-♪ Christmas ♪
-As we enter the 2022 holiday season,
Seattle is hoping for some post-pandemic cheer.
Big crowds returned to the city
for the tree lighting at Westlake Center.
And customers are flocking back
for new store openings and sales downtown.
-It's the ripple effect.
And we've got to start. We've got to get back.
-But while businesses are trying to stay positive,
they still have concerns.
-We have a crisis with a lot of transient,
a lot of drug issues, a lot of safety issues.
-With office vacancies still high,
and growing concerns over the recent round of tech layoffs,
is Seattle well positioned for 2023?
-We are slowly moving the needle.
-The tourism industry is a huge economic driver.
-Our panel of experts weighs in.
-Downtown's got to be safe, and clean,
and welcoming for all.
-Will we end the year on a high note or low note?
Taking the pulse of Seattle's economic recovery,
next on "City Inside Out."
♪♪
Welcome to this edition of "City Inside Out."
I'm your host, Brian Callanan.
Businesses across the Puget Sound
are praying for a big boost this holiday season,
after more than two years
of dealing with the effects of the COVID pandemic.
There are some signs of hope.
But in downtown Seattle,
the home of more than half the city's jobs,
there's a lingering office vacancy problem,
a rise in tech job layoffs, and ongoing concerns
about homelessness and public safety.
This week, we're talking with business leaders
and local elected officials
about the state of the Seattle economy,
and if it's truly a happy new year ahead.
Want a boost of holiday cheer?
Get ready for the return of the Seattle Men's Chorus --
this year, complete with
an audience participation conga line.
-The Seattle Men's Chorus holiday show
is more than just music.
It's really about community.
-Interim director Craig Coogan
is glad to be back at Benaroya Hall
in front of live audiences this December
for the first time in three years.
-There's something about just being connected.
And after a period of isolation, that is so important.
[ Singing ]
-Following the chorus' virtual and masked performances
during the pandemic,
Coogan says the 2022 holiday show
is a sign that our region
is slowly raising the dimmer switch
after COVID abruptly shut out the lights.
We're starting to come back on.
And we think we're one of the bright lights
of that dimmer switch, and we are turning it up.
-But while the chorus is ready to crank up the heat,
there's still a bit of a chill around the Seattle
business scene, especially downtown.
-All sort of good stuff.
-Maria Coassin is the founder of Gelatiamo,
a downtown institution for fresh-baked delights and gelato,
for the past 27 years, at Third and Union.
-Nobody's gonna kick me out of here.
Nobody's gonna move Maria on the corner.
So, I'm staying here.
-Back in April of this year,
the city rolled out Operation New Day,
with a heavier police presence,
to respond to multiple shootings near Coassin's storefront.
And she's thankful that support from the SPD has continued.
-I see police all over the place, so that's good.
It's good for -- for -- for people.
They feel comfortable.
-But recent photos from Gelatiamo show,
while tents may be gone from Third Avenue,
people who are homeless still gather here,
and street disorder is still a problem,
which Coassin says has a lot to do
with another glaring problem for Seattle.
-When the offices closed down because of COVID,
that really decimated the amount of people
that would come into the downtown.
-Economic reports from this fall show downtown Seattle
only has 36% of its workers back on the job in-person
compared to pre-pandemic levels.
Combine that with recent layoffs in Seattle's tech sector,
and it's no surprise downtown's office vacancy rates
are near the highest in the region --
a situation Coassin wants to challenge businesses,
as well as city leaders, to respond to.
-If we don't all show up, and try to be here,
and make our [indistinct] city livable again, and safe again,
then, we're just destined to die.
-Getting downtown really humming again,
hopefully, will make a difference on our forecast.
-Seattle City Council members, like Andrew J. Lewis,
had to reckon with a major projected shortfall
in real estate excise tax in their recently passed budget --
an indication that local property sales are cooling off.
-Look, people want to live here. People want to build here.
People want to start a business here.
And we need to work, as a city government,
to make those decisions easier.
-But Lewis is hoping the city's investments in downtown
with this year's budget
will help boost property tax and sales tax revenues,
while the council considers other progressive
funding sources in the future.
-Let's increase the base of the modes that we have
while we're also looking at progressive taxation.
And that's what I'm looking forward to in 2023.
-My little babies, here.
