Letter From the Seattle CityClub Team
Dear Community Members,
For four decades, this community has kept our region strong and resilient. Surpassing mere politics, your involvement with Seattle CityClub helps bring together experts and elected officials to bridge to solutions. Consider how:
CityClub leads the way in forging the space for respectful, productive debate. In accord with our long standing dedication to passionate nonpartisanship, we help guarantee access to elected officials. We also seek to be a national model for civil, publicly-accessible debates.
CityClub looks to the future. This year, CityClub Youth Leadership will again take focus and be incorporated into a number of our initiatives. The opportunity we give our youth now lays the foundation for a stronger democracy tomorrow.
CityClub evolves with our community. Our online civic programming has served millions of community members across our core areas of work. Even after our events returned to in-person, we continued to offer important digital inroads to civics.
There has never been a better time to get involved in local civics and democracy than today. We hope to see you at an event soon!
Sincerely,
The Seattle CityClub Team
Annual Impact & Looking Ahead
Curious what your support to Seattle CityClub did over the past two years? Here’s your briefing – plus a tour of archived programs.
Empowering Voters
Legislative Preview, Washington State Debate Coalition, and Public Forums
In 2023 and 2024, we hosted our annual Legislative Preview events, where we provided opportunities for the public to meet the top two Republican and Democratic Washington State legislators from the Senate and House, hear their priorities for the upcoming legislative session and ask them questions.
In 2023 and 2024, we also convened the Washington State Debate Coalition (WSDC). This statewide coalition of civic organizations, journalists and media executives produces free, publicly-accessible, live-streamed and live-broadcasted, local and state-wide debates, reaching hundreds of thousands of people. Media partners include Converge Media, Cascade/PBS, FOX13, KING5, KIRO Radio, KOMO news, KUOW, Rainier Avenue Radio, the Washington State Standard, TVW and the Seattle Times.
In 2023, we coordinated four Seattle City Council debates (districts 1, 3, 4 and 5) in each respective district, partnering with University of Washington and Seattle Colleges to host the events, and Comcast and GSBA to sponsor them.
In the spring of 2024, Seattle CityClub organized a public forum at City Hall for the open council seat for position 8, attracting over 100 participants to hear from the eight candidates running for that city-wide position.
In the fall of 2024, Seattle CityClub once again convened the WSDC to run three debates: Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI), Seattle City Council Position 8, and Washington State Attorney General. We partnered with Seattle Colleges and Edmonds Center for the Arts and coordinated with the Spokesman Review to help co-sponsor Senate and Congressional District 5 debates in Eastern Washington.
In November, immediately after the election, we partnered with Civic Commons, Civic Genius and Leadership Tomorrow to co-produce a Public Forum at Town Hall Seattle called “From Me to We: A Post Election Evening of Community and Action” to help participants process the election results and get inspired to get involved in their community. Seattle CityClub’s Board meets regularly to advance our strategic, multi-year initiatives and reinforce our commitment to provide accessible voter education through debates, civic cocktails and collaborative community programs.
Informing Leaders
Civic Field Trip (Civic Boot Camp) & Resource Guides
In 2023, we coordinated three Civic Field Trips (Civic Boot Camps) focusing on transportation accessibility in our region, including one virtual panel with the top leaders from transportation agencies, one in-person tour of the Northgate and Lynnwood Transit centers and one in-person neighborhood tour in Rainier Beach focusing on pedestrian and local transit access.
In 2023 and 2024, we partnered with the Gates Foundation to offer in-depth, day-long, experiential learning programs on topics including volunteer engagement, educational equity, immigration, civic engagement, and international public health. We’ve also expanded the scope of these programs to include digital Resource Guides that include recent articles, podcasts, websites, videos and other inroads to civics.
In 2025 we plan to continue our partnership with Gates Foundation to offer up to three more Civic Field Trips, and build on our existing model to reach other audiences and organizations.
Advancing Dialogue across Differences
Year in Review & Civic Cocktail
Seattle CityClub’s Year in Review program is our annual deep dive into the past year’s headlines with a panel of local leaders and change-makers. Each year, we convene this lively and informal discussion to hear from a variety of panelists about their choices for the top local and national headlines for the year, the impact on our region and what they predict will happen in the following one. In 2023, we heard from Dow Constantine, County Executive, King County, Jon Scholes, President and CEO, Downtown Seattle Association, Alesha Washington, President and CEO, Seattle Foundation, Sam Cho, President, Port of Seattle Commission and Shasti Conrad, Chair, Washington State Democrats.
Seattle CityClub’s Civic Cocktail program is our longest-running, signature series of events, highlighting critical community issues featuring diverse perspectives from elected and community leaders. In 2023, our Civic Cocktails highlighted Black history month, Women’s History Month, sports and community, a one-on-one with Mayor Harrell, emergency preparedness, and affordability in Seattle.
In 2024, we coordinated Civic Cocktails to respond to current events and emerging technology. Topics included misinformation and cyber security, the promise and peril of artificial intelligence, youth civic engagement, mental health awareness, civil dialogue and election integrity.
In 2025 we will continue our community-based civic engagement work by offering a full calendar Civic Cocktails. In all we do, we will center diverse speakers, model civil discourse, offer accessible and welcoming access to all.
Engaging Youth
Civically Engaged Youth Council
Serving and involving young community members has been a CityClub tradition for decades, but 2024 was a year of growth for youth civic engagement. Early in the year we formed the Civically Engaged Youth Council (CEYC) and offered youth speakers an opportunity to craft an evening of civic engagement entirely focused on youth leadership and youth-sourced topics.
In 2025, we plan to continue youth engagement through opportunities to highlight their perspectives and priorities.
Re-Engage
From polarizing Supreme Court rulings and healthcare to student loan forgiveness and an uncertain economy, the civic landscape can seem unsettling at times. At Re-Engage, Seattle CityClub posed topical questions, including: what actions can we–at the state and local level–take to ensure a fair and balanced democratic process?
Re-Engage featured a two-part event program. Guests were invited to take part in fascinating conversations, gain valuable insight from local experts, and connect with fellow civic enthusiasts. The first Re-Engage program featured a keynote speech from travel guru Rick Steves, while the second program welcomed entrepreneur Jonathan Sposado.
2023 Financials
For 2023 and 2024, Seattle CityClub’s budget was just under $500,000. Please see the charts below for a snapshot of our income and expense categories.
In 2024, Seattle City added additional programs, including a City Council Forum and post-election collaborative event.
Thank you to our Partners!
Thank you to our many individual donors and volunteers who make Seattle CityClub possible!
Thank you to our 2023 and 2024 Board members
Eric Berlinberg
Carla Carrell
Ajay Chakrapani
Michael Cheever
Cameron Cloar-Zavaleta
Liz Findley (Secretary)
Andrew Gabel (Treasurer)
Eric Garcia
Chris Guizlo
Karin Huelsbeck
Jill Jackson (President)
Sean La Marr
Andrew Stevens
Jay Yovanovich
Jaki Brophy
Mikkell Jackson Roeland
Thank you to our Corporate Partners
Thank you to our Media Partners
