Crime-ridden Seattle’s downtown Nike flagship store and multiplex movie theater have closed as violent crime and the death rate among the homeless skyrocket.
On Friday, the popular Nike store at the corner of Sixth Avenue and Pike Street in the Rain City’s central business district permanently closed its doors.
Nike’s departure followed the announcement by Regal Cinemas that it would reject the Meridian 16 lease at Seventh Avenue and Pike Street.
Although Nike has yet to comment on why it is closing the store after more than 26 years of service, locals told the Seattle Times that street crime was likely one of the primary reasons for the closure.
Seattle’s King County, which surrounds the city, will see its deadliest year for its homeless population in 2022.
According to the King County Medical Examiner’s Office, there were 310 deaths in the homeless community in 2018, a 65 percent increase from 2021, including at least 18 homicides and 160 fentanyl-related overdoses.
The Nike store in downtown Seattle, which had been open for 26 years, closed on Friday, with a new store scheduled to open elsewhere.
Additionally, the Regal Cinemas at Seventh Avenue and Pike Street will close.
In 2022, there will be a record-breaking 310 homeless deaths in Seattle, including 18 killings.
On Friday, when downtown Seattle shoppers visited the Nike store for the last time, they were upset and feared that it could signal the beginning of a fresh exodus from the city.
Richard Green, a Nike aficionado who wore the brand from head to toe, including socks and underwear, told the Times that he was “heartbroken” about the closing.
“I had big plans for this year,” Green said of his buying habits as he gazed into the shutting store, which had security guards observing the sorrowful customers.
In order to shop at a new store opening in 2023, customers would have to take public transportation for an hour to Bellevue Square on the opposite side of Lake Washington.
The same is true for aficionados of Regal Cinema, since the closest chains are located in Bellevue and Thornton Place, respectively.
Cineworld, the parent company of Regal, declared bankruptcy in September, and the downtown Seattle theater is one of 39 whose leases will be rejected on February 15.
According to Jeffrey Rosen, a commercial real estate dealer in the area, the city is still recovering from the pandemic, which caused approximately 500 companies to close by 2021, as reported by the Seattle Downtown Association.
The Times writes that downtown Seattle’s retail vacancy rate is 13.5%, a considerable increase from less than 2% in 2019.
“Downtown is a mixed bag,” remarked Rosen. There is some recovery occurring, but there is also some dissolution and retreat.
Persistently high levels of crime have hindered recovery efforts. According to the most recent statistics from the Seattle Police Department, 2022 was on track to match those of the previous year.
The police have recorded 285 rapes, 1,654 robberies, and 3,258 violent assaults as of November 2022.
The only statistic to surpass 2021’s end-of-year total was the number of homicides, which increased by 12.5% to 48 before the end of 2022.
And the increase appears to have affected the city’s most vulnerable population, the homeless population.
According to the King County Medical Examiner’s Office, at least 18 homeless persons were slain in 2022, including Trenton Harris, 30, who was shot four times and killed in July.
Trenton Harris, age 30, was one of at least 18 homeless individuals murdered in King County in 2022. Last July, he was fatally shot four times.
Jenniffer Dobbins, the mother of Harris, held a sign with his name as people gathered at city hall to mourn the deaths of all homeless persons in 2022.
Over the past two years, the city’s homeless population has increased by 10%.
Harris, a former Boy Scout who worked in the food service sector after graduating from high school, battled an opiate addiction and was initially believed to be one of the city’s 160 homeless overdose-related deaths when his body was discovered on a park seat.
Jennifer Dobbins, his mother, told the Times that she was horrified to find that her son’s death was a homicide, but she has not received any other information about the case.
The weeping mother was one of more than 50 individuals who attended a demonstration outside Seattle City Hall on December 21, 2022, to lament the deaths of all homeless individuals in 2022.
In addition to the murder and overdose fatalities, the homeless community in the county saw 78 accidental deaths, 35 natural deaths, seven suicides, and 12 deaths for which an explanation was still pending.
The total number of homeless deaths, 310, is an underestimate because the Medical Examiner’s Office analyzes only sudden and unexpected deaths.
Michael Ramos, executive director of the Church Council of Greater Seattle, who joined Dobbins at the vigil last month, encouraged the city to increase assistance for the homeless population.
Ramos stated at the event, “The longstanding crisis of homelessness continues to worsen, not improve, while politicians posture and governments plan a new initiative and housing comes with agonizing slowness.”
In the past four months, Seattle firefighters have been subjected to more than 40 violent assaults, the majority of which have been perpetrated by the city’s homeless population. Firefighters have requested that the city take action.
The attacks, which began in May, according to the city’s firefighter’s union, have seen the protectors constantly attacked by the unruly homeless, frequently while reacting to fires ignited at the city’s expanding homeless encampments (pictured is one such site)
Mayor Bruce Harrell, whose campaign centered on improving public safety and providing assistance to the homeless, stated that his administration is urgently trying to repair Seattle.
Currently, the city is collaborating with the King County Regional Homeless Authority to increase shelter capacity.
Anne Martens, the authority’s spokesman, lamented that the 2022 homeless death statistics were “preventable.”
According to her statement to the New York Times, the deaths were caused by “deep holes in our social safety net and an ongoing national opioid epidemic.”
The city expects that by cracking down on homelessness, there will also be a steady decline in crime, as this population is involved in several instances.
During the summer, Seattle firemen putting out fires in homeless encampments were attacked more than 40 times.
The attacks, which began in May, according to the city’s firefighter’s union, have seen the protectors constantly attacked by the unruly homeless, frequently while reacting to fires ignited at the city’s expanding homeless encampments.
Stuart, who has worked as a Seattle fireman since 1996, stated in a July 26 letter to city officials, ‘Seattle Fire Fighters are neither equipped or empowered to minimize violent individuals, and it is not conducive to our purpose.’
According to figures from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, King County will have approximately 25,211 homeless residents by the end of 2022, a 10% increase from 2020. The county trailed only New York City and Seattle in population.
Court filings accuse former Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan of intentionally deleting texts pertaining to the lawless CHOP zone established in the city during the Black Lives Matter riots of 2020.
In June 2020, Black Lives Matter demonstrators seized an area near Capitol Hill and the East Precinct and erected their own barriers. Originally referred to as the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ), the area’s name was changed to the Capitol Hill Organized Protest, or The CHOP.
Former Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan, who notably authorized the construction of the city’s lawless CHOP zone in 2020 during the Black Lives Matter movement, has been held largely responsible for the city’s current predicament.
The Capitol Hill Occupied Protest zone, established in the affluent Capitol Hill district, was promoted as a utopia devoid of police violence.
The region, however, swiftly devolved into anarchy, culminating in the murder of a teenager and the closure of local businesses, including the Nike store.
Local businesses watched in dismay as customers fled out of fear of violence, but Durkan vociferously defended the miserable enclave.
In response to a tweet from Donald Trump condemning the area, she wrote, “The Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone is not a lawless wasteland of anarchist insurrection; it is a peaceful expression of our community’s collective grief and their desire to build a better world.” Given his track record, it is not difficult to assume that Trump is once again in error.
Since then, business owners and residents have filed a lawsuit against the city for its bungled response, and have added a claim that Durkan robbed the plaintiffs of ‘crucial evidence’ by deleting hundreds of text texts on the CHOP zone.