2020 has brought several unpredictable challenges to Seattle. The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic?are still being felt in our city, region and country.??
Seattle?s road to recovery starts with vaccinations,?and while?we have hundreds of employees working our vaccination efforts, we still have to deal with an unstable and unpredictable vaccine chain.?This week, the City of Seattle and?90% of providers across the state faced delays in shipments because of winter weather across the country.??
Fortunately,?the Seattle Fire Department and our health care providers worked to?limit the impacts to already scheduled appointments.???
Photo from Alen Berner, The Seattle Times
We are deeply committed to ensuring our BIPOC communities and immigrant and refugee communities have equitable access to the vaccine. The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a disproportionate and devastating toll on BIPOC and immigrant and refugee communities ? we have to remedy that in our vaccine efforts.?We?ve worked with Public Health ? Seattle & King County to create strong principles for equitable?distribution?including?focusing on the highest risk and most impacted, partnering with community based leaders,?making registration easy,?addressing?transportation?and mobility, ensuring language access,?and providing?vaccinations?regardless of immigration status.??
As we focus on equitable distribution, our?Seattle Fire?mobile teams?are?addressing?disparities that we are seeing.?Every day, we are evaluating the data to see inequities in?distribution.?It is?clear that there is a gap in vaccinating?Black and?Latinx communities and communities in South Seattle and?West Seattle.?You can find vaccination data?here.??
 In King County, Latinx residents make up 24 percent of confirmed COVID-19 cases and nearly 18 percent of hospitalizations, yet they represent 10 percent of King County?s population. At 6.5 percent in King County, Latinx communities have a lower rate of vaccination than their share of the population.
Last week, West Seattle, South Seattle, Delridge, and Highline have the lowest vaccination rate of people 65 and older among all Seattle neighborhoods.
So this week, the City ? with our limited doses ? focused on vaccine efforts in South Seattle and West Seattle. We?re proud that to-date, approximately 70 percent of the 5,000 residents that we?ve vaccinated identify as BIPOC.
While we?re prepared to scale our vaccine efforts to include mass sites and more community pop-ups, doses continue to be extremely limited. We?ll continue our focus on serving eligible individuals in our most impacted areas and high risk residents in adult family homes, senior affordable housing and partnerships with strong community based organizations such as El Comite, Villa Comunitaria, the Senior Center of West Seattle, Eritrean Community in Seattle & Vicinity, Filipino Community of Seattle, and the Central Area Senior Center (CASC).
The City?s efforts show that we can take an equity focused approach to vaccine distribution, it just requires deliberate attention and effort.
For now, we all still need to follow public health guidance. This means masking up, physical distancing, and caring for our neighbors.
Stay safe and healthy,
This week, the Mayor did a walking tour with the?U District Partnership.?COVID-19 has been devastating for so many small businesses in Seattle. While the City has been working hard to support small business owners across the city with stabilization funds and grants, it is always helpful to talk to business owners, and workers.?
To-Date, Seattle Fire Department Mobile Vaccination Teams Have Provided 4,722 Vaccinations to Vulnerable Seattleites?
Mayor Jenny Durkan announced the City of Seattle?s plan for the upcoming week of vaccinations administered by the Seattle Fire Department (SFD) Mobile Vaccination Teams (MVT). This week, the Washington State Department of Health (DOH) allotted the City of Seattle with 1,500 first doses of the?Moderna?vaccine and 1,000 second doses of the?Moderna?vaccine. The SFD MVTs will continue providing first doses of the vaccine to?Phase 1B, Tier 1?eligible older adults living in affordable housing buildings, and Phase 1B, Tier 1 eligible older adults, with a focus on Latinx communities living in West Seattle, South Park, and South Seattle.?
In January, the new?Clean City?Initiative ramped up efforts and collected over 1 million pounds of garbage and properly disposed of over 26,000 needles? through trash pick-up or enhanced maintenance at over? 60 locations across the city.???
?The pandemic has taken a toll on our community in many unseen ways, one is the growing? graffiti, trash and garbage in parks and on streets. The Clean City Initiative has increased our focus on removing trash to begin to set Seattle up for clear road to recovery?for our businesses, schools, neighborhoods, and residents. We have much more work ahead to deliver for our residents and businesses? said Mayor Jenny Durkan. ?Thank you to the many hard-working City employees who are getting our city cleaned up in partnership with our neighborhood businesses and residents.??????
In a year of unprecedented challenges, Mayor Jenny A. Durkan delivered her fourth State of the City address at the Filipino Community of Seattle. Emphasizing the challenges magnified during the pandemic including homelessness, public safety, systemic racism, and climate change, she highlighted her plan for an equitable distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine and outlined her vision for Seattle to reopen and recover, especially downtown.?
Mayor Durkan helped launch?All In WA?s $15 million Vaccine Equity Fund, which seeks to invest in trusted, community-based organizations who can conduct linguistically and culturally-specific vaccine education and outreach, as well as safely facilitate mobile and pop-up vaccine clinics for those who want to get vaccinated.?
Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan, Former Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best, and Seattle Public Schools Superintendent Denise Juneau met Wednesday to discuss the ups and downs of serving as women in leadership. Town Hall Seattle and Seattle University Institute of Public Service Hosted the penultimate digital installment of ?The Conversations?.?
Moderated by journalist Joni Balter and Dr. Larry Hubbell, longtime former director at Seattle University?s Institute of Public Service, Durkan, Best, and Juneau considered the preparation it takes to rise up into a vital leadership position.?
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