece of bad news for you is you're talking to somebody who's covered crime and cops in many different jurisdictions, in many different states all around the country for a long darn time.

So my impression of police departments and I have a lot of police friends and whatnot, but there's always been a very high level of what I call palace intrigue inside of police departments.

People trying to cut the legs out from each other, gain advantage, sue each other's pants off all the things.

There's been a piece of that in the Tacoma Police Department.

My question to you is, is that culture fixable or does it come along with cops?

Is there something in the water?

How do you view it?

How do you take it, and is it fixable?

Right.

I think that culture and, you know, because I think there's also there's there's so many words and let's say buzzwords, whatever term you want to use with that.

Right.

There's so many words that are out there that, that or that hold a different, you know, definition for each person in it, depending on their emotion.

I think that culture is what we tolerate.

And I think that a shift has made in what's been tolerable.

And that is you.

You said it yourself, Sue the pants off of.

And that could be any, any way you look at it.

Just a lot of beef on the administrative team and and everything.

That's right.

And and I get it right.

And so, you know, there are times that I do believe that there are people that ultimately must use some form of litigation to, to, you know, impose that change that's necessary to move forward.

You know, we that's a little bit of a problem, though, that we don't always shift and move forward.

We still it it's like when, you know, in those horror flicks where you know, you know, don't go in there and somebody grabs a hold your ankle and they just keep pulling you back.

Well, and sometimes the litigation can be weaponized just right.

You know, I didn't get my way.

That's right.

I don't like the way things happen.

So-and-so got and I didn't.

That's right.

So there's a you know, that's a piece of it too.

And I think it matters with what you do with that.

Right?

So, you know, it does.

People tell you don't take things personally.

It's hard sometimes not to because you want to maintain an agency that that is really, you know, a place you said it yourself to where, you know, you maybe never saw yourself in law enforcement.

I want us to be an agency where people go.

I could see myself there.

Yeah, yeah.

What's, here's a chance to talk to city council and the decision makers.

What do you need?

I know you haven't been there for real, but if you.

If I could give you a wish list and you, you know, bullet point and 3 or 5 things on there, what would it be?

Right.

You know, everybody's going to think that I'm going to say and, you know, a truckload filled with money.

That's not really the answer.

Right.

You can give that to me and see this out there.

Yes, yes.

I think what we need and we're getting it, I want to make sure that I say that and big heart goes out, because that's what's making the draw for people to come to our agency is the support, excuse me, that we are getting right from the the city manager, the mayor, the council.

Right.

And our community, they're supporting us as an agency that makes this be an agency that people want to come to because they say, hey, we know it's not a profession that everybody loves, but it's a profession that's necessary.

Why not?

Right?

Build my career in a place where I feel supported and backed.

I was talking to the mayor recently on this program, and I was surprised to hear him say, well, we're doing really well with recruitment.

You know, we're almost there.

And I was like, really?

Oh, okay.

Well, that sounds good.

So give me an update.

Are we fully staffed?

Are we getting close about where do we stand?

We're getting very close.

So we were knocking on 40 door.

And I'm not talking my age.

Right.

We know a lot, but we were knocking on 40 door, and, we are at single digits now and I, I hold that people think, oh, it's the money.

Money is good.

But if that's what it was, we wouldn't have been knocking at 40.

Right.

And so I hold that and attribute that to people like that, that shift in the culture that you talk about, it's where people feel like they can come to work, they can do their job, they will be supported, and money is good.

But there's also a benefit package, right?

What comes along with that is their officer wellness.

And what is the leadership doing to make sure that that, you know, that they're kind of that front line in the football team, if you will.

They're making sure I'm okay and doing my job.

When Avery Moore sat in the very chair that you're sitting in, when he arrived, we did the same thing with him.

He talked pretty extensively about, I think it's a University of Tennessee, Texas Austin's violent crime plan, which you basically, you know, it makes perfect sense.

You look at, statistics to show you where the who, the where the troubled areas are and who the frequent fliers are.

And if you can address that population, you've taken care of a lot of the the crime pipeline.

Is there any merit to that?

Is that something that will continue, or are you going to put a twist on it when it comes to addressing crime and give me some context.

Right.

So so there is a twist on it already.

I think that that's a phenomenal.

Right.

So something needed to be done.

And you can look people criticize, you know, whatever it is that you want to do.

But I mean it comes down to disrupting crime.

Right.

And so but you do you need to use those, you know, the crime analysis.

Where are the crimes taking place?

What time is that happening, what types of crime.

And then let's get out there and put emphasis on that.

And it works because people crime is going to happen.

You know, I mean, I hate to say that because it seems flippant, but let's make it as least convenient for individuals that want to engage in criminal activity as we can.

And that's what we're doing.

And so we do what we have.

It helps when you are up there and you have that, you know, your your budgeted positions filled because those are your you know that those are the primary call responders.

Right.

And so they're out there, they're answering those 911 calls and get going to those.

But more hopefully preferably out just talking around a lot.

Right.

That was my next next thing that then you've got that.

But at the same time you're able to have groups of people that are engaged in, right.

Community policing.

It works.

