The City Council is set to vote Tuesday afternoon on a resolution expressing Seattle’s “Welcoming City” support for immigrant rights out of its committee set up to battle against the ongoing barrage of Trump administration executive orders.
The resolution was shaped and passed by the Select Committee on Federal Administration and Policy Changes led by citywide Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck earlier this month. Committee members Joy Hollingsworth, Bob Kettle, Mark Solomon, and Dan Strauss joined Rinck in the unanimous vote.
The resolution recognizes that Seattle “fosters a culture and environment that makes it a vibrant, global city where immigrant and refugee residents can fully participate in and be integrated into the social, civic, and economic fabric of Seattle” and calls for the city to maintain its commitment “to welcoming and actively supporting immigrants and refugees from all nationalities, religions, and backgrounds with policies programs, and dedicated resources that foster inclusion, meaningful participation, and economic opportunity for all.”
Rinck’s office says the resolution includes support for key organizations in the city that have faced challenges under federal cutbacks and changes including “a stated commitment to maintaining the work done by Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs (OIRA), and the Office Labor Standards (OLS) in support of immigrants across our cities.”
The committee chair says the federal upheaval is already doing damage here.
“Kids in Need of Defense (KIND) and Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP) are two of the organizations providing legal representation to over 200 unaccompanied minors in Seattle,” a recent update to Rinck’s constituents reads. “Both recently lost the federal Unaccompanied Children Program grant. As a result, KIND is winding down and will close entirely next month and they are having to withdraw from almost 250 cases of unaccompanied children.”
The resolution up for consideration by the full council Tuesday affirms the city’s compliance with the state law under Keep Washington Working, and directives to the City Attorney’s Office “to explore legal avenues for increasing legal support to immigrants and refugees.”
The resolution also commits the council to exploring an amendment “that will balance the City’s budget in a way that minimizes adverse impacts to the Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs, LGBTQ+ Business Community, Office of Economic Development’s community wealth building strategies, and OLS.”
The resolution, if passed, would “state a commitment to the exploration of funding the Office of Immigrant and Refugee Affairs” by $300,000 “to respond to emerging legal needs responding to immigrant enforcement.”
CHS reported here in February as Council President Sara Nelson responded to pressure from Rinck to form the new special committee amid “a flurry of executive orders coming from the new presidential administration challenging the rights and livelihoods of many of our residents, and the health of our institutions.”
In March, the council passed a “Welcoming City” ordinance Nelson said would strengthen protections “from harmful federal actions, specifically for people seeking reproductive health care and gender-affirming treatment.”
Nelson and Rinck — along with the mayor, and the city attorney — face reelection battles this year.
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This is the least welcoming city. What a fucking joke.
The entire philosophy is to try as hard as possible to keep people out becasuse it might make harder for them to aork.
That’s what I’m saying, like, all of this is hollow posturing to make the people who say it feel like they did a required social thing of themselves. This city has constantly fought tooth and nail against embracing a future with more people from other parts, and failed consistently in that effort to stop it outright, so we get this mishmash of decades late botch jobs.
The only people who even have a larger civic vision of a growing thriving city that takes in people from all parts, a cosmopolitan metropolis if you will, almost do it by accident, like the primary thing is a tax base and economic rents to dole out to important businesses and people.