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Katie Wilson on Safer Streets, Cheaper Housing & a World-Class 2026 World Cup - Ep. 103
1.3k Plays28 days ago
Learn more about Katie Wilson and about the Seattle Voucher Program http://lobbingscorchers.com/katie
In this episode, we sit down with Katie Wilson, candidate for mayor of Seattle, to discuss her vision for the city. From her early days founding the Transit Riders Union to her plans for addressing homelessness, affordable housing, and transit ahead of the 2026 World Cup, Wilson shares her detailed strategies and personal connections to the issues.
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Lobbing Scorchers is a Seattle Sounders and MLS focused show brought to you by Sounder at Heart. Hosted by Major League Soccer's Ari Liljenwall and Producer Noah Riffe. Join us as we lob our scorching takes on the American soccer landscape, Seattle Sounders, Major League Soccer, USMNT and more.
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Transcript
Introduction to Katie Wilson and Key Issues
00:00:00
Speaker
Well sir, we got a scorcher today. Gonna be a real scorcher today. Quite the scorcher today. Well it's gonna be scorcher.
00:00:21
Speaker
What's going on, everyone? We are joined by a very special guest today. of This is like a less than a soccer podcast and more of just like a Seattle podcast today. We're joined by Katie Wilson, who is running for mayor in the city of Seattle, the greatest city in the world, in my opinion.
00:00:38
Speaker
um And going to talk some soccer, some transit, some housing, everything. um Because for me and Ari, I think at the end of the day, we love the Sounders. We love the city.
00:00:51
Speaker
And kind of all of that stuff is intertwined, especially with the ethos of what the Sounders are and who they are. ah So it's ah it's it's cool to be able to get to sit down with you and chat and just talk about your vision and how people can get involved. So ah I wanted to start out by saying hello and if you wanted to introduce yourself, who you are and what your background is.
00:01:12
Speaker
Sure, um it's great to be here. Thank you so much for inviting me. So, yes, my name's Katie Wilson and I'm ah running for mayor. um And, ah you know, i I've lived in Seattle since 2004.
00:01:26
Speaker
and I grew up in upstate New York in a town called Binghamton, ah very much a car town, by the way. um And although I've never actually owned my own car. um And I moved here in 2004 with my husband. It was a very different city then. um we like We didn't have jobs lined up, didn't really have money in the bank, and we were able to find like a $400 a month room in someone's house. and um It would be really hard to do that today, I feel like. yeah so that was like you know Amazon existed, but that was before Amazon kind of took over the city.
00:01:57
Speaker
It was in that hospital old hospital building at that point, I think. right That's right, the Pagmed building. Yeah. yeah yeah um And yeah, so really kind of saw the city transform over the last 20 years.
Founding and Achievements of the Transit Riders Union
00:02:09
Speaker
um And then in 2011, I founded an organization called the Transit Riders Union.
00:02:16
Speaker
And at that point, ah King County Metro was facing the prospect of deep ah bus service cuts. And that was like a few years after the great financial crisis. And so there were just like, transit agencies and and governments around the country were facing these big budget shortfalls. So I got involved in a campaign to save our bus service and then out of that built this organization.
00:02:35
Speaker
Yeah, no, that's interesting. but I remember i I grew up on the east side, so I grew up in Snoqualmie and I remember slowly them whittling back all of our bus services out there. And as a kid, like we rode our bikes everywhere and, you know, took the bus and all of that. And so I remember very fondly, like losing that ability to kind of get around. It was a challenge even as like a child. So I can imagine, you know, people who relied on that, that was such a big issue.
00:03:01
Speaker
um Do you want to share a little bit more about the Transit Riders Union? ah You know, you're the co-founder, executive director. How did you really get into that and found that? And then, you know, what's some of the work that you guys are doing right now?
00:03:14
Speaker
Sure. So, yeah, um we so we started in 2011 and, ah you know, I and the other people who started it at that point, like we didn't really have experience and like, how do you do community organizing? How do you build an organization? So it was a lot of just like learning by doing.
00:03:29
Speaker
And it was all volunteer for years and years. Now this is my job, but um it was all volunteer. And um yeah, gradually over the years, we just like learned like about local politics and really also expanded kind of our mission so that we're like a multi-issue kind of economic justice organization now, I would say. so um One of our first big victories was winning the Orca Lift low income fare program, which you know tens of thousands of riders around the region use now.
00:03:53
Speaker
um Did a lot of work on other like free and reduced fare programs like for youth and um you know folks who live in affordable housing buildings. and um And then it was really with like Trump's first election that we started branching out and working on other issues a lot. So we've done a ton on like affordable housing.
00:04:09
Speaker
um In the last few years, we've done a lot of work on ah renter protections coming out of the pandemic. You know, there was um a big spike in in rents, as you might have noticed in the last few years. It's like really expensive to live here. I'm a renter myself. I live just, you know, on Capitol Hill.
00:04:24
Speaker
um and And we've also run ah minimum wage campaigns in several cities around King County, including and or starting with Tukwila in 2022, and now um and which now has the highest minimum wage in
Motivation for Mayoral Run and Critique of Current Policies
00:04:37
Speaker
the country.
00:04:37
Speaker
um And then also um ah we've played a big role in winning the Jumpstart payroll expense tax, which is kind of Seattle's like landmark tax on wealthy corporations. um which was passed in 2020 and really is the reason why we didn't have like devastating cuts during during the pandemic.
