Commentary: Operation Rio Grande is driven by fearmongering

Throughout the 1990s, street drugs were bought and sold in a triangular area of downtown Salt Lake City between the sidewalks of a dive bar, coffee shop and nightclub: the Shamrock Lounge on 200 South (razed), Bandaloops (now PF Chang’s), and the Zephyr Club on West Temple and Broadway (dilapidated after 14 years of vacancy). Back then, you couldn’t hit a shadow between the three landmarks without being solicited by a mouthful of colored balloons filled with cocaine or heroin. W