Seattle Mayor Katie B. Wilson today announced her decision on how to proceed with the city’s surveillance pilot project, and answered questions from journalists. She also announced she will be holding a town hall next Friday at Town Hall Seattle so the public can take part in a more in-depth conversation on this issue, and have a further chance to weigh in on this issue with the mayor directly.
The mayor’s remarks as prepared for delivery are available below:
I’m here today to announce my decision about the city’s surveillance pilot project.
This is a decision about more than cameras. It’s about how we approach public safety, how we build trust, and how we show up for communities across this city. And it’s important that we get it right.
So I want to start by establishing where things stand today.
In April 2025, Seattle launched the Real Time Crime Center, or RTCC, with 62 police CCTV cameras located in three areas: downtown, along Aurora Avenue, and in the Chinatown International District.
This was presented as a pilot program: the Technology-Assisted Public Safety Pilot Program. The legislation authorizing the installation of the cameras and the creation of the RTCC included a commitment to evaluate this pilot once it was implemented.
Before any evaluation was completed, a decision was made late last year by the previous mayor and council to expand the program to include three additional neighborhoods: the Stadium District, the area in the Central District around Garfield High School, and the Capitol Hill Nightlife District. I expressed my concerns about this expansion during the campaign.
As we stand here today, none of the cameras that are intended for the pilot’s expansion have been installed, turned on, or connected to the RTCC. In fact, they have yet to even be received from Axon, the vendor used by the city’s program.
So what we have in front of us is not a fully implemented program—but a pilot which was expanded before many policies have been formalized, and before its outcomes have been evaluated.
I want to acknowledge that this is a controversial issue. For some people, seeing CCTV cameras in the neighborhood where they live or work or attend school makes them feel safer. For others, those same cameras make them feel less safe.
Those feelings are important, because our quality of life is partly about our feelings of safety or lack thereof, and our sense that our city is a welcoming place that is designed with consideration for our well-being and our humanity.
But precisely because different people and different communities experience the cameras differently, it’s important to base a decision on more than feelings. It’s important to ground our actions in a thorough understanding of how the cameras are being used, of the public benefits they are providing, and of any harm they are causing or could cause.
I believe in approaching governance deliberately, and I didn’t want to rush this decision before my team had been able to visit the Real Time Crime Center, review data retention policies, explore any potential vulnerabilities, listen to people on every side of this issue, and engage with the Community Police Commission, Seattle Police Department, and other privacy and civil liberty experts.
Today I’m ready to announce my path forward. Then I’m going to share a bit of context on how the program operates, and how I came to my decision. And then we’ll have time for some questions.
Here is what I have decided:
First, I am pausing expansion of this pilot until we have completed a privacy and data governance audit, and taken significant steps to strengthen ourthose policies.
In the meantime, the RTCC will continue to operate and existing cameras will remain in place.
There are two specific circumstances where I am making additional, targeted decisions.
- First: Given the unique nature of the upcoming World Cup and the current geopolitical situation, I have chosen to move forward with the installation of the cameras in the Stadium District slated for this spring. However, they will not be turned on and will not be connected to the RTCC unless we are aware of a credible threat which warrants such action. They will be turned off once that threat subsides.
- And second: I am turning off one currently installed camera which has a view of a facility which provides reproductive healthcare and gender affirming care. I have confirmed that SPD’s current practice is to mask or “blur” those locations, but until we’ve completed a comprehensive security audit and have stronger safeguards in place, I don’t believe it’s worth taking that risk.
In the event of a surge of immigration enforcement similar to what was seen in Minneapolis, I will turn off all cameras in order to prevent them from being abused by federal authorities. While it is already policy that SPD may not share information with ICE absent a court order, I am also directing SPD to immediately inform the Mayor and Council if we learn of any information sharing with ICE of any kind, even if that information is unrelated to the CCTV program.
Finally, I am temporarily pausing all use of Automatic License Plate Readers, or ALPRs, which capture and record the license plates of all vehicles in a specific area. The state legislature recently added welcome new restrictions to limit the potential abuse of this technology. We will pause the use of this tool in Seattle until we can ensure that our practices are consistent with the new state law and reflect the best safety and security policies.
These are big decisions and I know I’ll receive a lot of questions about them. There will be time for that soon. But I want to take a moment first to talk about how the RTCC works right now, and then surveillance more broadly.
The RTCC is an office within SPD headquarters that operates police CCTV cameras, which are affixed to poles in public spaces.
