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Focus Group-RTC Colleen: Go ahead. I think we’re good to go. Male: So Courtney [sp] and I were at a meeting actually [inaudible] at [inaudible words], and Chris Falco, Falco Sault; Bruce and Chris I know really well. Chris had mentioned the homeless task force. It caught my interest immediately because we’ve had several issues. And it’s funny, because in working with your department, there’s an overnight officer that my team knows first name because the 911 calls that it calls over to have somebody come assist us. And there was actually one instance that there was a traffic collision and you couldn’t dispatch an officer to the hotel and we had to deal with a gentleman, quite honestly, that we were afraid of. Redmond couldn’t provide us any protective services because of this accident on the overnight hours. My team reminded me of that incident. So I thought, gosh, yeah, I mean, this for us, it’s a little bit larger issue than I think you are aware of. Then in just talking with Courtney, I don’t realize that when I leave my building, they just go right into her Town Center. So, the bathroom usage for showering, I mean, we have one gentleman that’s using our toilet to shower. We’ve asked him to leave half a dozen times. And so, you kind of look at all these instances and it’s compiling to the point where, when we heard of the task force, I’m thinking why aren’t the hotels; i.e., Marriott; and then I asked Courtney if she was part of it, and she wasn’t. Male: Courtney, I’m not familiar with what you… Courtney: Yeah, so I’m the property manager for the Town Center, and my security manager, Jeremiah, he’s been with the property quite a while, about ten years. After talking to Dan, I mentioned to him, like, do you know about the task force? Because he’s got a great relationship with your team and that; he says over the years, he’s heard about there possibly being one, but we were never very much involved in it. He wasn’t aware of any recent ones, so as far as the task force and that, I don’t have too much history on that. Colleen: Why don’t give a little background? Male: Well, it probably started in, I would say 2012 we started seeing, I refer to it as my much more, the visible side of homelessness because we’ve had homeless people in Redmond for years. But it became much more visible downtown. The library was one spot in particular and we just started hearing more and more from the community, emails to the Mayor’s office, emails to my office, emails to Colleen. So the thought was, let’s get a group together of constituents, stakeholders, together throughout the City to talk about what can we do in Redmond. ---PAGE BREAK--- I mean, there’s obviously a homeless issue throughout the country, definitely in King County and in downtown Seattle it’s very obvious. My concern, and I think Colleen’s, she represents us on the county groups, but I’ll just say, from the police chief’s concern in Redmond, I want to know what can we do to improve the situation in Redmond? What can we do now, some tangible things that we can do to improve the situation in Redmond? So, we convened a meeting in March, I think, from the community and invited anybody that wanted to come in and talk with us about it, got a lot of feedback. It was obvious that there was a lot of concern. So then, the mayor appointed about a dozen folks from human service providers, business community, residents, some apartment managers to sit with us and talk about what can we actually do to improve the situation in Redmond? So that’s kind of what this is about and I think, as a nutshell, in the background, we’ve been working on it for a while, but the task force has only met two times. We hope by the end of the summer to have some tangible things that we can do. Colleen: The charge of the task force is ultimately to come up with an action agenda, basically, with the idea that they can help identify actions that can, various sectors across the community can potentially be involved in taking to make this situation better. So, that’s why it’s really important to us that the input that you have and the experiences that you have been having are in the mix of what folks have to consider as they’re thinking about that. We would welcome you to continue to follow all the activities. We post everything online. We want this to be really available to the whole community. If you have additional comments as you track what we’re doing or if you want to talk with us, again, since I know the meetings aren’t really accessible, it sounds like given your other lives, we’re happy to kind of keep you up to speed and make sure, if you have additional feedback or things you need to have in the mix, that that gets considered along with everything else. Male: So I think your feedback would be helpful for the task force, number one. Number two, I’m anxious to hear, like most organizations, sometimes, the person at the top doesn’t hear what’s going on sometimes. So I’m interested in hearing, just for the police department’s standpoint, what issues that you’re dealing with, are we meeting your needs from the police department, services we can provide, and if not, then I want to fix that. So I want to hear for the task force so they can know what you’re dealing with. I’m also interested as far as are we providing the services that you need? Colleen: I would say, too, that the context that we’ve tried to talk to everybody about is to the extent, I mean, obviously, hearing the concerns and experiences that you’re having, but to the extent that you have ideas about what to do about it. We’re interested in that too because we feel a little bit, also stuck. And that’s really a lot of what the task force is about too, is how can we, as a community, come together to come up with ---PAGE BREAK--- some things that might be helpful? We’re trying to be really cognizant of striking a balance for people that are struggling to survive outside along with quality of life in this city, impact on businesses, all of that needs to be considered and taken