-There's a lot to look forward to in 2023,
but, like the 27-hour process needed
to make Gelatiamo's famous Panettone,
restoring downtown Seattle back to health
will take a lot of patience.
-I see hope.
It may not be as immediate as I really would want it to be,
but it's definitely gonna come back.
-It's a comeback that's just getting started.
For Seattle businesses all singing the same tune,
the show must go on.
-So, we don't expect that things are gonna magically turn over,
but we're all in this together.
[ Applause ]
-And joining us to talk more about these issues,
we have with us Robert Nellams, the director of Seattle Center.
Robert, great to have you.
We also have with us Tracey Wickersham.
She is Senior Director of Cultural Tourism
for Visit Seattle.
Great to have you, too, Tracey.
And finally, Jon Scholes, president and C.E.O.
of the Downtown Seattle Association.
John, good to see you again.
And John, maybe I can start with you, here.
Give us that big picture look, if you could,
the status of downtown Seattle after two years plus
of struggling with the COVID pandemic.
The downtown core, as you know, as we all know,
provides more than half the city's jobs,
more than half its tax base.
It's a huge part of our regional economy, too.
Talk to me about some of the signs of life
you're seeing, and also, if you could,
some of the concerns you're still hearing
from member businesses.
-Yeah, Thanks, Brian.
No doubt it was a difficult two years for downtown Seattle,
like downtowns across the world.
Our job's always been about bringing people together.
And in a pandemic, we were told, for good reason, to stay apart.
But really, the beginning of 2022 and --
and really kicking into the spring
was a turning point for the recovery of our downtown.
We saw a huge return of visitors from, you know,
within the county,
but across the country, across the world.
We had the highest hotel occupancy
in a number of weekends and weeks during the summer.
Our friends at Visit Seattle share,
I'm sure, many other data points around the cruise industry,
but a really strong return of visitors.
More people living downtown today than ever before,
than before the pandemic.
100,000 residents of downtown.
And we lost some during the pandemic,
but they came back, plus more.
So, record return of residential.
And return to work has been slow but steady.
We're in a stronger place than we were, you know,
four or five months ago,
as far as the number of people back in their offices
three or more days a week.
It's about 40%.
-Okay.
-But January, it was less than 20%.
So, we're headed in the right direction.
And a lot -- have a lot to look forward to.
New openings and new ribbons to be cut on --
on projects that continued throughout the pandemic.
-Okay.
I'll dive into that worker question
in a little bit with you. but Tracey,
let me jump to you next.
Hotel visits are up, as Jon was saying,
got the cruise bookings up,
arts and theater on the rebound, here.
I want to try to talk about some of the positives you're seeing,
and some of the things that still need to happen
for Seattle to make a comeback, here.
-Yeah.
Well, we're -- we're seeing tremendous rebound
towards the numbers.
Ironically -- [ clears throat ] -- excuse me.
Pre-pandemic, Visit Seattle was measuring --
we had 10 years of sustained
year over year growth in our tourism metrics.
And in early 2020,
that's what we were celebrating, was that, in 2019,
we had hit the 10th year of record visitation.
So, getting back up to that level,
as Jon says, I mean, at a time when, you know,
people were not being encouraged to travel.
But we're seeing that demand being expressed really strongly.
We're seeing changes in patterns,
but people are coming back,
and they're coming back strongly.
So we still have a ways to go in both visitation numbers
and in employment in the sector.
But the growth, especially in this year, in 2022,
has been really notable.
And of course, all the reasons that people travel
are coming back,
which is all of this great arts and cul--
culture, all of these holiday events,
all these reasons that people want to come to Seattle.
-Thank you. I appreciate that.
Robert, let me jump to you, here.
Having a winning hockey team is definitely one of the good
things happening at Seattle Center right now.
But I know that's just part of the story.
Tell us about how the center is recovering from the pandemic.
The opera, ballet, coming back online.
You got Winterfest happening now.
And also, talk about
maybe some of the large-scale concerns you have, too.
-Everything that happens at Seattle Center is --
is basically in-person.
And so, if you can bring people together,
if you can bring things, and make them happen,
that -- that's who we are, what we do.
The pandemic told us we couldn't do any of that.
So, we -- we shut down a lot of things.
And in 2022, we we started to see things start to rebound.
We had a Pokemon Go,
and that -- that had the most attendance at Seattle Center
in the past 10 years.
