Seattle is in a housing crisis, with affordability one of the many challenges. One couple is on a mission to build what they call “self-determined” affordable housing.
Edwin Lindo and Dr. Estell Williams took their first leap into business as founders of Estelita’s Library, which opened in Seattle’s Beacon Hill neighborhood, but is now in the Central District.
They’re raising funds for their next ambitious endeavor, a nearly $28 million project that would bring housing stability to Beacon Hill.
It’s an area that’s special to the Afro-Latino family – as it signifies a full-circle return for them.
“We started [Estelita’s] just up the street here. That was our original location, and so coming back here, we were welcomed with open arms back to this community,” Williams said while overlooking her newly acquired property.
In 2018 they opened a small social-justice community library and bookstore, inspired by their daughter Estella.
“We brought her home to the house just right around the corner over here,” Williams explained.
Seven years later, they’re birthing a new dream.
The vision: a 36- to 40-unit property large enough to accommodate families with three to four bedrooms. Williams says the vision also includes new housing for their headquarters and a curated event space for the community to use.
They aim to transform the traditional Filipino, African American and Latino community into a cultural hub with their development as the anchor.
“The name of this housing is going to be called the ‘Solidarity House’ because we are in solidarity. It’s not about picking an identity. It’s about saying, it’s for all of us,” Lindo said.
Over the summer they finalized the purchase of the former Dragon Auto Repair and Transmission property, and plan to close on the home next door to it in a month.
The land of both properties will be developed into the complex.
It will stand on a vibrant corner at Beacon Avenue South and South Forest Street, across the street from the Seattle Public Library’s Beacon Hill Branch. The couple says they already have a relationship with the branch. Over the past three years, they say, they have raised about $7 million.
They’re keenly aware of the stereotypes and biases communities of color still face when it comes to ownership. Lindo recalls an interaction they had after they purchased the former auto repair shop.
“We had an event when we first launched. There was a couple that came by. It was a white couple, and they came up to me. And they said, ‘Congratulations.’ I was like, ‘Thank you so much.’ They said, ‘It’s really nice that the owner let you do this.’ And I was like, ‘It is, because we are the owners.’ And they’re like, ‘No, no, I mean the owners of the pro .... I know you’re the owners of Estelita’s, but the owners of the property are letting you do this,’ he said.
“That speaks volumes to the fact that there are people who can’t comprehend that people who look like me and my wife, and our organization that has [Black] power fists, could own this land. We’re doing something to recalibrate the conscience of what it means to be us.”
Williams is a surgeon and Lindo a professor (who also holds a Juris Doctor) at the University of Washington School of Medicine. They’re approaching the project from a holistic perspective, informed by their backgrounds in health care.
“It goes from ‘I’m assistant dean for social health justice at the University of Washington School of Medicine’ to the organizing that we do in the community. A lot of this comes from research that says that this place, the United States of America, kills our people. And I don’t mean just figuratively. I mean by being here. No one has to do anything to you, just by being here. We have severed the connection to our ancestors, to our community, to our culture. And the data shows that folks who have immigrated to the United States have been healthier. Each generation that goes by becomes more unhealthy than the previous one in this country. Why?
“They found that you lose language, you lose traditions, you lose ceremonies. You lose the practices of elders that help you – guide [you] through birthing, through early schooling, through healing, we lose that. This place takes it away. It supplants it with fabricated foods. It supplants it with very little culture. It supplants it with the inability to connect to something that’s beyond us, in the past,” he explained.
Lindo and Williams plan to develop the land guided by a radical love for the community – the same social-justice principles that have made their library a thriving space in the Central District. Their cozy cultural refuge of a space opens its doors to classes, community author talks, guest lectures and more.
“Our skills as either doctors or professors, those are just tools in a toolbox. It is nothing special about us. It is nothing spectacular. It is nothing better than anyone else, but many people try to put that and place that on us to suggest, ‘Oh, they’re really smart, that’s why they do really well with Estelita’s.’ No. There are so many folks in our communities that are exceptional, we’ve just never given them the opportunity. And what I am saying is my ability to read a contract doesn’t make me better than Aunty or Uncle or Grandma that’s around the corner that has a dream to do something for their community,” Lindo expressed standing near a student-created mural over his shoulder in the library.
“So I don’t want it to be weaponized against other folks. What I am saying is yes, we have a skill and we are going to use it for our community.”
Before the site was Dragon Auto, it was an Exxon Mobil gas station. Lindo says it left the property contaminated. He says their $28 million funding goal includes cleanup costs and development construction.
Aware of the challenges ahead, Williams says they’re not seeking traditional funding through federal grants, which place income restrictions on tenants, but rather through city and state sources.
“We’re relying on people to use their imagination. Sometimes we can be limited by our own fears. We’ve been limited by what we have seen. What that exposure has been. I think sometimes it’s ingrained in us, especially people of color, to not believe in our own strengths,” Williams said.
They also say they want to create an opportunity for renters to become owners – if they want to. “You can believe in somebody else, and it doesn’t have to be this individualistic thing that unfortunately the U.S. breeds us to believe in. You know, you can with your whole heart invest in somebody else simply from the joy of watching them succeed,” Williams said.
“It's going to take every single one of us for this project to come to life,” Lindo said.
To learn more about Estelita’s and how you can support its work, click here.
