When you’ve watched the city you love disintegrate before your eyes, you learn to keep your expectations low.

Such is the sad state of Seattle – a once vibrant and growing tech hub whose activist class turned it into a national posterchild for wokeness gone awry. The worst part is that many of them are still blind to the damage they’ve done.

At several points in my decade-long career here, I tried to convince myself that things couldn’t possibly get worse. City Hall couldn’t possibly go lower. Downtown couldn’t possibly be less safe. The local press couldn’t possibly lose another ounce of self-awareness.

Let’s just say I am now intimately acquainted with disappointment.

From relentless attempts to tax Amazon out of the city, to endless riots and unrest, to the defunding debate, to the occupied protest zone, to a mass exodus of police officers, to rising 911 response times, to a worsening homeless crisis, to an unfettered drug market, to unsustainable levels of shoplifting and vandalism – Seattle has become an utter embarrassment to those of us who expect elected leaders to act in the best interest of the people they represent.

Enter Mayor Bruce Harrell.

Because he served on the Seattle City Council during a period of worsening crises around homelessness, drug abuse, and mental illness, I was skeptical that Bruce Harrell represented a meaningful solution to the city’s woes. But when he made it past the primary in 2021, there was zero doubt he was the better of two questionable options (the other being former City Councilwoman Lorena Gonzalez, a progressive who supported police defunding, made enemies of the city’s largest employers, and stirred up unproductive public tiffs with former Mayor Jenny Durkan).

On the campaign trail, Harrell said all the right things. He pledged to hire more officers and support the ones the city still had (except for unvaccinated officers, who he supported firing even at a time of low staffing). He promised to remove dangerous homeless encampments that were allowed to proliferate out of a mistaken sense of compassion. He promised to be a bridge builder and heal fractured relationships between councilmembers, the police department, the city’s top prosecutor, and the business community.

But talk in Seattle is not only cheap, it’s unreliable.

After all, three sitting councilmembers ran for their jobs in 2019 on the promise of hiring more police officers. Then they turned around six months later and pledged to defund the agency by 50% without an ounce of shame.

Harrell would have to do more than just talk to convince this emotionally depleted political pundit that he actually meant business.

And how is he doing six months into his first term?

I’ll be damned – Bruce Harrell has it in him.

The first real clue that the new mayor intended to make good on his campaign promises came during a February 4 press conference on public safety. For the first time in a long time, someone spoke with common sense at Seattle City Hall.

“I want to be very clear – we will not tolerate crime in Seattle.”

What?

“I inherited a depleted and demoralized police department – this status quo is not acceptable.”

Come again??

“We will not look the other way while the fabric of our neighborhoods and city is destroyed.”

Swoon!

I had to calm myself down and remember what city I was in. Surely the mayor of Seattle wasn’t brave enough to state the obvious. Besides, these were just more words.

But then came the action.

Open air drug markets in the International District and near Pike Place Market were first. Officers were sent in to clear the areas and directed ne'er-do-wells to move along. Work continues to keep the areas from reverting back to criminal hotspots.

Then the sweeps started – angry activists be damned.

Downtown to Ballard. City sidewalks to public parks. Residential neighborhoods to business districts. City workers were directed to move in, clear tents, and make final attempts to connect the unhoused to services.

And the best part? Mayor Harrell hasn’t flinched.

So far, Harrell appears impervious to an Achilles' heel that has rendered even Seattle’s most formidable politicians powerless: fear of the far-left fringe. It is what paralyzed former Mayor Durkan into allowing rioters to seize six square blocks of the city in the summer of 2020, rendering an entire police precinct useless.

Luckily for Seattle, Harrell doesn’t appear to give a damn what 10 loud voices on Twitter and Leftist bloggers at The Stranger have to say about him. How refreshing.

The same is true for two other newly-elected leaders: City Attorney Ann Davison (left) and City Councilwoman Sara Nelson (right). Both promised to put an end to performative politics and get to work righting the ship. So far, both have delivered.

In fact, Councilwoman Nelson recently unveiled a plan to attract more police officers to the city through financial and other incentives. What’s more impressive is she somehow got one of the council’s most anti-police members to work with her: Lisa Herbold.

Mayor Harrell was so proud of the teamwork that his office sent out a statement.

“As my administration continues to develop a comprehensive plan to restore police staffing, this is a reminder that when we work together and unite around shared values and common purpose, we develop better ideas that put us on a path toward better results.”

I texted a member of the mayor’s staff and included a link to the press release.

“This makes me happy,” I wrote. “Love seeing cooperation and collaboration for a change.”

Does Seattle still have a long way to go? Of course. Do its newest leaders still need to prove themselves? Without a doubt. But when you’ve covered politics here for as long as I have, sometimes a little common sense is worth celebrating.