[allana]

As much as the Seattle Chamber of Commerce and the local Sinclair affiliates might scream that Seattle is wrecked, people and businesses are still moving here, our economy is growing, and massive redevelopment is occuring.

One other place to pay attention to is Shelton, WA, they have a very interesting communal approach to homelessness and providing services, which has built a strong community that wooed some of my friends to buy and retire in Shelton.

[daenz]

>people and businesses are still moving here, our economy is growing, and massive redevelopment is occuring.

Yes, despite these massive social problems. The economic growth is not caused by drug decriminalization, so I'm not sure why you're loosely associating the two. One uncorrelated bad thing is not seen as the "price" for another uncorrelated good thing.

[throwaway827364]

People move here and the economy is growing because of tech. Do any of these employers support the city of Seattle’s policies on allowing people to openly shoot up in the streets?

[allana]

Its significantly safer than San Diego & Irvine IMO, both of which still criminalize homelessness and have had Hepatitis outbreaks due to these ineffective policies.

Google, Apple, Expedia and Facebook are each building and hiring thousands here in Seattle, our homeless are significantly less aggressive than those I encounter in California.

[entropea]

You sound like you walk around in daylight just seeing people shooting up on every street. Its absolutely not true. Its actually really tough to find someone shooting drugs unless you're really looking at night hours. It's honestly not as big of an issue as Sinclair makes it out to be.

[fzeroracer]

The fact is that visibility is the first step to recovery. You can arrest them, hide them or try to move them around but it doesn't change the fact that they exist. It just makes it so you don't have to look at the problem, which is really the American thing. Better to hide the problem than solve it.

These kind of efforts take time to take root. As people do things like this in public, that means more opportunity for social services to reach out and try to solve the problem. In 10-15 years you'll see drug usage rates drop as addicts can seek help for their problem without vilification or risk to having their lives destroyed.