By Patric Haerle, The Seattle Medium
Over 175 community leaders, activists, lawmakers, and legislative staff from across Washington state met over Zoom on Saturday, Dec. 3, for several hours to lay out the legislative priorities of their communities.
The 2021 People of Color Legislative Summit was a space for lawmakers to hear the biggest needs in communities of color across the state, and a space to outline their legislative responses. The summit also allowed community leaders to put forward bold proposals. For example, the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance is asking for a $400 million new investment into affordable housing funded by budget surplus and remaining federal COVID dollars.
The state Legislature convenes on Jan. 10.
Sen. Bob Hasegawa, D-Seattle, whose office largely organized the summit, said the goal is for community groups to run the summit as it becomes an established annual event.
Participants were broken up into virtual meeting rooms by issue and region, such as Education: Early Learning and K-12 or Housing and Homelessness. In the smaller groups they introduced themselves and their organizations, discussed community needs and identified their priorities for the upcoming legislative session.
The Communities of Color Association, the Black Community Lobby, the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance, Asian Counseling and Referral Service and Utopia Washington were just a few of the dozens of organizations represented at the summit.
“This is an ambitious project, and we hope that together we can bring racial equity and solidarity both inside and outside of the Washington Legislature,” said Karen A. Johnson, PhD, director of Washington’s new state Office of Equity and emcee of the event. “Racism is not graded on a curve. Oppression, depression, marginalization; we are in it together. And we are in it to win health, wealth and well-being for our children and our children’s children for the next seven generations and beyond.”
For Seattle groups, much of the discussion focused on housing, homelessness, healthcare, behavioral health, and justice reform; K-12 and higher education also received significant attention.
This was the third People of Color Legislative Summit. The first was held in 2018 and it was canceled in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The event is put together by lawmakers, their staff, and a committee of community leaders.
Legislative staff will develop a report from the summit, compiling the topics and ideas generated. It will be released before the end of the year.
Lawmakers of the Black Members Caucus and Members of Color Caucuses in the House and Senate will then use the report to inform their legislative priorities for the session, and provide a potential roadmap for the future.
“I believe there will be some legislation that will come forth that is in alignment with a lot of things that are said today and then of course, there are some of the requests that are here, that will be part of long term strategy,” said Rep. Jamila Taylor, D-Federal Way, and chair of the Black Members Caucus.
Participants focused especially on legislation from last year that received widespread support, but for one reason or another didn’t make it into law.
Among those brought up and discussed most by lawmakers were: HB 1191, which would provide health coverage to immigrants, HB 1202, which allows those injured as a result of police misconduct to receive relief and damages, HB 1494, which would allow an up to $250,000 tax exemption on the state portion of one’s primary residence, and HB 1507, which would establish an office for independent prosecutions to go along with the recently established Office of Independent Investigation in the state attorney general’s office.
These bills will face hurdles once again. In addition to any political wrangling that may get in the way, the 2022 legislative session is a non-budget year, meaning the session is only 60 days long compared to the 105 days of an odd-numbered budget year, such as 2021.
“I think the main goal of the summit is for us to be talking with each other and sharing what each other’s issues are,” said Hasegawa, majority chair of the Senate Democratic Caucus.
“Hopefully recognizing when you share an educational issue that pops up in Yakima recognizing that, ‘Gee we got those same issues in King County.’ And if not, we can empathize with why their issue is so important to the other area. Maybe not as important to us, but they still deserve our support.
“That’s the main goal of the summit, to build solidarity. And when we build solidarity, we build power inside the legislative process, and that’s what we need to make real change.”
