Nearly half of Seattle businesses weigh leaving the city, chamber survey of 247 firms cites public safety, taxes and homelessness, socialist mayor Katie Wilson expands policing and cuts spending while some high-rises have lost over 80 percent since 2019

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zerohedge.com

Nearly half of the businesses surveyed in Seattle have seriously considered moving operations, jobs or investment out of the city, according to a survey by the Downtown Seattle Association and the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce. More than 247 businesses answered the questionnaire, circulated over the summer with questions on the city's performance, direction, outlook, cost of doing business, biggest challenges and plans for the coming twelve months. The results arrive in the first year of socialist Mayor Katie Wilson's term.

Respondents cited public safety, high taxes, homelessness, regulatory barriers and affordability as their leading concerns. Wilson and her socialist allies are separately reported to be struggling to close a budget deficit and to address public safety problems — a list that covers both why businesses want out and why the city cannot easily afford to let them go. The Chamber asked about performance, cost and plans; the answers came back as a relocation calculation, on a twelve-month timeline that sits inside Wilson's current term.

The administration has already adjusted in office. Wilson has shifted toward increased police presence, expanded surveillance and spending cuts, and the mayor's first year now includes more police, more cameras and less spending than the campaign that won it, with pledges scaled back as the fiscal position tightened.

The property market did not wait for the survey's release. Some Seattle high-rises have lost more than 80 percent of their value since 2019; buildings cannot relocate, so their owners mark them down instead — a markdown the market delivered years before anyone answered a questionnaire. A city that sheds firms and floor values sheds the receipts that close deficits, and the deficit is the very item Wilson is cutting spending to close.

In September, Wilson told the city: "This is your city." Some of its towers are now worth less than a fifth of what they were in 2019.