SEATTLE NEWS ARCHIVES & FEATURES

Dori: Seattle suffers as Jenny Durkan insists everything is fine

Mar 27, 2019, 3:08 PM | Updated: 3:08 pm

Jenny Durkan...

The Licton Springs encampment fire on Saturday. (Photo courtesy of Diedra Ward)

(Photo courtesy of Diedra Ward)

If you don’t even recognize a problem, there’s no way you can fix a problem. After KOMO’s “Seattle is Dying” documentary, Mayor Jenny Durkan said that the hype was all nonsense, that everything is fine.

“I did see the special, and I think it was unfortunate that it focused on a very limited part of Seattle,” said Durkan in a recent statement. “Again, I think if you went to any neighborhood in Seattle today and told the story from Alki, to Seward Park, to up north, to Seattle Center, you’re going to see a city that is thriving, with people who care, that’s welcoming and diverse.

Hear that? Everything is just fine. Let’s see how fine things are.

RELATED: New Crown Hill business hit with break-ins twice in same week

Six Starbucks stores were vandalized this past week, with windows smashed from Ballard to Belltown. This goes back to the seeds of when Seattle really started to go down the toilet in the ’90s, when we had a city council that by today’s standards would look moderate, but was still nevertheless moving us left politically.

They invited anarchists from around the country to come here for the May Day riots.

Everything is fine at Alki, according to Jenny Durkan — but Q13 News just had a story about how West Seattle residents are frightened as can be because of the prevalence of street robberies.

In Licton Springs, as KOMO 4 reported, people at a homeless camp near the Licton Springs Tiny House Village started a fire on Saturday.

And Jenny Durkan sticks her head in the sand.

In other cities that surround Seattle — Shoreline, Lake Forest Park, Bellevue — they have police who are empowered, and they do a good job of stopping illegal camping. But in Seattle, because we’re a “welcoming, diverse city,” we allow the criminals to absolutely take over.

When I was a producer, we would go out after the 11 p.m. news, and then walk and talk together downtown. I was the most fearless, lifelong Seattleite you could imagine. I still do the same thing in New York City in the middle of the night.

There is no way I would do that in Seattle today.

But Jenny Durkan says everything is fine. Stop actually opening your eyes and seeing the reality of life around you. Jenny Durkan says if you go to any neighborhood, you’ll see that all these news reports are nonsense. Well, I just took you to several neighborhoods that proved otherwise.

Associated Press

Truck overturns in Kansas City, killing dozens of cows and causing dozens more to roam streets

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Dozens of cattle spilled onto a street in Kansas City, Missouri, when a semitractor-trailer plunged off a highway overpass in the city’s downtown area and onto a car early Sunday, shutting down some roads and setting off a search for the traumatized animals that survived. The accident occurred shortly before […]

1 hour ago

Troy Jackson (D) directs a question to Sen. Susan Collins (R) during the final Maine U.S. Senate de...

Associated Press

Jackson doesn’t regret telling Collins to ‘shut up’ after protester interrupted Maine Senate debate

WASHINGTON (AP) — Maine Democrat Troy Jackson says he does not regret telling Sen. Susan Collins that she should “shut up” after the Republican suggested a protester who interrupted their recent debate was one of his campaign’s backers. “She said that it was a Troy supporter. She accused me of setting that up. I had […]

3 hours ago

A golfer walks near log sections cut from trees at the East Potomac Golf Links, in Washington, Tues...

Associated Press

Trump says he will close historic DC golf course for 15 months of renovations

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday announced plans to close a historic golf course in the nation’s capital for 15 months and redevelop it despite an ongoing court challenge to his long-sought renovation. Trump posted on social media about his intent to shutter the East Potomac Golf Course, not far […]

5 hours ago

FILE - President Donald Trump, right, listens during a news conference with Israeli Prime Minister ...

Associated Press

Trump endorses embattled Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for reelection

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday endorsed embattled Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for reelection, a coveted boost because of Trump’s popularity but one that the U.S. leader withheld for months as their strategies in the Middle East diverged. Trump said in a post on social media that Netanyahu “has […]

5 hours ago

FILE - Donald Trump, seeking contestants for "The Apprentice" television show, is interviewed at Un...

Associated Press

Analysis: Trump says he’s a great dealmaker. His record says otherwise

WASHINGTON (AP) — Trump Tower had just opened and “The Art of the Deal” was three years from publication when 38-year-old Donald Trump suggested he could negotiate Russian arms control better than Ronald Reagan. “It would take an hour-and-a-half to learn everything there is to learn about missiles,” Trump told The Washington Post in 1984. […]

7 hours ago

JoAnna Mendoza (D), standing second from right, an Arizona Congressional District 6 candidate, talk...

Associated Press

Latino voters helped put Trump back in the White House. What’s their next move?

CASA GRANDE, Ariz. (AP) — Chris Martinez feels like Donald Trump has made a fool of him. The 28-year-old maintenance technician from Casa Grande, Arizona, voted for the Republican president expecting to get a thriving economy and no wars. Instead, gas prices are so high that Martinez returned one of his vehicles to the lender, […]

8 hours ago

Dori: Seattle suffers as Jenny Durkan insists everything is fine