EDMONDS — When Edmonds residents learned in late March about a proposal to sell Hummingbird Hill Park, word spread fast.
Local businesses put flyers in their windows, residents went door to door and others posted on social media.
By the next City Council meeting on April 1, the chamber overflowed with more than 200 residents showing up to save Hummingbird Hill Park and other community landmarks. Many of those residents had never attended a City Council meeting before, including one public commenter who had lived in Edmonds for 35 years.
Mobilizing the community was difficult, said Edmonds resident Chelsea Rudd, because there wasn’t a central online space for residents to have hyperlocal conversations about politics. A popular Edmonds Facebook group had banned political posts and commentary.
“We had this problem we had to solve together,” Rudd said. “We had to save our park. It became a question of how do you reach a lot of people in a short amount of time, and I think we all realized that there really wasn’t a platform that existed for us to do that.”
On April 13, Alicia Crank, director of Northwest WA Civic Circle, posted an episode of her podcast, “Edmonds This Week,” about the community effort to save the park.
“Let me just preface by saying the residents of Edmonds are activated,” Crank said.
Later that day, Edmonds Activated was born. The Facebook group — founded by Rudd and fellow Edmonds residents Kelly Haller and Cristina Teodoru — has since garnered more than 900 members.
None of the three founders had been to many City Council meetings before April, they said. Haller and Rudd met volunteering for Moms Demand Action, a grassroots gun sense group.
“I’m always involved in very specific issues like that,” Haller said, “but then ignore what the city is doing because I figured they know what they’re doing, so they can run themselves.”
As the trio became more tuned into city politics, they realized how inaccessible it can feel to the average resident who may not have time to dive into complex language.
“That also contributes to people feeling out of touch, or like they didn’t understand anything at the meeting so they won’t go to another one,” Teodoru said.
The group also aims to educate residents on the civic engagement process, including emailing council members and submitting public records requests and public comments, which can feel overwhelming for people who aren’t familiar with city systems, Teodoru said.
“It’s a seat at the table for people who often aren’t involved,” Rudd said. “Not because they don’t want to be, but because they don’t know how.”
On April 11, the trio started an Instagram account dedicated to saving Hummingbird Hill Park. It’s since grown to be another platform for Edmonds Activated, where the group posts information — and memes — about city politics. In the account’s bio lies a link to public records about the city’s discussion to sell the park that began back in February before most citizens were aware.
Making sure residents know about these resources is important to the group’s mission, Rudd said.
“I know one goal is that people feel empowered to know that this is their city,” she said. “This information belongs to them. They have a right to know it.”
In the seven years she’s lived in Edmonds, Haller said she has never seen so many residents on the same page about an issue.
“I have people on my street who are very conservative, I have some who are very liberal, and without hesitation, people came together to save the park,” Rudd said. “And I think we’re seeing that in Edmonds Activated people are willing to put aside their differences that are very evident on a federal level to come together on this community level.”
On May 3, Rudd announced her campaign for Edmonds District 1 Port Commissioner and stepped down as an administrator to keep consistent with the group’s nonpartisan mission.
“You got activated, and so did I and my family,” Rudd said in a post to the group on Saturday. “That energy of ‘let’s do something’ is still alive in you and it’s certainly alive in me.”
Mayor Mike Rosen, City Council members and other city employees are also members of the group, and the founders have met with a number of city officials in the past few weeks. Looking forward, the group hopes to host city council debates, asking “the questions that people want to know,” Rudd said. They aim to keep having productive discussions about city issues, including the budget deficit and changes to middle housing.
The group is also currently fundraising to replace the tables at Hummingbird Hill Park and dedicate them to Marty Jones, an Edmonds resident who first alerted community members about the potential sale.
“The choices we make today are going to be felt forever,” Rudd said. “We owe a debt to society and our communities to leave things better than we found them and to look out for each other. And I think, in Edmonds, that’s easy to do.”
Jenna Peterson: 425-339-3486; jenna.peterson@heraldnet.com; X: @jennarpetersonn.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
