Joy Hollingsworth on Seattle’s Racial Politics and Whether She’s the Council’s Swing Vote

[00:00:10] Hello and welcome to the latest edition of Seattle Nice. I'm David Hyde. This week marks the first month of the new Trump administration and Erica C. Barnett of Publicola. Everyone's freaking out on my various social media text threads in real life, but I'm wondering from your perspective, how bad is it on a scale from one to ten, where ten is the apocalypse and one is like about as bad as I thought it was gonna be?

[00:00:34] Uh, Z. I don't even know how to quantify it. All my friends are freaking out too. I kind of limit myself to like five minutes on social media every morning just to kind of panic myself awake. And that's it for the day for me. No coffee, just doom scrolling to wake up in the morning for Erica C. Barnett. Okay, Sandeep Kaushik, political consultant, same question. Ten is the apocalypse. One, you know, about what you were expecting.

[00:00:58] Yeah, it's not so, it's not so great, right? Uh, I would say maybe, I don't know, seven and a half or eight. Uh, look, we're not at full on constitutional crisis point yet, so it could get worse. That's gotta be ten. Yeah, it's gotta be worse. It could get worse, but uh. In what respect are we not at full on constitutional crisis point yet? Well, when he starts, when they really start defying court orders and stuff like that. The Supreme Court. Yeah, yeah. When John Roberts says do this and Trump says no.

[00:01:25] Okay, we've got another special guest on the podcast today, Joy Hollingsworth, who represents Seattle City Council District 3 that includes Capitol Hill and the Central District. Joy was elected back in 2023 after beating out progressive transit advocate Alex Hudson, who I will just say parenthetically that Sandeep and Erica both supported, to replace Seattle's only revolutionary Marxist city council member ever, Shama Sawant, who had represented District 3 dating back to 2014. Joy Hollingsworth, thanks so much for joining us.

[00:01:54] Hi, David. Thank you for reminding Sandeep and Erica about them supporting my opponent. But it's fine. I have to give them shit whenever possible. You're sowing dissent and dissension and hatred, David. We're so afraid of that. The Donald Trump of this podcast. Wait, don't say that. All right. Before I turn it over to Erica for our first question, I wanted to ask you the same one. Scale of one to ten. Ten is the apocalypse. One, you know, about what I was expecting.

[00:02:23] Look, I'm like Erica, five minutes on social media. Then I jump off. We've been through this for four years before. And so obviously we're constantly looking at what's going on. But I'm just trying to stay positive and optimistic through anything and everything. Good. Well, let's hope we stay optimistic. And Erica is going to start with our when we're talking about Seattle local politics. And Erica's got our first question.

[00:02:46] So my small picture question is during the recent debate over less lethal weapons, you were pretty quiet early on. You abstained from the committee vote. You said it wasn't your top priority right then. And then you ended up voting for amendments that would have placed some guardrails around the use of less lethal weapons. Then you ultimately voted against it. But I want to ask kind of a two-part question. Why didn't you speak out in favor of your council colleagues' amendments more strongly at the time?

[00:03:15] And then why did you end up voting against the bill? Yeah. So when it was in committee, I supported behind the scenes Councilmember Moore's amendments that, like you said, put really great guardrails around the bill. Um, I had had talks with the mayor's office and also Councilmember Kettle about my concerns about it when I had said that it was not my priority. What I meant by that was that I didn't think this was a priority the council should be taking on at the moment for, uh, you know, public safety piece.

[00:03:45] Um, and I was concerned that it was brought to the table at this point in time. Just the timing of it was kind of, you know, just not the best view at the time. And usually, honestly, Erica, when I'm listening to bills and talking about stuff, I I'm processing just like everyone else, you know, uh, not too much lead time. And, and, and so, you know, just understanding what the bill meant, understanding the federal, uh, dissent decree that they wanted to get out of our executive and our police department.

[00:04:13] Um, so that's, that's where I landed on that. Well, and again, just joy. So what ultimately flipped your vote or, or, or, or flipped your decision to decide finally to vote no on it? What was the. Yeah, I had, I had three non-negotiables. One was throwing away from people. The second was underhand. And the third was a mayor's approval on that. Uh, we only got two out of the three, uh, during the final vote. Kathy Moore, those failed in committee.

