About Us
Our work
Working Washington is building worker power and winning the fight against wealthy corporations. We’re a statewide organizing home for the multiracial workers movement growing across all sectors. Through education and legal services, we raise wages, labor standards, and respect for all of us.
Our strategic narratives shift the debate about what workers deserve, building our political power to win a democracy rooted in economic and racial justice.
Psst, we are not a union
We’re not a union and we don’t unionize workplaces. We’re a grassroots movement of workers organized across diverse industries, identities, and communities. We build worker power in places where unionization may not be an available tool to improve our wages and workplaces.
Who we are
Our members
We are workers, united across different industries to improve our working conditions and our lives across Washington state. We are coming together as a multiracial community of working people, including immigrants, women, people with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ workers.
Our leadership
Danielle Alvarado,
Executive Director
Working Washington & Working Washington Rights Center
Danielle has more than a decade of experience working in movements for racial and economic justice across the country. As Executive Director, she provides leadership on organizational strategy, advocates for public policy that puts workers first, and fosters collaboration between our campaigns, legal, and education teams to build worker power in Washington state and beyond. She previously served as our Legal Director, overseeing the Legal Clinic’s efforts to recover $1.5 million in stolen wages and expanding representation of low-wage workers in wage theft, harassment, and retaliation cases.
Before coming to Working Washington & Fair Work Center, Danielle was an Immigrants’ Rights Staff Attorney at Takeroot Justice, where she provided direct representation, policy and technical assistance, and strategic campaign support to grassroots immigrants’ rights organizations and worker centers in New York City. She serves on the Board of Directors for Detention Watch Network, a national organization dedicated to ending immigration detention in the United States. She speaks Spanish, attended Whitman College and Northeastern University School of Law, and is a proud past recipient of the National Lawyers Guild C.B. King Award. Danielle is admitted to practice law in Washington and New York. When she’s not working, Danielle enjoys taking her puppy out on walks and making pottery.
What we do
We build power through education, organizing, and enforcement. We work to raise and uphold standards in the workplace. And we fight for economic and racial justice in our communities.
Our mission
Our mission is to build a powerful workers’ movement that can dramatically improve wages and working conditions, and change the local and national conversation about wealth, inequality, and the value of work.
We do this through Working Washington’s education and organizing efforts paired with enforcement from Working Washington Rights Center, our 501(c)3.
Our vision
Our vision is a democracy rooted in economic and racial justice, where everyone shares in the prosperity we create together. We see a future where all jobs are good jobs, and where all workers are respected, paid a living wage, and thriving in our workplaces and communities.
Our history
Working Washington was founded in 2011 as part of the “Fight for a Fair Economy”, guided by the vision of SEIU International’s leadership, as well the leaders and members of SEIU locals, community groups, faith organizations, and other labor unions in Washington state.
We quickly established a track record of groundbreaking successes in SeaTac, Seattle, and beyond. As many Fight for a Fair Economy campaigns came to a close, we took the bold step of diversifying our board and funding sources to achieve long-term sustainability so we could continue to unite workers to improve their working conditions.
We are a 501(c)4 nonprofit organization, and like most nonprofits we are sustained by a mix of support from foundations, unions, and individual contributions.