into account as we’re thinking about this. So that’s kind of the broad perspective. So, whoever would like to sort of just start. Male: I’ll let Courtney. Courtney: I previously, I was in downtown Seattle doing property management, so coming from there to Redmond it’s not, like you said, it’s very obvious in Seattle. But I think one of the things that we found challenging here is that when we do have frequent homeless, like on the Town Center property that keep returning, they definitely know, kind of their rights, so, which is great, but then we run into a challenge where we’ve hit a roadblock that there’s nothing else we can kind of do. An example we have, and I don’t know if you are familiar with this individual, but her name’s Ms. Williams, that she was previously, from my understanding, at Safeway for a really long time, Bear Creek Village over there, Safeway, Panera Bread and that. And I guess they had some… Male: African-American? Courtney: Yes. They had some challenges with her over there. We had a long-standing challenge with her. One of the perks we have is we just added a fireplace, so that was very nice that we do see quite a few homeless people that want to kind of sit in front of our fireplace. Colleen: Where is, that Courtney? Courtney: We just added it. It’s right next to Starbucks. Colleen: It’s outdoors? Courtney: Yeah, behind, kind of behind the fountain. So she loved hanging out there and it’s tough. She knows she can go into Starbucks and she buys, and she does, she buys a cup of coffee, but then she’s sitting at the fireplace with all of her belongings and she’s there all day. I also find her in our bathrooms, using the stalls to shower and all that kind of stuff. She knew her rights. We asked her to leave, we asked her to move along, we trespassed her and she knew that there wasn’t anything that was going to happen with trespassing. So, I think that’s where my big road blocks, is that sometimes, it is move along and that’s easy enough. My security can handle that. But sometimes it gets into situations where she’s gotten angry and yelling back at my security and we do call the police and they’ve been great about coming and we did trespass her, but she knew that there was nothing that the, from my understanding is, it’s tough to enforce the trespass. ---PAGE BREAK--- Male: It’s very difficult in a public mall, public setting, to tell somebody… Courtney: Yes, to do, so and… Male: Well, you’re in a public area. Courtney: Yeah. I will say that I’m happy because she’s moved along. From my understanding, I hear she’s at another Starbucks location. She’s off our property, she’s moved along which is great for us, but still an issue for the city. Then, another frequent one that Dan mentioned is we have some that really get aggressive and yell at my staff. Now, from talking to Dan, they’re coming over here. One gentleman, in particular, I found about six incidents where I think it’s the same guy where he’s just verbally abusive, yelling; tough to get off the property. It just puts my security staff in a tough situation and they do call the police and, from my understanding, we don’t have any issues there as far as responding, but it’s just trying to get a final solution so that we don’t keep having these encounters. Then, I guess the other big thing, just for us, is the homeless camps are tough for us as well. I mean, daily, I have my security guards, where they’re checking those areas, if we find things abandoned, we typically, we get them and we toss them so that hopefully, people don’t come back. But the wooded, green areas, they like to set up the camps over there. Male: On the Town Center property? Courtney: Yeah, so we have some property that’s actually off the trail. So it’s not the shopping center, but we actually own the property of the green space and so that’s something that we’re; I just got a call actually yesterday from the city asking us to address those areas. Male: We’ve cleaned up a number of camps [inaudible words]. Courtney: And I think typically, we do call you guys if we find a camp and we document it. Male: First we need to find out who owns the property, is it private property? Is it public property? Is it city property? So [inaudible words] what most calls you’re [inaudible words]. Courtney: Yeah. Typically, if we find any sort of camp things, we typically call the police, so we document it properly and can remove the items and all that kind of stuff, but they know where they can hang out. Male: Have you seen an increase in the camps? Courtney: Typically, yeah, around this time of year, we do see an increase. ---PAGE BREAK--- Male: Has it been a number of years, or just this year in particular, or what would you say? Courtney: No, I think it’s an ongoing issue. Some of my staff’s been with the property for; I’ve been here for two years. Some of my staff’s been here longer and they said it’s an ongoing thing that they’ve; especially for the homeless camp areas. In the last two years, I have seen an increase more recently of actually homeless people hanging out in the Town Center itself, though. Male: I’m going to catch up. Thank you. Male: Mine’s not as complex because we don’t have the open space, but to echo what Courtney’s saying, probably in the last eighteen to twenty-four months, we’ve seen a steady increase. One gentleman in particular, bearded, heavyset; we were meeting in this room that we’re here today, in Studio Four, and his verbal abuse of my front desk clerk could be heard from the lobby. That’s how loud he got. Was arrested, no trespass, came back three days later. Same gentleman is coming in and using the restrooms to shower, what have you. I think the biggest concern for us is twofold; one, the aggressiveness that we’re starting to see out of these people. We’ve had two verbal threats of our staff. One was that day. The other occurred on overnight and Ron, that’s the concern, is it’s the overnights, when you don’t have a lot of officers on, when we’re down to a skeleton crew, there’s not anybody at the Town Center. There may be an officer or two