Seattle's Homelessness and Open-Air Drug Use Crisis Now Exploding Under Socialism

Seattle, under self-proclaimed socialist Mayor Katie Wilson, is a city in free fall. I've been there a couple of times in recent months, and even before Mayor Wilson took over, things were headed downwards; huge, sprawling homeless enclaves, litter, and graffiti. I remember visiting Seattle in 1986, if memory serves, while taking some Army training at what was then Fort Lewis, and I recall then finding Seattle to be a clean, prosperous, friendly city.

No longer. And the new administration is doing everything it can to make it worse.

City advocates say they are struggling to find solutions as homelessness and open-air drug use spread across Seattle’s streets, amid growing concerns about the direction of socialist Mayor Katie Wilson’s new administration.

"You can just see the foil is like blowing down the sidewalks like autumn leaves," Andrea Suarez, founder and executive director of We Heart Seattle, told Fox News Digital in an interview. 

"Very common to see property damage of our parks and shared spaces. You can see Narcan is used to reverse an overdose, so you'll see cartridges. But at least we're remodeling the bathroom to be gender-neutral. I'm not [kidding] you, that's where our priorities are." 

This is well to the left of insane, but it's an insanity that has become all too common to too many of our nation's major cities in recent years. The far left, and they don't come much farther left than Katie Wilson, seem to labor under the misapprehension that they can make their lunatic ideas render success if they just really believe in them hard enough, if they sprinkle enough verbal pixie dust and unicorn flatulence around. But it doesn't work. It has never worked. It will never work. And in places like Seattle, the local conservative minority is doing its best, but where leftist enclaves like this are concerned, it's like shouting into a rain barrel.

Local conservative radio host Ari Hoffman told Fox News Digital in an interview that he believes the city is making its problems worse. 

"Seattle and Washington and King County have spent a ton of money on what I call Homeless, Inc., which is fueling this problem," Hoffman said. So, they don't actually get you into treatment. They say, ‘Here, let's give you foil, let us give you a pipe, let's give you a spoon, let's give you whatever drug paraphernalia you want and maybe a pair of socks and some condoms also on top of that.’"

Here's the fun part: Seattle has shown that it can clean the streets up for a big enough event, like the World Cup; my friend and colleague Bob Hoge brought us that story:

Bob writes:

Seattle, it could be argued, is the poster child for the tragedy that has befallen our beleaguered metropolises. Dangerous, dirty (and rainy), it often looks like it could be the set for a Blade Runner movie. If you’re a resident of the Emerald City, they don’t care about you, but if you’re a foreign visitor and/or you’re bringing television cameras, suddenly you’re a VIP.

And authorities aren’t about to let the rest of the world see the mess they’ve made, so they’re frantically cleaning up the cr*p before the FIFA World Cup (soccer, for those who aren't familiar) comes to town this summer.

It would appear to be a rather gross effort:

Seattle is ramping up cleanup efforts as it prepares to welcome tens of thousands of visitors for the FIFA World Cup this summer, with a new report highlighting millions of pounds of waste removed, hundreds of thousands of sharps collected, and growing community participation across neighborhoods.

They won't make any such efforts for the people of the city, of course.

So why has Seattle gone so bugnuts crazy on this matter? It's hard to see any rational reason - and that's the key. There's no rational reason. There's no reason any sane administration would enable open-air drug use by handing out clean fentanyl pipes and Narcan kits. There's no reason why any sane administration would not only allow, but encourage, the sprawling homeless enclaves by handing out these freebies. The homeless enclaves, after all, are known hotbeds of drug sales and use, and worse. There's no reason why any sane administration would put up with bums sleeping on the sidewalks, the rampant shoplifting, the human waste left on the streets. 

No sane administration would allow any of this. And there's the answer: The socialist administration of Katie Wilson is not a rational or even sane administration; not where these problems are concerned.