00:04:55
Speaker
um And all of that work has been like coalition work. So my role has usually been to bring together like lots of organizations, individuals um to push forward these like transformative pieces of legislation that then ah you know help help people in their everyday lives.
00:05:09
Speaker
Katie, I do want to ah i want to dig into more what you were talking about, about rent protection. But before we get into that, I did want to ask just more broadly about this campaign. It's a situation where you've got ah Bruce Harrell running as the incumbent, and there's seven, I believe, opposing candidates.
00:05:29
Speaker
ah So when you're when you're ah running against an incumbent, the implication is that the status quo needs to change. So I guess I wanted to ask you, you know, just why why did you start this campaign and why do you think you're the best candidate? And like, what what about the status quo do you believe needs to change?
00:05:51
Speaker
Yeah, so um you know over the years as I've been working with the Transit Riders Union, I've never really thought of elected office as something that i wanted to pursue. um And so this was actually a pretty quick decision-making process for me. And that um that started in February. So you might remember we had a special election in Seattle in February.
00:06:09
Speaker
um And it was on um a measure to fund Seattle's new social housing developer, which was actually established by a voter initiative the previous year. um Was that one ballot? that It was a one on like with the one thing you were voting for, i think, or two or something? Yeah, it was one a So it was Prop 1A. And then there was an alternative that the mayor and the council cooked up yeah to put on there, which like pretended to kind of like also be in favor of social housing, but was like actually ah like undermining it. yeah And and it was that was funded by like Amazon and the Chamber.
00:06:40
Speaker
um And the the mayor was kind of the face of that opposition campaign. So you might have gotten like three or four mailers in the mail with like Bruce Harrell's face blasted on them saying like, oh, let's do this the responsible way or something, right? yeah um and and And the reason why ah you know he and Amazon and the chamber didn't want this to pass is because it was a funding measure um on some of the wealthiest corporations in the city. And guess what? They didn't want to pay. So um the Prop 1A, the good one, ah passed by a landslide.
00:07:10
Speaker
um And I was thrilled by that. um But the thing is that the mayor actually holds a lot of power to ah either make this new social housing developer succeed or fail.
00:07:21
Speaker
um And so I am just very concerned that if our current mayor has another four years in office, um it's going to fail. So that was the thing that that made me first start started to start to think about running.
00:07:34
Speaker
um But you know I've been kind of pushing from the outside on so many issues for so many years.
Exploring Solutions: Revenue, Rent Control, and Social Housing
00:07:39
Speaker
There is a lot that our city can do better. And you know even though I've never held elected office or worked at City Hall, I've had a very much of an inside view of kind of how City Hall works, both the legislative process and the executive, kind of how things are carried out.
00:07:53
Speaker
um And I would say just to like name a couple other things that would be really high priorities for me in office. One is ah the homelessness crisis, which I think has to be right up there at the top for anyone.
00:08:04
Speaker
um And, you know, our current mayor on the campaign trail four years ago, like promised to open like 2000 units of you know emergency shelter and housing in his first year. And he like just didn't.
00:08:14
Speaker
um And we actually have less shelter now than we did four years ago. Oh, wow. um And now he's like ramped up the encampment removal. So they're basically like pushing people around, but we have more homeless people on the street than ever before.
00:08:26
Speaker
um And so we just we like, we have to do better on that. Like we're way better than, or way worse than other cities and in terms of like actually getting people inside. um And then the other thing I'll say is like with Trump and the White House, um you know, we're in danger of losing federal funding for a lot of things that like flows through Seattle. um And so we need to be prepared to raise new revenue, new progressive revenue to make sure that like the city can keep delivering the services that people need.
00:08:53
Speaker
So what you mentioned there about, I think, in general, making a promise and then not delivering on it, ah that's something I think that a lot of people, and myself included, it's what gets people jaded on politics.
00:09:05
Speaker
And i think it's related to what I wanted to ask you about the ah rent control issue. I was looking at your platform before before we started the interview, and it said that you led campaigns that won stronger rent protections, including longer notice of rent increases,
00:09:20
Speaker
Caps on moving fees and late fees and more in jurisdictions, Seattle, Kenmore, Kirkland, Redmond, Berry and SeaTac and Shoreline. So that ah that caught my eye more than anything, because I've honestly become like a single issue voter in that in that sense.
00:09:37
Speaker
were I think that the ah just the way the housing system works and the rent increases, where you have rent increases but no wage increases, it's not sustainable. and ah or no ah no water.
00:09:51
Speaker
yeah your kills In the case of my apartment building, they like to shut my water off every two days and then increase the rent when doing absolutely nothing to make the building better or more livable or anything. so yeah it's just ah It really and ah I'm passionate about it because it's really, it affects our day-to-day lives and really ah my my opinion is that um like Democrat politicians in general, they lose on that.
00:10:18
Speaker
They lose on that because really if you had someone who was like, I'm going to lower rent, I'm going to get ah housing, the cost of housing under control, and then they actually delivered on that, that's you would win on that every time, but I feel like I've been in situations where, you know, I vote for people who say they're going to do that. And then my rent just keeps going up, keeps going up, keeps going up. I'm not making any more money.
00:10:42
Speaker
I think a lot of people are in that situation and it creates a situation where I, by the end of it, I'm like, okay, well, why am I voting? Why? Like, what did I get from that? My rent just went up. So I'm sorry for soapboxing, but I guess like when it comes to that issue in particular of rent control, like ah what are your just thoughts on what I think is a full on crisis? But then how do you how do you go about delivering on that? Because I think that is something that if someone if someone ever actually delivered on that, they'd be the most popular person in the history of the of the city.
