Puget Sound Sage

Puget Sound Sage builds thriving, resilient communities rooted in good jobs, affordable housing, accessible transit and a healthy environment.

Puget Sound Sage combines research, innovative public policy and organizing to ensure all people have an affordable place to live, a good job, a clean, healthy environment, and access to public transportation. Our work has impacted thousands of workers by ensuring: workers have power and a voice in the workplace; working people have living wages, health care and dignity; people live in healthy com

munities where there are good jobs, affordable housing, clean air and accessible transit; and an effective government that provides for the common good of workers and communities. We achieve our mission through our four core programs:

Climate Justice
Sage centers communities disproportionately impacted by climate change at the center of climate resiliency strategies. In order to build climate resilience throughout our communities, our climate justice program focuses on addressing existing vulnerabilities while also fundamentally shifting the approach that local, regional and state governments take to addressing climate change to an equity-first approach. Program accomplishments include:

- Partnering with immigrant truck drivers and South Seattle residents to reduce diesel pollution in the Duwamish Valley.
- Releasing a community-based participatory research report Our People, Our Power, Our Planet, detailing community concerns about climate adaptation, decreasing carbon pollution and ensuring equitable representation from their base in policy development.
- Co-chairing the City of Seattle Equity & Environment Initiative, resulting in the Equity & Environment Agenda and creation of an Environmental Justice Steering Committee. Equitable Development
We advocate for affordable housing as a central component of community-based development that is based on community needs, assets and inspiration. While displacement is fundamentally about housing, it is also about how communities cohere together. Traditional planning efforts fail to acknowledge the role of anchoring communities of color, immigrants, and refugees around culturally relevant businesses, community centers, faith institutions and service providers. Our equitable development program advances policies that support compact, high-density development and affordable housing along transit corridors to prevent displacement, which is core to healthy, climate-resilient communities. Program accomplishments include:

- Securing millions in public funding for affordable housing.
- Co-leading our Transit for All campaign, with Transportation Choices Coalition and One America, to secure new transit investments, improved bus service, and the successful implementation of ORCA Lift, the nationally recognized new low income fare.
- Convening South Communities Organizing for Racial & Regional Equity (SouthCORE), a multi-racial coalition of twenty community and member-based organizations that serve as an organized voice for community-led growth and development in South King County. Good Jobs and Workers' Rights
Sage is on the forefront of a renewed movement for economic justice in our region. We reduce inequality by advancing policy, such as minimum wage, paid sick leave, access to full time jobs, enforcement of good job standards, and placement of people with barriers to employment in public worker construction jobs. Program accomplishments include:

- Passing $15 Minimum Wage and Paid Sick & Safe Days ordinances in Seattle.
- Advancing labor standards for 6,000 airport related jobs in SeaTac.
- Convening the Interfaith Economic Justice Coalition, comprised of interfaith leaders from the region as a means of uplifting worker issues for the public, organizing support in faith communities, and helping build power in worker organizing.
- In collaboration with our partners, winning the City of Seattle Priority Hire Ordinance for local workers to enter into green construction careers. Leadership Development
We advocate for planning and policy that makes racial and social equity a top goal for decision makers at all levels of government. We believe that communities of color can prosper in place by harnessing market forces and public investment, with their own vision for growth at the center of local planning. However, lack of decision-making power and capacity to engage in long-term planning greatly hinders our capacity to influence policy in the region. Our leadership development program is dedicated to providing emerging leaders from low-income communities and communities of color the training and opportunities they need to have a seat at decision making tables, laying long-term groundwork for achieving solutions based on community needs. Program accomplishments include:

- Launching our Community Leadership Institute (CLI), a fellowship program that supports, trains and places emerging leaders from low-income communities and communities of color to sit on local boards and commissions.
- Succeeding in placing seven cohort members on local boards and commissions less than four months following the graduation of our 2015-2016 CLI cohort. Of the seven placements, four women of color have won appointments to boards and commissions, such as the Seattle Women’s Commission, Move Seattle Levy Oversight Committee, and the Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board, and one man of color won appointment on the City of Seattle Planning Commission.

07/27/2026

The World Cup has come and gone, but the traffic impacts in the CID left us with important lessons. ⚽
During match days, traffic reroutes into the neighborhood brought congestion, noise, safety concerns, and challenges for residents and small businesses. Now imagine those same kinds of disruptions not for a few days, but for years. 🚙🚗🚕 That’s what the CID could face if a new light rail station is built on 4th Ave S or 5th Ave S, both of which would require major road closures and significant traffic reroutes during construction.

The North/South Station is designed to reduce those impacts and keep our neighborhood better connected. 🚈 In this new episode of Spilling the Tea, learn why the North/South Station is the community’s preferred option and how it can help keep the CID thriving for the !

(Maps and projections used in the video are taken from Sound Transit’s own reports.)

