TIME FOR A HEALTHY DEBATE ABOUT RACE IN SEATTLE

The "discontent" and "anger" being expressed by many African-American
residents of the Central Area in light of the May shooting of Aaron Roberts
is being met by equal "dismay" and "outrage" on the part of white
Seattleites who don't see a basis for this level of discord.

In fact, large numbers of whites genuinely feel African Americans are not
treated differently by the police. They also believe that the constant
charge of racism is driving a "wedge" between blacks and whites in Seattle.

Discourse around this issue has been heated, and I think that is good. For
too long, discussions about race have been too polite in Seattle, making it
extremely difficult for the underlying problems and divisions in
perspectives between blacks and whites to float to the surface, where a
healthy debate and re-examination of policy might occur.

I believe there is clear justification for the level of rage and
frustration within the African-American community around this incident. And
I think a strong case can be made that African Americans are treated
differently by the police. It's not just because many feel that Officers
Greg Neubert and Craig Price were unjustified in shooting Roberts. It's due
more to the fact that there have been too many shaky confrontations in
recent years between blacks and Seattle police.

There are basically three areas of conflict that give rise to the black
rage ignited over the Roberts shooting:

• Alarm over the high number of African-American men killed by white
Seattle police officers since 1980;

• The growth in the frequency of racial profiling by police in their
dealings with African-American motorists and youth;

• The horrific expansion of the War on Drugs and the decision of police and
the criminal-justice system to concentrate the enforcement of draconian
drug laws in the African-American community.

Since 1980, 42 percent of the 33 people killed by Seattle police officers
were African American. Since 1996, five of the eight people who have died
at the hands of police were African American.

Just over a year ago, the death of David John Walker was particularly
troubling to many African Americans. Walker, clearly mentally ill and
skipping down the sidewalk surrounded by Seattle police, was shot by
Officer Tommie Doran.

In 1998, Michael Ealy was in the grasp of police and medics when he died,
reportedly from a chokehold.

Eddie Anderson was shot in the neck by a police officer in 1996 while stuck
in a fence.

In 1988, Erdman Bascomb was shot and killed by a police officer while
watching TV during an alleged drug raid. The police thought the remote
control in his hand was a gun.

All officers involved were cleared of any wrongdoing, but many African
Americans felt these shootings were unnecessary and, therefore, not justified.

Second, countless black motorists have protested stops by Seattle police
for simply "Driving While Black." To many African Americans, these stops
appear to be the result of racial profiling by police who think any African
American driving in the Central Area in a nice car is a dope dealer, or
otherwise involved in a criminal enterprise.

Legions of black teenagers and young adults have also reported being
stopped in the Central Area or downtown Seattle because they are "dressed
like a gang member" or because "braids in their hair are Crip-like." Many
are forced to go through an extremely humiliating stop, frisk and search
routine. These negative interactions with the police have remained in the
memory banks and souls of these African Americans, making it likely that
any incident involving a "brother" would immediately rekindle their fear of
and hostility toward police.

Third, the horrible fallout from the "Drug War" has devastated the
African-American community, particularly the African-American poor, who
have seen a disproportionately high number of their family members and
friends hauled off to jail for "allegedly" using or selling illegal drugs
(marijuana, crack cocaine or heroin). The man who played the drug czar in
the movie "Traffic" had it right when he said, "Who wants to be part of a
war which is being fought against one's own family and loved ones?"

An obscenely high number of African Americans are being run through the
Seattle and King County criminal-justice system for using or selling small
amounts of illegal drugs (rarely is a drug dealer with a significant amount
of drugs ever arrested). Many are arrested by undercover police who
sometimes beg them to sell or to "find one of your friends who I can buy
some crack from." Or they pay or threaten other street-level
African-American addicts (under the threat of being incarcerated
themselves) to set up their neighbors or "homies" for a buy-bust. These
tactics have created serious levels of paranoia, suspicion, fights and
other divisions within the community.

According to the 2000 census, 8.3 percent of the population in Seattle is
African American. But nearly 60 percent of those arrested for drug offenses
are black. The overwhelming majority of those arrested are nonviolent,
poverty-stricken street addicts or underclass youth who rarely have more
than $20 worth of drugs on their person. What makes these statistics
particularly upsetting to the black community is that most studies reveal
that between 75 and 80 percent of the drug users in this city are white.

The Centers for Disease Control reports that white teenagers are eight
times more likely to smoke crack cocaine and 34 percent more likely to sell
drugs than African Americans their same age. Objectively speaking, the
powers that be are using the War on Drugs as a means to criminalize as many
poor African Americans as possible.

An examination of 1999 King County criminal-justice data shows that an
African-American narcotics user was 22 times more likely than a white drug
user to be arrested by Seattle police for a drug offense. For all intents
and purposes, most whites in this community (and throughout the nation) are
excluded from prosecution when it comes to the use and sale of illegal
drugs. While at the same time, the police have aggressively mobilized to
criminalize thousands of low-income black drug users.

This differential treatment of black drug offenders is so maddeningly
obvious to so many black Seattleites that they wonder why our beloved "City
Fathers" rarely acknowledge this outrageously unfair double standard of
justice in our "fair" city.

Until elected and criminal-justice officials are willing to address the
three problems described above, the cry from the inner-city community will
continue to be, "no justice, no peace."

Metropolitan King County Councilman Larry Gossett, a Democrat, represents
the 10th District (Central District, Beacon Hill, Capitol Hill, University
District).