[00:04:40] She brought them to full council, um, and ultimately decided to vote no on it, um, with council member rank and also council member more. But I do want to say this council member kettle really how he navigated. That was pretty phenomenal in terms of behind the scenes work and talking to people and understanding, you know, what people wanted, what people didn't, what was important, how he tried to shape the bill. But ultimately I just didn't think it was the right time for us to be voting on this type of legislation in Seattle.

[00:05:08] So, uh, so joy, you voted in favor of Kathy Moore's capital gains tax proposal that narrowly failed. Didn't say much about your vote at the time. So we were curious, you know, why did you support a local capital gains tax when a number of your colleagues did not? And then whether or not you'd like to see a local capital gains tax pass this year in 2025. People love taxes, don't we? And, uh, with the capital gains, especially progressive taxes, we saw social housing pass,

[00:05:36] uh, pretty substantially with one a, um, I heard your old podcast about it, which was really great insight, uh, regarding progressive taxes in Seattle and capital gains. Uh, inter, I supported Kathy. Um, I thought it was something that was much needed at the time it failed in committee. So I went into full council because it failed in committee. I, you know, um, didn't support it.

[00:05:59] Um, but what I will say is that people not only want taxes, um, they, they want the impact of them. So it's not, Seattle's always been a giving city and I've been here 40 years. I understand like Seattle in and out and what people are very giving, but they want to see impact. They want to see those taxes do something for their dollar. Um, and so that's what we're trying to work on right now in terms of impact from people's tax dollars. Can you elaborate that on that a little more? What do you mean? Is this like an audit the budget kind of thing again?

[00:06:29] Or, um, you know, uh, when you say you want to see impact, what is it that you want to, to see before you can vote for another tax like this again? Yeah. I want to see movement on some things that we've seen, uh, whether it's homelessness, whether it's, uh, understanding about our, uh, uh, uh, public safety pieces after school programs for kids, uh, the school levy that just passed. People want to see impact. They want to see movement on the taxes that are actually being occurred right now.

[00:06:59] Housing levy, the housing levy. People want to know how many new housing doors have been built from the levy that we passed two years ago, the billion dollar levy. Transportation. People want to see movement on our transportation levy and the impact. And what, what does that look like? Um, so this is not necessarily auditing the budget and understanding, um, you know, us trying to cut fat or trim certain things. I just personally want to see impact and, and what numbers are doing for our dollars and how they're, uh, you know, helping solve problems.

[00:07:28] I'll just quickly throw in a comment here more than a, more than a question. Cause I do think, you know, the way we're talking about this right now, I think is sort of indicative of sort of sometimes how we talk about taxes in Seattle, which is that we kind of talk about taxing for its own sake. Right. And I'm kind of like, what's the problem we're solving? Like, like let's figure out the problem and the solution to the problem and figure out how much that solution costs. And then we figure out how to pay for it. Right. Like the taxing sort of should come in my mind, come to the, at the back end of like, okay,

[00:07:57] here's, we got a plan to solve a problem. Now let's fund the plan. Joy, where were you on, uh, on 1A? Ultimately the council voted to put 1B on the, on the ballot 1A passed. Um, were you part of the 27% or whatever it is now that voted for 1B? I'm, I'm, I'm part of let's get social housing together. Let's let it be successful. Let's push it forward. I want it to be successful. I want it to open doors. I want us to have housing, uh, in Seattle.

[00:08:25] And so, um, that, that's my answer, Erica. Well, how are you optimistic? I mean, now that it has passed, I mean, what do you think about the prospects for, for its success? Uh, that's something that we're going to have to discuss. Uh, what I guess, you know, what we're hearing with voters is that they want to try something new. What Seattle has been doing has not been working. We haven't been building housing fast enough. We haven't been, you know, serving the needs of our citizens. We haven't been affordable. Right. And so building more housing is going to do that. And so we saw voters want to try something different in Seattle.

[00:08:55] They want to do social housing. They want to experiment with something new. That's great. But I also want to make sure that the money that we are taxing on our, our businesses, that it's going to have, we're going to build new doors of housing. We're going to have more opportunities for people to be able to call Seattle home. So thinking of sort of what's coming down the pike, uh, for the council over the next several months. And one thing council member I keep hearing about is that council member Moore wants to

[00:09:22] bring forward a package of sort of reforms or changes to some of the renter rights laws, you know, a whole plethora of them that got passed by the previous council. I keep hearing maybe that's going to come as soon as March. Um, uh, what are your thoughts on that? I mean, especially in light of the fact that I'm hearing some of this stuff is coming not just from mom and pop landlords, but we'll be hearing from some affordable housing providers

[00:09:48] who are saying they're having real difficulties, you know, dealing with problem tenants and some of their buildings. It's causing their revenue streams to erode and, and, and it's causing them, you know, problems in terms of operations and function. So, so what's your take on all this? Are you kind of in the loop on what's, what's coming down the pike and all that stuff? Yeah, I've heard, I've, I've heard a little bit, you know, council member Moore and I've had various conversations about this.

