3 ways you can advance No Discrimination Spokane
By Pui-Yan Lam, co-chair of No Discrimination Spokane
The No Discrimination Spokane coalition was created as a collective response to a ballot measure called Proposition 1 that would have taken away the measures under the City of Spokane Human Rights Code that protect immigrants and people of color from racial profiling based on perceived immigration status by city employees, including local law enforcement.
Thankfully, we won in court back in August 2017, and we kept winning in the court of appeals due to the expert legal defense provided by the Center for Justice. Since then, No Discrimination Spokane has also worked with other organizations to help pass the Protecting Passenger Rights for a Safer Spokane Ordinance which limits unwarranted immigration enforcement by ICE and Border Patrol. But we know that our fight for a more welcoming and equitable Spokane for immigrants and people of color is far from over.
No Discrimination Spokane is continuing to build strong coalition across a wide spectrum of Spokane. An inclusive and equitable Spokane is beneficial not only to immigrants, refugees and people of color but also vital to the economy, health and civil society of Spokane as a whole. The makeup of No Discrimination partners should reflect this. We are actively recruiting more organizations to join No Discrimination Spokane. Please let us know if you can help us recruit from the business or health sectors.
We will proactively shape Spokane’s collective narrative around immigration. We will not allow those driven by hate and fear to dictate the narrative around immigration. If you have the expertise and talents to help us reframe the public messages around immigration from a public health or an economic angle, please let us know.
We will fight to ensure that immigrants and people of color will not have to fear racial profiling and intimidation by Border Patrol when they try to ride the bus at the Intermodal Center. We are working with ACLU-WA, PJALS, Center for Justice, and other NDS member groups on that front. We will need volunteers to help carefully document Border Patrol activities. Please let us know if you would like to volunteer. We plan to hold a volunteer training in the summer.