DCist/WAMU project: Tracking business closures in D.C.

Hi all,

My name is Morgan Baskin and I’m an editor at DCist. I’m reaching out because we’re working on a series of ambitious projects to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic, and we’d love your involvement.

One of those projects is an attempt to quantify just how many businesses have been lost in D.C. Those include restaurants, bars, laundromats, hardware stores, food trucks, corner stores, dispensaries –– any brick-and-mortar spot that has shuttered since March 2020.

Part of our data collection efforts will be crowd-sourcing tips from people who know their neighborhoods best –– like you. If you’re up for it, we’d love for you to let us know on our Google form here which businesses have closed in your district (or beyond!). We’ll be gathering all of the tips we get to compile a huge map of the closures, and hopefully learn more about how the pandemic has exacerbated economic inequality in the city.

Here's the link again if you'd like to share it with friends, colleagues, neighbors, and family: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1hI9zjlWRfsBReC--HdFCeQ4_teyy_qioXOCr6ZTnYSM/edit?ts=6026b8b7

Tracking D.C. business closures

A project from WAMU 88.5 and DCist

docs.google.com

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Our first major deadline for data collection is Feb 26, so we’d be grateful for any submissions you’d be willing to send before then, but we will continue to collect them on a rolling basis through the spring. Thanks so much in advance for your help, and please don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions about this.

All my best,

Morgan