Spherical bollards protected the now-closed Fry’s building from smash-and-grab burglaries throughout its life as an electronics store

Renton police are recommending businesses consider installing bollards after seeing a growing number of burglaries in which cars are purposely smashed through windows and walls of buildings.  The number of incidences has been growing exponentially since the legislature prohibited police from pursuing these burglars after they steal cars and after they crash into stores. There were a dozen incidences of this type of crime in Renton last year, and in 2023 we’ve already had three, putting us on the discouraging track to break last year’s record.

This recommendation makes sense under today’s circumstances, but it’s too bad we’ve come to this point where this is a significant concern.  While bollards can be decorative and come in many architectural designs, they can also be pedestrian or bike hazards themselves, and they can limit legitimate vehicle access to storefronts when performing certain maintenance.  When bollards are installed they should be substantial and tall enough to be easily seen, to prevent people from running into them or tripping over them.  And some stores may want to consider them at more than just the front door– burglars have been known to drive stolen cars through walls as well as doors and windows.

Perhaps one of the best reasons to add storefront bollards is for the protection of personnel inside the store.  It’s only a matter of time before one of these late-night smash-and-grabs in Renton kills or injures an employee doing inventory or restocking work.

This kind of security measure is unfortunately another large expense added on top of  losses many businesses have sustained due to the pandemic, increased crime, and in the case of downtown businesses, a long period of road construction.

KOMO news reports on the police recommendation for bollards here.

Renton Council President Randy Corman makes a case to Sound Transit Board to increase Renton’s share of service in ST3. Photo Q13 Fox

Note:  This is the third installment of a three part series about Renton seeking equitable service in Sound Transit 1, Sound Transit 2, and (this entry) Sound Transit 3.

As Sound Transit 3 was being formed, it became ever more apparent that the structure of Sound Transit was repeatedly leaving Renton out of a fair share of service.

Sound Transit is its own taxing district with its own governance board. It was structured by the legislature to have four “sub-areas” that are each supposed to receive as much benefit as they pay in.  The legislature placed Renton in the Eastside sub-area, along with  Bellevue, Redmond, Issaquah and other eastside cities.  Under the legislative structure, certain current city elected officials were appointed by the County Executive to represent these subareas.  This structure unfortunately has a built-in conflict for those appointed; do they represent the sub-area overall, or give preference to the city that elected them?   The County Executive picked elected officials from Redmond, Issaquah, and Bellevue to represent our eastside subarea.  These three cities will receive Sound Transit light rail service in the coming years.  Renton has been left out of rail service, and will only receive two Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) stations.

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Sound Transit 2 was presented to the voters in 2008

The above document can be accessed here

My previous blog entry covered Sound Move, and how we in Renton passionately worked to get our promised share of funding.   Today I’m providing some history of Sound Transit 2, in my own words at the time.  Renton officials were working hard to get a fair treatment for Renton commuters and taxpayers.

Here is my blog entry four months in advance of the election, when Sound Transit was again offering us less ridership opportunity than other cities for our money.

Here was my write-up following bond approval

Senator Bob Hasegawa will hold an in-person town hall on Saturday March 18, from 10:00- 11:30 AM, at the Teamsters Hall at 14675 Interurban Ave South, Suite #307, Tukwila, WA.  The official announcement can be found here.

His morning town hall will be followed in the afternoon by a town hall in Renton with his legislative colleagues Rep. Steve Bergquist and Rep. David Hackney, where residents who have appointments can meet with the legislators.

It’s a little unusual for our 11th district to separate the house and senate town halls, as most of our neighboring districts appear to be combining them, especially when house and senate colleagues all represent the same party.  I encourage Renton residents who are concerned about public safety issues to attend both town halls as there is enough time for a trip from Tukwila to Renton and a quick lunch between them, particularly if you book a later appointment at the afternoon town hall.

Senator Hasegawa has appeared out of step with the City of Renton’s official legislative agenda this session on drug use legislation, police pursuit, and other public safety issues, and these issues are still before the legislature.  So if these issues are of concern to you, this town hall is a good time to share your views with Senator Hasegawa face to face.

It is very important that your legislators hear from you first-hand, in-person about your public safety concerns.  Legislators typically will be most responsive to in-person conversations, then to your emails, and probably last to your social media posts (if they see them).  So please try to make time for these town hall events!

Photo from apartments.com showing current apartments available; Renton officials have been criticized for Renton having the same number of evictions within the city as in the larger unincorporated, mostly single-family, neighborhoods east of Renton. However, this is probably because there are more apartments, and therefore more renters, in the city.