-Wow.
-We've had a lot of things happen that have allowed us
to start to bring people together.
And so, Climate Pledge Arena, hockey,
all of the acts that have come through there,
you know, those are going pretty well.
I mean, you can sell out,
you can do a lot of things in -- in that realm --
popular events, music, et cetera.
And sports are happening.
Where you have a little bit of [ stammering ]
of a lag is with our cultural and [ stammering ]
theater events.
And so, the rep, the ballet, the opera,
all of those things are getting better.
Things are moving in the right direction.
But they're slower than the popular culture.
-Got it. Got it.
So, not selling those out just yet,
but we'll -- we'll see where it goes.
Jon, let me probe a little further about this idea
of workers not coming back to work in person downtown.
It's a lasting effect of the pandemic in many cities.
I know we're seeing it around the U.S.
And I know the DSA is tracking it.
This idea of 40% of workers --
less than that, possibly --
back in person downtown compared to pre-pandemic.
What impact is this having on downtown and our economy?
-Well, there's certainly the number of businesses
that rely on employees downtown --
shoeshine, flower shops, the barbershops, salons,
the lunch spots, the deli.
And they're not seeing the same level of traffic.
And there's a lot of other businesses
that are more oriented toward residents, and visitors,
and tourists that have had, you know,
really great summer and fall.
So, there is an impact there.
And I think the jury's still out on where we end up,
with the numbers on return to office.
But we believe the office is still gonna be very centric
to work, and downtowns themselves
are gonna be central to our ability
to connect and collaborate in person.
And, you know, not many companies have said
they're gonna be fully remote.
And even those that have still believe in in-person connection,
of connecting with your team in a restaurant, or in an arts
and cultural venue, or team building in person.
And downtowns can serve as those venues, and have been.
And so, I think the office and the downtown
are gonna be very relevant, still, to connection
and collaboration, in-person, for companies.
-Can you talk about what you've been doing
to try to encourage more people to come downtown?
I know, at the end of the day,
it's the business that has to make that call.
But the DSA has been trying, here, I know,
to try to encourage that with -- with happenings.
Some thoughts on that.
-Well, what we've heard from companies and from employees
is the number-one issue, as it's always been,
is that, first and foremost,
the downtown's got to be safe, and clean,
and welcoming for all.
So, that's where our focus has been,
both in our direct services of cleaning, and private security,
and taking the plywood down, and investing in beautification,
and things like that --
and events, and making great things happen
in our public spaces.
During the holidays, during the summer,
that was a big focus of ours.
And then, working with our public-sector partners
to address the issue of safety, security,
to help our neighbors inside, and off the streets.
And the good news is, is we are in a much better position
on all of those fronts than we were a year ago
than we were six months ago.
-Thanks.
And I'm gonna dive into some of those public safety issues
in just a little bit.
But Tracey, I wanted to talk to you.
I'm thinking of situations where a lack of workers downtown
might have shut down a favorite restaurant or business
that -- that is very popular for Visit Seattle,
and would affect your work.
Is it a situation where Visit Seattle
has to turn some of its energy towards attracting
local Seattleites, King County residents,
whoever else, to come back downtown.
-Yeah, we did do that during peak pandemic.
We actually worked on a couple of different campaigns
to really try to bolster our neighborhood jams,
and our -- our sacred places,
really, you know, that we wanted people to realize
that we needed to turn out, and support those.
Typically, that is not Visit Seattle's mandate.
You know, we are a destination marketing organization,
and where our success is judged on bringing people in
from outside the region to stay.
So, luckily, we're able to shift back
to that more external focus.
But at the same time, a vibrant --
everything that Jon talks about is exactly the same for us.
I mean, think about your own travel patterns.
You want to go somewhere that feels vibrant,
that feels like the locals are engaged and loving it,
and that feel safe, and welcoming, and clean.
So, all of those things are important.
But we have created a couple of campaigns.
We did the I know a Place campaign,
where we're really asking our locals
to tell other people about their favorite places.
I mean, whenever anybody asks me, I'm like,
"Even if you're local,
you should be looking at the Visit Seattle website,
because we are full of great information
about what to see and do."
But yeah, you know, those lunch places,
and getting that kind of critical mass of feeling
that energy that comes from a lively downtown,
it's really critical to tourism, too.
-Yeah.