overnight. They’re trying to force their way into the building. We have it on video where there were several attempts to get through the back of the hotel. We’ve found people in our banquet foyer space sleeping the evening that we couldn’t get any police response because there was nobody available. We had to deal with somebody who refused to leave. We have them entering our back hallway, looking for food, going through the refrigerators. We didn’t have a homeless guy, but a gentleman picking up pallets. His windshield looked like a kaleidoscope it was so damaged. Came around our drive, pulled into our drive backwards, in my mind, was on something because he was everywhere. He gave us his business card, which was one of my napkins with his name written on it, with a pile of cookies in his car that he had gotten out of my banquet [inaudible], so he had actually gone into the building. We are secured, but we do have people coming and going. It almost is like they’re trying to find patterns of when they can get in. So it’s kind of taking it to the next level where you’re homeless and you’re looking for a warm, dry place to sleep, but it’s actually starting to rival theft, forced entry and then, obviously, the threats to staff. My staff will not deal with anybody. We dial 911. If I can’t get police response, I’ll call John, say John, I had this happen this night and you weren’t able to respond to me, what are you going to do? And that’s kind of what we’ve gotten to because I had a female one evening; she actually left the company because of the incident. So we’ve ---PAGE BREAK--- actually had turnover because this particular associate didn’t feel safe and what happened, and he entered through the Enterprise Car side of the building, the door over there, somehow got through that door and came in and when he was asked to leave, he threatened her. And, in her mind, being in Redmond, she said this isn’t, I’m not getting paid enough to… Male: How long ago was that? Male: Elizabeth left within the last two weeks, so it I’d say it probably happened about a month ago. And they, my [inaudible words], as much as I can look back [sounds like] , we’ve probably had about six incidents in the last six months that we’ve had people coming into the building. Colleen: Of those incidents, what’s your sense about, is it six different people, or is it two people three times? Male: Three to four different people. The gentleman, the heavyset gentleman with the beard, interesting enough, he just, the other day I was [inaudible] in here and he walked by, I shared with Courtney, I was shocked to see him walk by. Again, and I didn’t know the Town Center side. I figured it was private property, they could just… Courtney: Well, and technically, we are. We are private property and we can tell people that, but we’re a shopping center. Everyone views it as a public place and all that, which is fine and as long as everyone’s using it appropriately. But I mean, we have used that, actually, this is private property, you have to leave and all that. But being a shopping center, and we’re a very large shopping center as far as the amount of space that I cover. I mean, I don’t just have the retail core. We go all the way back to 24 Hour Fitness and all that. So it’s a big area where, when we do try to kick somebody off the property, we’re following them for sometimes two blocks just to make sure they actually get off our property and move along. But then, the problem with that is now, it’s okay for me, but I’m just making it somebody else’s issue. I don’t want to push them to Dan or push them to north of us or anything like that. It would be nice to try to find… Male: And on the other hand, you’ve got a business to run. Courtney: Yeah, exactly. And it makes shoppers feel unsafe. It also makes employees feel unsafe; especially the retail center closing in the evening when it’s dark, while young girls are working, and the retail stores and all that kind of stuff. I want to make sure we have a safe environment. Male: [inaudible words] three to four people, one bearded guy, I mean, if you had to estimate his age? Male: Early sixties would be my guess [speaking simultaneously - inaudible words]. ---PAGE BREAK--- Courtney: Yeah, and I might have some, I just have the summaries here, but I can actually pull these incident reports and maybe send them over to you because typically, my security, they’ll put in a description of individuals. Male: Of the others would say, under or over twenty-five? Male: They’re all over twenty-five. Male: Majority are over twenty-five. Male: Yeah, I would say so. And that’s what you need, because in talking with the mayor, I know that we could pick them up and take them to a shelter if they’re under a certain age. Unfortunately, the dynamic that we’re dealing with doesn’t fit that criteria, because I asked John, I mean, is there somewhere? I’m not about, I, let’s help these individuals if they want help. I mean, I think what I, also, from Seattle, I think what we learned about the Seattle homeless is they don’t want help. They actually want to create a scene. When you sell the City of Redmond, when I’m out selling this hotel as a destination, we’re trying to bring business into this market. One of the things I can hang my hat on is the safety and security of the city, is the fact that we have eighty-five full-time officers or whatever that number is today and you look at safety and security of the hotel and we’re one of the top five in the company because of the environment that Redmond is able to provide. In the last eighteen, twenty-four months, that’s slipped tremendously and so have my scores. To have someone in the lobby with that kind of scene, they don’t do that in all of my media rooms because nobody knew what was going on. And Ron, you and I both know the last thing you want to see at a hotel is police. That’s the last thing you want to see. Fire and police are not, they’re our friends, but guests get concerned [speaking simultaneously - inaudible]. Male: Not good for business. Courtney: Yeah. Male: So when I have