Edmonds city prosecutor reports backlog shrinking, community court revamp and staff recruiting challenges

City-contracted prosecutor Aaron Walz updated the Edmonds City Council on April 8 about the office’s 2024 work, a case backlog and staffing plans.

Walz, who said his firm’s contract with the city was recently extended, told the council the case backlog that developed over the previous year has been reduced by about half in the last two months and that he expects the backlog to be eliminated in another two months while remaining current with incoming referrals.

“We’ve essentially cut that in half and expect in another two months that it should be completely eliminated,” Walz said.

He said the prosecutor’s office has retooled the community court program to follow best practices recommended by the Administrative Office of the Courts; the program is focused on connecting people — particularly those with homelessness-related offenses and other cases driven by underlying needs — to services and lowering barriers to access. Walz said Moral Reconation Therapy (a cognitive behavioral approach used in some domestic‑violence and other cases) is among the tools the office uses when appropriate to reduce reoffending.

On staffing, Walz said the renegotiated contract included funds intended to support hiring a second, more junior prosecutor. He said hiring has been difficult in the market: the office has interviewed a few candidates and expected more interviews in the coming weeks, and he hoped to fill the position by the end of the month. If a licensed attorney cannot be hired he said the office could consider supervised law‑student interns authorized under court rules while continuing to prefer a licensed attorney.

Council members asked details about caseloads and outcomes. Walz said he did not believe the office had taken any cases to jury trial in 2024; a trial that had been set fell apart during pretrial. He also said some older cases (for example certain DUIs awaiting toxicology) remained within statute of limitations and the oldest were roughly a year and a half old.

Walz said referrals come to the prosecutor’s office in three main ways: arrests leading to bookings and probable cause reports from police, out-of-custody arraignments where officers submit reports for arraignment dates, and direct referrals from officers when no arrest has been made. He said the most common case types in Edmonds include DUIs, thefts and trespass (noting activity around Highway 99), and domestic violence.

Councilmembers asked for continued updates on hiring and backlog metrics; Councilmember Dasch asked whether the city’s contract-tracking spreadsheet required by the renegotiated contract had been shared with staff; Walz said the tracking spreadsheet had been provided to the HR director. Walz and councilmembers also discussed the potential to use newly licensed attorneys and supervised interns if hiring remains challenging.

Ending: Walz said the revamped community court is still ramping up and that it will take several months to grow participation and to evaluate outcomes; he suggested staff might have a clearer picture of results by the end of the year.