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Homeless Building Treehouses to Evade Camping Ban, Causing Environmental Damage

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Homelessness
Street Report

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For the past few years, all eyes have been on Seattle’s homeless drug crisis. But Kent’s street problems are being compounded by the “nomad class.”

These are the people who have tapped out from society and are refusing shelter and services.

They want to stay in nature and have taken over prime wetlands and greenbelts, building treehouses to evade enforcement in this South King County city.

Beautiful streams are now clogged with trash and the environmental cost to clean this up is easily in the millions.

I spent the past week investigating the situation which is spread out across the city. I will be launching the entire series soon. Here is a preview.

Jonathan Choe

Journalist and Senior Fellow, Center on Wealth and Poverty
Jonathan Choe is a journalist and Senior Fellow with Discovery Institute's Center on Wealth and Poverty, covering homelessness issues for its Fix Homelessness initiative. Prior to joining Discovery, Choe spent several years as one of the lead reporters at KOMO-TV, consistently the top rated television station in Seattle. His in depth stories on crime and deep dive investigations into the homeless crisis led to measurable results in the community, including changes in public policy. Choe has more than two decades of experience in television news behind the scenes and in front of the camera for ABC, NBC, FOX, CBS, and Tribune. He has also been nominated and honored with multiple industry awards including an Emmy. Choe spent several years teaching classes on emerging media and entrepreneurship to under privileged youth in inner city Chicago. As an independent journalist, Choe also contributes regularly to the Mill Creek View and Lynnwood Times and has reported on exclusive stories in the past year for Daily Wire and The Postmillennial.