After several months of organizing with so many awesome folks here showing up consistently to fight for the vision of the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke Campaign, we just won funding to upgrade half of Seattle’s 26 community centers to be climate resilience hubs through the metropolitan parks levy which passed last night (September 28, 2022)! The measure passed 8-1 with Alex Pedersen casting the only no vote.
Van Asselt, High Point, South Park, Garfield, Rainier, Lake City, Queen Anne, Greenlake, Loyal Heights and four more to-be-determined community centers are now slated to get heat pumps, HVAC upgrades, and microgrid solar installations.
These schools and community centers will now be able to run without gas power so they can provide cooling during heat waves, and thanks to the HVAC upgrades they’ll provide clean air during smoke events. Lastly, the microgrid solar installations will enable them to run during power outages and consistently add clean energy to our grid!
Seattle’s Green New Deal calls for eliminating our City’s climate pollution by 2030, while creating thousands of good jobs and healthy, climate-resilient neighborhoods for all.
To get there, we need transformative investments at the scale of the crisis in climate justice solutions:
- affordable housing
- clean energy
- free, electrified transit
- community resilience
Join our 2022 Green New Deal campaign: Healthy Through Heat & Smoke!
With heat waves and wildfire smoke becoming Seattle’s new normal, it’s time for City leaders to act.
We need climate resilience; we need clean energy; we need good green jobs!
Read & share our full Community Endorsement Letter, and sign on your organization to join our growing list of endorsers here.
This year’s Seattle Parks Levy is a huge opportunity to upgrade Seattle’s community centers to be climate resilience hubs — to be powered by clean energy and to provide clean air, cooling and shelter for all Seattle residents. These investments will create union jobs that directly benefit local communities and move Seattle’s public buildings off fossil fuels.
Get involved!
Join us for canvassing or phone-banking! Or come learn more about the campaign and get connected to taking action by joining our weekly HTHS Volunteer Welcome call on Tuesdays @ 6:30pm all summer long. Can’t make it on Tuesdays? Sign up for a 1 to 1 orientation with our Welcome Team and we’ll get you plugged in.
Excellent Additional Resources
To learn more about the Green New Deal in general a great book is A Planet to Win — a short read about the plan and implementation.
Another great read is Movement Generation’s “From Banks and Tanks to Cooperation and Caring: A Strategic Framework for a Just Transition”
Recent work & wins
On September 28, 2002, the Healthy Through Heat and Smoke Campaign won funding to upgrade half of Seattle’s 26 community centers to be climate resilience hubs through the metropolitan parks levy. This means that Van Asselt, High Point, South Park, Garfield, Rainier, Lake City, Queen Anne, Greenlake, Loyal Heights and four more to-be-determined community centers are now slated to get heat pumps, HVAC upgrades, and microgrid solar installations.
2021 was a big year for 350 Seattle’s Green New Deal organizing: building new partnerships with local labor unions, organizing an anti-racist, cross-movement coalition and investing in our volunteer organizers.
Together we won $20M in new Green New Deal investments that reduce climate pollution, build community resilience and create living-wage union jobs.