00:11:17
Speaker
So yeah. Yeah. And so like obviously it's not easy or like maybe people would be doing it. um So yeah, lots of thoughts there. So first of all, this is a personal issue for me, right? I'm a renter. I've been a renter the whole time I've lived in Seattle.
00:11:30
Speaker
I will continue to be a renter because it's like an expensive. That house literally right next to a One point seven million dollars. I mean, it's like big, but I'm like, yeah, that's like a what? Yeah. Huh? That's an insurmountable amount of money in my brain.
00:11:43
Speaker
It really is. And yeah, I mean, like I live in a one bedroom with my husband and our toddler and it's like real cozy and it would be nice to have a two bedroom. But you know what? It's a lot more expensive. So um yeah. And OK, so.
00:11:57
Speaker
A lot of things. So first of all, it would be nice if we could actually limit rent increases, do rent control or rent regulation locally. Unfortunately, there is a state law in Washington state, which does not allow local governments to regulate rents directly. um So that is one obstacle. Now, that doesn't mean that can't be changed, but that would be a state law change, which you know is challenging. Now, one thing that the state legislature did do this year, which is good although it doesn't go nearly far enough, is pass a kind of an anti-rent gouging law. So basically moving forward, most landlords, there's a few exceptions, but most landlords will not be able to raise the rent more than 7% plus inflation up to a maximum of 10%.
00:12:38
Speaker
Think about it. That's a lot of math. So like what, 25%? No, up to a maximum of 10%. Got it, got it, got it, got So, okay, so let's imagine like inflation's a few percent or whatever. So let's say it's 10%.
00:12:49
Speaker
So if your if your apartment's 2,000 bucks a month, that's a $200 a month rent increase. That's still kind of rent. a lot money. Exactly, right? So that's why I say it doesn't go far enough. Now, it will help, right? Like over the last few years as I've been doing organizing with renters, I've heard plenty of stories
Vision for Public Spaces and Lasting City Improvements
00:13:05
Speaker
of rent increases of like 20%, 30%, even like 40%, which is just, I mean, you're leaving. You're not gonna stay. Yeah, they're trying to get you out. Yeah, exactly.
00:13:13
Speaker
um And so, okay, so so Seattle can't directly go further. There are some things we can do. So ah one thing we can do is um we have this law called Economic Displacement Relocation Assistance, which was passed a few years ago. And it basically says if your landlord raises your rent 10% or more and you have to leave,
00:13:34
Speaker
um you ah Your landlord is supposed to pay you relocation assistance of three times your monthly rent. Now, we did a survey, Transit Routes Union, we did a survey of renters a couple years ago, and what we found was that a lot of rent increases were just under 10%. So the landlords are like, I don't want to trigger that law. yeah um So they kept their rent increases lower.
00:13:53
Speaker
So why don't we have that kick in at 5%? So that would create an incentive for landlords not to raise their rent that much. um And so that's one thing we could we could do. um Another thing we could do is ah ban algorithmic right rent settings. So there's these companies like RealPage, Pure2RealPage.
00:14:09
Speaker
they basically And like a lot of landlords, like all the corporate landlords, kind of use this service. So they basically like pool data from all these landlords, and then they tell the landlords what to set their rents at to maximize their profit.
00:14:21
Speaker
um And it basically means higher rents um and more vacancies because they're kind of like, well, you set the rents higher, you make more money overall, even if there's a bunch of vacancies. so um And it's kind of I mean, it's basically price fixing. So like it should be illegal and there's lawsuits about it. But there's a bunch of cities around the country which are starting to just ban it.
00:14:41
Speaker
So we could do that. um And another thing we can do is ban rental junk fees. So like you sign a lease, you think, like oh, this is how much it costs, and then they're like, ooh, no, actually, like the next year when you wanna renew your lease, they're like, well, there's $150 lease renewal fee. And you're like, what's what's that for? you know It's just a fee you gotta pay, right? yeah So there's a ton of things like that.
00:15:00
Speaker
So you know granted, these are not like transformative laws that are gonna lower your rent, but they will make a little difference around the edges. Um, social housing, which I mentioned before, right. That's basically like publicly owned, permanently affordable, um, uh, housing. And it's for people at a range of incomes. So like a lot of the way that we do affordable housing right now is like just for the poorest of the poor.
00:15:25
Speaker
Um, this would be like up to 120% of area median income, which I don't know off the top of my head what that number is, but it's pretty high. yeah Um, and that seems similar to New York and DC and kind of the ways that they do it. Is that correct? I'm I'm not sure that they don't have a social housing model exactly to my knowledge. think I meant like when they' their rent caps are close to 120 to 100. I could be wrong. yeah Well, this is more this is kind of like a little bit more of a European model of affordable housing. So like in a city like Vienna or Paris, like actually kind of a large part of their housing stock is not on the private market. It's like publicly owned or community owned.
00:16:01
Speaker
And like you're not going to pay more than 30 percent of your income living there. So if we can get that going in Seattle, and like unfortunately, this is not a short-term thing, right? So like if I'm elected mayor, like I can like pour my heart and soul into making social housing work. like It's going to be a start. It's not going to actually like you know be providing housing for thousands and thousands of people for quite some time. But we've got to start somewhere. So um you know if you can get that going, then that's a lot of affordable housing for the people who live there. But then it also, if you have a large sector like that, it makes private landlords compete with this kind of like public option.