07/13/2026

🚃 Insightful article by transit advocate Anna Zivarts at PubliCola - "Because elected officials, transit agency leadership and contractors rarely, if ever, ride transit, they do not feel the urgency that those of us who rely on transit do in creating transit systems that are truly excellent. This lack of transit familiarity has real costs, not just in what we imagine is possible but also in our expectations for transit service and construction."

https://publicola.com/2026/06/26/how-do-we-get-transit-champions-on-transit-boards/

06/26/2026

Displacement is happening in South King County now, and we have a plan to engage our neighbors in a plan to stop it.

Will you come to our kickoff and sign up for some doorknocking shifts?

BIPOC-led organizations across King County have been organizing for years to get the King County Equitable Development Initiative funded to make it possible for our communities and organizations to buy land in our neighborhoods and ensure our communities stay rooted with affordable housing, cultural spaces, community spaces and farmland. Now we’re taking it to the next level.

Join Skyway Coalition, White Center Community Development Association, Duwamish Valley Affordable Housing Coalition, and the whole King County Equitable Development Initiative Coalition (led by Puget Sound Sage and the Multicultural Community Coalition) in getting out into our neighborhoods and talking to our people about housing, affordability and how we can build power to stay rooted. We're not going anywhere!

This is an exciting effort to talk with neighbors, learn about their experiences and bring them into the fight to stop displacement and keep our communities rooted! Out of this effort, we hope to understand our neighborhoods better, build narrative, and bring more people into our organizations and movements. We're not doing this in just one neighborhood - we're doing it across Skyway, White Center, and South Park!

And... We need you! Will you come to our kickoff and sign up for some doorknocking shifts?

Copy the URL to signup for doorknocking:
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0445A5AA22A2FEC43-64561048-stay #/

06/25/2026

📣 WE'RE HIRING! Executive Director 📣

Are you a visionary leader deeply committed to making change at the community level? We are searching for our next Executive Director to guide Puget Sound Sage and Sage Leaders into their next chapter! 💫

As the strategic engine behind our team, you'll be leading big picture strategy, spearheading fundraising, collaborating directly with our board, and bringing everyone together to turn big ideas into reality.

What we're looking for:
🌇 Demonstrated experience leading an organization, including oversight of staff, budgets, and strategy
💵 Proven track record raising funds
🌎 Deep commitment to community power, deep democracy, and racial justice
🌟 Collaborative, relational leadership style
✅ Strong alignment with organizational values

Learn more about the role: https://pugetsoundsage.org/about-us/jobs/

Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis with screening beginning after September 4th.

06/24/2026

Sage joins the picket line where Embassy Suites workers are on strike! Right next to the stadiums - come on down between 6:30 am and 7pm to support these brave workers!!

06/17/2026

Join Immigrant Guide and Puget Sound Sage as we celebrate the accomplishments of the Community Advocacy and Leadership Academy (CALA) Fellows! This special event is an opportunity to honor the inspiring leaders who have completed the fellowship while connecting with community members, partners, and elected leaders.

If you're interested in growing your leadership skills, building community power, and creating meaningful change, this is also a great chance to learn more about the fellowship program and meet current fellows and alumni.

Register at bit.ly/CALAGrad

We look forward to celebrating with you!

06/15/2026

No Soccer Without Workers! ✊️ The World Cup games have kicked off in Seattle, and we’ve got the backs of the workers who keep our neighborhood running. We’re putting stickers up all over town. If you see one out there, take a pic and pass it our way! ⚽️

05/20/2026

Chinatown-International District is calling! Join your community to fight for the ! We’ll be making fans and buttons to bring to the next Sound Transit board meeting to continue our community advocacy for the South of CID station. Sign up to work together on May 21 3:30 to 4:30pm. RSVP for location!

https://secure.everyaction.com/AjD0fXS2mkeVJ46cgIlRxw2

05/08/2026

Good news! The application period for the Community Leadership Institute has been extended to May 15th. If you've been thinking about elevating your leadership skills and widening your network, this might be the fellowship for you.

Sage’s Community Leadership Institute (CLI) is a fellowship program which resources, educates, and places emerging leaders from communities of color and low-income communities to serve on strategic municipal boards and commissions. Through participation, CLI alums have the opportunity to move forward a racial equity agenda at a government level by asking critical questions about who benefits and who is burdened by policy decisions and offering solutions that integrate community participation and perspectives as part of the decision-making process.

05/07/2026

We're standing with the Southend Transit Justice Coalition next week to fight for the Graham Street light rail station, and we'd love to see you there! 🚉

After decades of community organizing, Graham Street Station was included in the voter-approved Sound Transit 3 Plan. Now the Sound Transit Board is considering delaying it yet again. South Seattle has waited long enough. Join us in holding Sound Transit to the promise our communities have continued to fight for.

Transit Justice Rally and March: 5/11 at 10am, begins at MLK Jr. Way S & S Eddy St.
Transit Justice Town Hall: 5/12 at 6:30pm, 5740 MLK Jr. Way S

Learn more at: tinyurl.com/WASouthendTransitJustice

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Telephone

+12065685000

Website

http://www.pugetsoundsage.org/

Address

414 Maynard Ave S.
Seattle, WA
98104

Puget Sound Sage

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