Black Lives Matter updates – please join us on Nov 13

We invite you to join us in person every Friday through the Winter to stand up for Black Lives Matter at 65th NW and NW 15th. This is not a sprint, it’s a marathon (or perhaps a relay race?). Please come take up the baton whenever you are available. Everyone who is able to join us in November will receive a free digital subscription to Chinook Book.

Note: We now gather 4pm to 5:30pm on Fridays, starting earlier because of darkness. We recognize that may be difficult for some, so we’re extending to 5:30 for those who can’t come until later and hope that everyone can join us for a 45 minute to 1 hour block during that time.

PLEASE WEAR MASKS & FOLLOW PHYSICAL DISTANCING GUIDELINES. We can spread out along 15th for space. Studies are now showing that protests with appropriate safety precautions are not contributing to the spread of Coronavirus. Please do NOT attend if you are sick, exhibiting symptoms, or if you believe you have come into contact with someone who had COVID-19.

Go here to be on the mailing list to receive Black Lives Matter updates.

Want to contribute from home?

If you can’t come out with us, contact your local representatives. And/or donate to Black Lives Matter Seattle King County. 

It helps if you collaborate with friends and neighbors, and reach out to people you know who are more familiar with the local issues. It’s up to you to make sure your local officials feel the pressure to improve police accountability and dismantle the structural racism that has been built into all of our institutions.

Updates from the front (please take the time to look into who’s organizing the events below to know whether or not they are truly centering black voices and advocacy):

SHOW UP

For an up-to-date, more detailed calendar of events, see this link.

UPCOMING & ONGOING EVENTS
  • Every Day Morning March: weekdays at 8am, following @morningmarch on Instagram for locations
  • Every Day Evening March: weekdays at 7pm, follow @seattleveningmarch on Instagram for locations
SIGN ON
  • Across Seattle people have been continuously calling, emailing, and tweeting at council members and taking to the streets, demanding that they cut the Seattle Police Department’s (SPD) budget and reinvest that money in community health and safety. Keep the pressure on Council to support Decriminalize Seattle and King County Equity Now’s demands! Here’s a guide on who to call and what to say.
  • Stonechild “Stoney” Chiefstick, Sr., a Chippewa Cree and Cowichan man and beloved member of the Suquamish community, was shot and killed by Poulsbo Police Officer Craig Keller in a crowd of people on July 3rd, 2019. Please join the fight for justice for Stoney and add your name to this petition.
  • Participatory budgeting is a democratic process in which community members decide how to spend part of a public budget. Decriminalize Seattle and King County Equity Now are joining forces to help inform and guide Seattle’s spending on the city’s “public safety” agencies. Want to be part of the process to defund SPD and reinvest in real community safety? Fill out this form to sign up for updates on how to get involved.
  • Demand Whole Foods Market stop retaliating against workers’ support for the Black Lives Matter movement by signing this petition. 
  • Seattle, Auburn, Federal Way, Kent, Renton, and King County are suing to stop public review of police killings, also known as the inquest process. In support of the families of Damarius Butts, Isaiah Obet and Charleena Lyles, a petition is demanding that elected officials withdraw their inquest lawsuits and ensure transparency and police accountability around these murders. Sign on as an individual or organization here.
  • Sign this local petition to defund the Seattle Police, organized by Seattle COVID-19 Mutual Aid and supported by Nikkita Oliver and other BIPOC organizers in Seattle. 
  • Are you part of any organizations? Sign on as an organization.
  • Sign on to Call for Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan to Resign. This petition is in response to Durkan’s failure to protect the safety of our communities, specifically our Black community, the homeless, and peaceful protesters, and for violating the accepted standards of our community by excusing and defending the violence used against our families, friends, and neighbors. 
  • Following the recent precedent in Minneapolis and other school districts across the country, students, parents, teachers, and allies are calling for Seattle Schools to end their relationship with the Seattle Police Department. Sign on to support this demand here and here.
  • The University of Minnesota recently ended its contract with the Minneapolis police union in response to the murder of George Floyd, and students across the country are demanding that colleges to do the same. Calling all UW students, alum, employees, faculty: sign this petition calling on UW administration to cut its contract with SPD.

DONATE

  • Support the protests and protesters:
  • Support local Black queer trans organizations, including:
    • Washington Black Trans Task Force: an intersectional, multi-generational project of community building, research, and political action addressing the crisis of violence against Black Trans people. They provide resources to broaden safety nets and increase avenues for justice available for white trans people. 
    • Ghetto Heaven Collective: A collective of queer spiritual healers, community activators, and creatives. They create spaces that center BIPOCs, creators, dreamers, freak, geeks, queer folks, our fellow community organizers, and most importantly GAWD**N ANCESTORS!!! 
    • Alphabet Alliance of Color: Alphabet An organizing alliance of all our letters. We center people who share our identities, and we serve our intersectional community — meaning ourselves, our intersectional community, and all of our letters who are experiencing racism, violence, transphobia, and economic violence. 
    • Queer the Land: Queer the Land is a collaborative project grounded in the self-determination of queer, trans, and two spirit Black/indigenous/people of color (QT2BIPOC) and the vision of collectively owning their land and labor. 
    • Trans Women of Color Solidarity Network: upholds the self determination of Two-Spirit, Trans Women and Femmes of color. They create opportunities to exercise collective and community care. 
    • Black Trans Prayer Book: The Black Trans Prayer Book is an interfaith, multi-dimensional, artistic and theological work that collects the stories, poems, prayers, meditation, spells, and incantations of Black Trans & Non-Binary people. 
  • Support black-led, community-based organizations in Seattle, such as:
    • Seattle | King County Equity Now is an 18-year campaign to bring members of the African Diaspora in King County to equity across key metrics (e.g., homeownership, wealth, birth rates, mortality rates, college admissions, organizational control, etc.) by 2038—the 175th anniversary of the emancipation proclamation and the 75th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.
    • Donate to Black Lives Matter Seattle–King County to support Black Lives Matter organizing in and around Seattle. Note: the bail fund they created received a huge number of donations and is now closed, but you can support the chapter’s general fund at the above link.
    • Community Passageways is leading the way in reimagining and actively creating an alternative to today’s criminal legal system with felony diversion and prevention programs – and a vision for zero youth incarceration.
    • Creative Justice builds community with youth most impacted by the school-to-prison-(to-deportation) pipeline by creating space for political education, particularly through art.
    • WA-Bloc partners with local public schools, community partners, and students and families, to create a collective vision for equitable education that is culturally responsive, trauma-informed and restorative. 
    • Wa Na Wari is a center for Black art and culture in Seattle’s historically redlined Central District neighborhood that creates space for Black ownership, possibility, and belonging through art, historic preservation, and connection.
    • Got Green builds community power by waging visionary campaigns at the intersection of racial, economic, gender and climate justice that incite community participation (via robust base-building), provides a pipeline of leadership development for directly impacted communities, and engages in direct action.

Thank you to Sulakshana with 350 Seattle for this curated list of resources.