OUR MISSION
Friends of Historic Belltown is a community-based, non-profit corporation that works with others to increase the collective sense of place, identity, and community within one of Seattle’s oldest neighborhoods: Belltown.
OUR PRIORITIES
Priority #3: BUILDINGS
- Protect Belltown’s historic and iconic buildings
- Encourage new development to reflect, respect and enhance Belltown visual, cultural and economic character
Where it all began: the Landmarks Hearing Board Meeting–October 7, 2015 — where the Belltown community successfully argued to designate the 125-year-old Wayne Apartments on 2nd Ave as an official City Landmark.
Priority #2: BUSINESSES
- Promote local, independent and affordable businesses by promoting small, affordable commercial spaces and by identifying and cultivating profitable and socially-engaging business ideas.
- Use local knowledge and the principles of environmental psychology to identify new business models that create the feeling and functions of community.
Priority #1: BELLTOWNERS
- Sustain and support Belltown’s historic workforce culture by protecting and promoting affordable housing so that people who work downtown can afford to live downtown, including young adults and foreign-born residents
- Develop apprenticeships, small-business incubators, and other programs to help our local workforce continually develop their skills, value and earnings
- Encourage Belltowners to engage with City planners to promote Belltown character and values
- Respect and promote the continued presence and cultural values of Seattle’s first people: the Duwamish Tribe and other indigenous people
- Sustain and support ALL Belltowners — include diverse cultures, races, and
incomes; recent, long-time and future residents; young and old; rich and poor; housed and homeless; healthy and ill; intoxicated and sober; growing families and swinging singles; and everyone in between!
