Firesteel

This January, the 2019 Washington state legislative session begins, and YWCA Seattle | King | Snohomish is supporting eight bills to further our mission to eliminate racism and empower women. In this series of three blog posts, we’ll be diving into each of the bills we support and their impacts on women and families in Washington state.

Sexual assault in the military is a huge, and often ignored, issue. It is a terrifying example of how systems in our lives are set up to ignore, erase, and perpetuate women’s suffering inhumanely.

Tuesday was a historic night. As Americans voted in the most important midterm election in a generation, women broke barriers everywhere. Here in Washington State, organizers with De-Escalate Washington celebrated voters passing Initiative 940 on election night after a long-fought campaign by Native and African American communities.

Seattle’s vibrant jazz club scene of the 1940s produced famous musicians like Ray Charles and Quincy Jones. But the success of Seattle jazz bands was built on the union organizing skill of black women jazz players.

Owning a home is the biggest factor in determining your wealth, but in King County and across America, racist policies have pushed Black and Latinx families out of their homes. Eliminating the homeownership inequality is key to closing the racial wealth gap, and ensuring that our communities are more secure.

The racial wealth gap is the largest form of economic inequality in America, yet it is the least commonly understood. With the median Black wealth on pace to hit $0 by the middle of this century, serious policy changes are needed to reverse this dangerous divide created by a history of discrimination.