Seattle

Police Arrest African American Vet For Using Golf Club As Cane

January 31, 2015 Meg Wagner, www.nydailynews.com Educate! Law, police brutality, Seattle

A Seattle cop arrested a 70-year-old military veteran, claiming the golf club he used as a cane was a weapon — a move that prompted the arrestee to sue the city and force a review of its officer. Newly released dashcam video showed Officer Cynthia Whitlatch arrest retired bus driver William Wingate in downtown Seattle in July. Whitlatch, who is white, claimed Wingate, who is black, swung his club at her. The footage of the incident showed no such maneuver. Seattle Police Chief Kathleen O’Toole ordered a conduct review into Whitlatch after the July 9 arrest, where Wingate was charged with obstruction and unlawful use of a weapon.

Seattle Tenants Force Public Housing Not To Raise Rent

December 29, 2014 James Tracy, www.rooflines.org Organize! Human Rights, Public Housing, Seattle

Public housing tenants are celebrating the Seattle Housing Authority’s (SHA) decision to retract a controversial plan to raise rents by more than 400 percent in the coming years. The “Stepping Forward” plan, announced last September, was immediately met with stiff resistance from tenants mostly organized through theTenants Union of Washington State(TUWS). In November, about 200 tenants of SHA buildings marched down Queen Anne Avenue to protest, then descended on the regularly scheduled SHA Board of Commissioners meeting, and spoke out about fears of displacement and homelessness if the plan were to be implemented. Commented TUWS leader and public housing resident Lynn Sereda, “We do remain vigilant, but consider this to be a victory for tenants, and our attention is now focused on making sure that the new appointments to the Board of Commissioners of SHA will be accountable to tenants and that we will have a voice in that process.”

Seattle Considering Creation Of A Public Bank

December 24, 2014 Matt Stannard, www.publicbankinginstitute.org Create! Law, Public Banking, Seattle

Seattle is at the forefront of cities taking back democracy. Seattle’s city council knows that the antecedents of democracy are material -- the ability to provide services, the ability to absorb the impact of economic shifts, the ability to make citizens feel invested in their communities. But one way the city can finance even more audacious and prosperous democratic participation, housing, social services and mass transit is with a public bank. The Wall Street Journal, the New York Times,Salon, and other national publications have recently touted the benefits of public banking; even the conservative Wall Street Journal admits that the Bank of North Dakota (the nation's only current public bank) outperforms "too big to fail" Wall Street banks.

Seattle WTO Uprising Still A Force In World Events

December 3, 2014 Ben Manski, www.berkeleyjournal.org Strategize! Democracy, History, Protests, Seattle, WTO

“This is what democracy looks like!” has become, since Seattle, more than a momentary expression of an alternative world that is possible. Instead, it has grown into an ongoing direct challenge to corporate capitalism and elite government. To be clear, the cost of that challenge has already proven high. And the past fifteen years have brought not only increased popular resistance but also greater social control in the form of police militarization and violence, security state expansion, unending war, and the legalization of corporate rule. Yet the fact remains that we have witnessed the birth of a global democracy movement that is constitutionally subversive and antagonistic to the institutions, laws, acts, and culture it seeks to transform.

Seattle Times Furious With FBI’s Alleged Impersonation

October 28, 2014 Ansel Herz, www.thestranger.com Create! FBI, Journalism, Law, Media, Seattle

Seven years ago, the FBI used a kind of spyware known as a CIPAV to track down and arrest a 15-year-old hacker who was sending bomb threats to a high school near Olympia. Old news for privacy watchdogs. But today, ACLU analyst Christopher Soghoian trawled through an arcane set of the bureau's records and came across something startling: in order to get the suspect's computer infected with the spyware, the documents suggest that the FBI sent a message to him that masqueraded as an e-mail from The Seattle Times. "Here is the email link in the style of the Seattle Times," wrote one FBI agent, whose name is redacted. "Below is the news article we would like to send containing the CIPAV," wrote another. The e-mail includes a message, headline, link, and subscription information all purporting to represent an Associated Press article carried online by The Seattle Times.

Seattle Votes To Recognize Indigenous People, Not Columbus

October 7, 2014 Victoria Cavaliere, www.rawstory.com Create! Colonialism, indigenous, Law, Seattle

The Seattle City Council unanimously voted on Monday to redesignate the federal Columbus Day holiday as Indigenous Peoples’ Day to reflect that Native Americans were living on the continent before Christopher Columbus’ 15th Century arrival. Mayor Ed Murray was expected to swiftly sign the measure, making Seattle the second major U.S. city after Minneapolis to mark Indigenous Peoples’ Day on the second Monday in October, the same day as Columbus Day. The change will take effect for the upcoming October 13 holiday, the city council said. The legislation acknowledges that Native Americans were already living in the Americas before Columbus’ arrival and says Seattle, named after a Native American tribal chief, was built atop indigenous peoples’ homes.

