For a couple of months in 1974, Frank Chopp lived in a Seattle parking lot. The UW student wanted to draw attention to the demolition of low-income housing nearby. He rented a parking stall for about $10 a month, and then he and his dad, a Bremerton shipyard electrician, built a small geodesic dome for shelter.
At the time, the city was a blue-collar town grappling with Boeing layoffs, high unemployment, power brownouts, and a national oil crisis. Low-income housing was vanishing, and Chopp felt driven to help.
Now, as he wraps up 21 years as the Washington State Legislature’s longest-serving Speaker of the House, Chopp, ’75, pauses to reflect on his lifelong habit of shaking things up and finding ways to help the underserved members of the state… Read more in UW Magazine.