CITY OF SEATTLE
ORDINANCE __________________
COUNCIL BILL __________________
title
AN ORDINANCE relating to surveillance technology implementation; authorizing approval of uses and accepting the 2025 updated surveillance impact report and 2025 executive overview for the Seattle Police Department's use of Real-Time Crime Center software.
body
WHEREAS, on October 8, 2024, the City Council passed Ordinance 127111, adopting the original Surveillance Impact Report (SIR) for Real-Time Crime Center software (RTCC); and
WHEREAS, the purpose of the RTCC program provides a centralized location for real-time information and analysis-integrates dispatch, cameras, officer location, 911 calls, records management system, and other information into one single view. The software is used to alert real-time crime center staff to a serious criminal event, see multiple streams of information overlaid on a map view, and convey that information to officers who are responding in the field; and
WHEREAS, subsection 14.18.020.F of the Seattle Municipal Code (SMC), which section was enacted by Ordinance 125376 and last amended by Ordinance 125679, states that "[a]ny material update to an SIR, such as to change the purpose or manner in which a surveillance technology may be used, shall be by ordinance"; and
WHEREAS, the material update will provide the Seattle Police Department (SPD) the ability to view the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) traffic monitoring cameras in the RTCC software; and
WHEREAS, the RTCC program went live in May 2025 and early examples of the RTCC program directly contributing to public safety outcomes include a drive-by shooting where the suspect was taken into custody, footage from a stabbing incident in the Chinatown-International District to assist investigators, a female reporting an attempted robbery with the male suspect denying the allegations but the RTCC video footage showed the male grabbing the female's purse to disprove his story, and locating...
Click here for full text