[00:10:13] I know that she has a massive, uh, work group that she has extensive from affordable housing to mom and pops to, um, some tenants as well, where they're understanding and trying to figure out ways to make it better for everyone. Um, you know, I think we passed in the last, what, five to seven years, a number of tenant protection rights, which are very important, uh, for us, uh, from the $10 late fees to,

[00:10:39] you know, uh, first, um, uh, you know, first in line, first tenant that, right. First in line that qualifies all these different pieces, which is important. But what we've seen on the backend with our affordable housing providers is that there are some, there are some tenants that they're working with in which, you know, they cannot provide the certain type of services that are needed for that tenant. And so being able to transfer them to another property or whatever, all these different things,

[00:11:05] they're having issues with some of the, the rules and legislations that we have in Seattle. And so taking a look at what can make it better for, for our affordable housing providers and our mom and pops as well. Well, I mean, to put a finer point on what Sandeep said, you know, what I, what I hear consistently from both private and nonprofit developers and, you know, and I'm not saying I agree or don't agree, but, um, is that it's not just tenants who need more services. It's tenants who aren't paying rent.

[00:11:33] Um, and you know, for whom a $10 late fee is not enough of a deterrent or, you know, I mean, people are basically complaining that they can't kick people out. And I'm wondering if that, you know, if that factor is going to factor into how you vote on some of these, you know, proposed changes, um, or if you're going to propose some yourself. Yeah. Look, we've heard from mom and pops during the pandemic that got stuck with 30, $40,000 water

[00:11:59] or light bill from tenants who just didn't pay or, you know, someone who might not been, have been paying for a year or two their, their rent, uh, for these affordable housing providers and their margins are super slim. I think some of the rental protections that were passed were, uh, for the venture capital firms that hike up rents and, you know, they're trying to meet some type of margin and so forth. But when we're talking about affordable housing providers and mom and pops, I think that is

[00:12:24] something very different that, uh, you know, the certain bills are there, they're being, they're not being targeted, but they're having to abide by them and it just doesn't work for them. And then all of a sudden, you know, um, it just becomes, uh, a big obstacle for them to stay, stay in business and do those types of services or provide affordable housing. And so, look, I'm going to talk to tenants. I'm going to literally talk to everyone to understand what are, what are we missing and how can we make it better?

[00:12:52] Uh, another topic you led the effort on the city council to create a stay out of drug area zone, a soda zone for Capitol Hill. And at the time critics like former Seattle city council member, Tammy Morales said that the effort was just for show, um, using Sandeep Kashuk's favorite word performative. As a matter of fact, you know, this was an effort to make it seem like the council was getting tougher on drugs. Now we have this report out fairly recently by David Croman in the Seattle times saying the soda zones are mostly going unused.

[00:13:21] So what do you think about sort of where we are and that criticism of the law being performative in the first place? Yeah, well, look, can we do better? Absolutely. When the soda zones were first proposed, it was for 12th and Jackson and it was for a third in Pike. My concern for Capitol Hill was that if we put those two as zones, that potentially some activity was going to get pushed, uh, to Capitol Hill and then continue to get worse as it is for our pipeline corridors.

[00:13:52] Um, and so how many, it's only been how many months I'm not ready to give up yet. We have made a turn on more officers. I've talked to the East precinct once a month. I'm constantly going in there for roll calls or, uh, doing ride alongs. And what I'm hearing from officers is like, Hey, if we have more officers, we'll be able to enforce this a little bit better. And I think we made a turn. We had a plus one. Everyone said, Oh, you only had one gain for officers. No, that's 101 point swing. We were losing over a hundred officers a year.

