Seattle, WA. 4Culture is consistent in mission and adaptable in serving four program areas including arts, heritage, historic preservation, and public art. The agency ensures public access to cultural experiences through museum collections and theater productions. It currently hosts zoom sessions every third Friday at 12:00 pm and puts artists in the spotlight, like those featured in the picture above who spoke during a zoom session last November.
Committed to re-evaluating its effectiveness in meeting the needs of the community, a Social Justice Action Team was formed. Composed of staff, board, and advisory committee members, the group will assist 4Culture to better clarify its roles and responsibilities in the movement for social justice. The Recovery Task Force will focus on conducting a COVID-19 pandemic impact analysis, evaluate the effect on King County’s cultural sector, and stage a path to recovery.
As part of the recovery planning effort, 4Culture hired a consultant to oversee a Landscape Report, which will provide the groundwork to develop a recovery plan.
Image credits: A screenshot from the filmed Zoom performance of the new play Ain’t (Y)Our History by Rachel Atkins, directed by Shermona Mitchell, film edited by Robin Campbell, presented as part of Washington’s Votes for Women Centennial 2020. Actors featured: Porscha Shaw as Ida Wells-Barnett, Shermona Mitchell as Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin, and Shaunyce Omar as Mary Church Terrell.
The Mukai Farm and Garden was turned into a temporary COVID-19 testing site for Vashon Island near the onset of the pandemic. Volunteer Yvonne Kuperberg is ready to assist as she stands in front of fruit barreling plant, which currently in the midst of restoration. Photo by Michelle Bates.
State and county COVID-19 survey results have played an important role in 4Culture’s ability to make informed and timely decisions, and remains a priority to identify specific needs and restore cultural activities.
The early stages of artists’ careers are showcased in the galleries, which include promoting experimental and often less commercial art installations. Christina DePaolo, Communications Director shared, “It is important to us, as public agents, to meet individuals and deeply engage in what has become a digital space.” In lieu of in-person shows, Gallery 4Culture commissioned artists for an online series titled PAUSE/PLAY and features each EXHIBITION season.
Monyee Chau was one of ten King County artists to participate in 4Culture + Amplifier Collaborations with Resilience, 2020. Digital illustration.
In 1965 the agency formed as an arts commission and continued to evolve into an official Public Development Authority. Mission: With a focus on racial equity, we fund, support, and advocate for culture to enhance the quality of life in King County. As the cultural funding agency for King County, Washington, 4Culture works to make our region vibrant. For cultural funding and support programs visit: 4Culture
Seattle, WA. The Seahawks Players Equality & Justice for All Action Fund confirmed its beneficiaries for the $500,000 they pledged last June. (Photo above courtesy of Rod Mar and the Seattle Seahawks. ‘We Want Justice’ t-shirt remains front and center for the Seahawks as they confirm their recipients for $500,000 worth of grants against injustice.) The funds are being donated as a response to the systemic racism in the United States and the heart-wrenching deaths of Black Americans at the hands of law enforcement. Half of the money is going to organizations, which will be using it to fight against social injustice and support local disadvantaged youth. The other half of the funds will be going directly towards scholarships for students of color who have overcome adversity within their own lives.
Creating opportunities for youth of color is imperative in changing the dynamics of disenfranchised communities, from the bottom-up. This is why the Seahawks have chosen to provide scholarships to students who need it most and donate to the following six organizations:
Click each of the links above to find out more about each local organization and how you can help them achieve their goals. There’s no justice without equality and opportunity for all.
Learn more and donate directly to the Seahawks Players Equality & Justice for All Action Fund here. From the Seattle Seahawks:
In June, as Seahawks players, like so many people around the country, tried to come to grips with the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, the Seahawks Players Equality & Justice For All Action Fund pledged to donate $500,000 in grants that would go to local organizations working toward social injustice causes and supporting our local youth. Go ‘Hawks!
Seattle, WA. Although the COVID-19 crisis forced FEEST Seattle to pause nearly all of its usual activities, the youth-led, health justice organization quickly shifted gears to bring much-needed nourishment to the homes of students in South Seattle and South King County through a grocery delivery program. As Community Engagement Manager Leigh Thomas explained, pandemic-related school closures and job losses have amplified food insecurity, especially for the low-income, youth of color served by FEEST. “We saw a gap in families getting groceries,” Thomas said, “and we decided to bring the food to the students.”
Staff, donors, and volunteers rallied to fill this gap by purchasing and delivering groceries to over 600 families that requested assistance between March and June of 2020 (see above photo of FEEST staff and volunteers purchasing groceries). Currently, FEEST is offering grocery assistance in the form of pre-paid gift cards for eligible families in the Sea-Tac, South Seattle, Skyway, Tukwila, White Center, Burien, and Delridge areas. More information about this program can be found on the grocery gift-card page of the FEEST site and those who would like to contribute can do so through the donation link.
Youth gather around the table at a FEEST community dinner (pre-COVID-19).
Founded in 2008, FEEST is a non-profit organization focused on bringing Seattle youth of color together to build community and organize around issues of food access and health justice. Prior to COVID-19, community dinners, where young people prepared and shared a meal, were the heart of the organization’s mission “to set the table for young people to transform the health and equity of their community by gathering around food & working towards systems change” (see photo above of teens at a FEEST dinner). According to the organization’s leaders, “the FEEST kitchen creates space for young people to reclaim their health, celebrate ancestral food traditions, and share radical joy. In addition to the practical skills youth learn in the kitchen, breaking bread together builds lasting community connections that become a foundation for long-term organizing.”
In the past, this organizing has generated several successful youth-led campaigns. Motivated by the belief that “all students deserve to have access to fresh, hot, nutritious, and culturally relevant meals whenever they need them” (FEEST website), a group of FEEST youth leaders worked directly with school administrators to add new, healthy, culturally relevant foods like squash curry and lentil stew to the lunch menus at Highline Public Schools. FEEST youth also created two innovative healthy snack pilot programs that brought free, nutritious snacks to students at Evergreen and Chief Sealth High Schools. Watch FEEST youth talk about their participation in FEEST and their roles as “food justice leaders” in the video below.
This school year, Thomas shared that FEEST plans to continue the grocery gift-card program, and also to bring back some additional programs, beginning with a “youth fellowship program” where students will discuss social justice issues that concern them, and identify causes that they would like to rally around. The best way to support FEEST at this time is to donate, which can be done through the link here.
FEEST is an organization led by youth of color in South Seattle and South King County working to improve health in our schools. Focusing on the need for more healthy, affordable, and culturally relevant food at school, FEEST centers young people as leaders toward concrete changes in our food systems. Youth are in the lead at FEEST because change is not effective unless those most impacted by health inequities are the decision makers. When young people lead the way with creative solutions, the whole community benefits. Fierce youth who speak truth to power are essential in a time when our communities are constantly under threat by a political system that directly threatens our survival.
We seek health justice: the elimination of all barriers for people to live physically, mentally, socially, culturally healthy lives.
Our mission is to set the table for young people to transform the health and equity of their community by gathering around food & working towards systems change.
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