Seattle To Fine Residents For Not Composting

September 25, 2014 Kim Malcolm, www.ijpr.org Create! Environment, Law, Seattle

The Seattle City Council unanimously passed a new rule Monday governing what residents put in your garbage bin. The idea is to increase the amount of food scraps going to compost. Council member Sally Bagshaw said promoting this practice could reduce up to a third of Seattle's waste ending up in landfills. "So if we just get ourselves into the mindset of, Ok, we're going to recycle our bottles, our papers, our cans, just as we've been doing for the past 25 years, and now we're going to compost the stuff in your kitchen, really easy to reduce the amount of stuff that's going to a landfill," she said. Under the new rule, garbage haulers can ticket bins that contain 10 percent or more of food waste.

Seattle: Escalating Activism Leads To Escalating Surveillance

August 20, 2014 Cassius Methyl, www.theantimedia.org Resist! Activism, Police, Seattle, Surveillance

Activists in Seattle are currently extremely active, doing daily protests for Ferguson, Palestine, against Monsanto for environmental issues, among many other causes. Image credit: jglsongs It is under-reported how active these people are, and how much work they have put into making people conscious. Seattle, and more specifically Capitol Hill activists, are in such large numbers and work so peacefully and effectively, that the Seattle Police Department and the Department of Homeland Security are targeting them and doing heavier and heavier surveillance by the day. On a daily basis, helicopters fly over the protests that take place in Seattle, hovering menacingly over completely peaceful people. Innocent people get maced for no reason who aren’t even involved in protesting, and violence is instigated by the police. For example, earlier this week the anarchist Co-Op coffee shop ‘Black Coffee’ was put under blatant surveillance and were met with intimidation by an officer. A female officer parked directly in front of the place and pointed her dashcam camera at the activist coffee shop, videotaping the entire scene for about an hour and a half. This coffee shop is under investigation in several ways , and the police are doing everything they can to shut it down. It will probably have to move to another location in Seattle in the next few months.

Seattle Residents Blockade Tracks To Protest Oil-By-Rail

July 29, 2014 Rising Tide North America, www.risingtidenorthamerica.org Resist! Oil Trains, Protest, Seattle

Three residents of Anacortes and Seattle are currently blockading the oil train facility at Tesoro’s Anacortes Refinery by locking their bodies to barrels full of concrete. Supported by local residents, the three are demanding an immediate halt to the shipment of explosive Bakken oil through Northwest communities, the rejection of all new oil-by-rail terminals proposed for the Northwest, and an end to the refinery’s repeated violations of the Clean Air Act. “Thursday’s derailment was the last straw,” says Jan Woodruff, an Anacortes resident. “If Federal and State regulators won’t stand up to the fossil fuel companies endangering our communities, then we, the people of those communities, will do so.” Last Thursday, July 24th, an oil train bound for Tesoro’s Anacortes Refinery derailed in Seattle, highlighting the dangers posed to Northwest communities. Between nine and sixteen oil trains travel through Seattle and Mount Vernon every week – about five of which are bound for the Tesoro refinery. The day before Thursday’s frightening derailment, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray and all nine City Council members sent a letter to the Department of Transportation asking for an immediate halt of oil-by-rail shipments through Seattle.

Seattle $15 Minimum Wage Signed With Unpopular Loopholes

June 5, 2014 Paul Bigman, www.labornotes.org Educate! Elections, Minimum Wage, Seattle

It’s official: with a unanimous city council vote, Seattle yesterday adopted a roadmap to a $15 minimum wage. Like the making of sausage, the making of the final plan involved some unsavory additions. Still, it’s the nation’s largest step yet toward establishing an adequate wage floor for the working poor. The plan creates four groups of employers, two large and two small, each on its own phase-in schedule. The last of these groups to arrive at a $15 minimum wage—small employers whose workers receive tips or health benefits—will get there in 2021. The four categories will converge by 2025, when all Seattle workers will be guaranteed a minimum of $18.13 per hour. From then on, the minimum will increase 2.4 percent per year. Washington already has the nation’s highest minimum wage, $9.32, indexed to increase at the rate of inflation each year. But with the new increases, Seattle will pull far ahead of the rest of the state, with $18.13 by 2025 compared to an estimated $12.08 for the rest of Washington.

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