[00:14:21] And so that was a massive swing. We stopped the bleeding and now we can get more officers to do enforcement. I'm not ready to give up on it yet. Uh, it's another tool in the toolbox and I'm looking forward to finding out what are, what are we missing, uh, and what legislative pieces that we can put and continue to get more officers so we can enforce the soda zones. So, um, I want to jump over to the comprehensive plan. You are the head of the committee that oversees the comprehensive plan update, which is a 10 year

[00:14:48] plan to, uh, you know, essentially allow growth in the city and, you know, not allow growth in some parts of the city. Um, and, uh, there've been appeals to this plan and without getting too much into the, you know, nitty gritty details of those appeals. Basically they're saying that the plan fails to consider things like tree removals, like parking loss, like aesthetic changes. And, uh, one of those appeals is coming from in your district, at least one, uh, from Madison park.

[00:15:14] And, you know, I'm wondering how seriously do you take these kinds of complaints, um, you know, about, uh, you know, everything from parking loss to sidewalks, to aesthetics. Um, and, you know, will you consider those, uh, complaints in, you know, sort of tweaking the comprehensive plan, uh, in your committee? Yeah. So, you know, there have been six appeals from different neighborhoods. One, as you pointed out, Erica, Madison park, they're, they're talking about infrastructure and a whole bunch of other issues that they have with the comprehensive plan for us to consider.

[00:15:43] We have an executive session on the 25th where we'll talk to our lawyers and we'll talk to the hearing examiner's office and understand, you know, the validity of these complaints and what does it do to our timeline? Our intention as the chair is to continue this process. Forward, um, for us to continue the cadence of our meetings for us to continue. The, uh, plan is where you have phase one, all the way up to phase three with comp plan and then house bill 1110.

[00:16:10] Um, and, and so, uh, you know, right now, um, we know that we'll be in the discussion phase and understanding, like we said, um, how these appeals are going to affect us, but our whole, our, our thing is we're going to continue to, uh, push this forward. Seattle needs more housing. We have to continue. We're a little bit late on it and, and we have to continue to, to, to go forward.

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[00:17:09] Download the Ikes app today or head on over to Ikes.com. That's Ikes.com. And are you, uh, open to eliminating any of the neighborhood centers? These are areas where, you know, three to six story apartment buildings will be allowed, uh, very close to frequent transit stops. There's a bunch, uh, I think something like four in your district. Are you open to eliminating any of those?

[00:17:37] Um, I am not, uh, uh, I am not planning on eliminating any of them. Um, what people have talked about is, um, you know, the anti-displacement plan, making sure that people can be able to afford and to live in these zones. I met, I walked the neighborhood with Madrona behind off of 34th. There's a slew of black neighbors that are literally within those lines of the neighborhood center and the upzoning. And they're nervous about being displaced and, you know, the taxes, property taxes becoming

[00:18:06] too high and, you know, just, you know, not wanting to be priced out. They bought those homes back in 1950. And that's something that's important to me to make sure that those neighbors can be able to stay in those homes while we're continuing to grow, um, and understanding what impacts that they're going to have and, and make sure that the resources are there. So if they want to stay in their homes, that they can. And does that include, sorry to get so into the weeds on this and I promise we'll come back out, but does that include things like, um, you know, making the senior tax exemption

[00:18:35] on, on housing, um, move forward to successive generations so that like a kid who inherits a house could still have that tax exemption? I know that's an idea that's been floated up there. Yeah, it could be. I know that's the, the county, the first piece that we need to address with the county is 10% of the people that are actually eligible for property tax exemptions are actually using them. So we have a number of people that number one did not realize that they're eligible.

[00:19:03] The amount has moved up, uh, in terms of money for household income because of inflation. And a lot of people just didn't know, and they don't know how. And so part of our job is funding different, uh, organizations and nonprofits who can go out house to house to be able to, to get people to navigate the county. Um, so they can get their, their taxes, uh, under control and, and just be locked in so they can keep their homes. Yeah. Just, if I can jump in with a, with a kind of follow-up, cause obviously comp plan is

[00:19:31] front and center, huge issue, you know, one of the top things that the council's taking up this year. And already, as you all have been having hearings about it, we've kind of seen some of the divides in the, in the city show up, you know, lots and lots of folks coming out to testify against adding greater density or, or more, you know, more opportunity for housing and stuff like that and saying, you're, you know, this is going to fundamentally change the character of our neighborhoods or it's going to take away trees.

[00:20:00] And so just joy, I want to back, back it up a little bit and just ask you kind of generally, where are you on questions around, you know, density and growth and, and, and development and stuff like that? You know, are you kind of urbanist aligned? Are you, you know, I, people hate this term NIMBY, but you know, the kind of lesser Seattle, you know, what, how do you describe your own politics around growth? Yeah. It's like, look, I land right in the middle. Okay.