00:16:32
Speaker
um And it kind of tends to moderate rents across the board. um And then the final thing I'll say is that building more housing will ultimately help with rents. um And you see this right now in like a place like Austin, Texas, where they had this big apartment building boom, and rents actually came down. yeah um and so we can do a lot better in Seattle at allowing more housing to be built like in great neighborhoods around the city um in a way that will um at least help to kind of slow or stop rent increases.
00:16:59
Speaker
Yeah. I know there's, um this is going to be like a kind of galaxy, maybe not galaxy brain, but not exactly what the details of it. But I know a building like this, like we're in a, this was built in 1911. It's a, you know, multi-level, many unit apartment building.
00:17:15
Speaker
um It's more expensive to build something like this on a lot of the same size as those, I don't know, what do you call Like the box houses? Like the townhome. Yeah, the townhome. The ones where it's like, it's like how do you make a do you make like a fairly good-sized home feel really small? Exactly. Because it's just like one room. and yeah it's and but it's a thousand square feet. It's like, okay, but my living room looks like a bowling alley.
00:17:35
Speaker
um But I heard, and maybe this is incorrect, but you know there's some there's some permitting and zoning things regarding that. Maybe more at the state level for state building code.
00:17:46
Speaker
Maybe it's city building code. But like buildings like this are disincentivized to be built because of... you know, i don't know, i was this is a TikTok, of course I'm getting my information from TikTok, it's 2025, but like if your door opens to the street, your front door opens to the street, you are not under commercial building code, you're under a different building code. Is there things like that that can be kind of- Absolutely, yeah, yeah. There's a lot of kind of doubles in the details, kind of rules around how people are allowed to build on a lot and you know, how high and where.
00:18:13
Speaker
and And we can change a lot of things to make um to to both allow more housing to be built, but also to make it so that maybe yeah it's not all those of those townhomes. Which I think are, I mean i agree, they're ugly.
00:18:25
Speaker
They're ugly. you know if people People like them. That's awesome. Good for them. um Not for me, but i wanted to you, you noted something about the homelessness crisis in here. And I think that, you know, we all we we all live on Capitol Hill like we experience it like these are still our neighbors. But like, you know, there are there are problems that go around with it. And ah One thing that I really found disturbing during the um the all-star series All-Star Game, All-Star Series, was the way in which, you know, our unhoused neighbors were treated by the current administration and just, like, swept and and abused and moved away so that this, like,
00:19:06
Speaker
star-studded event could come to Seattle and we could roll out the red carpet for these people and never really addressing the real issue there. um And I worry, you know, obviously if the status quo continues that this is the same thing that's going to happen for the World Cup.
00:19:21
Speaker
And I think that the World Cup this is something, I mean, moving into this is a big way to drive positive movement or negative movement in terms of all of these different issues, whether it's transit, whether it's homelessness, whether it's housing, whether it's, you know, i don't know that annoying neighbor who Airbnb is their house every week. I don't know.
00:19:43
Speaker
Like that's a, so I wanted to hit that, like where those kinds of sweeps are obviously terrible to watch and it really destroy communities and, and probably make it very hard on our, on our unhoused neighbors.
00:19:58
Speaker
Absolutely, yeah. And you know i'm I'm super excited about the World Cup coming here. like you know i could go into kind of my relationship with professional sports, but I will say that like like the World Cup is actually the one like sporting event that I seek out and watch when it comes around.
00:20:14
Speaker
um And so I think it's great. It's a great chance to like show off our city, to like welcome the world here. um But ah there are it's so important that we get it right. And and I think that yeah what happened at the All-Star Game is like, it's totally gonna happen again if if the the status quo continues, right? Because as I mentioned, we have less shelter than we had four years ago. And that is it's just not a priority of the current administration to get people what they need.
00:20:41
Speaker
they Their approach is purely cosmetic, right? They get calls from neighbors, they get calls from businesses. Why is there a tent here? Why is there a tent my park? And so their approach is like purely to try to make people disappear.
00:20:53
Speaker
um And that is absolutely what they'll be doing next year. Yeah, that's tough. And I guess, you know, for me personally, like I know a lot of the people in my neighborhood who are on a house, they're normal people, they're people with lives and all of this. And so like, you know, it really does.
00:21:09
Speaker
For me personally, it's like the World Cup is about it's supposed to be about, you know, bringing all of these different cultures, all of these different people together. And it has been used to like, you know, sports wash places in the past and things like that. And it's like, I would hate for that to happen to my own city. I would prefer that, you know, we use it to build infrastructure and build these things. And so I think i wanted to ask this specifically is, do you have any ideas or plans using the World Cup as momentum towards reaching some of these goals, whether it be transit or housing?
00:21:40
Speaker
I think there's a huge opportunity there, right? Because ah big events like this do come with like big investments of resources. And I think the question is, like are we actually using this as an opportunity to make investments that are going to last and that are going to benefit the city and the people of the city in the long term? Or is this just a flash in the pan, like blow a bunch of money so that like our city looks nice for for a few weeks, right?
00:22:04
Speaker
um and And I'm afraid that our current trajectory is really the latter. um But it is a big opportunity, right? Like, how can we use this moment when there's going to be so many people, people who are going to need to get around by transit? Like, how can we use this to improve our transit infrastructure, our transit system um so that those improvements last?
