Support Seattle Legacy Businesses
It seems that every day there’s news about yet another beloved local business closing and there’s nothing we can do about it. Existing historic preservation tools do not protect specific uses or businesses. What else can be done? What can you do?
There are efforts underway to try to address this issue of how to protect Seattle’s older businesses. Historic Seattle has been working with other advocates to support the notion of a Legacy Businesses program in Seattle.
Seattle Councilmember Lisa Herbold has been leading an effort to raise awareness of the importance of these legacy businesses. For the City of Seattle’s 2017-2018 Proposed Budget, she is sponsoring a proposal to add $100,000 for a study on legacy businesses with the goal of identifying places and fostering an atmosphere in which they might better thrive going forward. The funding would support a study to determine the scope and definition of a Seattle Legacy Business project.
Historic Seattle supports Councilmember’s Herbold’s budget proposal addition—we testified at a recent Select Budget Committee meeting in support of the proposal.
Today, we are asking for your support. Please contact Council Budget Committee Chair Tim Burgess at tim.burgess@seattle.gov to request that he include the funding for the Seattle Legacy Business Study in his proposed balanced budget package. He will announce his budget package next Wednesday, November 2.
Seattle Weekly discussed the issue of Legacy Businesses in a recent article. Read more here.
Learn more about Seattle Legacy Businesses!
Photo by Joe Mabel, Wikipedia Commons. Bush Garden, Seattle Chinatown-International District