L/C
1
2
Round 3
4
5
6
B
A
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100 60 100
30 30
30 100
100 100 60 100 100
100 60
70 70
70
KATHY ATWOOD, ’99 MPA on being Everett’s first female Chief of Police
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70
“I’ve always been surrounded by a culture that values diversity and women. It’s been a non-issue. I am just treated as a police officer.”
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30 100
10 40 40
40 70 40
20 70 70
70 40 40
70 70 40
40 70 40
70 40 40
40 70 40
0000
70 40 40 10 25
3.1 2.2 2.2 10.2 7.4 7.4 25 19 19
3
50 40 40
50 90 100
75 66 66 100 100 100 80 70 70 100
75
Color OK_____ Layout OK_____
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40 100
30
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pg.
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ICS# 120123 • Seattle University 2012 Spring Seattle U Magazine - 48 pg. 8.5” x 11” • 175 lpi • PDFX1a • G7_GRACoL • 70# Orion Matte Text
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30
30 / Top Cop
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70
Taking on the role of Chief of Police was not top of mind for Atwood, who was approaching her 50th birthday and considering retirement. That changed in late 2010 when her predecessor, Police Chief Jim Scharf, announced his retirement and recommended Atwood as his replacement. This past July she officially began her tenure. “I’m humbled that I was chosen and also very proud that the department and city helped create a foundation for me to be successful,” she says. As police chief, Atwood’s typical day involves handling personnel issues, making hiring decisions, lots of meetings and engagement with community groups. Atwood also serves on various boards, committees and associations, including the FBI National Academy Association (Washington chapter)—she is a 2003 graduate of the FBI National Academy—and the Dawson Place Child Advocacy Board of Directors. Additionally, she is on the Snohomish Regional Drug and Gang Task Force Executive Board and the executive board for the NW High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA). As a guest lecturer for the criminal justice program at Everett Community College, she often covers topics pertaining to women in law enforcement, drawing from personal experience. One of her immediate priorities as chief is developing a long-term strategic plan for the department. Another is staffing. “One of my goals is to get us up to full staff,” she says, adding that the department is fortunate as one of the few in the region to be hiring. As she talks about her work, Atwood is conversational and friendly, at times self-effacing. She isn’t fazed that she is the first woman police chief in Everett. In fact, she downplays its significance while acknowledging that other women in this line of work may have faced greater adversity because of gender. “I view myself as a police officer. The gender makes
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become an officer, she started on patrol in Everett in 1989 and never looked back. Fairly early on in her career she was doing special operations and undercover work that included posing as a prostitute in a John sting. “It was very stressful. You have to maintain your safety at all times,” she recalls of the experience. This type of undercover work was especially difficult, Atwood says, because she had to assimilate into a culture that was foreign to her. She also had to learn what she calls the “sub-culture language” and slang used in that world and be convincing in wrangling a deal all the while maintaining her cover. “Prostitution is a tragic lifestyle and in many ways I consider the women and girls, and young men as well, who are involved in prostitution victims,” she says. “I don’t know of anyone who grew up aspiring to be a prostitute.” Atwood has made it a personal mission to reduce prostitution and human trafficking citywide. The Everett Police Department is part of the Sexual Exploitation Intervention Network in Snohomish County and Atwood was instrumental in developing the group in its early days when it was known as the Prostitution Prevention Network. The network, which consists of social service agencies and law enforcement partners, works to assist young people who were in the sex-trade industry and provides programs and services for them to get out the business and lead healthy, productive lives. “Through these efforts we endeavor to ‘rescue’ young women and get them on a new track,” says Atwood. “I’m in a position to continue to support these efforts by allocating resources in that direction.” Atwood, a single mother to teenage son Andy, worked her way up the ranks in the department, from patrol officer to detective to sergeant, then on to lieutenant, captain and deputy chief.