The police CCTV cameras continuously capture footage of specific zones within specific neighborhoods: parts of the downtown business district along 3rd Avenue, parts of the Chinatown International District up to and including 12th & Jackson, and parts of the North Aurora Corridor. These areas were initially selected based on reported concentrations of certain types of crime.
The RTCC also integrates live feeds from many traffic cameras. That traffic camera footage is already public and viewable in numerous other locations.
RTCC operators are civilian employees of the police department, and may not share data or information with Federal, State, or other city jurisdictions for enforcement efforts related to immigration enforcement, reproductive rights, or gender-affirming care absent a court order or judicial warrant.
While the police CCTV cameras capture footage continuously, they are not continuously monitored.
When a relevant 9-1-1 call is received, cameras in the RTCC are activated, and operators can zoom in, pivot, and thus provide additional visual information about the area.
In general, camera footage is stored on site and retained locally for 5 days, after which it is deleted.
However, if footage is connected to an “incident” it is uploaded to and retained on servers operated by our technology vendor Axon, on their evidence.com platform. This footage may be used in investigations related to reported incidents.
I know cameras can be, have been, and will be useful tools to solve crime in Seattle and in countless other cities across the world
I believe in the good faith and good judgement of the people currently operating the RTCC. But too many of the most important protections rely on standard operating procedures rather than clear, enforceable policy.
I am also aware of the reports that the state Department of Licensing and other agencies have provided information to federal authorities, and we need to make sure a similar data leak cannot happen here in Seattle, whether intentionally or unintentionally.
That means putting in place clear, enforceable protections for how surveillance data is stored, accessed, and shared.
I also remain concerned that we don’t know enough about the security of our data when it is transferred to off-site evidence.com servers which may be located in states with different degrees of legal protection and could be vulnerable to subpoena.
And more broadly, I believe it is not good governance to expand a pilot program without completing a full evaluation of its impacts.
That’s why I’m pausing the planned expansion until we are able to complete an audit and strengthen protections. We are pursuing a partnership working with NYU’s Policing Project to conduct the data governance and privacy audit. This audit will specifically examine whether current policies and practices address potential harms to civil rights and civil liberties adequately. The UPenn evaluation, overseen by the OIG, is focused on evaluating crime occurrences, investigative outcomes, police operations, and community perceptions of the RTCC.
I know this issue has become an intense focus of public interest, and I think it’s also important to zoom out a little.
There’s no doubt that these cameras make it easier to solve crimes, including serious ones like homicides. But also: Cameras are not the one key to making our neighborhoods safe.
On the other hand, there are legitimate concerns about privacy, over-surveillance, and potential misuse of surveillance technologies. But also: these cameras are not the primary threat to immigrants, trans people, or people seeking reproductive health care in our country right now.
There is so much more to public safety, and so much more to protecting the communities being targeted by the federal government.
These are big sticky multidimensional problems with no simple answers. In that context the cameras start looking like an easy switch that can be turned on or off.
So I know that some people will be upset that I’m not turning off all the cameras immediately, and others will be upset that I’m not charging ahead with turning more on.
To those people, I say, let’s work together on the bigger project of making SoDo and the Central District and Capitol Hill safer. And let’s work together on all the ways we can keep immigrants and other vulnerable communities safe. All the ways that aren’t as easy as flipping a switch.
I’m committed to that work, so even if you disagree with me about this decision, let’s move forward on that together. Please consider my office a partner in that work.
I want to thank all the advocates who have been active on this issue, on all sides.
I know that we all want the same thing: for all of us to be able to get where we need to go, spend time in our neighborhoods, and live our lives, knowing we’ll come home safe.
I also want to thank Chief Shon Barnes and SPD for their collaboration as my office has been working towards this decisions. And in particular I want to thank Commander Doug Raguso and the staff at the Real Time Crime Center for their work and partnership. I want to thank members of the City Council for productive conversations, and everyone in my office who’s been working on this issue, especially Caedmon Cahill, my General Counsel.
I think the best governance is when as many people as possible are behind you, united towards a shared goal.
The decisions we make now will shape how safety, privacy, and trust are experienced in Seattle for years to come. So we need to take the time to get the right policies in place so we can get this right. And hopefully we can find some more common ground along the way.
My decision today is just the first step.
I’ll be holding a town hall next Friday at Town Hall Seattle where we can have a more in-depth conversation on this issue, and people can have a further chance to weigh in on this issue with me directly.
And now I’m happy to take questions now. I have Caedmon Cahill and Dr. Lee Hunt here as well to handle any technical questions that may arise.