Hundreds of people showed up at an outlet mall in Auburn, WA today to queue in their cars for handouts of excess potatoes at an event organized by the Washington Potato Commission. They gave away 100,000 pounds of potatoes, part of an excess totaling one billion pounds in the state due to coronavirus-related supply chain issues.
I spent the morning with Ricky Moore, who has an inspiring story and was brave to share it. He was sleeping in the laundry room of an apartment building in Auburn when police kicked him out. He later found Co-LEAD, which set him up with temporary hotel lodging and more. Co-LEAD grew from the Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) program to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic by keeping people experiencing homelessness, or who come into contact with law enforcement, out of jails while providing temporary lodging at hotels, deploying intensive outreach responders, and providing other basic resources including medical care and case managers.
I met Frank Martinez of Saddle View Farms at his storage facility, filled with Russet Burbank potatoes, in Warden, WA yesterday. Washington state is facing a surplus of potatoes as demand plummets during the coronavirus pandemic, which is hurting growers like Martinez.
Today I visited Friehe Farms in Moses Lake, WA on assignment for Bloomberg News. Farmers in Washington are facing a surplus of one billion pounds of potatoes due to restaurant and school closures amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Washington Potato Commission.
I spent the afternoon with a mobile COVID-19 testing unit, run by Swedish Medical Center, at Interbay Village, which a village of tiny houses managed by the Low Income Housing Institute in Seattle.
I spent the afternoon at the COVID ICU, built to handle exclusively COVID-19 cases, today at the University of Washington Medical Center – Montlake for Reuters.
It was a pleasure to meet more folks facing the COVID-19 pandemic today at the Swedish Medical Center Issaquah campus, making portraits of them for Reuters.