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ABOUT KATIE

Katie has spent her career fighting for working families, building powerful coalitions, and winning major policies that put money in people’s pockets and improve their daily lives:

  • Built a coalition that won King County’s commitment to improving public transit access for low-income riders, then served on the Low-Income Fare Options Advisory Committee, playing a central role in designing the ORCA LIFT program that now serves tens of thousands of low-income riders across our region.

  • Built coalitions that improved or initiated many other transit access programs, including the Human Services Bus Ticket Program and the Seattle Youth ORCA Program that eventually inspired the successful push to make transit free for youth statewide.

  • Played an instrumental role in designing and passing the JumpStart Seattle Payroll Expense Tax on large corporations, which prevented devastating budget cuts during the COVID-19 pandemic and in last year’s budget process, and is funding thousands of units of affordable housing.

  • Led campaigns that raised the minimum wage in Tukwila, Burien, and unincorporated King County, establishing the highest minimum wage in the nation and also giving part-time workers greater access to full-time work.

  • Led campaigns that won stronger renter protections, including longer notice of rent increases, caps on move-in fees and late fees, and more in jurisdictions including Seattle, Kenmore, Kirkland, Redmond, Burien, SeaTac, and Shoreline.

  • Served on the Seattle Revenue Stabilization Workgroup and co-authored an extensive report on local progressive tax options, work which has unfortunately been shelved by the current administration.

Achievements

Bio

Katie Wilson is the co-founder and executive director of the Transit Riders Union (TRU), a democratic membership organization that has become a powerful voice for working people across Seattle and King County. Since founding TRU in 2011, Katie has led the organization for well over a decade, directing hundreds of thousands of volunteer and staff hours toward winning successful campaigns for better transit, higher wages, stronger renter protections, and more affordable housing.

Through her leadership of TRU, Katie has built and managed large, multi-partner coalitions to secure the transformative victories described on this page. These wins were made possible by Katie’s deep commitment to community organizing, coalition-building, and strategic advocacy.

Katie brings the experience Seattle needs in its next mayor. She has spent years listening to ordinary people’s experiences in communities throughout the city, leading research teams and surveys to understand real needs around transit, housing, and work, and collaborating with diverse stakeholders to write, pass, and implement legislation. She’s led public outreach campaigns, authored articles and reports, hired talented staff, trained and coordinated hundreds of volunteers, and worked side-by-side with local nonprofits, labor unions, elected officials, and staff across City and County departments to make change happen.

Before founding TRU, Katie graduated salutatorian of her high school class in Binghamton, New York and studied physics and philosophy at Oxford University. She arrived in Seattle in 2004 and worked a wide range of jobs to make ends meet: barista, lab tech, laborer, boatyard worker, apartment manager, legal assistant, and more. These early experiences grounded her in the everyday realities of working people and shaped her lifelong commitment to improving people’s lives.

Katie has also written extensively on local policy and politics as a columnist for publications including Crosscut (now Cascade PBS), PubliCola, The Urbanist, and The Stranger.

 

When she's not organizing or writing, Katie enjoys exploring Seattle’s great parks and playgrounds with her daughter, riding our public transit system, losing herself in a book (or, more realistically these days, an audiobook), and being a superfan of her husband’s homemade pizza.

 

'“Everything TRU has achieved has been possible because we built strong coalitions,” says Katie. “Leadership is not about one person or one organization. It’s about bringing together competent, motivated people around a shared vision, being smart about strategy, making hard choices when necessary, and getting results. That approach will guide my administration in City Hall.”

Achievements

Katie Wilson has spent her career fighting for working families, building powerful coalitions and winning major victories that put money in people’s pockets and improve their daily lives:

  • Led campaigns that raised the minimum wage in Tukwila, Burien, and unincorporated King County, establishing the highest minimum wage in the nation and also giving part-time workers greater access to full-time work.

  • Led campaigns that won stronger renter protections, including longer notice of rent increases, caps on move-in fees and late fees, and more in jurisdictions including Seattle, Kenmore, Kirkland, Redmond, Burien, SeaTac, and Shoreline.

  • Played an instrumental role in designing and passing the JumpStart Seattle Payroll Expense Tax on large corporations, which prevented devastating budget cuts during the COVID-19 pandemic and in last year’s budget process, and is funding thousands of units of affordable housing.

  • Served on the Seattle Revenue Stabilization Workgroup and co-authored an extensive report on local progressive tax options, work which has unfortunately been shelved by the current administration.

  • Built a coalition that won King County’s commitment to improving public transit access for low-income riders, then served on the Low-Income Fare Options Advisory Committee, playing a key role in designing the ORCA LIFT program that now serves tens of thousands of low-income riders across our region.

  • Built coalitions that improved or initiated other transit access programs, including the Human Services Bus Ticket Program, the Subsidized Annual Pass Program, and the Seattle Youth ORCA Program that eventually inspired the successful push to make transit free for youth statewide.

Katie Bench fam 2
Katie and Fam

Bio

Katie Wilson is the co-founder and executive director of the Transit Riders Union (TRU), a democratic membership organization that has become a powerful voice for working people across Seattle and King County. Since founding TRU in 2011, Katie has led the organization for well over a decade, directing hundreds of thousands of volunteer and staff hours toward winning successful campaigns for better transit, higher wages, stronger renter protections, and more affordable housing.

Through her leadership of TRU, Katie has built and managed large, multi-partner coalitions to secure the transformative victories described on this page. These wins were made possible by Katie’s deep commitment to community organizing, coalition-building, and strategic advocacy.

Katie brings the experience Seattle needs in its next mayor. She has spent years listening to ordinary people’s experiences in communities throughout the city, leading research teams and surveys to understand real needs around transit, housing, and work, and collaborating with diverse stakeholders to write, pass, and implement legislation. She’s led public outreach campaigns, authored articles and reports, hired talented staff, trained and coordinated hundreds of volunteers, and worked side-by-side with local nonprofits, labor unions, elected officials, and staff across City and County departments to make change happen.

Before founding TRU, Katie graduated salutatorian of her high school class in Binghamton, New York and studied physics and philosophy at Oxford University. She arrived in Seattle in 2004 and worked a wide range of jobs to make ends meet: barista, lab tech, laborer, boatyard worker, apartment manager, legal assistant, and more. These early experiences grounded her in the everyday realities of working people and shaped her lifelong commitment to improving people’s lives.

Katie has also written extensively on local policy and politics as a columnist for publications including Crosscut (now Cascade PBS), PubliCola, The Urbanist, and The Stranger.

 

When she's not organizing or writing, Katie enjoys exploring Seattle’s great parks and playgrounds with her daughter, riding our public transit system, losing herself in a book (or, more realistically these days, an audiobook), and being a superfan of her husband’s homemade pizza.

 

'“Everything TRU has achieved has been possible because we built strong coalitions,” says Katie. “Leadership is not about one person or one organization. It’s about bringing together competent, motivated people around a shared vision, being smart about strategy, making hard choices when necessary, and getting results. That approach will guide my administration in City Hall.”

Katie Senior OTS
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