After pressure from her progressive base to shut down the Seattle Police Department’s (SPD) surveillance infrastructure, Mayor Katie Wilson agreed to turn off exactly one camera in the entire system — one positioned near a health facility, to protect patient privacy. In a press conference Thursday, Wilson announced she will not yet meet demands from her own campaign staff and volunteers to dismantle Seattle’s surveillance state, but she will “pause” part of a recently approve

Mayor Katie Wilson is in trouble with supporters from the very grassroots movement that pulled off her seemingly impossible win last November. Volunteers and staffers from Wilson’s campaign are gathering signatures for a letter to the Mayor’s office demanding she hold true to the anti-surviellence stance she took in the election and dismantle Seattle’s surveillance state: “This includes stopping the rollout of additional surveillance initiatives, canceling expansion contracts

Both chambers in the Washington State Legislature have now approved the historic “millionaires tax,” which would levy a 9.9% tax on income over $1 million. While highlight reels of the marathon floor debate in the House and the two floor votes in the Senate will show Republicans flailing around, arguing that a small income tax will surely  bring about economic apocalypse, 11 Democrats also quietly opposed their caucus’s flagship policy of the session. Reps. Dan Bronoske (D-La

When our progressive revenue advocacy coalition, Tech4Taxes , sat down with key lawmakers during the legislative interim, we weren't just there to talk policy; we were there to witness a high-stakes trade. Behind closed doors, the "not-so-secret" secret of the Millionaire’s Tax was laid bare: This bill wasn't born from a sudden burst of progressive conscience. It was a carefully balanced proposal from corporations. In those meetings, it became clear that the corporate lobby h

The City of Hunts Point posted the agenda for their upcoming monthly City Council meeting and it turns out there’s nothing to talk about! The agenda simply read “Cancellation due to lack of agenda items.” The cancellation comes the day after flyers circulated social media calling on advocates to “pack the room” at the council meeting — not to talk City policy, but to register their disgust that Mayor Joseph Sabey’s commercial real estate company is renting office space to IC

According to a flyer circulating social media, advocates want to “pack the room” at a Hunts Point City Council meeting next Monday, March 2nd. It's a seemingly unusual target considering the affluent Lake Washington town has a population less than 500 people, but this isn’t about zoning or potholes or any City policy — it's about the Mayor’s day job, and more importantly, how he may soon profit from the abduction of our neighbors.  Joseph Sabey became the Mayor of Hunts Poi

About a dozen representatives from the Washington State House Democratic Caucus signed on to a letter calling for the House Finance committee to pass the millionaires tax WITHOUT the corporate giveaway baked in. This marks a huge shift in the discourse surrounding the tax — Republican opponents, tepid supporter Bob Ferguson, and its Democrat sponsors in the Senate have hardly mentioned the half a billion dollar tax break for big business. The debate will lay bare who is a f

Supporters of the millionaires tax under consideration in the Washington State Legislature say the tidal wave of opposition in the bill’s public sign-ins may not reflect genuine public sentiment, but a spam campaign inflating the right’s numbers with tens of thousands of duplicates and at least 100 falsified entries. Even one of the bill’s sponsors, Sen. Victoria Hunt (D-Issaquah), was falsely signed in as opposing the bill she voted out of her chamber earlier this month — tw

A central promise  of Katie Wilson’s mayoral campaign was to add 1,000 units of shelter by the end of 2026. It’s a promise Seattle desperately needs her to keep. After declaring a state of emergency  on homelessness over a decade ago, our city has failed to expand shelter capacity at the pace and scale required to tackle the crisis. As a result, homelessness in King County has increased year over year  since the state of emergency was declared. Shelter expansion is obviously

Mayor Wilson was not wishy-washy on surveillance in her State of the City Address. She delivered full-on pro-surveillance propaganda indistinguishable from Bruce Harrell’s or Bob Kettle’s rhetoric. People need to acknowledge this, and let it inform how they approach this administration on surveillance– and every other issue.   Here’s what she said : I continue to have the concerns I expressed during the campaign about data security and how surveillance cameras could be abused