My Negligent Safeway (Surprise!)

Like today in Portland, a blue sky above a white snowscape is a beautiful sight, but with it come dangers of course, particularly as the temp stays below freezing and the snow pack turns to ice on the city's sidewalks and streets.

Our snow won't be going away until Sunday and Monday, likely, as a new warming spell arrives over the weekend.

I don't drive, but I walk a lot, as I did today to the Safeway near my pad.

Most understand that it is the civic duty of businesses, indeed the law, to clear and make the sidewalks outside their establishments safe for pedestrians.  Businesses handle the sidewalks, the city covers the streets. In theory that is.

Generally, I'd say that enterprises, including apartments, churches, coffee shops, et. al., are doing a decent job in my neighborhood.  I'm in the museum district.  It's good around the museum proper, for example.

And of course the one business that is not doing its part is the mega-corporation and grocery chain I shop at--our beloved Safeway.

The entire half-block around the store looks like it was cleared halfheartedly right after the snowfall, but hasn't been touched since; indeed, it has become an ice-rink

The city could fine Safeway.  But of course it won't, for obvious reasons.  One doesn't mess with corporate power if avoidable.

And any person who slips there and falls, like I nearly did numerous times this morning, wouldn't have, shall we say, a snowball's chance in hell of winning a lawsuit against the bums.

I mentioned the sidewalk's conditions to a clerk.  She promised to relay my message to someone important.

Haha...


TS