The Seattle DSA Local Council voted to endorse the 2023 Solidarity Budget: among the key issues with the proposed budget are raiding money from Jumpstart housing in the general funds and putting those funds into police firearms, ghost positions at SPD, film permit review, and non-housing items. Bluntly, a police firearm is not a hammer; we can't arrest our way into housing people. Other alternatives with funding (in addition to housing) are abortion, publicly financed as Cmbr Sawant has called for in The Stranger.

The ask from organizers is to read up and get informed and then:
1) Contact their Seattle City Council Members to support the two proposed budgets,
2) Consider attending a City Council meeting to express their support, and
3) Be ready if any direct action is organized to support the budgets.

No phone scripts. Read up, get informed, and speak from your own lived experience that housing and abortion can be made available to all. We don't have to choose prison, death, and poverty.

Seattle DSA engages in a united front with left and liberal forces to lead a rally to win back reproductive rights. In Seattle, the call to action was taken up by the Seattle Democratic Socialists of America and Seattle Green Wave, a student organization at the University of Washington that works to destigmatize abortion and provide education on reproductive justice. The rally and march, held Saturday, October 8 at Cal Anderson Park, drew a crowd of 500 people and was endorsed by over 20 organizations. Endorsing unions included the MLK County Labor Council, UNITE HERE local 8, the Seattle Education Association, and the United Food and Commercial Workers local 3000, the largest private-sector union in Washington State. The rally was the largest event Seattle DSA organized this year.

Tammy Morales has put in a few budget amendments that would be extremely helpful for social housing if I-135 is passed, including hiring full-time staff to acquire land for Seattle to develop affordable housing and putting funding towards green housing (The Stranger covered this today, it's at the bottom of the article).

Real Change has put together a script for writing letters to your councilmembers in favor of adopting these amendments here. Please take a moment (< 1 minute) to fill out letters to councilmembers urging them to adopt these budget amendments, or write/call your councilmembers in favor of these amendments.

The amendments in question are:

• OH-002-A-001-2023 – Municipal Housing Administration Team and Fund ($550k)
  This would begin the establishment of a new affordable housing model in the City of Seattle. One that is not reliant, or restricted, by current Federal Government affordable housing financing.
• OSE-002-A – Green Housing Tradesperson Certification Program ($220k)
  Passivhaus is the gold standard for green housing, and we urgently need a program that will teach and certify the building of this housing.
• OSE-OO1-A – Green Housing Construction Apprenticeship Program ($2.5m)
  This program will create urgently needed opportunities for jobs, education, and the opportunity for Seattle to become a nationwide leader on Green Housing.

Seattle Democratic Socialists of America