Partner news! Awards and Acknowledgements (February 2021)

In the news:

Front and Centered coalition and coalition members, Puget Sound Sage, Got Green, Community Latino Fund, Community to Community Development, are featured in this Yes! magazine article: Strengthening Communities and Shifting Power in Pursuit of a Just Transition. How two grassroots, BIPOC-led coalitions are helping to democratize the climate justice space:

“I am proud because we are building something for us, about as, and led by us,” she [Rosalinda Guillen] says.

Video: Community-Run Kitchen Spice Bridge Shows the Key to Equity Lies in Food Access

The Food Innovation Network (FIN) and the stories and foods from some of the culinary and food business entrepreneurs connected to the FIN and Spice Bridge Food Hall are featured in this February 8th Whetstone article as well as this new video from the American Planning Association, Community-Run Kitchen Spice Bridge Shows the Key to Equity Lies in Food Access, this local news feature story on Taste of Congo business owner Caroline Musitu, and in this January Forbes article.

Wa Na Wari and the work for a community arts space and anti-displacement policies that support residents, community and cultural anchors for the Black community in Seattle’s Central District are highlighted in this Real Change article from December 2020:

“It’s always coming out of the community to reach the imagination barrier when it comes to policy and imagining how our society should be ... and then figuring out how you interject those ideas into law, into government, into sort of the bureaucratic norms that govern our society,” [Inye] Wokoma said.

Inye Wokoma also writes about relationships to place, community and lineage in this February 18th article in the South Seattle Emerald, Seedcast: On Home and Belonging for Black and Indigenous Peoples:

When I’m talking about the importance of Black home ownership in Seattle, as I often do in my work and art, part of what I’m doing is, “How do we disrupt that process of never-ending migration?” I am asking a global question, imagining what it means to intentionally root ourselves to place again as a means of reconstituting our fractured humanity.

Wa Na Wari is also spotlighted in this Seattle Channel video: Wa Na Wari: "Our Home" for Seattle's Black artists & community:

Wa Na Wari, a Kalabari term meaning "Our Home," is the name of this community beacon in Seattle's Central District. Co-founders Inye Wokoma, Elisheba Johnson, Rachel Kessler, and Jill Freidberg established this gathering place for black artists and neighbors. Through a cultural strategy of expression and performance, Wa Na Wari is preserving this neighborhood's legacy, history, and community.

Directed by Devon de Leña and CHIMAERA.

COO Governance Group member Ubax Gardheere and COO partners in government and community, City of Seattle’s Equitable Development Initiative and Rainier Beach Action Coalition (RBAC) are profiled in this Yes! Magazine article, Seattle Bets on Equitable Development:

“One of our key goals is asking: how do we heal and repair historical harms and inequities?” Gardheere says. “Saying that our success is having that building in place, that does not repair harms or inequities. Success is this community coming together and visioning and looking at how well-connected this community is.”

Abigail Echo-Hawk, Director of the Urban Indian Health Institute on Indigenous resilience and the urgent need for better race and ethnicity data collection in vaccine distribution efforts, in this Op-Ed in The Hill:

But to truly understand the impact of this virus, we need better data to work from. States are doing a poor job of tracking and reporting COVID-19 data for American Indians and Alaska Natives and other people of color. A recent study showed that current data on vaccinations is missing 48 percent of race and ethnicity data. They need to be held accountable to improving their practices if we are to ever achieve data-driven decision making for allocation of resources to end this pandemic. We can no longer be invisible in the data.

Awards:

Some of the recent awards to COO community partners include funding from the following grants and institutions:

Seattle Awards Over $500,000 For Community-Led Projects that Advance Environmental Justice

Awards to COO partners: FEEST, Got Green, Chief Seattle Club

2020 Resilience Fund Grants Include Focus on Black-led Organizations

Awards to COO partners: Black Trans Task Force, Wa Na Wari, Byrd Barr Place, Collective Justice, Northwest Health Law Advocates, Tenants Union, UTOPIA. The Maternal Coalition

Equitable Development Initiative Awards $4.4 Million to community development projects