Californians Keep Out!

A wave of transplants from the Golden State touches off a backlash in Seattle

Kelly Cutlip was driving along a Los Angeles freeway in June 1988 when a speeding Toyota with a drug-dazed 22-year-old woman at the wheel traversed crazily five traffic lanes, crashed broadside into his pickup and gave him the ride of his life. Cutlip, 36, a marble mason from nearby Irvine, found himself strapped upside down as the truck skidded on its roof at 60 m.p.h., sparks flying past his head like an acetylene shower in a metal shop. "That's it," he announced to his wife that night. "That's the clincher."

Within two months the Cutlips had sold their house and moved...

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