[00:20:30] We need density and we also need to understand. I wouldn't, let me tell you this. You can't call black people from the seedy and South end NIMBYs. I was trying to tell someone understanding like that word where it came from back in the, you know, like understanding urban sprawl and black people wanting to move to certain neighborhoods and they were called, you know, those neighbors were called NIMBYs because they had these covenants for black people and Jewish people and Asian folks and Hispanic to not be able to move there.

[00:20:59] And so it's really interesting to me when people call, I'll hear, you'll hear a woman from the central district come and talk about displacement and people are like, she's a NIMBY. And I'm like, oh gosh, some people just don't understand the historical context to it, but I would land right in the middle, understanding that, look, there are neighborhoods that have never had any type of density before. And when you talk to people in the Rainier Valley central district and you ask them like, Hey, what do you want?

[00:21:24] And they always say, Joy, we want these other neighborhoods to be up zone as well as us. Is this neighborhood getting up zone too? Not just us. Is this neighborhood going to take some of the density as well? And some of the growth. And so I land right in the middle where I think everyone's going to get up zone with House Bill 1110, where you can build all this housing on one lot for, I think, for, be able to build four units on a lot. So I'm with, I'm kind of like right down the middle. I think we need to hear from all sides.

[00:21:54] So you can call me a Seattle urbanist from the central district, I guess. Uh, another sort of where do you, where do you see yourself question? I guess, um, because you were of course, part of this big centrist wave election on the city council that we had in 2023. It's a bit over a year in since you've been in office and it turns out you don't always vote with that centrist majority. We mentioned the blast ball vote, the capital gains tax. There's been some others.

[00:22:23] So my question is, do you see yourself as a swing vote as the swing vote on the current council? Because it certainly seems to be shaping up that way. Yeah, I, I think I'm trying to, um, like blur the lines and what a centrist is in Seattle, what a progressive is in Seattle, whatever that even means. Those definitions, uh, Seattle council's a nonpartisan position. And so what I try to do is vote with the best, uh, intentions from what I hear from community,

[00:22:50] what I think is best at the time for the city. Um, and, and, and also just understanding that there have been communities that have not had access to city hall before. And so I've listened to a lot of those groups that might not come down to city hall, but I see them at church or I'm walking with them down the neighborhood. I see them at the grocery store and we're talking, having conversations, folks that just haven't had, uh, the transparent access to city hall. And so, um, you know, I vote how I think is the best way for our district and what I think is best for our community.

[00:23:19] I don't put myself in a box, say centrist or progressive or conservative. You and I talked about this a little bit before joy, but I want to put you on the record and be a little more specific about it. There was, um, there's a beach in Madison park. Uh, it has, it has a historical name, which I think might be offensive if I say it, but you might know it. Um, but it's a, it's an LGBTQ friendly beach and it's new beach. Uh, there's property owner, um, and several allies of his that want to shut it down.

[00:23:49] And they've been in communication with you as their district city council member. Um, and I, you know, I'm just, I'm just wondering, you know, what you said when I asked you about these meetings is that, you know, you want to get rid of inappropriate behavior if it's happening. I want to ask, you know, what kind of inappropriate behavior? Well, first, where are things with that beach right now? Um, you know, and I know that those neighbors are still unhappy. Um, so where do things stand and then what kind of inappropriate behavior do you, do you believe based on, you know, evidence is actually happening there?

[00:24:18] Um, and what solution would you advocate for that? Thank you for the question. So look, uh, that beach, uh, Denny Blaine beach, uh, is a destination for our, uh, LGBTQIA community. And it has taken off because it's been on TikTok. It's been on social media. So a lot of people from across the country come to this beach because they know it's a safe place. Um, I'm all for that. I want to continue to that legacy, continue to that tradition.

[00:24:45] I think what some of the neighbors have implied, and I've met with a ton of neighbors, they've come to my office and we've had conversations regarding, uh, the capacity piece and making sure that, you know, the park is taken up for parking, that we have garbage cleanup, that we also have, um, you know, a, uh, park ranger as well, ensuring that we have some type of safety component as well. Um, but what I've seen, um, from pictures and videos have been people outside of that

[00:25:15] community and outside of just everything else. Um, small group, I'd say about 10% of folks that go down there and their inappropriate behavior, whether it's from masturbation, whether it's, um, indecent exposure or, um, relieving themselves in the bushes or the lake or just, you know, different things that you just don't want to have in a park, whether it's in Denny Blaine or it's in Rainier Beach or Lake City, it doesn't matter.