Everybody check out Tracey's No Umbrella podcast --
or, excuse me, the blog you write.
Robert, I want to talk to you, and just reflect on the fact
that you've had a very long and distinguished career
with the city of Seattle.
And thank you for your service.
Started work in 1996 at the center,
became director just as the Sonics were leaving town,
which was tough.
Worked through the 2008 recession there.
Help us put things in perspective, if you can.
This impact of fewer workers,
fewer people coming downtown to Seattle Center, et cetera.
What's going on now
compared to what's happened in the past?
-We've been through this types of things before.
We've been through times where things were a little tough.
And this has been something that has been a little unusual
because it's been health-related.
And, you know, typically, when -- when we have had
other issues, and so forth, we can rally people together,
and bring them together, and say,
"We're gonna do X, Y, or Z."
We can't -- we couldn't do that during the pandemic
'cause bringing people together
was the absolute worst thing you could do.
So, where we are now is that we're slowly --
and I don't want to emphasize that too much,
but we are slowly moving the needle
to bringing people back,
and making sure that people are comfortable.
Climate Pledge Arena has been a huge help in that.
And the sports, the entertainment,
all of that, is happening.
People are coming back, and doing things.
Our Festal events are coming --
you know, after a couple of years where they were online.
-Big cultural events.
-They came back.
And now, people are coming back to see that.
We're doing Winterfest, now,
and we'll be celebrating New Year's Eve
at the Space Needle again.
So we're -- we're doing things that people can recognize,
that people can understand, and that people want to do.
And that's been the thing.
'Cause people want to get together.
-I want to stick with you, Robert,
and talk about homelessness and public safety.
The Seattle Center plays a very important role
with these issues, serves as an emergency cold weather shelter
for the city during the winter months here.
And I know you really consider the center
to be the heart and soul of Seattle.
I've seen that many times written in connection with you.
So, if you're trying to have a heart,
be a welcoming place for people that need shelter there,
and you're trying to keep the soul of the city alive, too,
by welcoming people to different cultural events.
Excuse me for pushing the metaphor, here,
but how do you see that heart and soul?
Are they in conflict when it comes to dealing with
the homelessness crisis there?
-They're never in conflict.
We are a public place,
and so, what we try to do is make sure
that everyone that comes to Seattle Center feels welcome,
feels honored, feels like they belong there.
And so, having spaces and places where people can gather,
having spaces and pla--
places where people can be by themselves,
having spaces and places where people can share in --
in different kinds of events
that they appreciate, are all part of who and what we are.
And -- And I must say that, during the pandemic,
I mean, when everything was shut down, we were a shelter.
We had two shelters.
We were a hygiene center.
So, we still ran the park, the place,
and we provided some support to those who were in need.
And that allowed us to keep going, keep doing things.
It was very good for our -- our -- our staff.
It was very good for the people that we were serving.
And it allowed us to continue to be who we are,
which is the heartbeat of this community.
-Yeah. Thank you for that.
And Tracey, let me talk about this with you,
because Visit Seattle's 2022 annual report
included this conscious effort towards rebranding,
trying to find ways to battle these misperceptions
about the city of Seattle.
Talk to me about that.
What do you see as the public's perception of homelessness,
public safety, in Seattle,
and what can you do to try to change the narrative there?
-Yeah.
Certainly some of the messaging that came out
during the pandemic took a harsher look at our city,
along with some other cities, particularly on the West Coast.
And it's important to us
that people understand the real story.
And that is, of course, like many large cities in America,
our city is grappling with these issues of homelessness,
and -- and trying to solve those.
I think we also have a city that has an enormous heart,
and compassion, and wants to do this
in a way that really helps address the root causes,
and solves the problem, and doesn't just hide the problem.
So, I think that, you know, part of it has been --
we've been -- we started a Seattle Good News campaign.
-Right.
-And that was partly to, again,
just let people know all the things we're proud about
about Seattle, and this region, that we are a city
of creativity, of innovation, of resilience.
as Robert mentioned.
One of my favorite --
I got really tired of the word "pivot" during the campaign,
during the pandemic.
But one of my favorite pivot stories
was how Kanellis reinvented itself as a --
one of our city's bastions of fine dining.
And they recognized that that wasn't what the city needed,
and couldn't support during the pandemic.
And so, they found a way to become the Pop-Up Crab Shack
or the Burger Hut.