And I'm going to say it, my agency makes fun of me because I've kind of adopted this.

But, you know, my my big thing is get to know us before you need us.

And we're out there talking around, you know, people get to know us and it makes it easier for you to go, oh, you know what used to question myself on whether I should call the police?

I know they want me to.

911 here, we got this thing going on because that's the only way we get good is form partnership.

Let's talk a little bit about something that's been in the news lately.

I know you've been following it.

You know, when you read your police chief journal and it's been an issue in the state to the flat cameras.

You know, Keith Swank says it's kind of gives the bad guys a real leg up on us if we can't use it.

Do you think there's an it?

Do you do you wish the decision was made to allow them?

Right.

Do you think that's an investment that should be made or not?

Give me your take on flight camera.

Right.

So the flight cameras is, you know, basically a brand of a company.

There are other, right, camera systems that are out there that that are being used, whatever.

You know, you use terms like surveillance for all these type of things.

We didn't that we never invested in, like going with the flock.

We were looking at it right when, you know, this, the big push came against it.

Controversy.

And I know that people are afraid and their fears, their reality.

That said, you know, we talk about all these things that we think and you can again, fill in the blank, cops are too, you know, they're too reactive.

They're not reactive enough, you know, whatever term it is that you want to use.

So we find tools that'll help us do our jobs, that'll make certain that we're not escalating where we don't need to.

And then we kick it out from under you.

Yeah.

You know, hold I think, you know, agencies accountable to what they say they're going to do.

But I think that the fear became so nationwide spread that there just wasn't enough support behind it, that it really was, you know, the juice wasn't worth the squeeze.

Right?

Yeah.

So and, it is in you know, sheriff's link is not wrong, right?

It is it is a tool that that we can and should be using.

But we also, you know, want to respect, you know, the laws that are out there.

And it's the public disclosures that really, you know, kind of put that cramp on there.

To me, it seemed like it had the potential to kind of increase the safety of officer public interactions in the sense that as opposed to just doing traffic stop straight now, I can start run in place for once in warrants.

That's right.

And I know what your profile looks like on paper where I typically need to I need to go talk to you.

That's right.

Okay.

We're going to talk.

That's right.

Necessity.

Taking that away seems like it puts us back more in the kind of round of stops.

And who knows what could happen on any given traffic stop.

And I don't know if I like that as much.

I agree, I think that it does create a little bit more of that false narrative that somebody is being stopped just because of it.

But, you know, you're going back to that, you know, human, this is what we know, this is what we're told.

And so you're looking for that.

And sometimes we get it wrong.

Right.

But I will say the good things that have happened, you know, that there was that, you know, horrific, you know, assault that happened, you know, out at the Point Defiance Park.

There's been individuals when I first got here, you know, a little three year old went missing.

And you know, the use of that.

There was the shooting over at Alan Moore Hospital, and we were able to locate the suspect quickly.

Yeah, because of that.

And so it's a tool that is effective.

But given anything else, if it's if it's misused, it creates a false right sense of, I just support from the, from the public.

One of the other things that's kind of been cast over the not just to come up, but a lot of police work, but to come with police department is the whole issue of racial disparity.

There's been a fair amount of racial strife, internal strife in that department, and of course, a fair amount, alleged outside the department.

How do you how do you view the Tacoma PD?

Does it have a racial problem?

Is it happenstance?

Is it a few bad apples?

Set me straight on that.

I think that if you know somebody believes that a problem exist, we can make that exist, right?

Because the fact that that's our emotion, it's what we grew up with.

It's how we handle things.

Sometimes we cannot.

And I've had people tell me, you know, I just I hate the police and I've asked them what their experience, but.

Well, I never had it on my parents.

Did you know what have you.

Same thing.

I don't like a certain type of food.

I didn't grow up with it.

And so do I think that that there's still, you know, racial inequity, racial disparity.

You know, you you fill in that that term?

I think there is and I think that that's a nationwide problem not specific to Tacoma Police Department.

I will tell you that, that we are making a difference because I don't know if you, you know, follow anything with like when you said you were looking up, but like when I had the privilege of being sworn in as permanent right the year after I'd been here as the interim, if you would have looked in, you know, those individuals that came to witness that and to support us as an agency for that?

You would have said I would have never thought that I would see, you know, this group represented there or or that or this great collective group.

And it was amazing.

So when it comes to research that shows that, you know, minority groups are more likely to be ticketed, more likely to be confronted.

Are those reality in your mind?

Are they improving in your mind?

And do you think there is a chance?

Are we driving toward or have we turned away from something like a consent decree with that?

I, I would always hope that we've turned away from I don't, you know, have the information says we're, you know, we're driving towards there are individuals I think that would like that because I think that they feel that that would be the answer.

But my response to that, and it doesn't mean that that I'm not supportive of, you know, having somebody sit beside me, not behind me, not looking over my shoulder, sit behind me so we can make sure that we have the same data set right, to be able to look at that.

And that does happen a lot.

There's, you know, you use the term look behind the curtain.

You know, I will tell you.

And I used it in another thing I just done with when the Seahawks were, you know, at the ball, I tried to call the coach there and say, hey, man, I think you should do this, okay?

