For the Kent Chamber of Commerce’s annual Safety and Security Summit on Thursday, Aug. 1, community leaders, experts and local business owners came together to learn about and discuss recent legislation that would potentially improve safety in the City of Kent.
Located at the Green River College’s Kent campus, the luncheon kicked off with a welcome from Chamber CEO Zenovia Harris, remarks from sponsor Agency Security Group and keynote remarks from Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson.
Ferguson, who is currently running for governor, gave an update on the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office’s (KCPAO) Organized Retail Crime Task Force, which was formed in 2022.
Ferguson talked about the state’s convictions including the first conviction in June, where electronic items totalling over $145,000 were stolen from Target stores across King, Pierce and Kitsap counties.
He finished with reminding business owners the importance of presenting retail theft cases to KCPAO as referrals, which is how cases are taken on.
Following Ferguson was a panel discussion and Q&A with Puget Sound Fire Chief Brian Carson, Kent Police Chief Rafael Padilla, inTech Consulting Inc. President Raj Sidhu and KCPAO Chief Deputy Prosecutor Patrick Hinds of the Economic Crimes and Wage Theft division.
“We care about the crimes that impact the community, but also our retailers, our businesses, because businesses — particularly small businesses — are the lifeblood of the community,” said Hinds.
Chief Padilla talked about his views on accountability, substantial jail time for crime in Kent and how the majority of shoplifting arrests in Kent are misdemeanor level crimes that are charged to the municipal court.
“I just got our data reports, we’re up 35% in the number of case files we’ve had to our municipal court from last year,” he said. “There’s a lot that goes into that, mainly some of the changes to the legislation has been a big help, and also the fact that we’ve been stable now for well over a year in our staffing. So more available cops means more response, but still not enough to get to the level where I want to be, which is we get staff so that we’re doing preventative presence and not just responding to calls.”
Chief Carson talked about “a fire danger problem in Western Washington,” especially with open spaces in Kent, the dangers of unattended fires and how prevention is key.
“If you have open space, you need to know what’s going on inside that open space. And it does bring us back to the topic of homelessness , and that doesn’t mean that you have to call [911] every time a cooking fire has started, but we do want to know when there is an unattended [fire], particularly this time of year,” he said.
Chamber CEO Harris, who moderated the panel, asked Sidhu about what business owners in Kent can do in terms of cyber security and safety, using scamming emails as an example.
“It’s just a matter of when, not if,” said Sidhu, who added that knowledge of what cyber criminals do is the best defense and pointed out that the AT&T and T-Mobile phone users in the room have all had their personal metadata stolen and sold off.
“So what’s happened is the cyber criminals at this point know who you’ve been calling, who you’ve been texting, so all those those messages, all those calls that you were getting, expect to get more, because now they know who your favorite person is, who you spend the most time with,” he said, explaining that because the cyber criminals have that information, they can use it to “spoof” (or pretend to be) a contact in a person’s phone or on their computer in order to de-fraud them.
Sidhu also talked about the threat that artificial intelligence (AI) has when used for cyber crimes, saying that it will make things worse. He said that the best way for businesses (and for people in general) to keep their information safe is to assume that a website has already been compromised. He also said to be careful when inputting personal data and use a different password for every login or account.
“The best thing that I can tell you is you just have to be aware,” he said. “Take precaution, make sure your’re treating your digital life in a way where you actually know where your data is going.”
Questions from the audience included ways to prevent open drug use, which Chief Padilla said is a misdemeanor crime in the City of Kent, and how business owners can acquire NARCAN or Naloxone in order to prevent a drug overdose in their place of business, which Chief Carson answered.
“I can tell you that in Kent, all the fire units have NARCAN, all have the medical units have NARCAN, all police units, all of the sheriffs have NARCAN. Also all the school nurses have NARCAN,” Carson said, adding that fire units can give NARCAN to business owners upon request when responding to an incident.
The luncheon ended with closing remarks from Kent Downtown Partnership Director Gaila Haas about the Main Street Tax Credit Incentive Program.
To refer a retail theft case to the KCPAO, email ORCU@atg.wa.gov or call 206-389-2011.
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