They kept their people employed.
And then, they did the Kanellis University,
and they brought in experts from --
I mean, like, this is -- this is not a city in decline.
This is a city that is brilliant.
And -- And one of the guests
they had was Leonard Garfield from Mohi.
And he talked about the historical perspective,
how many times Seattle has weathered challenges.
So -- So we want to share the news that Seattle is back.
I mean, when I made this list, here,
because I -- I thought, "You're gonna ask me
about arts and culture in the city."
Well, I could take the entire show,
and tell you about all of the craft fairs,
and beautiful museum exhibitions,
and performing arts performances,
and special events, like the Christmas show.
So, those are the stories we want to tell.
And we want to be honest about --
that we're a major American city,
and we are grappling with these issues.
But, you know, we're a great place to visit.
-We'll work on booking the "Craft Fairs with Tracey Show."
But thank you for jumping into it.
Jon, I want to talk to you about the homelessness,
public safety issues
that I know you're dealing with every day here.
We saw Operation New Day launch back in the spring,
providing more of a police presence downtown --
one of several efforts to improve public safety,
deal with chron-- chronic homelessness.
Has that been working? Is my first question here.
And also, what sort of progress are you seeing
from Seattle city leaders,
the Regional Homelessness Authority,
when it comes to these twin concerns
of public safety and homelessness.
-Yes, it's working, and we need to continue and expand it.
We've seen a reduction in violent crime
in our downtown since the spring,
and since we had additional officers deployed to areas
that were experiencing high concentrations of crime.
And so, that's good news.
We're finally moving in the right direction,
and seeing those numbers decline.
We also have fewer people on the streets than we did a year ago.
A year ago, we probably had 135 or so individuals
living in tent encampments in the greater downtown,
by a count of our ambassadors
that are on the streets every day.
Today, we have around 12.
We still have folks living unsheltered,
you know, living under a blanket,
maybe spending the night in an alley,
or a doorway, or a sidewalk.
But we also, now, have a new effort of 40 outreach workers
that are on the street every day,
a command center at the city's emergency operations center
that's working daily to find housing for those individuals.
And I think the most highly coordinated and focused strategy
that we've ever seen to address
the crisis of homelessness in downtown.
And we need to do more there, and that work has just started,
but they've moved nearly 40 people in the last
month and a half, two months, off the street into housing.
And that's what we need to be doing to create
a safe, healthy environment for everybody,
and to help those most in need.
-Brief follow-up here.
This idea from the RHA that they can hit
functional homelessness downtown
with help from Partnership for Zero --
do you believe it?
-Absolutely.
We shouldn't normalize homelessness.
That's not a been a normal condition in --
in American cities for most of our history.
It's been a very pronounced one over the last decade.
And the pandemic exacerbated the challenges
that Seattle, and Portland, and L.A.,
and other cities across our country are facing.
But we shouldn't normalize these conditions.
We know what works.
We need to offer more of it.
-Yeah.
I want to switch gears just a little bit.
And Robert, if you could briefly talk about a new partnership
between you, City of Seattle Public Schools, too,
when it comes to renovating Memorial Stadium.
This sounds really exciting.
The council just made an investment in this project
with its budget approved last week.
What are we gonna see at Seattle Center?
I've heard a lot of buzz about World Cup 2026,
and "USA" ringing in the stands.
What's going on?
-Well, there's been a lot going on.
This has been a great partnership
between Seattle Public Schools and the city of Seattle.
And, you know, there's been a...
years and years and years of looking at Memorial Stadium,
and trying to get something done.
The school district took the first major step
by making sure that Memorial Stadium
was in its levy package back in February --
$66.5 million dollars.
The city just passed a budget
that puts $21 million in right now,
and we'll seek another $19 million
in the next budget cycle,
to put $40 million into this project.
And so, something will happen.
And this makes me --
you know, people say, "Well, why are you leaving?"
I said, "Well, you know, when I first got an opportunity
to be acting director of Seattle Center,
I sent the mayor, Mayor Nickels, a 20-point plan.
And I said, 'In the next 100 days,
we're gonna do these 20 points.'"
We did 19 of them. -Okay.
-The one thing that was on that list
that never got done was Memorial Stadium.
-Here we go.
-So I'm coming to the -- to the end of that.
And so, and -- and this will -- this will be something
that will be great for the students of Seattle.
