Tag Archives: White Center

Community

Intentionalist: Spend With Pride at These Seattle LGBTQIA+-Owned Businesses

by Jax Kiel

Intentionalist is built on one simple idea: where we spend our money matters. We make it easy to find, learn about, and support small businesses and the diverse people behind them through everyday decisions about where we eat, drink, and shop. #SpendLikeItMatters

LGBTQIA+ small business owners have a lot to be proud of, from overcoming the barriers of being queer and out in the professional world, to navigating the year of pandemic shutdown that shocked the world. Despite it all, they keep going. 

Historically, LGBTQIA+-owned businesses and spaces have been places of refuge, of rebellion, and the only places queer people could find other people like them. To this day, our communities gain so much from LGBTQIA+-owned small businesses. Queer business owners create safe, welcoming community spaces, donate profits to LGBTQ+ nonprofit organizations, and queer children have role models to look up to.

LGBTQIA+-owned businesses contribute over $1.7 trillion to the U.S. economy, creating good jobs and innovating industries, and building wealth in the LGBTQIA+ community, according to The National LGBT Chamber of Commerce. Take this opportunity to spend with pride and be intentional about giving money back to LGBTQIA+-owned small businesses. 

This month, Intentionalist is teaming up with Seattle Sounders FC, Seattle Storm, Seattle Seahawks, OL Reign, Seattle Mariners, and Seattle Kraken to encourage everyone to Spend With Pride. Upload your receipt from a local LGBTQIA+-owned business to Intentionalist’s website for a chance to win a Pride prize pack from your favorite sports team. If we hit our goal of $25,000, each team will make a donation to support local nonprofit Gender Diversity.

Here are three Seattle-area businesses where we encourage you to Spend With Pride!

News

NEWS GLEAMS: Vaccine Updates, Calls for Artists, Earth Day Zoom Rally, and More!

curated by Emerald Staff

A round-up of news and announcements we don’t want to get lost in the fast-churning news cycle! 

Vaccines: Here’s the Latest — UPDATED 4/7 @ 11:30 a.m.

This Week, the City Will Vaccinate a Record 30K People — The City of Seattle will administer approximately 30,000 vaccines across multiple sites this week including Lumen Field Event Center, the Rainier Beach and West Seattle Community Vaccination Hubs, and via Seattle Fire Department Mobile Vaccination Teams (MVTs), which will visit locations where formerly homeless adults live in permanent supportive housing. The MVTs will also administer second-dose shots to older adults living in affordable housing.

Continue reading NEWS GLEAMS: Vaccine Updates, Calls for Artists, Earth Day Zoom Rally, and More! →
Voices

‘Black and Center’ Holiday Gift and Giving Guide!

by Jasmine J. Mahmoud

Before the pandemic, my two favorite places to shop for holiday gifts were Kinokuniya Seattle and Pike Place Market. At Kinokuniya, the bright, densely-packed Japanese bookstore in Uwajimaya Village, I browsed children’s books, comics, magazines, and stationery for hours. At Pike Place Market, I beelined to the Herban Farm stand, founded by Ras Levi Peynado, a Seattleite with Jamaican Roots who farms and dries his products. There, I would test-smell the fragrant seasonings, rubs, and salves, while staring at ferry boats crossing Elliott Bay, before buying gifts for family members. Among favorites were Pike Place Herbs (an all purpose seasoning), the paprika-rich Seatown Smoke (“BBQ in a jar”), and the floral Lavender Sea Salt.

Continue reading ‘Black and Center’ Holiday Gift and Giving Guide! →
Community

Shopping the South End: Holiday Gifts From BIPOC-Owned Businesses in Delridge, White Center, and South Park

by Mark Van Streefkerk 

It’s no secret that small businesses and retail shops have had a challenging year due to COVID-19 restrictions. Most local retailers have had to move their sales online, or host a hybrid of safe, socially-distant, in-person shopping along with new online sales platforms. Here at the South Seattle Emerald, we encourage you and your family to shop local this holiday season, especially seeking out local, BIPOC-owned businesses that might have been hit particularly hard in the pandemic. Here are a few businesses from the Delridge, White Center, and South Park neighborhoods to support this year. Check out the Seattle Green Book for more Black-owned businesses, and The Intentionalist for an index of woman-, LGBTQ+-, and BIPOC-owned businesses. 

Continue reading Shopping the South End: Holiday Gifts From BIPOC-Owned Businesses in Delridge, White Center, and South Park →
News

South King County Food Banks Face Severe Shortages — And There’s No End in Sight

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by Carolyn Bick

It’s sunny, and beginning to get warm on an afternoon in early May, when people start to line up outside the White Center Food Bank. Clad in masks, they patiently wait an adequate distance from each other to choose food the National Guard is helping food bank workers distribute.

This outdoor model is the latest iteration of food service the food bank has tried, Associate Executive Director Carmen Smith said. So far, it’s also the most successful, she said. Usually, the food bank operates in a grocery store model, which allows patrons the freedom to choose their own items, and mitigate the stigma associated with needing to use a food bank. But once the novel coronavirus pandemic hit the state, Smith and her fellow food bank employees found that the inside of the food bank was just too small to allow for safe social distancing practices. Having volunteers shop for the patrons’ food was also a no-go, because it’s just too hard to shop for someone else, Smith said.

Continue reading South King County Food Banks Face Severe Shortages — And There’s No End in Sight →
Community

White Center Quarantine Site: The Inefficiency of Delayed Outreach

(This is the second of a two part series. You can read part one on the White Center Quarantine Site here.)

words by Ari Robin McKenna

photography by Chloe Collyer

Last Thursday, while two large excavators dug deep trenches for lengthy sewer pipes at the White Center Quarantine Site, two County employees walked past on 112th, shades on against the midday sun and shoulder bags full of paper. David Daw and Bong StoDomingo retained the appropriate social distance from each other while Chloe Collyer snapped their picture. They’d produced public health information about the upcoming quarantine site, featuring Frequently Asked Questions–one of which has been echoing on this street for weeks: “Why were communities not consulted in advance of siting?” Continue reading White Center Quarantine Site: The Inefficiency of Delayed Outreach →

Community

Community Comes Together to Question White Center Quarantine Site

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words by Ari McKenna

photography by Jovelle Tomayo

Typically, democracy suffers when a state of emergency is declared, but White Center’s response to a quarantine site being prepared on an especially populous street has led to a mobilization uniting community members amidst a pandemic.

Early last week, King County declared a state of emergency as confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus began to accelerate, with six people dying from the disease north of Seattle and in Kirkland. While there had been an initial, temporary quarantine site for people traveling from China in Shoreline near the Public Health Laboratory (it has since closed), the county began announcing new sites where people could be isolated: Continue reading Community Comes Together to Question White Center Quarantine Site →