any, when you respond, and by the way, phenomenal, but you guys respond in numbers. Male: Right. Male: And I’ve actually said to, please don’t hit my drive, because it just, my guests see that, hit the back of the building when you have these issues because we don’t want to set off that panic alarm in guests. My average age of traveler is forty-six and that’s split down the middle, male and female, which is very unique because usually are hotels are very male-dominated. This hotel is actually right down the middle. ---PAGE BREAK--- To top it off, [inaudible words], which is confidential, but Microsoft puts, in this market, between these two hotels, a very large amount of, thank you, by the way, of recruits. I can tell you every recruit that comes internationally is brought into this building or next door and it’s thousands upon thousands of room nights [sounds like]. And again, you want to create environments where people feel safe, and obviously, Microsoft, trying to get these people to relocate here. Male: They want them to come work here. Male: Well, and OneRedmond and these organizations are trying to create an environment that they want to live, work and retire here. We’re faltering on that a little bit right now. There’s the church up off of 202, not just, it’s by Education Hill that does the homeless camp. Male: St. Jude? Male: Yeah, they do it in the back there. Colleen: The tent city? Male: Yeah, we look at younger people who come from there and we’ve actually found them up in our concierge lounge at our business center in the concierge lounge not poorly dressed, but just out of place. Courtney: When was the last time that tent city was up there? Do you remember? Colleen: It’s there now. Male: Recently. Courtney: It is? Okay. Because I would say that too, is that I think we’ve seen some younger ones come in and I bet you, it kind of correlates with that. Again… Colleen: Not teens. Courtney: Not teens. I would say younger, like maybe early twenties or around that age. But again, to the point where sometimes my security comes to me and they’re, like, do you think it’s a homeless person or should we do something? Because they have a protocol of how to handle the fireplace and people hanging out there too long that appear to be; but we’ve caught them sleeping on our couch, the soft seating we have out there and all that kind of stuff and that was in I’d say in the last, like, month or so that we had a few of those. Male: And those will come when the camp’s here [sounds like] and I have echoed that to the mayor before, because we’ll, somehow, they’re getting up into areas where doors are left open by staff that are bringing things in and out. And I said to John, I said, ---PAGE BREAK--- they’ve got to be looking to get into these areas. I mean, they’ve got to be somewhat casing the area to know. Because we’ve found a young man who was delightful and we put two and two together, he finally ‘fessed up where he was at. And he had surfed our computers for almost three days in and out and had a guest key and showed our staff the guest key. Oh, I’m a guest, okay, great. And the pattern just didn’t, it wasn’t right. He was here in the middle of the day and people that work in [inaudible words] in our hotel. So we were finally able to do the math. I would say to you this. When we hear about a task force and what we’re sharing with you today is Town Center or at the Marriott’s, or [inaudible words] aren’t on the task force, I’d share with Colleen, that’s concerning to me because you can hear that this is something we deal with every day, probably more than most businesses. And it’s actually gotten to the point where we’ve had threats of bodily harm to our staffs. And from a police chief’s standpoint, that’s concerning. Heaven knows we don’t want the local news to pick that up and say look, we’ve got this story escalating out there about these homeless camps behind the Town Center and all these different things. That’s not what we want to do. We just want to make sure that we have the services provided both to those who need it and then to the staff that travel in because the people that work in Redmond don’t live in Redmond. Most kids in this area don’t need to work. We pull from Bellingham. We pull from Burien. We pull from Renton. So people are traveling long distances to come here and one of the things we can offer is free parking, which downtown, they can’t offer. So there are these incentives that we have built in to have these people travel all this distance, you want them to be safe. And we, too, have ladies leaving at night. We have overnight people that aren’t just males and we have to create those environments where they feel absolutely safe. And when I get a report that we’ve got someone trying to get in the back doors on the graveyard hours, that keeps me awake at night because gosh knows, I can share many stories with you in the hotel industry of things that happen over the graveyard hours that don’t end nicely for people trying to force their way in for literally, nothing, because there’s no cash on the property. We don’t keep any cash on property, and heck, if they want the safe, I tell my staff to help load it in the car, do whatever you need to, just get an accent or get a description. If you get a license plate number or car make, great, but help them get it out of here. There’s nothing here. So I think, for us, that’s at least where I’m coming from and asking Courtney if she was part of it, and she said no. I was a little bit surprised because it looks it’s really focused in the downtown area. Well, this is much wider spread than just that area and then I wonder about Overlake, if they’re having any issues as well. And I know we have two hotels, not Marriott, but Starwood has those two hotels opening up there which, it’s only going to continue to escalate. ---PAGE BREAK--- And then I ask, what is bringing them here? Why Redmond? Is it the hospitality that they love? I mean, there’s a lot between us and the city. Colleen: Well, I think that’s a question that’s very hard to answer because