Cascade Party
A new path in Washington State politics.
A new path in Washington State politics.
September 18, 2025 Seattle Social Housing meeting report.
By Jesse A. James (October 1, 2025)
Seattle Social Housing got their website back after it being held hostage by an ex-contractor. The investigation into CEO's alleged behavior continues. Professional public relations spin accountability.
The meeting started off swiftly, with the day’s agenda and last meeting minutes; both were approved unanimously. Board members Karen Estevenin and Treasurer Brian Abeel were absent, with seven out of nine board members present.
The board is still dealing with the investigation of alleged anti-black racism and abuse by CEO Roberto Jiménez. Board member Ryan Driscoll stated that interviews of board members regarding the matter have begun, and will continue into the next week or so. After making sure no more interviews are necessary, they will wait for an oral presentation from the private investigator.
Chair Tom Barnard then introduced a couple of guests to talk about the IT security software update. Barnard assured the technology is only there to prevent malware and bugs, and then let guests Marvin and Michael talk, but nothing politically interesting came up. No meaningful questions were asked. Kaileah Baldwin was the lone abstention to the software approval.
On September 5, CEO Jiménez announced a lawsuit filed in King County Superior Court against its former IT consultant, Andy McMaylor. According to SSH’s LinkedIn account, a hearing was scheduled for September 10. I wanted to attend the hearing, however, the case never came up on the court schedule. I even had someone with a law degree try to find anything. They couldn’t even find a case number.
A week later Jiménez wrote on LinkedIn,
After filing a lawsuit last week against a former IT vendor holding its website hostage, Seattle Social Housing has successfully restored public access to the site socialhousingseattle.org.
The lawsuit was filed in King County Superior Court against its former IT consultant, Andy McMaylor, for locking the public agency out of its own website after his services were terminated. After filing the lawsuit, the agency was able to work with its web hosting company, Wix.com, and IT consultants to create a web presence, making the need for an emergency court hearing unnecessary. The lawsuit will proceed against McMaylor. Foster Garvey PC is representing SSH in the lawsuit.
We appreciate the public’s patience as we work to launch our new web presence. We will continue to provide updates as necessary.
SSH must be aware of the bad look with their vexing governance issues and is touting accountability on their website’s front page. They have listed the Seattle City Council at the top of whom they’re accountable to.
The SSH charter reveals who this publicly-funded organization is mostly accountable to — and it’s not the city council. City government only appoints a puny three seats directly to the SSH board. It’s the Seattle Renter’s Commission (SRC), who currently directly appoint the majority of board seats. (The SSH board holds 13 positions and the SRC appoints 7 of these.)
The designers of the Seattle Social Housing initiative also baked-in political patronage by allowing organized labor and community groups to appoint board members. The charter provides:
Article VII
- (2). One member shall be a rank-and-file union member appointed by the Martin Luther King, Jr. County Labor Council, which shall also appoint replacements.
- (3). One member shall be a leader from a community organization that provides housing to marginalized communities. El Centro De La Raza shall appoint the first member to fill this position. The Board shall select replacements for this position after a public call for self-nominations.
The SRC appointed Wylie Duffy to the board. El Centro De La Raza nominated three candidates for the SSH board to consider to fill the community group position. Chris Cawthon won the appointment. These two appointees made the nasty allegations against CEO Jiménez.
Before resigning from the board in protest, Cawthon served as Treasurer and Duffy as Chair. Here is a little background on these former SSH leaders:
Cawthon co-authored an OpEd in June of 2020, South King County Policymakers Are Putting Our Lives in Danger, which captures the dominant political sentiments of that explosive summer. The article proposes to, “Defund the inefficient and deadly police infrastructure, and invest in a shared vision of community safety and investment in our community that actually works. This must be our north star.”
When Duffy's bio was up on the SSH's site, it stated they were, “dedicated to doing whatever is in their power to increase access to affordable housing and make oppressive systems obsolete.” Their 2017 bio on the Seattle Queer Filmmakers, lists Duffy as a pornographer, with "multiple corporate projects under their belt."
I know the SRC is appointed by the city council, however, this does not mean they're necessarily accountable to city leaders. The designers of Seattle Social Housing had to realize this. The politics of the Seattle Renters Commission could be a whole other article; at any rate, SRC’s role appointing SSH board members is temporary.
If any social housing is ever occupied, the SSH charter defines its tenants as a “constituency”. The majority of the board (seven out of thirteen seats) will then be elected from SSH renters.
Time will only tell what kind of leaders this exclusive — yet publicly-funded — social democracy will elect.
This segment mostly consisted of interviews Jiménez has planned with Tiffany McCoy of House Our Neighbors and working with PR consultant Pyramid Communications.
Gabriel Mendoza, who is compensated $6k per month, operates the Facebook, Instagram, and Linkedin accounts. Jiménez noted slow and steady progress in social media activity; then continued on with a recent anecdote about how he spoke at the Housing Oregon conference where he participated in three small workshops. He also said that next week he will be speaking to folks in Spokane along with their mayor, council members and affordable housing developers.
This means Seattle business taxpayers are supporting SSH leaders, and the consultants they hire, to promote the idea of social housing wherever anyone is willing to listen.
Jesse A. James lives in Seattle. He serves on Cascade Party board of directors in position 7/9. James is also a Rock musician.
(Image: Screenshot of SSH teleconference.)