Critique of City Planning and the Role of Local Politics
00:22:24
Speaker
um And, you know, the whole downtown, right? Like, we could we could make some really permanent improvements to downtown in terms of, like, pedestrianized space and um just like places where people want to hang out. and um And yeah, so I think that there's a real opportunity there. And also, you know, you think about, I think the Chinatown International District um obviously is going to be one of the most impacted neighborhoods. And so how do we make sure that um that they're benefiting too, right? That the the small businesses and the residents um in the CID are benefiting permanently from from all of this. That's like one of my favorite things to do pregame is go get food and and the CID.
00:23:01
Speaker
That's the stop I get off at, you know, to walk to the stadium. Like that's all. That is a heart of my Sounders experience every single week. And so, yeah, that's important. And into the to the walkable infrastructure and the importance of that, one of the Sounders supporters who leads the the fan community ah the ECS Emerald City supporters he was struck ah by a truck while on a lime scooter just you know crossing the street um down in Pioneer Square and so yeah I think that's important to like actually make sure that that's going to be a safe area for people to get around because yeah people are going to be taking the bus and the train you know there's going to be people from all over the world they're not renting cars like I know it's America but you know that's not really logical so yeah I mean, there's just, yeah, we just like, we're a growing city and there's just yeah just's just like spatial limits to how many cars we can pack into the city.
00:23:54
Speaker
And I think, I mean, I guess my worry too is like looking at just some of the record of the current administration on how they approach kind of transit and and public space. And like, we just like we just heard that um Aurora is going to get twenty seven twenty four seven bus only lanes for the next two years because there's construction on I-5 and then it's going to go away, right? And so it's like,
00:24:14
Speaker
Couldn't we have some vision and be like, maybe we should just actually have 24-7 bus only lanes on Aurora? And similarly with like Pike Place, right we had this exciting new experiment of pedestrianizing Pike Place, which people have been calling for for just like years and years and years. Since I was a child. yeah and it's like and And it's being framed as this temporary kind of construction related thing.
00:24:33
Speaker
um Now, hopefully, it will everyone will love it and the the you know Pike Place, some of the businesses that have been concerned for various reasons about it, will see that it's okay and and then it will go forward. But there's just not a lot of vision of like what is the what is the city that we are trying to create and how do we take steps to get there. It's just very kind of reactive and short-term thinking. Yeah. so I think bringing that full circle in general, just specifically, like what do you have any actionable ideas around the 2026 World Cup that you would want to put forward?
00:25:02
Speaker
I mean, I think um and I haven't gotten like super in the weeds on like the downtown plans and everything. But like, yeah, I mean, I do think that there are probably um I think with like safety, as you're talking about, because right now we are not doing well at our kind of vision zero goals, which is that by 2030, we should not have anyone dying on the streets from like vehicular violence, basically.
00:25:25
Speaker
um So I think the more we can do on like protected lanes for you know bikes and scooters and um you know transit only lanes, things that are making um transit in the downtown area, but also in the rest of the city, you're like really fast and efficient and competitive with driving. I think that all of that, like hopefully we can kind of put that on st steroids as we get closer to the games.
00:25:48
Speaker
Katie, I'm curious what your message would be to people to people out there who feel jaded right now in general with ah politics, ah both on the national level and locally. I know speaking for myself, I used to be a person who was ah very engaged in the news and read a lot about what's going on.
00:26:09
Speaker
nationally. And it feels like it's just gotten to a point where stuff feels pointless, hopeless, whatever adjective you want to you want to use. And like, frankly, i always felt like I could have been more engaged on what's going on locally. I followed local politics like more tangentially and I was locked in on the national stuff.
00:26:29
Speaker
But I admit like in the last, you know, year or so, things just feel bleak. So I guess, ah what would you say to people who ah feel like this upcoming election, like it might not ah it might not matter? And why is being ah continuing to be engaged in local politics important?
00:26:49
Speaker
Yeah, and I totally get that. I mean, I think looking at what's going on at the national level, it's really easy to feel just like kind of despairing, honestly. yeah um And also it's just so big, like how is an individual, like what can you do, right? You're like, oh, they're going to cut Medicaid and food stamps for like millions of people. What do I do about that, right?
00:27:09
Speaker
um So it's like frankly terrifying, but I think the the hopeful thing for me, and I know this as 14 years as as a community organizer, like we have won things. We have won big things which improve people's lives. And at the scale of local politics, like one person can make a difference. We can all make a difference. and you know, I think that there is such huge potential and really need, just especially considering what's happening at the national level and the fact that that is going to impact like people right here in our neighborhoods, like your neighbors, your community members.
00:27:41
Speaker
Um, you know, if food stamps get cut, right, like people aren't going to be able to eat. Right. Um, and, uh, and there is so much that we can do locally, but like, we really need to come together and like have that political will and that political will that's like,
00:27:55
Speaker
ah you know a lot of A big part of the problem is the way that um you know corporate interests get intertwined with politics. And you know i over the years, have done a lot of work, for example, on how do we make a better tax system where like,
00:28:10
Speaker
wealthy people in corporations are actually paying. So we have the money to do the things that we need to do. Um, and, uh, you know, the current mayor's like tied in with the chamber of commerce and they just have a position of no new taxes. Right. So, okay. Off the table.