I think it’s probably not a single answer for the various folks. I just did a focus group with some guys staying at Camp Unity to try to understand what’s your story? What’s going on? And they have all kind of reasons for being here. One of them’s from Redmond. One of them, oh wait, I’m getting my focus groups confused. I’m not sure one of the Camp Unity guys was from Redmond. One of them came from Dallas and then he called a friend and said hey, why don’t you come up here? Maybe the two of us together can afford a place to live. And he got here and they still can’t afford a place to live. So I don’t think there’s a single answer to that question. I mean, what Ron said at the beginning is that this is, it’s not just in Redmond. It’s happening everywhere. Male: About a year ago, Colleen and I started hosting meetings in Redmond with human service providers and police representatives from Bellevue, Kirkland, Sammamish, Bothell, Issaquah; the Eastside cities, to say we’re seeing it here. Are you seeing it or what’s going on? And they all are seeing it. So that led me to believe that it’s not just Redmond. It’s migrated to the Eastside, the problems, because, like I say, Sammamish is seeing it, Bothell is seeing it, the same issues, Kirkland is, that we’re dealing with, camps in their shopping centers and whatnot. So we’re collaborating, saying what’s worked for you, we can try that, we can try this, trying to better the situation. But it’s a community problem that’s going to take a community solution, so that’s what we’re looking to do. Male: The one thing I did leave out, it’s not my establishment, but the McDonald’s up here, a lot of these guys that they’re signing over on 520 with their little signs, they go over to McDonald’s and they’ve had a few guests; when we bring all the soccer tournaments in, they tend to walk over to McDonald’s, the kids do. And I’ve had parents comment on how uncomfortable they felt with the men, specifically, men that were in there staring at their daughters. And one of the teams actually moved to another hotel in Bellevue which, we don’t like to hear because it’s our facility, King County, but it’s sixty acres and we’re the host hotel for that. But it just made it feel very uncomfortable with what’s happening within the McDonald’s, and again, they buy a cup of coffee. But it’s interesting enough because I went over one day and I was with my kids. And I recognized the guys immediately from the 520 off-ramp. And so I went oh, they’re just getting whatever money they’re getting and then they’re walking down. And I guess it’s funny because my wife has always had this tradition on Thanksgiving that, if we have dinner, what have you, when we lived in Seattle we always went out and we found one of the groupings of homeless and she would give them whatever was left over. And I just realized that we’re enabling homeless by doing that. And I ---PAGE BREAK--- guess people who are also giving money are enabling them just to continue to stay out on these corners. So for me, maybe it starts with that process of we need to stop. I hand them a business card, say you know what? I’ve got labor positions and housekeeping and janitorial, what have you, call me. We’re always looking for people, but it’s tough to find… Male: Actually, I think that’s a better solution. Male: And I never get a call. And I’ve literally, I’ll take $5 and put it on a business card, say here’s this, call me if you want to work and I’ve done it right up here and my phone never rings. And it’s my personal business card. I will personally see you through the process because it’s a computer-generated process and I’ve done it just to see if I would ever get that call. You see the father, the guy, father whatever, you think to yourself, what better person to put them in benefits and after a year profit sharing and all the things that Marriott can provide, phone never rings. Colleen: Can I refer some people to you that I just met? Male: We’re always looking for applicants, so absolutely, we would never say no. I mean, we work with OLS at Bellevue, so we work with adults with, kind of, I mean, learning disabilities. We also work with Seattle Central College and a group called Mainstay. So they have, and it’s funny, because what I’d love to do is find out Mainstay could get involved with these people because they’re coaching services. They go through dress and education and process and the interviewing process and I have three former homeless people on staff. Colleen: That’s great. Male: Cory being my latest one, and Cory’s phenomenal, and so we’re very dedicated as a company, as a hotel, to finding work for people who are looking for it. Colleen: I’m so happy you shifted the way you did because that’s the next thing I want to ask you about is other ideas. I mean, you just gave two. Male: You have janitorial as well. Courtney: Yeah, I mean, yeah, that’s another great example. I mean, always send any applicants our way and all that, I mean, yeah, we’d just love to just see these people, like you said, instead of just handing them cash, but getting them jobs and all that kind of stuff, so. Colleen: Do you have other ideas, just thinking about community solutions, people being willing to consider hiring folks, huge. I mean, that’s a great idea. But other thoughts about things we could be thinking about or the task force could be thinking about? ---PAGE BREAK--- Male: I work with some organizations, because of OLS over at Bellevue, I’ve been on that board for years and I can tell you, there’s groups out there that like and there’s groups out there like Mainstay and these groups work with, typically, people with disabilities. I know that there’s a large part of homeless that may have a disability or two that we could qualify that we might be able to umbrella, DVR is another one that jumps out at me. I have some contacts over there I work with. But I guess, for me, and again, not knowing what’s available is what organizations could we as a city work with, source, so that someone can approach that guy on 520 on that off-ramp and say