On a Wednesday night outdoors the Renton Excessive College Performing Arts Heart, chants stuffed the air: “Homes, not ballfields!” “You displace considered one of us, you displace all of us!” It’s not a typical scene in Renton, a suburb south of Seattle the place civic engagement is normally muted, native College Board elections are sometimes uncontested and Metropolis Council election turnouts are low. However that evening, residents from throughout Renton confirmed as much as the College Board assembly with a protest, petition and public feedback to make a easy demand: accountability.
In a time when religion in American democracy is waning, what’s taking place in Renton affords a uncommon glimpse of democratic hope: odd individuals organizing, mobilizing and fascinating within the civic course of to face in solidarity with their neighbors.
This story begins in 1968, when the Renton College District seized the land of the Houston household — one of many few Black households within the space to personal property — by eminent area. The district by no means constructed a center college, because it had promised. As a substitute, it bought the land and turned a revenue, whereas the Houston household was left struggling.
Fifty-five years later, historical past is repeating itself. The district is once more invoking eminent area, this time to pressure out longtime residents and small-business house owners to primarily construct ball fields and a parking zone when there’s already a stadium close by for pupil athletes.
The households being displaced embody a lady who volunteered within the district for 20 years, retirees who can not afford to relocate and immigrants for whom English will not be a primary language. The justification for this growth? A 2022 bond measure that voters accepted to “present protected, fashionable amenities to reinforce studying.” However ball fields and a parking zone don’t fulfill that promise.
In 1968 nobody mobilized, so why are individuals doing so now?
As a result of this time, the households aren’t alone. A member of South Renton Connection, a neighborhood group on the opposite aspect of city, informed us residents had been being displaced. She then related me to the North Renton Neighborhood Affiliation, the place I met others equally knowledgeable and outraged. We pooled our data about eminent area and the board plans, displaced individuals’s tales, alternate options that might enhance the varsity and save properties, and what management ought to appear like in our neighborhood.
Phrase continued to unfold. An area enterprise proprietor acquired others to signal a letter to the College Board in solidarity with the residents and companies. New teams shaped, akin to For a Higher Renton, which introduced collectively individuals with the mission of holding Renton public officers accountable. This group launched me to John Houston, who informed me his story. Throughout Renton, neighbors started organizing — sharing sources, petitioning, canvassing, holding teach-ins about civic literacy and collectively pursuing politics that persuade elected officers to be conscious of their constituents.
What emerged was a imaginative and prescient of democracy typically romanticized however hardly ever practiced: one the place individuals put probably the most susceptible first and work collectively, regardless of variations in opinion, to construct various options that care for everybody. We aren’t simply attempting to cease an growth plan. We are attempting to remodel how energy operates in our neighborhood.
This isn’t politics as efficiency. That is politics as collective care.
We all know that we could not reach reversing the district’s use of eminent area. However that doesn’t imply we do not make progress. Houston efficiently advocated for a invoice signed into regulation final month, the Houston Eminent Area Equity Act (SB 5142), that prohibits college boards from making a revenue from eminent area. The following step is guaranteeing our public officers use these instruments with care after which holding them accountable once they misuse it to hurt the neighborhood. We all know that it doesn’t matter what occurs, we’re constructing — new political constructions, civic networks and expectations that can make our democracy extra responsive, extra consultant and extra simply. That’s value preventing for.
In an period when People are informed that democracy’s survival hinges on one election or one chief, Renton’s story reminds us that democracy begins at dwelling. It begins in how we deal with one another, how we present up for each other and the way we maintain public officers accountable. If we fail to do this, we’ll proceed to see democracy falter — one displacement, one silence, one forgotten neighborhood at a time.
The query isn’t whether or not democracy could be saved. The query is: Will you combat for it?