It will be great for the community at large.
And it will allow us to bring people together
in even more and distinct ways, as we do that.
-Jon, I wanted to touch on one macro issue, here, if I could.
The council approved investments
for downtown business recovery in its budget.
There's an investment in workforce development
to restart Bumbershoot in 2023, too, which is exciting.
It sounds positive short-term,
but I want to talk about funding in the future,
because it looked like the council's long-term
financial picture didn't look that great.
There was a big shortage of real estate excise tax.
I guess, are you concerned about where dollars are gonna
continue to come from, from the city to the DSA,
in the future, concerned about a recession in 2023?
What are you hearing, and what do you know?
I think the best way to strengthen
our city coffe--
coffers is to continue to support
the recovery of downtown,
because our downtown has been an economic engine
for our city for many decades.
And today, we've got more tax revenue
in our city than ever before.
The general fund is larger than it was last year,
larger than it was five years ago.
Growth, over the last decade, of the general fund
has been 100%, far outpacing growth of population.
So, we have a city with a lot of resources,
and I think how we apply those resources, how we spend them,
is the question we should be asking
How do we get to the best results
in helping more people in need,
and ensuring that our city is is safe and welcoming for all?
So, I don't think resources are an issue,
and I think the best way to grow them is --
is by recovery in our downtown,
our neighborhood business districts,
welcoming people back,
attracting people from across the country
and across the world for meetings,
events, leisure travel, that are gonna
spend their money here, and then they go back home.
That's a good thing for us. That's a good deal.
-Thank you.
I need to start wrapping up, here.
This has been a great talk, and I appreciate it.
I want to talk about expectations for next year.
Tracey, where's downtown Seattle headed?
Where is the region headed, economically, et cetera?
What's it gonna take to get there?
-Well, again, the tourism industry
is a huge economic driver
for our region, and for our state.
Tourism is Washington state's fourth largest industry.
And of course, we're gonna have a huge boost
with the opening of the additional
convention center facility,
which will be officially opening in January,
welcoming in its first group.
So, that is gonna be great news for downtown.
We're gonna be able to host larger groups, more groups.
You know, pre-pandemic, we were turning excellent groups
away from meeting in Seattle
because we did not have the capacity.
We will have that capacity.
So, I think that and the return of all these other sectors
that matter -- arts and culture,
retail, restaurants, all these special events,,
this is what's gonna bring people back to our community.
-Jon, 30-second version of what you're expecting in 2023.
-I think Seattle's brightest days are ahead of us.
In addition to what Tracey noted, you know,
we're gonna have All-Star Week here in July of '23.
I think that's gonna just be phenomenal for our city.
We're starting to cut the ribbon on different parts and pieces
of the waterfront project
that will be fully complete in 2025 --
the light rail extension,
some new retail that we know is coming.
So, we've got good momentum.
-Okay.
Robert, last question to you, 'cause you're --
you're out of here in a couple months.
Just your thoughts about 2023.
I know there's that one day in February,
that's your last day, that's part of that.
But some thoughts ahead for Seattle Center,
and the city as a whole.
-Well, I'm looking forward to '23
'cause as we've slowly been moving forward,
things have been getting better, and better, and better.
We're gonna bring back Bumbershoot next year.
We're going to have another year of Climate Pledge arena.
We're gonna have the opera, the ballet, Seattle rap,
and everybody growing and engaging.
We're going to have Festal stepping out.
We're going to do all of the things
that we have done previously,
and we're going to do a few new things.
And I'm just very excited about the direction of our city,
the direction of Seattle Center,
and making sure that we are preparing ourselves
for what's to come.
-All right. Robert finishing strong.
Thank you, again, for all your work for the city.
Thank you all for your input here.
And we will be right back.
♪♪
-What are people saying on social media
about Seattle's economic outlook?
One person writes
"The post-pandemic economic recovery
depends on workers feeling safe to come back to the office."
Another person says,
"The Seattle economy is the regional economy."
We'd like to know what you think.
Send us an e-mail at contact@seattlechannel.org,
or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Coming up next week, we're closing out 2022 with a bang.
We hear from business leaders,
elected officials, and local journalists
about the biggest news stories this year,
and what they're expecting in 2023.
Don't miss our Year in Review show,
next time on "City Inside Out."
I hope you can join us.
♪♪