you know what? Gosh, not only do we have a meal for you tonight, we’re not going to give you cash. We have a meal for you tonight, as a city, but we have an opportunity for you to go through Skills, which is going to allow you to find that job that you’re looking for. And quite honestly, if they don’t want a job, if we do that enough times, they’re going to find a new city. And I hate it say it’s going to move it on, but it’s going to happen anyways. There’s a guy in Woodinville that my wife; we came out of a movie theater one night and she purposely filled her soda and her popcorn and I couldn’t figure out why. And she walked out, she went to hand them to him, and he was, I don’t want that crap. And she was offended. She looked at him, my wife is the sweetest person in the world, he goes, you have any gift cards? I’ll take gift cards. And I just said, let’s go. We just kept walking. And he sits right outside the Woodinville theater and he sits right next to the Arco station and every time we go there, my son always asks, why is he not nice? Why is on his a cell phone? Why is he smoking cigarettes? Where does he get the money? My son, my eight year-old is doing the math now. How does that work? So I think Skills, I think DVR, if they could get involved, I think there’s Mainstay, if we can find those organizations and put it in front of them, it’s their choice. My question is what do we do if they don’t choose that? Courtney: Yeah, I mean, for the people that are friendly and cooperative and that, maybe then just having an approach of, this is how the City of Redmond responds, like you were saying, even if it was like a card that you would give to the establishment, it’s like the Marriott or Redmond Town Center, that when we do encounter these people, we can say, hey here’s a card, go to this place. You can get a meal. You can have a place to stay tonight and they’ll help you. Then we’re all kind of having the same approach in trying to with them, but yeah, I think, and unfortunately, I don’t have ideas on it, but just yeah being able to handle the people that are more aggressive and not wanting our help, that’s where Dan doesn’t even have security guards here. I do have security guards, but they’re security guards, they’re not police officers and that so putting them in the situations; I have a female security officer, putting her in a situation with a bigger man that’s yelling and that at her, those are the situations that I kind of need help with. We do the trespass thing, but if they’re smart enough, they know that we can’t do anything with that so ---PAGE BREAK--- what are some other solutions on how we can continue to make our facilities feel safe? Dan: That’s the thing for me right now is the level of aggravation that we’re seeing from a few of them. We’ve always had them in Redmond and we’ve asked them to leave and they leave. And we even get well dressed ones. I got a guy that comes kind of in a running outfit and he’ll literally walk in when we have banquet food out here for groups and actually has helped himself. We’ll shoo him off, but it’s probably in the last six to eight months where I’ve seen this escalation of threats and the want to physically get in. So, from a police standpoint, we’ve reached out we’ve asked can you adopt us? Because in a lot of cities I’ve been in Beverly Hills, LA we get adopt a program and so an officer adopts a hotel on the overnight, they want to adopt a Town Center so that officer’s beat that particular night is to check in with those staffs. We actually take it a step further in the hotels because we say come in and have coffee. Use our lobby to write your reports. Stay for breakfast. And we don’t give it to them for free if that’s not, but we give them a police discount, $2.50 whatever that is. And we asked about that. As a matter of fact the overnight officer, and I can’t think of his name off the top of his head, my staff’s actually inviting him in now because we take in reverse what I shared with you earlier. If you pull them in the Town Center, you pull them into the hotel and you see a police car and guests see that, but in the overnight hours they’re okay with it. Homeless people see it they’re just going to go the other way. Courtney: And we love it too is that being the Town Center people do come here so your staff comes here and having them sit outside at Starbucks by the fireplace and have coffee, I love that because it gives us a presence and that. So I think continuing those roles are very helpful for us. I mean I know you guys obviously have a job to do and that, but I mean maybe asking them hey, this area we’ve been getting a lot of complaints, let’s focus more on Rose and those areas just without us having to call. And not having a routine that’s always helpful. That’s one thing I always tell my security guards is don’t walk the same area on the same time... Male: Same time every day. Courtney: ...you got to be different so that people can’t case us can’t figure out our things. I had an issue where Mac Store was getting broken into a few times last year. And I figured out they knew where my shift changes were. So I have it switched up that we always have two officers on at a time, I don’t have shift change happen at same time for both officers. Everybody is staggered now and it’s helped. So we’re trying to kind of do those things, but any sort of presence kind of helps us. Male: What other concerns have you’ve seen at Town Center? Car break ins or burglaries? ---PAGE BREAK--- Courtney: Knock on wood we haven’t had a lot of car break ins, at least, that have been reported to us. We did have one about a month ago at BJ’s where like two or three cars got rocks thrown at them, but that was the first time in a while that I’ve seen anything. Male: Yeah, I wasn’t aware but sometimes they don’t make the report and you hear about it. Courtney: Yeah, but again, Victoria’s Secret, they’re hit a lot... Male: Shoplifting. Courtney: ...shoplifting a lot there. I think you guys hear from them a lot. We try to help them anyway we can. Some of our outdoor