They never took my call.

We're expected to take the call in policing.

And it is typically from an individual who's never gone through the 720 hours that, you know, you know, an agency member needs to go through just to become a certified peace officer.

Yeah.

And so it's I think that that some of the data that you see, you can you can I'm not saying that that there's there's false I want to be careful.

I don't want the hate mail that goes with that.

But I'm saying that it does exist.

Right.

If you look now and you're driving down the road, I would I would challenge you to tell me what you know, what the the gender is of the person driving toward you, what race they are.

You know what else you know?

Where do they come from?

Right?

You can't see anymore.

The cars are, you know, so they've got illegal ten time.

That's right, that's right.

And so I want to be careful because not everybody that's driving a vehicle like that is doing anything illegal.

But I do believe that there has been such a belief.

It's going to take a long time to walk us back from that.

Yeah.

And we're doing it.

I, maybe two years ago, I would, I would say it was fair to say the business community in Tacoma was fairly apoplectic about street crime, the impact on their businesses, the business climate in this town.

I attempted to do a program on northwest now where we had some business people or people who who were pretty outspoken and podcast and in print.

Right.

They came in here, we turned on the cameras and oh my gosh, they were the turns out they were trying to sell books and they were politicians and everything was great.

I would say it was one of those shows that I just assumed taken, kind of thrown to throw into the Puget Sound.

But privately and in other discussions, I know the business community was outside of its goal.

Right.

Have you had those conversations with the business community?

What are you what are they telling you and what are you telling them?

I absolutely have had them.

I have shown up for everything, you know.

Of course, we all have a life.

But everything that I've been invited to, I really try to myself personally show up or to send representation from our leadership teams so that we know kind of can we move the needle.

And I believe the needle is being moved, and I don't believe it's necessarily anything that's called police department is doing.

I believe it's us as a community police department is involved.

Right.

But we have partners.

And I think getting back to if there's social services that are needed, let those subject matter experts handle the social services right aspect of it.

If law enforcement intervention or even just being there as a as a presence needs to happen, let us do what we're trained to do and let's work collaboratively with the business owners.

Stop telling people what they need, stop hearing what they need, or start hearing excuse me what they need and then work towards that.

Where are you working?

Where do things stand in terms of crime?

I know that we had a real spike in Covid, and now it seems like it's dropping off nationwide and I think Tacoma included.

I don't know if we're pre two, nine, 2019 yet or not, but what do you have goals for that?

What what is a win for you?

When do you come out and hold a news conference and say, folks, right, I, Patty Jackson, have solved the problem?

No, you'd never do that.

No.

Facetious.

But, what does success look like in this town when it comes to crime?

That was awfully darn high profile and bad for a while, I think is moderating to some degree.

What do you see as your goal?

I think that success can be measured and can truly be measured.

When you see that people not just hear that right, you see that people feel safe because it is something that's palpable, right?

If I see people walking down the waterfront or if I see them, you know, walking in the business units in neighborhoods, I think that that is a huge indicator that that we are successful, as you know, some, some form of crime prevention.

Right?

Crime is I mean, historically, it's going to happen.

Yeah, but what can we do again?

And I, you know, to to disrupt.

Right.

Those individuals that are engaged in I'm not trying to say that I want them to go out to, you know, another area, but not in Tacoma.

I don't want you here.

And we, you know, we're going to have the best right agency that we can to make certain that we, at the very least, make it difficult for you.

Last 60s here, you talked a little bit about City Council and the fact that you being you've been well provided for with that said.

Right.

If, if, if I said, hey, what's on your radar?

2 or 3 bullet points over the course of the next year, what are your top priorities?

Right.

I think the top priorities are exactly what we're doing, right.

We're moving forward as an agency.

We need to grow it.

You know, but like you said yourself, you know, we're at our full budgeted capacity, but but that's, you know, still, you know, 50 less than what it was years ago for us.

Better back to what we need.

And then let's be out there to where you know, you want the you want the police department to come out and see you and talk to you.

Welcome us.

Everybody loves it when we get out of our car and you're not throwing a rock at us.

And I will tell you that that you know and I know it's corny or whatever.

I love the men and women that I work for.

I work every day to earn their trust.

Just as importantly, and probably, you know that the community knows it.

I work every day for the agency to earn the community's trust as well, and it's working well.

Chief Jackson, thanks so much for coming in to northwest now.

Great to have you and, wish you the best of luck.

It's my privilege.

Thank you so much.

Reasonable people can have different opinions about whether it's fair to characterize Tacoma police as a troubled department.

The bottom line most of the people at a 400 person department can do a great job, but a relatively small percentage of high profile, corrupt or racist or power hungry or greedy or psychologically unfit people can blow a very visible hole in the entire organization, and dealing with that small subset of bad apples is going to be the challenge for TPD for the foreseeable future, just like it is out on the streets.

I wish Chief Jackson the best and appreciate her time here on northwest now.

I hope this program got you thinking and talking.

You can find this program on the web at KTRK dawg, streaming through the PBS app, or listen on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

That's going to do it for this edition of northwest.

Now, until next time, I'm Tom Larson.

Thanks for watching.

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