The subject of renter protections has been on many people’s minds lately as the region works to solve the ever-worsening homeless crisis.  Anything that can be done to help renters keep their homes is worth discussing.  Preventing jolting rent increases, unfair landlord practices, and unjustified evictions certainly deserves discussion.  Part of keeping tenants in their homes is keeping landlords from quitting the business, which has happened 3000 times in Seattle in the last few years, adding about 6000-9000 new renters to the displaced tenant pool. An increasing number of landlords have found there is not enough profit in offering rentals any more, particularly Mom-and-Pop landlords who are used to operating on very little cash-flow margin, or none at all, as they’ve worked to keep rents low for tenants while taxes, utilities,  insurance, and now interest rates climb rapidly.  As landlords drop out, their rental houses sell to owner occupants, reducing the number of new homes built for this market, and lowering construction in the region overall. The reduced construction raises prices for everyone.  Because of this necessary market balancing, it’s important to use accurate data and get thorough public input before making any significant changes to the rules covering landlord and tenant relationships.

The State of Washington has several bills working their way through committees that attempt to address these issues, and the legislature has been taking public testimony and gathering data on these bills for months.  The state process will not likely be completed in this legislative session, but there is a good chance it will be completed later this year.

At the February 27 council meeting a representative from the Housing Justice Project asked the Renton City Council to consider adopting new tenant protection laws ahead of any state action; rules that some other jurisdictions have adopted, including unincorporated King County.

The council was split on how to proceed, with four members (Rivera, Prince,  McIrvin, and O’Holloran) choosing to give the issue to the city administration for study and a recommendation, and three members (Alberson, Perez, and Van) suggesting that since the state is already doing the work and is ultimately in charge of statewide landlord-tenant law (which could supercede any work done by the city), it would make sense to simply let the state finish the job.  The group wanting to leave the job to the state pointed out that Renton planning staff time is a scarce resource that could be better spent on many other urgent Renton issues that the state is not trying to solve for us.

If I was still on council I probably would have voted with the second group, as our city staff and even our City Council have a number of other very important activities they should be dedicating time to.  For instance, they need to devote resources to other ways to help solve Renton’s homelessness challenges, rein in the burgeoning drug overdose problem, and remedy the increasingly dangerous streets.  And we should be dedicating Renton staff time and Council focus to trying to getting Sound Transit to give our residents a fair share of future transit opportunities.  Housing is not as good if people can’t get to work or access services from it.  It’s possible the administration could come back with a recommendation to leave it to the state for these same reasons.

The Renton Reporter ran a recent article on this council discussion, and included a quote from early in the testimony of the representative from the Housing Justice Project.

“Tran-Larson (from Housing Justice Project) said Renton makes up 4.7% of the total population of King County, while the unincorporated areas around Renton make up more than double at 10.8%, yet their number of evictions are nearly the same. She said this means that renters inside the city limits of Renton are nearly twice as likely to be evicted.

Tran-Larson suggested that this difference is due to the regulatory environment for tenants in Renton, as she cited that unincorporated King County saw a “significant decrease” in eviction filings from 2021 to 2022, a year after they passed their tenant protections in the county.”

I personally got sidetracked at this speech opening as I watched the testimony, as it is an apples-to-orange comparison.  While I accept that the unincorporated areas primarily to Renton’s east may have twice as many residents as in incorporated Renton, these areas, per state growth management, are much less dense and far more likely to be single-family homes than the residential areas of Renton.  On a population basis, one would expect to see far fewer evictions from single family neighborhoods, where maybe 19 out of 20 own their homes, than in apartment neighborhoods where everybody rents.  So unless Tran-Larson had accidentally abbreviated her comment, or else we all heard it wrong, she appeared to base her testimony on a questionable statistic.  Finding the truly relevant data, like “when comparing a significant number of like-rentals in the county compared to the city, do eviction rates differ?” will take time and resources.

The Renton Reporter reached out to a landlord-tenant attorney, Devin Glaser, who emphasised the difficult financial climate many tenants are in, and I tend to agree with everything he said in the story.

One comment of his I found interesting was after mentioning different minimum notice periods different cities have adopted for rent increases, he said “Ironically, this means that someone could have very different protections than their neighbor living across the street depending on which city they live in and whether or not it has officially been incorporated as a city or is unincorporated county land.” 

To me, this is exactly why we should encourage the state to come up with harmonious, consistent protections for tenants statewide, and not spend precious Renton resources further adding to the disparate, confusing rules that both tenants and landlords are continually sorting out.

Everyone in Renton who’s frustrated with our escalating crime rates should watch the above brief video in which Senator Mark Mullet (D, 5th District, Issaquah) makes an impactful speech in yesterday’s State Senate debate on police pursuit.  Senator Mullet brings honor and intelligence to this debate, and specifically expresses the needs of our city even though he only has a small part of Renton in a corner of his district.  Senator Mullet deserves Renton’s gratitude.

Thanks in part to Senator Mullet’s critical support and his compelling speech to the full chamber, the State senate surprised many of us by getting SB 5352 approved in the full chamber (26 to 23) after it had languished in committee for many weeks.  This bill will now go back to the House, where the legislators had just buried their own version of the bill the day before.  They would ordinarily now consider this Senate bill (unless opponents devise a way to procedurally bury it), and Renton officials and residents should encourage them to pass it.

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