SEATTLE SOLIDARITY BUDGET

Invest in Seattle's Green New Deal and a healthy climate future for all. Seattle's Green New Deal calls for eliminating our City's climate pollution by 2030, while creating thousands of good jobs and healthy, climate-resilient neighborhoods for all. The 2022 City Budget can lay the groundwork for this equitable energy transition, while meeting urgent needs for utility assistance, building community climate resilience and creating pathways to good living-wage jobs.

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Address Seattle’s widening wealth-gap by prioritizing funding for Housing for all. Seattle has fallen short of its responsibility to provide clean, safe, and affordable housing for all its residents. In 2022, we must start to build an equitable housing future by investing $634,750,000 in housing, supports and land acquisition.

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Offer Seattle options for mobility that allow residents to thrive without a car through properly prioritized Transportation funding.

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Recognize Childcare as essential infrastructure and fund it accordingly. The COVID-19 pandemic made more clear than ever the universal need for childcare - the system of support that enables parents and caregivers to work and to care for themselves and their communities. The high cost of childcare in Seattle and the lack of available slots combine to render childcare inaccessible for many, with a disproportionate impact on families of color (including underfunded caregivers such as family members, friends, and neighbors). By investing $153.7 million in childcare for all, we’re investing in the future of our young people, and in the well-being of all families with children.

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Offer Food Support and Food Sovereignty by investing $17,780,000 for the survival of our most vulnerable residents. Food insecurity has been exacerbated by COVID-19 and the climate crisis that is making it harder and harder for BIPOC producers to grow food for local communities.

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Expand Education funding to $170,810,000, with an emphasis on BIPOC students and disabled students.

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Ensure Digital Equity and Internet Access through key investments and pilot programs. The ability to access the internet can be the difference between life and death, between surviving and thriving. Whether it’s finding the latest vaccines, locating rapidly changing public health guidelines, accessing employment, searching for resources for dealing with violence, participating in democracy, visiting long-distance loved ones, or attending classes via remote learning, many of our community members have been barred from accessing robust internet in their daily lives. These barriers are both physical (e.g., the wires that run into homes) as well as social and structural. This budget connects digital equity to Seattle’s social safety net.

Read our key recommendations for expanding digital equity

$2.8 million for Indigenous Sovereignty

In the absence of federal recognition, funding, and human services, Duwamish Tribal Services has struggled to provide numerous social, educational, health, and cultural programs to the public during the past 35 years. It is time to give back to the People who gave up so much while getting nothing in return.

Read how the City of Seattle can honor the Duwamish People, past and present, and the land itself, by prioritizing investments that promote the Tribe’s Indigenous sovereignty

Generate Progressive Revenue

We know that the investments listed in this budget may exceed the City’s general fund. We also know that they do not exceed the City’s potential income. Our City is home to some of the wealthiest corporations and individuals in the world; their wealth only grew during the pandemic. Many of us fought for and won the JumpStart tax, which provided economic relief to immigrant and refugee communities and small businesses during the pandemic and now constitutes a major, though still insufficient, new revenue stream for affordable housing and homelessness. We know that Seattle has other options for generating the progressive revenue we need to create a city that works for all of us.

Read our key recommendations