cameras are purposefully pointed that direction now and that, but that’s the biggest one. We had, like I said, Mac Store last year got hit a few times. T-Mobile got hit a few times, but I think that was region wide T- Mobiles were getting hit. They put in new garage grille doors that go down at night and they haven’t gotten hit since that happened. So, not a ton on the break in side, knock on wood, but Victoria’s Secret’s the one that we hear from the most. Male: Yeah I’m aware they have a big shoplifting problem there. Colleen: And that’s probably not terribly related to the homeless issue. Male: No. Courtney: No. Male: They have small items that can usually fit in a bag. Courtney: Yeah and I talked to them too about kind of their staff because sometimes I walk in there and I’m like make sure your staff is having a presence because I walk in there and I can’t get somebody to recognize that I’ve walked in and people pick up on those things. Dan: And we don’t have any car break ins as well. I mean we’re a valet. I’ve talked about putting gates on our, but holidays, Christmas which we put something in the car to notify guest it’s best to put stuff in the trunks our valets do the same thing. But it’s interesting, that’s not the issue. It’s a different issue than that. Male: Looking for a place to sleep trying to get food... Courtney: Yeah, I mean we just; night before last we kicked somebody out of one our back corridors that was sleeping back there. So yeah, it’s more those are kind of the issues. Male: Which is strange because the weather’s warmer which usually... Courtney: We don’t see... ---PAGE BREAK--- Male: It’s cool at night. Courtney: And if they figure out a spot where they can, they’ll keep coming back until they’re, for lack of better word, harassed enough that they don’t want to come back. Dan: And we’ve hired a new security person and we call him LP [sounds like]. It’s a former, actually I brought out of Seattle and he works at Aviation, it’s the control tower in Auburn. So he’s a federal officer and he works at night. He has a presence, I mean, he is a big boy and so, we’ve redone the route of the hotel and he has a system that he goes through that we’re actually recording rates at to make sure he’s actually doing the rounds. But we’ve stepped it up in the last month, I’d say three weeks, and a little bit quieter, but I think overall, I’ve seen probably a little bit quieter lately. I don’t know if it’s just the weather change or whatever where winter was a little bit more escalated. Colleen: What would each of you like in terms of as the work of the taskforce continues do you want to track it online? Do you want me to send you things directly? How would you like to make sure that you’re kept informed and if you feel like a need to offer more input, you have that opportunity? Courtney: I would love to get some emails of just kind of status of things, any meetings going on. I’m working personally trying to attend more things in the city and hear about public meetings, but like the ones that were held for the taskforce before I didn’t hear about those where myself or my security manager would have been good to stop by. So, any email notifications and that. Colleen: So one of the things about the setup of the taskforce is there’s not a time for public comment. Courtney: No, I’m sorry, I thought you mentioned that you guys had one earlier this year. Colleen: We had a community meeting so... Male: We had one community meeting just to kind of get an idea of what’s the state of the problem. Courtney: But being a bigger stakeholder in the City of Redmond I just [speaking simultaneously - inaudible]... Colleen: So I do have a distribution list that I call Redmond Community Concerned About Homelessness so like adding you to that for any... Courtney: That would be great. ---PAGE BREAK--- Colleen: ...kind of periodic updates. And I’m trying to send an update after each taskforce meeting just giving a general sense of what was covered at the taskforce and then reminding people of the link to all the materials. Courtney: That’d be great. Male: Courtney a number of years ago we used to have your security director or manager for Town Center on our Public Safety Advisory Committee. I’d love to get... Courtney: That’d be great. Male: ...that person or yourself, if you want to. So every other another month we meet in the evenings to hear; that’s my chance and the fire chief’s chance at public safety to hear from community members about what concerns do you have. We talk about programs we’re trying to rollout, do you think that’s good? Do you don’t think that’s good? Courtney: No that’d be great. I’ll give you my card so if it’s not myself... Male: Yeah I mean if you’re looking for an opportunity, I can definitely; you’re obviously a big stakeholder in the community... Courtney: Yeah myself or my security manager I would love to have attend those kind of meetings. That’d be great. Male: Okay, alright. Colleen: Anything else from you Dan? Dan: She’s available. No I think yes I need to be informed. Blackstone Hospitality, which is a very, very, large company out of New York purchased these two hotels and spent probably close to 150 million I’m guessing in the buildings with everything said and done and he’s here next week. And when we talk about lost business we talk about things like this. I need to know what’s happening and I think that’s why, when I reached out when we heard that the taskforce was occurring, and we didn’t really know what the direction and what the taskforce was doing, but yet we had this issue. We need to be informed and either that’s by email, if you feel that you need to swing by we have a quick meeting we can talk through things updates. Colleen whatever’s best sort of for you. I can tell you if I’m not in the loop, I’ll let the mayor know. I have no problem giving John a call and saying John, listen... Male: I’ve heard that. [speaking simultaneously - inaudible] Dan: ...yeah, we’ve echoed it and when it comes down to the safety of our associates and then the guests; and we both do a very