It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas in San Francisco.
Macy’s 33rd Annual Tree Lighting was held Wednesday night, kicking off the holiday season in Union Square.
With the flip of a switch, the holiday season brilliantly and beautifully announced its arrival in San Francisco this evening. All in partnership with Big Brothers and Big Sisters. Klyde, a little brother flipped that switch.
“It was excitement and shock because it was such a big light. I was so excited to light the tree,” he said.
San Francisco city and civic leaders on hand, promoting in person shopping, seeing an opportunity for retail city wide to emerge after being hit with not one, but two lumps of coal in its stocking.
“In fact, not just the pandemic but also online shopping and there’s nothing like being able to go into a store and look around and enjoy the space and purchase something over the counter,” said San Francisco Mayor London Breed.
But city leaders also remembering it was almost exactly one year ago, something very dark left happened and it left the shopping Mecca in a pre-holiday hot mess.
On Nov. 19, 2021, the season of giving turned into the season of taking, as droves of thieves stole armloads of items from Union Square stores, leading to an anti-crime uproar from city residents.
"Last year was a wake up call," said San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott. “So, we will be out here. We will be deployed heavily and robustly, and we want people to enjoy this beautiful space. It’s a beautiful place. So, we want to make sure that people come here and enjoy it” he said.
And maybe some people can enjoy the tree a little bit more when they find out that it is a reusable tree and the lights are all low energy LED.
