Coors Hospitality Center (Arizona)

The sender of this terrific postcard laments “what’s happened to [San Fran and Seattle]” and hopes that I “actively [try] to make San Fran a better, safer place.” Unfortunately, it seems that this sender has fallen prey to the greatly exaggerated accounts about West Coast cities’ decay. Remember folks, you can’t believe everything you see on TV or read on the internet. The problem with for-profit news is that it stops being news after a while and starts being click-bait and scare-o’clock fear mongering. Reach out to your friends and family who live in these places to see what the reality is.

And I also recommend you get out of your cars once in a while if you don’t live in a densely-populated area. Chances are, the only time you spend on your feet is in private places like homes and business, and not in any truly public spaces like parks, sidewalks, or libraries. The problems that we see every day in SF like homelessness and drug addiction are present across the US, but if you only zip from home to work to big-box store and home in your car, you’re never forced to come face-to-face with the predictable results of failed public policy. And it’s easy to convince yourself that it’s only a problem in dense cities on the coasts, and not a problem in your very own suburbs.