Amazon moves employees out of downtown Seattle office due to crime

Amazon is telling personnel they can function at an alternate place due to modern crime all-around its downtown Seattle office environment at 300 Pine St.

“Given current incidents close to 3rd and Pine, we’re offering staff members currently at that spot with option workplace area somewhere else. We are hopeful that situations will boost and that we will be able to deliver personnel back to this site when it is protected to do so,” a spokesperson claimed in a assertion.

Bloomberg to start with claimed the news.

There are currently 1,800 staff members that do the job at the Amazon place of work, formerly household to a Macy’s department store and positioned much less than a mile from its key headquarters. Amazon opened the place of work in 2018.

Earlier this thirty day period Seattle Law enforcement Main Adrian Diaz claimed SPD was “launching an initiative to curb the violent felony behavior” in the location in the vicinity of Amazon’s business office.

The criminal offense in downtown Seattle is producing lots of businesses, tech firms involved, to either transfer places of work or undertake a wait around-and-see method of staying remote even as COVID-19 situations recede.

Businesses are also taking ways to maintain staff members and buyers safer as they transition again to in-particular person work, which includes closing workplaces early so workers can get residence ahead of dark, and selecting personal safety officers. 

Before this yr an Amazon engineer was strike in the head with a baseball bat though strolling close to downtown Seattle. Days later on there was a rash of shootings in downtown districts, making on what city officers say was a 40% boost in gun violence final yr.

Seattle saw sharp spikes in crime in 2021, but rates haven’t achieved the historic amounts seen in the ‘80s and ‘90s. The spikes are however alarming, nevertheless — so a lot so that Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell put public security at the best of his initial Point out of the Town address very last thirty day period. 

Past month The Wall Road Journal editorial board declared that “lawlessness now hampers Seattle’s financial recovery.”