[00:25:41] Um, and so those are things that I'm going to be addressing the response to the city right now. The weather is not as nice. We know the weather kicks up nice here around like May, um, April, late April and May. Um, and so what we're doing is preparing for that response, making sure that we have a park ranger, do we have more bathrooms down there? Can we have no parking signs? So medical and emergency vehicles can be able to access people's homes or down at the waterfront if they are called, um, for that.

[00:26:08] So that that's my goal is to make sure that the city's response for city services is, uh, on point. Just quick follow up. Do you think that the mayor's, uh, you know, that we know that the mayor worked with, uh, the property owner there and was talking about putting a playground there, which would essentially shut down the new beach. Do you think that was appropriate of him to intervene or to, to, to start to intervene at least in that way? Yeah. I don't know the, the background. I know that, uh, uh, they were working on a playground in that area. I don't really know the intentions why.

[00:26:37] Um, but what I do know just on my end is that I'm just, I know that some history happened. Uh, I'm just trying to make sure that we can be responsive for cleanliness, parking and make sure that people are safe. And the people that are doing indecent exposure and masturbating and doing drugs and other thing can be removed. So people continue to have a safe environment down there. Great. So joy, I was really, you know, I've been wanting to have you on the podcast for a while in part

[00:27:05] because I really wanted to have a conversation with you, have all of us have a conversation with you about, about race, right. And about racial politics in the city of Seattle, like we talk a shit ton about race, right. In our, in Seattle and in our politics. But I kind of feel like we don't, we talk a lot about race.

[00:27:30] We don't have very many honest conversations about, about where we are as a city around questions of race, what, what our racial politics are, what the divides are around race. And so, am I right about that? Do you, do you feel like the same way I do that? Like there needs to be a more real dialogue around some of this stuff. I know that, that, you know, at various points you have on social media and other places

[00:27:57] sort of call some folks out by sort of how they have either addressed you or talked about, about race more generally, which obviously it's sort of caught my, my attention and, and it's something that I'd love to hear more from you about your takes on. Well, first of all, I didn't know you can curse on this podcast. So totally. You can say the S word. I saw, I saw David cringe when you said the S word and Erica cheer.

[00:28:27] No, I'm just like, yeah, we talk. Okay. So absolutely. I think race needs to have a conversation when we talk about progressive politics in Seattle. I think it's incredibly important because oftentimes progressive for the definition has not always meant progress for black people or for people of color or for minorities. I'm retiring the word BIPOC because that just puts, you know, it's just, it's over. Okay.

[00:28:57] Yeah. We need to talk about different races individually. And because everyone is, everybody's needs are different. And so I've always pushed back on this thing where I heard people say, well, Joy, you're not progressive enough. And I said, well, what does progressive mean? Give me a definition, what it, what it means. And people will dance around it or they'll give me a thing. And I said, well, you know, that doesn't mean progress for black people, or that doesn't mean progress for this, you know, certain demographic.

[00:29:26] And so I think in Seattle, we have this paternalistic progressives that they go in and they tell people what they think is best for them instead of listening to people and then saying, you know what, maybe I should sit my ass down and let those people lead the progressive movement what's best for them. But instead they want to take this centralized, you know, stance and say, well, because I

[00:29:53] have been the oppressor, I should be the loudest one in the room for you. And oftentimes those good intentions do not mean the best for people of color or black folks. I mean, Joy, I thousand percent agree with you on that. But, you know, I do think that the problem that happens in Seattle, you know, and I don't know if it's because we're close to Canada and like have just have trouble talking about anything that's tough up here. Like, you know, I don't know. I'm not from here.

[00:30:24] But, you know, I think that there is a tendency to to turn communities into a monolith and it goes in all directions. So, you know, there's like this this idea that the black community or, you know, the Latinx community or the Asian community wants one thing. And then, you know, another group will say it absolutely doesn't. This community wants a different thing. And I think that a lot of our conversations get stuck there.

