“Progressive Paradise”

With the Covid-19 shutdown dragging on for months, and business owners and employees struggling to stay afloat, San Francisco’s restaurants, cafés, bars, and fitness centers were permitted to create patios, or “parklets,” so that they could operate outdoors. This option offered a critical lifeline. Running the gamut from modest to elaborate, the parklets soon became ubiquitous. They stretched by the hundreds along sidewalks and into streets and alleyways in every district in the city. Small-business owners and their staffs finally had some revenue coming in, and their communities rejoiced in any semblance of normal life returning.

Nearly two years ago KOMO News in Seattle produced a special titled “Seattle is dying” which spent an hour looking at the problems of drug-abuse and homelessness and the impact they were having on the city. That special was a big hit. It was shown on television in the city and since March of 2019 it has been viewed more than 8 million times on YouTube.