00:28:23
Speaker
Um, and so I just think that if we are able to, um, have better leadership and not just better leadership as in people in office, cause like people in office can't just like you know snap their fingers and get things done. like We actually need more of like a movement in the community of people who are just like, yes, we want these things to happen that can support like through those tough choices. Like the housing vote.
00:28:43
Speaker
Exactly, yeah. like i think i think that we I think we can make real progress. It's not gonna be like overnight everything changes. um But like, I just like I think Seattle is just such a great city and we can get to the point like and it's not going to be in the next year, or the next couple years, but we can get to the point where like it is affordable.
00:29:02
Speaker
You can afford to live here. Your rent is not going up like one hundred dollars every freaking year. um you know And we have like great public space where you can live in an apartment like this and the city is your living room. You go out and there's like great parks and there's great like squares where your kid can run around and not get hit by a car. right um And you know we've got small businesses that are like thriving and they're not just like you know in danger of closing every month because it's just so this kind of pressure cooker economic environment. so like like I think we can actually achieve those things, and and that's what local politics is about. it's about and And in a way, it's like i mean it just it it affects your daily life so much, and I think it's easy to forget how much the the decisions of the local government are really like affecting just the texture of your daily life. And you know if you travel to...
00:29:50
Speaker
cities in Europe that have done much better at their transit systems and at their public space and you just feel the difference of like what it feels like to live in a city and you're just like it's nice to be here. and Like I want that's the experience that I want people to have in Seattle is like it's nice to be here.
00:30:05
Speaker
This is where I want to be. Where do you think we collectively maybe like lost our way in terms of like politics being something that's about making people's lives like actually better, like making a difference that way? Because like for me, when I look at it, you know I consider i consider any but pretty much anyone who voted for Trump a sucker because ah you you cast this for like to own people, basically.
00:30:32
Speaker
But it's think about like what's going to happen in anyone's day to day life. It's not going to be better. Your rent's not going to go down one dollar. So like you really have not actually accomplished anything at all by that victory.
00:30:45
Speaker
ah So I do think that's the case. But if someone were to turn around and say to me, well, like you voted for Democrat politicians and that also it was the same outcome. Your life didn't get any better. Your rent didn't go down. Nothing happened.
00:30:57
Speaker
Either way, what do you think is the like, I guess, how do we change that? And is there like more to what's going on with that than like you you were talking about corporate interests and stuff? I think that's obviously a big part of it. But sometimes it's hard for me to wrap my head around how we have all these fights, but then the ultimate outcome, what is what is actually different about it? I can't answer that.
00:31:19
Speaker
I mean, I guess that's a big question that you just asked. Political philosophy classes in session. We could be here for a long time. But I think what one strand that I'll pick out is just that if you think, I mean, it's always dangerous to look back in time and be like, oh, there was this time when everything was much better. But you know there was a time in the 20th century, earlier in the kind of mid-century, where there was there was ah ah I would say more um
00:31:50
Speaker
more of kind of like a progressive, forward-looking, like we are trying to create a society where um you know not just the rich can thrive kind of ethos. And what really support and and that was you know kind of attached to the Democratic democratic Party at at the time. I'm thinking about like the kind of 60s.
00:32:09
Speaker
um And ah that was really supported by the fact that we had a relatively strong labor movement at the time and you know in the first half of the 20th century in the 30s there was like this big kind of industrial union movement where working people were like getting organized and it was the strength of ah organized labor that really pushed forward you know first the New Deal and then all of the kind of um reforms and and programs that came out of that um and that that kind of power of organized power of working people has really um fallen apart in a lot of ways over the past 50 years or so.
00:32:47
Speaker
um And yeah this is ah maybe not the podcast in which to get into the details of that, but I really think that's significant because what it means is that we have these political parties today that um just aren't really accountable to normal people. They're they're accountable to the people who fund them and the people who have the money.
00:33:03
Speaker
um And, you know, they still want to appeal to the the the people in various ways because they need our votes, but um they're not really strongly rooted in in that kind of organized discipline power of of of workers that um that used to exist more, not like Tua Hiji, but more.
00:33:19
Speaker
um And ah yeah, so I mean, I really do think that moving forward, and this is why you know my background is again in community organizing, it's like how do we build people power in a way that can actually like hold elected officials accountable and and win things?
Sports Teams, Infrastructure, and Public Funding Debate
00:33:32
Speaker
um like We need to figure that out. And and you know there's still labor labor unions, obviously, and like I want them to be strong and I want there to be more of them, but I think we also need to look at other ways that um working people, ordinary people can organize and and really wield power, because you can't, You can't just trust elected officials to do it for us when um you know there's money plays such a huge role in our our political system.
00:33:56
Speaker
And speaking of that specifically, I had to like I'm putting on my ah my oligarch capitalist sports guy hat. OK, I'm going to be what's who's a good example of this Robert Kraft or something. I don't know.
00:34:10
Speaker
um There's two things in this city that are constantly brought up. It's. When are the Sonics coming back? that's ah That's a classic one. That's been used by mayors in the past to be like, i will bring the Sonics back and then they get ton of votes that. Yeah, that's a classic. I will do it, we're going to do it, and then they do not do it. Which I think is always funny because it's like, what are you going to go march into Adam Silver's office and be like, you're giving us our team back, buddy.
00:34:36
Speaker
It's usually just, oh, no, we'll just give whatever tax cuts and whatever space and all of that kind of stuff. There is talk about that. I want to get to that. But also the Sounders are in kind of a similar position. They are looking potentially to move out of Seattle.