[00:30:49] I mean, I just think about like, you know, the debate over the the light rail station in Chinatown. Right. I mean, there is there is, you know, a group of folks who came out and said this is what the Asian community wants. We want it out of Chinatown. And then, you know, another group in that community, you know, in that same geographical community, but also Asian American mobilized and said, we want this. So I think, you know, this isn't I guess this is just an observation that has frustrated

[00:31:15] me covering issues over the years is like it's there's a weaponizing and a monolithizing. I don't know if that's a word, but of, you know, of racialized communities in this city that makes it very hard to have these conversations. And, you know, and maybe that's all being done by, you know, by the majority group, by by white people. I don't know. I mean, Tim Seas was kind of leading the, you know, the charge on one of these Chinatown sound transit options.

[00:31:43] But anyway, just curious what you what you think about that. And, you know, if there's a way to break out of that in these conversations that we have. Yeah. I mean, you hit the nail on the head that people think just because you say something, let's say from like, I'll just say for black people, just because I speak the all black people might think the way I do because they think we're a monolith, like you said. And that's just not the case.

[00:32:07] I think in Seattle, we have this tendency to listen to like the loudest voices in the room and, you know, say, well, that's what all Asian people are thinking right now. And then you have other folks come to the table who might not have access and be like, oh, I didn't realize this community thinks that way. And they only do that for people of color. You know, oftentimes, sometimes they're the only one in the room. Seattle's not that much black. We only are like, what, 6% of the population.

[00:32:35] But if you have that one black voice, they think that that black community thinks that way. And so I would just challenge people to just not, when they hear a certain person of color speaking or someone that they go, okay, well, that's how that person feels. That's how maybe some of the Asian community feels and wanting to explore other voices as well, I think is incredibly important. But here's the other thing too. I think we have to do a redefining of what progressive means in Seattle.

[00:33:05] Because right now, what has been defined as progressive the last 10 years, for me personally, as a black woman, has not been good for black folks. We are, our average household income for a black family is under $50,000. And so I think of progressive as having economic mobility, very different than whatever terms we have so forth been thinking before. And you can be progressive and racist.

[00:33:32] I, someone has to say, you can be progressive and racist and you can be progressive and anti-black. And I think just having those conversations and just people just understanding that and being like, well, hey, what does that mean? I think people just need to be open to Seattle. Just because you're progressive doesn't mean that you can't be racist or anti-black. One thing that I noticed over the last, I'm going to say 10 years probably is, but certainly since 2020, a greater long overdue push to diversify sources.

[00:34:00] But when a lot of media, not just in Seattle, but all over the country did that, a lot of times what you might end up hearing from what Sandeep would call white progressive reporters is featuring the right kinds of black people, people who agree with them essentially. And so I know you've kind of been touching on this already, but I'm wondering from your point of view, how the media in particular has been getting it right or wrong when it comes to covering race. Yeah.

[00:34:28] It's some, sometimes if, if you're like a progressive liberal and you have a black voice that agrees with you, you know, you, you're uplifting them. Hey, this is the person that is, you know, right. And we hear them. And then you hear a black voice that doesn't agree with you. All of a sudden they are, they're conservative. They don't know what they're talking about. Now you start questioning their blackness. I can't begin to tell you how many times I've taken a vote in Seattle and I've gotten emails saying,

[00:34:58] well, are you voting for the black community or you're not black? I mean, just crazy stuff where people are now questioning my blackness. And I'm thinking that is probably some of the most racist thing you could possibly do is question my blackness because you don't think I'm voting a certain way in which you stare. You have stereotyped black people and thinking that's how they should vote. Another thing progressives think is that all people of color are poor.

[00:35:23] It's like this whole thing where it's like constantly low income minorities. And that's all they're talking about when they're not understanding that there are other people that might, uh, other people of color that might be middle class and how they're impacted by that. And so, um, you know, I think the media has gotten it wrong. I think they've gotten progressive, um, voices wrong. I think they've gotten the definition wrong. I think they've gotten certain things wrong. And I like to be able to come in and just give a different perspective.

[00:35:53] I'm not saying my perspective is right. All I'm saying is I think I offer just a different perspective to people so they can kind of challenge their mind and think about stuff. You know, I think that's a national problem. Um, but I also think it's particularly a problem in Seattle because of the, you know, our racial demographics are, you know, so overwhelmingly white. I mean, you know, it's not, it's not Atlanta, you know, it's not Houston where I came from. Um, it's not, you know, I don't know. I could list out.

