We envision a region where all people live, work, and play in joyful and just communities.
Founded in 2007, Puget Sound Sage been on the forefront of driving some of the nation’s most dynamic policies for climate, economic, and racial justice for over a decade. Working in partnership, we advocate for equitable policies that move away from a policy framework of harm reduction and instead towards transformational change in the Puget Sound region.
From land use to workers’ rights, environmental justice to living wage initiatives, policymakers and community leaders alike view Puget Sound Sage as a go-to resource for coalition building, community-based research, and policy expertise.
We are a policy powerhouse led by and for people of color, women, and LGBTQIA individuals and organizations. In order to move systems change, we apply the following four strategies:
Community-based participatory research, which centers community needs from the start and identifies policy solutions from those most impacted.
Coalition organizing, which builds collective power that individuals and groups wouldn't have individually, and uses that power to create systemic change.
Policy advocacy, which centers the liberation of all people and works to address the root causes, not just the symptoms, of the issues through innovative policy solutions.
Leadership development, which invests in building the leadership and capacity of those most affected by racial, social, and environmental injustice.
Our Values
- We prioritize relationships and building community.
- We value collective leadership based in trust and humility.
- We honor histories by:
- Consistently applying structural antiracist analysis
- Pursuing a feminist approach that centers women, queer and trans BIPOC ways of working and being.
- We strive to be bold in the face of power by communicating directly and honestly.
- We champion creativity.
- We invite love through accountability. We adhere to James Baldwin’s understanding of love: “as a state of being, or a state of grace… in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.”
*Sage does our work in a Just Transition framework. We define a Living Economy as an environment where natural resources are renewable and people’s labor is cooperative and all of the things a community needs are controlled and governed by everyday people: like housing, schools, farms and food production, local governance structures, art and culture, healthcare and healing, and transportation. -- thanks and credit to the New Economy Coalition for their definition of a solidarity economic ecological systems that informs our definitions.
Racial Equity Definitions and Commitments:
Puget Sound Sage and Sage Leaders understand that the liberation of all people is inextricably tied to the liberation of Black and Indigenous peoples.
Black Liberation is the restoration of the health, economic, social, spiritual wellbeing, and dignity of Black people as fully human. Achieving such liberation of Black people demands addressing both systemic and non-systemic barriers that continuously impede the wellbeing of Black people within and outside of Sage.
Indigenous Solidarity Here on Turtle Island (North America), our society is built upon a foundation of settler colonialism that causes ongoing harm. Sage commits to the struggle against settler-colonialism by supporting Indigenous self-determination nationally and locally.
As a multiracial organization currently led by non-Indigenous people, we position ourselves in solidarity with Indigenous communities. We commit to supporting Indigenous leadership and organizations, and continuing our own education to be responsible partners and community members with Indigenous peoples, especially those whose land we occupy and organize in: the Duwamish and other Coast Salish Tribes, and urban Indian communities.
Mission
Puget Sound Sage charts a path to a living economy in the South Salish Sea and Duwamish River Valley regions by developing community power to influence, lead and govern.
Vision
We envision a living economy where Black, Indigenous and People of Color workers, families and communities thrive and where we live in sustainable relationship with our land.
Our Impact
In 2020, Puget Sound Sage secured $200M for both Seattle's Equitable Development Initiative and the Green New Deal, developed new models for land stewardship with local BIPOC-led organizations, and kept Washington families connected to power throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.