Photos by Danny Ngan. Check out more fabulous pics here, and feel free to share them with credit.
Our Executive Director Kirk Hovenkotter likes to say that ‘Coalition’ is the most important word in TCC’s name. Last Friday, our coalition showed up in force for Tuxes & Trains: The Art of Mobility! Our 2024 fundraising gala was a huge success, thanks to our community of collaborators and supporters. Read on for a few highlights, photos, and exciting updates announced publicly at the event.
More than 300 people joined us at the gorgeous Seattle Art Museum for an evening of celebration and community-building. The evening featured a live jazz band (Doughboy); DJ Toya B; an art-making station; our Hall of Fame awards; inspiring videos, and stirring remarks from Kirk, King County Executive Dow Constantine, and Lisa Brown, Mayor of Spokane.
We celebrated a fantastic year for transit, with projects that we helped win at the ballot years ago finally coming to fruition. We also heard about what’s at stake for transportation right now. We can preserve critical funding for transit, paratransit, and Youth Ride Free this November by voting NO on Initiative 2117. We can invest in safe, equitable, and sustainable transportation by passing Proposition 1 in Seattle. And we can fund a safety megaproject to improve our state’s most dangerous roads in the coming legislative session.
We also recognized the 2024 Transportation Choices Hall of Fame inductees: Mayor Lisa Brown of Spokane, the Transit Safety Officers at Whatcom Transportation Authority, and the Week Without Driving. What an incredible group of transportation advocates! Read more about these transportation champions and how they’re helping more people access safe, equitable, and sustainable transportation here.
In total, we raised $255,025, exceeding our goal of $250,000! A huge THANK YOU to everyone who helped make this possible: our sponsors, in particular our Title Sponsor Expedia, and each and every one of you who attended the event, donated, bought raffle tickets, or participated in our online auction. We were particularly thrilled about the enthusiastic participation in the “Raise the Paddle” portion of the program. Thank you to everyone who stepped up with a gift and to our extraordinary emcee and fundraising auctioneer, Sasha Summer Cousineau, for helping to make this important fundraiser a success! If you didn’t get a chance to give, you can still donate today to help fuel our work.
Finally, we shared the exciting news that McKenna Lux has been promoted to Deputy Director, and Katy Ricchiuto will be TCC’s next Policy Director. McKenna has served brilliantly as our Events & Engagement Manager since 2021. If you have enjoyed Tuxes & Trains over the last four years, it is in large part thanks to McKenna. Katy was the Policy and Public Space Director at the U-District Partnership. If you’ve enjoyed the transformed streetscape in the U-District, it is thanks to Katy’s work.
Huge thanks to everyone — including the Transportation Choices Coalition staff and board, Synchronicity events team, the Seattle Art Museum staff, our amazing volunteers, and so many others — who helped make Tuxes & Trains 2024: The Art of Mobility such a resounding success.
We can’t wait to celebrate with you next year at Tuxes & Trains 2025!
