Blog

For Immediate Release Thurs, 06/17/2021 Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits www.seattleurbannatives.org Contact: sunn.outreach@gmail.com   SEATTLE — Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits (SUNN) members stand together in support of our Two Spirit and LGBTQ+ relatives, especially our youth, in light of recent disparaging and damaging comments made by a highly visible Native influencer. The significance of these comments arising during Pride Month is not lost on us. At a time when we come together to celebrate the visibility, diversity and endurance of the 2S/LGBTQ+ community, we are reminded that we still have a long way to go to achieve true equity and justice for our 2S/LGBTQ+ friends, family and community members. SUNN’s core values are respect and leadership rooted in love, compassion, courage, accountability and humility. We ask our cis-straight Native friends, relatives and allies to call out attitudes and behaviors that continue to cause harm to the 2S/LGBTQ+ community and to hold those around us...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Thursday, May 6, 2021 The strength and resilience of Native values: Seattle’s urban Native community confronts COVID-19 and looks to the future SEATTLE, Thursday, May 6, 2021 – It’s been a little more than a year since COVID-19 upended the world. Now, members of Seattle’s urban Native community are speaking out about how their organizations and communities coped with COVID by affirming and practicing traditional Native values, as well as what they see for the future. The public is invited to join Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits (SUNN) collaborative on Wednesday, May 12, from 1 – 2:30 p.m. to celebrate the return of light and warmth, healing and renewal, as local Native leaders share traditions, songs, reflections and insights from a year of upheaval and change. The event will be held on Zoom, and registration is free: https://bit.ly/3xSStYX See the event information here: https://fb.me/e/564VmxIK5 The SUNN collaborative currently includes 12 Native-led and...

HERE COMES THE SUNN - A Renewal of Native Unity. We invite everyone to this community event. When: Wednesday, May 12th 1:00pm – 2:30pm PST Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/7716110931?pwd=ZWN0eXBPL21ab1BCaUxKZEdPb0xDUT09 Meeting ID: 771 611 0931 Passcode: HCTSUNN All are welcome to celebrate the season of light and warmth, healing and renewal, with Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits (SUNN) collaborative. Join SUNN members for an afternoon of song and tradition, reflection and insight, as they look both back and forward. Find out how Seattle-King County’s Native-led nonprofits and the Indigenous communities they serve met the challenges of the past year by affirming and practicing core Native values, including a deeply shared sense of community responsibility. Hear from SUNN members how these core values helped them individually and collectively navigate the rapidly evolving circumstances of COVID-19. The SUNN collaboration represents a renewal of Native unity in the Greater Seattle area. In keeping with our values all are...

For Immediate Release Thurs, 04/01/2021 Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits www.seattleurbannatives.org Contact: sunn.outreach@gmail.com SEATTLE —Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits (SUNN) stand in solidarity with our Asian American allies with a commitment to strengthen our coalitions in unity against Anti-Asian racism. As a Native-led collaborative, we write to express our community's outrage against the tragic murders in Atlanta, Georgia, on March 16, 2021. We acknowledge the pain, fear, and sadness that so many of our Asian relatives feel and we want you to know that you are not alone. We stand with you and hold space for the grief of this moment. Out of respect for the families and community, we are not listing their names. We extend our hearts to the victims and families of this tragedy. We stand beside you in the fight against racist and gender-based violence. We are with you. We see you. Anti-Asian racism is not new. Propaganda has fueled...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 1, 2021 SEATTLE, March 1, 2021 – The Seattle Urban Native Nonprofit collaborative announces the launch of its new website at www.seattleurbannatives.org. The purpose of SUNN is to convene and strengthen Native-led organizations throughout Seattle-King County to build collective power through dialog, education, action, and advocacy. The region is home to a thriving a vibrant Native community encompassing a rich blend of Tribal cultures, multi-generational families, and individuals with myriad talents and professions. “Our website will be just one of the public faces of our organization,” said Cleora Hill-Scott, Potlatch Fund's executive director.  “As such, it will be an important resource for both the Native population in Seattle as well as a way for the public to get to know us, and we’re very excited to share it with the community.” Currently, twelve member organizations comprise SUNN. They include Chief Seattle Club, Duwamish Tribal Services, Indigenous...

February 9, 2021 Dear Seattle Public Schools Board Members, We would like to join the efforts of the Clear Sky Youth Leadership Council, an inspirational cadre of dedicated Indigenous youth leaders with the motto “Empowerment through Education, Culture, and Tradition,” to support a youth-led effort to uphold Seattle Public Schools’ commitment to equity and inclusion by formally adopting March 9 as Billy Frank Jr. Day. The Billy Frank Jr. Day Resolution calls for designating March 9 as a day of remembrance, celebration, and recognition of the life, legacy, and achievements of Billy Frank Jr. (Nisqually Nation). Billy Frank Jr., 1931-2014, was a courageous advocate for tribal treaty rights in the Northwest. He is remembered for his leadership role in gaining fishing rights for Native people when treaties were being ignored by the U.S. government. First arrested as a teenager in 1945 for “illegally” fishing on the Nisqually River,...

Seattle WA, June 3, 2020 On behalf of the organizations that make up Seattle Urban Native Nonprofits, we express our resolute support for the Metropolitan Urban Indian Directors (MUID), and the communities you serve, in the pursuit of justice for George Floyd, and all people of color, who have been victims of the Minneapolis Police Department. We stand in solidarity with Black Lives Matter. We denounce anti-blackness and settler colonialism. We recognize the power of Black and Indigenous solidarity to honor intersectional identities in our collective liberation. Although we are more than 1,500 miles away, the grave injustice of the brutal police killing of George Floyd is deeply emblematic of the thousands of people that continue to be subjected to police brutality in our communities since colonization. We bear witness to this trauma experienced by your community in the past few days, and long before now. We know...