unique thing for the city of Redmond which we invite people who don’t call Redmond home to come here and spend money and that pays for all this luxury that we have at City Hall and police cars and ---PAGE BREAK--- and what have you. Without that, we’d be in real trouble and having a brand like Marriott in this community is significant. We just want to continue to have that environment where everybody’s safe and for the most part we have. And I really don’t have any complaints. And speaking of your officers and your response and what it is that we need, you guys are amazing and on the fire side as well many of them we know by name and just is a great group of people. So I think that’s there it’s just how do we develop this relationship. And I’ve got to tell you for me that adopt a program that I’ve seen in larger cities is something that... Male: Let me get back to you on that to see what we can work out with our midnight officers. Dan: Yeah it’s just a simple check in once or twice during the evening. And as those relationships form over time it’s a night where there might be a lot of activity someone’s looking to fill out reports just do you mind if I sit here, come in to, absolutely, let’s get you a cup of coffee. We encourage that and if it’s great for the officers to be able to be in the community and be seen that way again we want them to do that and if they’re here they’re in the Town Center as well because their car’s sitting right out in front of the hotel so. Courtney: Yeah it’d be great. Dan: To me I think that would help tremendously because it’s the graveyard hours that we’re more concerned with. During the daytime there’s plenty of people around. It’s the overnight hours that we have a very limited staff with not a lot of resources. Male: I’ll have probably one of our midnight supervisors. Who would the best person to get ahold of to work on developing that? Dan: Just use me for now. I have a hotel director of operations that I’ll get involved with, but because of the importance of this, I’d like to stay in the loop. Male: You bet because that sounds like a great idea. I mean, sometimes I’m looking for things for them to do. We don’t have a lot of nightlife in Redmond, so the officers that work that overnight shift, when things really do slow down at midnight, one o’clock in the morning, there is time available I know for them to stop in a couple of times and if they have a place that they can write a report or have a cup of coffee... Courtney: Yeah, that’d be great. Male: not aware of a reason why we couldn’t do that. Dan: Again, it’s just the presence piece. During the day I don’t want to see you. During night you put four of you out front and I’m fine with that. ---PAGE BREAK--- Courtney: Well I think for us it’s different when having an officer responding to a situation and going into a store and talking to people, that alerts people they’re wondering what’s going on. But seeing an officer even during the day for us or morning hours... Male: Having a cup of coffee. Courtney: ...sitting outside of Starbucks, that’s not alarming, but again it creates a presence for people that maybe want to do things that aren’t as positive. It puts them on alert. Male: Is there a time of day in that area that’s [speaking simultaneously - inaudible]? Courtney: We love the fireplace. It actually stopped working on me for a little bit and I was working on getting it fixed and that seemed to get the homeless people that were hanging out there that haven’t figure out that I’ve turned it back on and it’s working again, so that’s helpful, But, I guess. besides graveyard and having those in the early morning when it’s colder when they want a cup of coffee or when they want to set up camp for the day they go in and they get small drip and then they kind of think they can hang out all day because they purchased something. So for a while Ms. Williams I referred to earlier she would buy some small thing at Red Mango and think she can hang out around the center all day sleeping in vacant spaces doorways or something like that and her response is I bought something. So it’s kind of the early morning when they want to setup camp all day. That’s another issue for us. Dan: Do you have bike patrols in the city? Do you have officers on bikes? Male: No, actually I just came from a meeting we’re talking about trying to start one up part-time, but something I would like to have. It’s just a manpower issue being able to dedicate it full-time so we’re trying to do something on a part-time basis. Dan: We can ask Microsoft to fund that? Male: Why not? Dan: Bike patrol would be huge. I mean I have some doing foot patrol so if the opportunity of an officer being able park somewhere in Town Center a couple times a day and a couple officers just walk the Town Center, again, it’s that presence piece and I know that’s been very effective in other communities I’ve been in just to see someone on foot or to see someone on a bike. Courtney: Is there anything happening out of that office anymore? That little community service office? Male: No we no longer have that. ---PAGE BREAK--- Colleen: It’s not there anymore yeah. Male: It’s something else now but... Male: The levy proposal for August which includes five employees, two of which will help us staff a bike patrol. Dan: Speaking of Courtney’s issue behind the stores over there, I mean, bike patrols if they’re out and about with regular frequency riding back through that trail coming across 520 up to the off-ramp, that’d be tremendous and effective. A really effective use of an officer’s time to be able to get around like that and promoting health and a great community. Courtney: Well, it’s Redmond, come on. Male: It’s Redmond, bicycle town. Colleen: That’s right. Dan: Yeah, it’s interesting, I’ll wait until that’s off though. Colleen: Is there anything else you want in front of the taskforce because we can move to chatting if you’re done with your [speaking simultaneously - inaudible]... Dan: I have a great way for funding. Colleen: Oh okay alright. Well I’ll turn this off for now then.