Central District's Africatown Plaza affordable housing opens

Africatown Plaza affordable housing project opens in Central District

A major new affordable housing development finally opens in Seattle's Central District. We talk with project leaders and community members about what it means for the neighborhood.

SEATTLE - If you drive through Seattle’s Central District, you might pass by the Africatown Plaza building. It’s a nod to culture and history and building up a community in more ways than one.

"It’s a start, we still have a lot of work to do, but this is an important milestone for the community and the city," Rico Quirindongo, City of Seattle Office of Planning and Community Development Director said.

Africatown Plaza consists of 126 affordable apartments in Seattle’s Central District neighborhood. It is affordable housing for families and individuals earning up to 60% of the area median income, but the building is also a symbol of community empowerment.

Africatown Plaza in Seattles Central District

"[This is] Proof that we can go from losing ground to holding ground, to breaking ground to gaining ground and knowing that we still have a lot of ground to cover to get us back to where we were and beyond," K. Wyking Garrett, President and CEO of Africatown Community Land Trust said to the crowd.

Board Chair Margo Jones told FOX 13, the new development is about community organizations working together so they can provide a stable foundation for generations to come.

"For my children, my children’s children and their children’s children," Jones said. "We need to bring people back home to central Seattle, people have been displaced because of gentrification, they’ve been displaced because of high rent costs."

Whitney Lewis is one of the architects who worked on the building.

"This building was my baby and now I’m expecting a baby," Lewis said. "For me it was refreshing and reassuring to come on to the site and see people who look like me."

On Saturday, people of all ages gathered for the grand opening of Africatown Plaza.

"A project like this is really critical because it’s an opportunity to provide black families a place to be, to raise their families, to celebrate culture and not get pushed out," Quirindongo said.

"To be able to walk by and tell my future child, ‘Hey this is what your mother did and what she did with the community’ because that was the most important thing for all of us in this endeavor, I will never forget it, it is something that will leave an indelible mark on me," Lewis said.

You can find out more about AfricaTown Plaza and how to apply here.