[00:36:18] It's not Chicago, you know, it's a, you know, it's a, it's an incredibly white city and, you know, and, and, and incredibly, you know, sort of white homeowning city in a lot of ways. Historically, I think it's becoming less so, but, you know, yeah, I mean, I think that that's part of the problem specifically here in Seattle is, you know, is there is kind of a monolithic media culture and, um, and David, to your point, like, I think it's getting reflected in, you know,

[00:36:43] increasingly, you know, in the sort of backlash to, uh, you know, the, the diversification of voices, it's, it's, you know, becoming worse, not better in a lot of ways. And if I could just jump in on top of what, what, what Erica's saying, cause I, you know, I do think, man, I remember when I first moved to Seattle in 2002, right. And I moved here from Cleveland, right. Which is a very diverse city. Right. Um, I, I don't, I don't know whether Cleveland's majority black, I can't remember anymore, but

[00:37:09] it, but it's close if it's not, uh, if it's not majority black, but you know, Cleveland's pretty typical East coast, Midwest city. And you came to Seattle and I was like, man, this place is like a white Disneyland. Like, like everybody's like pretty and tattooed and like, you know, and they're all white and everybody's hip and like, you know, and I'm like, where's the. It is like legitimately shocking when you move somewhere else. I was like, what, what the fuck is this place? The Disneyland part sounds kind of good. Yeah.

[00:37:38] It was a white progressive Disneyland. Like, and it took me a while to kind of, kind of get used to it. I mean, Seattle kind of grows on you like a camper and now I'm, I'm, I'm completely, you know, committed to this place, but it was definitely kind of a shock for me to, to adjust it. And so joy, I guess I wanted to ask you, cause I know you've had a chance to go travel to Detroit a few times, very different city than Seattle, majority black city, not an affluent knowledge economy city of, you know, a much poorer city.

[00:38:07] And so what, do you have any observations about sort of the differences and the cultures of, you know, and, and, and how these issues kind of play out in, let's say Detroit versus Seattle. Yeah. Any, any time I go to a city where it's majority, um, people of color or black, they have a really strong, uh, black demographic, whether it's Detroit, Atlanta, Chicago, have opportunities to go to all these places.

[00:38:35] Um, you see a very different culture and sense of, you know, um, for example, you might see black politicians that don't have to say equity every two sentence, right? Because it's just implied with their race, with their experience, with the lens that they constantly have to do is it's going to be equitable. Um, you see people, uh, have different, uh, perceptions of Seattle.

[00:39:02] You talk to them and they think, you know, Seattle's this wild, crazy place where, you know, people are running wild. We don't have any public safety. And I mean, it's kind, it's kind of, it's kind of crazy to see people's outside of the bubble that we're in, um, people's perception of us, but, but you just see a different lifestyle. You see people that have, um, especially in the Midwest that are concerned about affordability, about housing stuff, uh, public safety, grocery, egg prices.

[00:39:31] They were not talking about democracy on the ballot. It was a very different conversation for what people had in certain areas, um, you know, in, in the Midwest and in certain places versus Seattle because of, you know, the demographic. So I just think it's, um, something where Seattle is like the white Vegas. I've heard white Vegas before. Um, the, the Disneyland is pretty dope. Particularly Ballard. Ballard and Fremont, they call it white Vegas.

[00:40:00] You're calling out Ballard. Yeah. Yeah, I am. Don't tell, don't tell Dan Strauss. He's gonna, he's gonna, he's gonna come in. Don't tell, don't tell the mayor of Ballard. Yeah. Yeah. I won't. Um, but that's what, that's what I've heard. But, but Seattle, I've been here for, you know, my family's been here for four, four generations deep. I love this city and I love the people that live in it. I think we have well-intended people. I think we have really great people that live here. And, um, I like, I like my, uh, white Vegas. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:40:30] Yeah. It has its charms, you know, white, white, white Disneyland, white Vegas. Oh my God. We're giving Seattle a whole bunch of new nicknames all of a sudden. Yeah. This is, yeah, that, that could have been our, our, uh, instead of calling it Seattle. Can we have a city council resolution? Alternative title. To, to officially make Seattle the white Vegas. Yeah. I'll get everybody to sign that one. All right. Joy Hollingsworth. Thanks so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. David, Sandeep, Erica.

[00:41:00] I really appreciate it. Joy. Thank you so much for coming on. Really appreciate it. That's it. I'm going to say, right. For another edition of Seattle Nice. He's Sandeep Kaushik. She's Erica C. Barnett. I'm David Hyde. Our editor is Quinn Waller. And thanks everybody so much for listening. Yeah. Thank you.ителей. Thank you.