00:34:49
Speaker
um They're at least through to like Renton to be like, yeah, like not like not out of Seattle, but. out of the city itself. And people are very concerned about this as Sounders fans.
00:35:01
Speaker
Lumenfield is owned, I believe, by the city. Get me wrong, but it's leased to first and goal, which owns the Seahawks and operates the stadium. And the Sounders are kind of like a secondary tenant in that space itself.
00:35:14
Speaker
um And, you know, this is this could also just be posturing between two rich people to be like, I'm going to take my team and move it somewhere else if you don't give us a better deal. But... For us, I think as fans, it is concerning because there's a lot of people who are like, I just won't go to games anymore if it isn't in Seattle. Well, I mean, one of the cool things about where it is now is how from a transit perspective, right? Like you could get to the game by ferry, by streetcar, by Amtrak, by light rail, by bus, but by the sounder train, actually. They run special trains for the games. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's like it's such an ideal location from from that kind of transportation point of view. It seems like Renton would be a big...
00:35:51
Speaker
step down in terms of like how you get there and who would be able to get there. Yeah. So I guess in that vein, you know, I know that this is, you probably won't have the specifics on this, so don't worry too much. I'm don't sweat it too much, but you know, if that does come up and, and you know, the sounders and the ownership are like, we feel like we don't have a place to go. Is there a space that the city can, maybe not a space. I'm sorry. That's, that's a bad way to word it, but like, how would the city approach that under your kind of leadership while maintaining, obviously that we, I mean, I don't want to give them any of my tax money. I already give them ticket dollars.
00:36:24
Speaker
I mean, that's a good question. And I I'm kind of on the same page there. I actually was involved in a campaign in 2018 where King County was proposing to give, I think like $180 million dollars to the, uh, Mariners stadium kind of, uh, rehab, you know, the John Stanton's billionaire who owns it, right? Et cetera, et cetera.
00:36:43
Speaker
And I think we managed to peel like $50 million dollars away. So they ended up giving him like 130 million. So, and that was for affordable housing. um So yeah, I mean, i'm I'm definitely like I and honestly like we have a huge budget issue right now in Seattle and so it's not really the right time to be like ah throwing like public money at stadiums or whatever but um But I mean I do I I think it would I want the sounders to stay in Seattle so like um I would and I'm not you know I don't know all the details of of the move or anything like that so um But I would definitely try to find a way that we could could make that work um and And I hope that it would be somewhat like convincing to them just like how how many of the fans value having it here.
00:37:25
Speaker
The location's second to none. It's literally the best. That's sort of what I've been saying about it is like there's ah even if the facility itself is nicer and they enjoy having it be like specific, to like a soccer specific stadium instead of having to share it.
00:37:38
Speaker
There's no location by my estimation, other than if they somehow renovated Memorial, just say hypothetically Memorial stadium, that location, if you could put like a state of the art soccer specific facility right there, that is the only location I could think of that ah wouldn't be a downgrade from Lumen. Like I, I don't see. And that's not as easy to get to as Lumen.
00:37:59
Speaker
Like even that, yeah. even Like you can take, you can get off at two different light rail stations to get to Lumen, depending on what side of the field you're going into. It's, But I don't know. That's that's definitely a ah concern for me. But it sounds good that like you'd willing to extend your arm to be like, listen, let's see what we can do to help. But I'm not going to just like buy you a new space. That's I'm I'm pro that personally.
00:38:22
Speaker
um Yeah. So I guess that takes us into. but I guess I should ask about the Sonics. Do you have any Sonics takes? I don't know. That's a tough that's a tough question. Maybe. I feel like I should stay quiet. That's good. That's a good idea. um I mean, I know like I do. I do understand. Right. Go Sonics. Exactly. I you know, I think there's kind of like a requirement for elected officials to be just extremely patriotic about all of their local sports teams. So I'm sure that by the time I am elected mayor mayor in November, I will be just a diehard fan of.
00:38:51
Speaker
you know professional football and baseball and basketball and like I'm missing some sports rugby rugby yeah got hockey ho hockey yes um Australian rules football is that one yeah something like that but no I mean they have a space so they're good they they played the Kraken arena right that's already set up for them for the Sonics yeah I think they have an NBA locker room there now so won't even have to worry about it you can just be like yeah I'll come to the games hell yeah Okay, here's a question. Here's a very uninformed question. Yeah. Like, could we have like a publicly owned basketball team?
00:39:24
Speaker
Publicly owned? I like that idea. Don't the Packers? Is that a thing? It's like the Packers. Yeah, the Packers, I think, are community owned. They have this thing where like the owners are the fans kind of thing. It's something like that. But it's like very unique... They're like the only team I could think of that has that. There's some soccer teams. you could sell like bonds, right? And like individuals could buy like a bond and then like we could, you know, buy... It's like a GoFundMe. Yeah.
Personal Connection to Soccer and Campaign Strategy
00:39:47
Speaker
Okay. Okay. This is, see, okay. This is, see, now we've got a headline. We're like publicly owned Sonics.
