Monday, September 14, 2020
Dear Mayor Durkan, Council President González, and Councilmembers Herbold, Juarez, Lewis, Morales,
Mosqueda, Pedersen, Sawant, and Strauss:
We are writing you as representatives, owners, employees, customers, and supporters of small
businesses in Seattle. Small businesses are owned, operated, and managed by Black, Indigenous, People
of Color, immigrants, refugees, women, and LGBTQ people across the socio-economic spectrum, who
are as diverse as the customers and clients they serve. Small businesses, collectively, are the largest
employers in Seattle.
Small businesses are an essential tool for economic opportunity and mobility, particularly for people of
color. Small businesses have been disproportionally impacted during the Covid-19 pandemic and its
subsequent economic crisis, which will last for years to come.
In this moment, we ask you to pledge your support to our small business community by addressing the
accompanying list of expectations, led by the following core principles:
•
•

Implementation of safety measures to ensure clean, safe, welcoming and vibrant business
districts
Ensuring employees and customers can frequent storefronts without encountering violent or
destructive behavior

Seattle’s small business community represents an essential spectrum of cultural, ethnic and economic
diversity of our entire community and small businesses are a gateway to opportunity for all. The
essential services, products and economic vitality provided by small business within Seattle’s
Neighborhood Business Districts are of critical value to our community, especially during a global
pandemic.
We ask you take small businesses and the owners, employees, customers, and adjacent residents into
consideration when assessing the public safety needs for the constituents of this city. Seattle is at a
crossroads and is choosing its path forward. It’s time for us to ask our leaders, both legislative and
executive, to find a way to work together to achieve what they essentially agree on: a reimagined
municipal social contract—especially around public safety—that protects and lifts up all of us.
Confronting and dismantling systemic racism and providing a safe environment for our neighborhood
business districts are not mutually exclusive; indeed, they rely on each other completely.
Two Immediate Actions Needed:
• Visit each of our neighborhoods for a socially-distant tour to better understand the impact that
Covid-19 and the current public safety challenges are having on our small businesses
• Take the Seattle Small Business Pledge
This pledge is the voice of our community and the neighborhoods that support them. It provides a
roadmap for a more prosperous future for all small businesses in Seattle.

Seattle Small Business Pledge │1

 Sincerely,

Chinatown-ID Business Improvement Area
Monisha Singh, Executive Director

SODO BIA
Erin Goodman, Executive Director

Tutta Bella Neapolitan Pizzeria
Joe Fugere, Founder & CEO
Co-Chair, Small Business Advisory Council
City of Seattle

Seattle Tourism Improvement Area
Bill Weise, Board Chair
GM, Silver Cloud Hotel – Seattle Stadium

Ballard Alliance
Mike Stewart, Executive Director

Rainier Avenue Business Coalition
Matthew Stubbs, Steering Committee

Columbia City Business Improvement Area
David C. Sharp, President

Capitol Hill/Broadway BIA
Egan Orion, Director

South Lake Union Chamber of Commerce
Danah Abarr, Executive Director

Alliance for Pioneer Square
Lisa Howard, Executive Director

U District Partnership
Mark Crawford, Interim Executive Director

Downtown Seattle Association
Jon Scholes, President & CEO

Columbia City Business Association
Robert A. Mohn, Coordinator

Visit Seattle
Tom Norwalk, President & CEO

West Seattle Junction
Lora Radford, Executive Director

Seattle Restaurant Alliance

Seattle Hotel Association

Puget Sound Attractions Council

Linda Di Lello Morton, President

Sean O’Rourke, President

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Seattle Small Business Pledge │2