I recently traveled to New England to see family and friends. While enjoying the trip, I was reminded of some of the things I will never miss about the Northeast.
There were days with oppressive humidity – the kind of days when you sweat without exercising.
I had to step carefully while hiking in order to miss the poison ivy.
I smeared my legs with repellant, but still found ticks walking on my legs and looking for a place to parasitize me.
I drove over potholes that rattled the windows of our rented car.
It was good to get back home.
While riding the shuttle bus at SeaTac, I spoke with another traveler who was coming home from Boston. Seattle, he said, could learn a lot from Boston about making a city livable. He was surprised to find that Boston’s roadsides were much cleaner than Seattle’s. He was surprised to see almost nobody living on the sidewalks and parks of Boston. We had to agree: it was sobering to think of our home city as being inferior to Boston on such important quality of life issues.
Seattle and Boston are similar in many ways. They are both wealthy cities. In per capita income, Boston ranks third in the country. Seattle is fifth. The population of the metropolitan areas is also similar, with Boston at No. 11, and Seattle at No. 15.
Both cities are reliably liberal, with various ranking sites putting Boston at the fifth most liberal, and Seattle at No. 3. City government is dominated by Democrats in both cities. Both cities rank in the top ten for most educated population. But they are very different in visible litter and homelessness.
The rate of homelessness is said to be largely determined by employment opportunity, poverty rates and availability of affordable housing. Boston has a much larger percentage (18.7%) of its population living below the poverty line than Seattle (11%). The unemployment rate is higher in Boston, at 6.2%, versus 4.8% in Seattle, so finding a job in Seattle is potentially easier. Housing costs are more difficult to compare, with various sites saying either city is more expensive.
According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Massachusetts has a homelessness rate of 22.2 per 100,000 population. Washington is quite a bit higher at 32.6 per 100,000.
More notable to me is that Massachusetts has made some progress, with a decrease of almost 14% over the last four years, while Washington is going in the wrong direction with an increase of 2.5%.
With conditions in the two cities so similar, it is hard to explain the different results in reducing the problem. The Seattle Times documents multiple efforts and expenditures to combat homelessness. It also documents what could easily be called political dysfunction in the various boards and agencies that are battling homelessness. They need to look at what has been done in Boston, and in Houston, and in the many other cities where homelessness rates have decreased.
As for the fact that Seattle looks more trashy than Boston, I will put in another plug for a bottle deposit bill in Washington. Much of the visual trash in King County is non-returnable bottles and cans, and this is true in Enumclaw, as well as in Seattle. Not only will people be less likely to toss their bottles and cans on the roadside, but people will also collect them to redeem the deposits.
Organizations like Sure We Can assist people who collect and redeem bottles and cans. Many times, “Canners” are from the homeless population. It may not be a job you would want, but for some people it is a step up. If every drink container was worth a dime, there would be many thousands of dollars lying around in Seattle and the rest of King County. People who need money would get money, and our environment would be improved.
On a few occasions while traveling to other parts of the country I’ve talked with people who say things like, “Oh, Seattle. Isn’t it really dangerous there?” Not being one to argue with strangers, I have replied blandly that “All cities have dangerous areas to avoid, but we never feel unsafe in our trips into Seattle.”
While walking on a Massachusetts beach in June, we chatted with a woman from South Carolina. As expected, she commented that Washington was a hotbed of crime and violence. We gave our usual bland response. When the South Carolinian walked away, we said, “What we should have said was, ‘Washington ranks far lower than South Carolina in violent crime rate. The number of shooting deaths is also much lower in Washington. And with the passage of more gun control laws, it will get even safer! We feel lucky to live in Washington.’”
Maybe I should have cited a recent Seattle Times poll that found 85% of Seattle residents feel safe in their neighborhoods, and give a more strident defense of my home state.