00:39:55
Speaker
They will never move again. i promise you that. Cause we're not, you're not getting enough people to vote. That's actually a great idea. I love that. Um, and then I wanted to close out here, with, I know you said that you are not super sports for forward, but Soccer is your priority. I asked you what I'm honestly like it's not just that I like actually like watching the World Cup soccer I play I've used to play soccer so when I was in school I played soccer and And then as an adult in Seattle I used to just play like informal pickup games like in the U District and a little bit at Cal Anderson and I only stopped because I was getting old and it got to the point where you know because like mostly the people who play pickup soccer are like young men
00:40:36
Speaker
and I got to the point when I was like my mid to late 30s when I was like I could be their mom and it just started feeling weird and so I stopped but I miss it I miss it I soccer is just like it's it's a great game right it's like I feel like like it's a very democratic game too because you like you just need a ball like and that's why everyone plays it and it's the best game the world's game the world's game okay well universal language new new campaign event pick up pick up with Katie I would I would absolutely do that Done.
00:41:04
Speaker
We'll be there. So to close it out, if you have a favorite Sounders memory and then also where people can get involved, what people can do and all of that kind of good stuff.
00:41:16
Speaker
Sure, yeah. um And you know somewhat embarrassingly, I've actually only ever been to one Sounders game. Sounders. I'm open to that changing. I'm open to that changing. But ah yeah, and and I actually, like I thought I should at least be able to say when that was, but I actually couldn't find that. um I do remember that it was it was kind of a boring game because I believe no one scored. So anyway.
00:41:38
Speaker
Schmetzer Bowl. However, and i did ask a couple of friends. So in the Transit Riders Union, there's a lot of people who are like diehard Sounders fans. um And so I did ask a couple of friends what their favorite Sounders memory was. So my friend Tony says um packed Pride game in 2019. It was his partner's first game ah with Sounders winning at the death.
00:41:57
Speaker
That's a good one. And then my friend Bo says my favorite memory would be being in the stadium in 2022, the night they won. I'm going to pronounce this right. CONCACAF. CONCACAF. Yeah. CONCACAF Champions League final, which meant they were the best team in the North American Confederation. That was the best day of my life. That was a good day. That was the best day my life. No joke. We all famously remember that day. That's actually the day that we met.
00:42:19
Speaker
Well, it was the night It was the night before, but that event led to us meeting and living together. or so Really, the origin of Lobbing Scorchers was that was that game. It's a, if you want to really trace it back. Yeah.
00:42:32
Speaker
We love soccer. We love that. It's like a community thing. And like we said before, like we really think it's a bigger than, uh, just, just the sport, bigger than just the sounders. So bigger than just the sounders, how can people get involved? yeah Well, and not to, not to like flatter your audience, but like, I think like soccer fans seem like pretty cool people relatively speaking. and i tend to so There's a few of you out there. We know who you are. And also, like you know kind of like politically engaged and stuff. Oh, yeah. um Yeah, so how to get involved. so like And this is really important, actually, because I'm i'm like absolutely the underdog in this race. And you mentioned there's lots of other candidates. I am the non-Herald candidate who will be making it through the primary. So after so August 5th is when we all vote in the primary.
00:43:15
Speaker
um So in the general, it will, I mean, Barring something very unexpected happening. ah It will be me and Harold and ah You know Harold's been in a City Hall for like 16 of the last 18 years So he has this like long kind of incumbency advantage um And the way that we're gonna win this election is by getting reaching the like half of the electorate that normally does not vote in a mayoral off your election so that's like think about that right like We just had a presidential election last year, and I think turnout in Seattle was like 84% of registered voters, but in off-year election, like 50% vote.
00:43:53
Speaker
um So we're really gonna win this election by getting to the people who, like you were saying, people who are just like, what does local politics do for me, right? um And that means that like we need to be out there knocking doors and really just like talking to our friends and our colleagues and you know people who we know who might not be paying attention.
00:44:11
Speaker
um So, three things that people can do. So one, um if you my website is Wilson4Seattle.com and there's like a volunteer button and every Tuesday we do like a Zoom thing in the evening which is kind of like an onboarding for people who want to get involved in the campaign.
00:44:27
Speaker
um And so like I'm on there and we talk for a little bit, answer questions um and then my field director already kind of like walks through like the different ways that people can get involved. um So that's one thing people can do um and we're having a ah big rally um this coming Saturday. i don't know when this is going to be airing, but Yeah, this will be Probably we can get it before that okay if If it's not yet May 31st we're rallying on May 31st and the details of that should be on the website But it's at El Centro de la Raza on Beacon Hill 11 a.m. Saturday May 31st for the Sounders game
00:45:02
Speaker
There you go. prega and Pre-game. Pre-game rally. Pre-game rally. um And yeah. And then, I mean, more broadly speaking, I would say too, like if I get elected or you know, when I get elected, um my ability to do like big transformative things in office is going to depend on like continuing organizing on the outside. And so like, especially if you're in public transit, but even if you're not, join the Transit Riders Union. um You know, that we're we're going to be continuing to make things happen into the future.
00:45:31
Speaker
but we look forward to potting. Is there like a mayoral mansion? you get mayoral mansion? Is that a thing? I feel like that was like one of my dad's first questions. i told him I was running for mayor. it's just like where I thought that was that's governor.
00:45:44
Speaker
Oh, I guess governor. i don't know. There's not a mayoral mansion. No, I will probably. That's platform number one. It's moving up on the list. I will i will ah probably continue to live in my one bedroom apartment.
00:45:57
Speaker
Well, we look forward to following up, hopefully. And if you ever want to go to a Sounders game, you let us know. I kind of do. Okay. Well, we'll sort that out. We'd love to have you there. And thank you so much, Katie. This was awesome.
00:46:11
Speaker
Thank you for the time, Katie. We really appreciate Thank you.