Friday, November 19, 2010

Sunshine Garden Funding Restored!

Last Friday, the Seattle City Council announced highlights of the anticipated 2011-2012 City budget, which will be formally adopted on November 22nd. Funding was restored to a number of human services and community centers that were facing cuts, including the City funding for Sunshine Garden. Thank you to our many community supporters! All the petitions signed and online comments left for the City Council truly made a difference in the lives of our seniors.

You can read more about the budget at the City Council website.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Reaching Out to Victims of Human Trafficking


CISC’s Crime Victims Project Director Alan Lai gave a presentation in a press conference at the Attorney General’s office this past Tuesday. Alan was responsible for the Chinese translation of a new poster to be widely used throughout the city that aims to aid victims of human trafficking abuses. At the conference, he mentioned that some victims of human-trafficking are hesitant to come forward because of cultural mistrust of the government; the groups behind this poster hope it will encourage more people to ask for help.

For the full Seattle Times article about the poster initiative, please use the link below:

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Efforts to Save Sunshine Garden

As many of our supporters know, the City of Seattle cut its funding for the Sunshine Garden Senior Day Care program from the 2011 budget. Our Sunshine Garden staff has been working with many community supporters and volunteers to collect signatures supporting the restoration of Sunshine Garden's funding (see our Facebook page). The support has been overwhelming! They collected more than 2,400 signatures from the community, with 7 local businesses helping to collect signatures and more than 60 votes and many comments of support on a City Council website for submitting ideas from the community.

CISC staff also made a 5 minute presentation at the City Council budget hearing on October 26th, with the help of a family member of a client. The final budget will not be adopted until November 22nd, so there is still time for the City Council to reconsider the decision to cut Sunshine Garden's funding.

As a former Sunshine Garden worker commented on the City Council website, "From my working experience, I can tell you that all the Chinese elderly treat the center as their second home in US. In the center, they can find their sense of belonging, friendship, care and support. Without the center, they have no where to go to seek support."

To learn more, please contact Andes at andesk@cisc-seattle.org or 206.624.5633 x 4121.

Update on 11/12: To watch the video of the budget hearing, click here. The Sunshine Garden presentation is during 200:06-205:17 of the video. 

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Staff Retreat

CISC held a staff retreat at the end of October to do some serious brainstorming in the morning about what CISC is as an organization, and what we want to be in the future. The afternoon, however, was a little less serious: line dancing and self-defense classes. It's good to get a little exercise after a long week at the office.

Tuesday, November 09, 2010

Halloween at Sunshine Garden


The seniors at Sunshine Garden had some special visitors this Halloween: a trick-or-treating CISC preschool class, and some students from Lakeside School to help them carve... well, not pumpkins, actually. Take a close look and you'll notice that they are carving oranges. Halloween, Sunshine Garden style.