❤️ Showing love for small businesses ❤️

Valentine’s Day is a busy time for Rosa María Cisneros Andrade. As the owner of RMC Floral Designs, she’s preparing lots of orders of roses, orchids, balloons, and chocolates. Helping Rosa María handle the rush is a brick-and-mortar space in Cedar Hall in the U.S. Bank Center on Fifth Avenue. Before this year, she ran her whole business out of her home. Now, she’s operating a pop-up in the ground floor space through our Seattle Restored program. The space is creating opportunities for Rosa María to grow her business. She’s learning more about owning a business, from marketing to getting a better understanding of cash flow. It’s also helping her build a community. The pop-up is scheduled through March 16. Read more about Rosa María and RMC Flora Designs’ story.

We’re also proud to celebrate Seattle’s Black-owned businesses during Black History Month and all year long. Need ideas of businesses to show some love to and support? The Intentionalist’s Spend Like It Matters campaign features Black-owned businesses in your neighborhood. Mama Row’s Caramel in Lake City. Cultural and social events that celebrate Black history like the 2026 Call to Conscience: Black History Month Museum and the Northwest African American Museum.

“A stellar example of good government!” 🤝

Our office’s film permitting program continues to receive positive feedback as the easiest to navigate in the country. We offer a $25 a day, one-stop-shop concierge film permitting coordination. Productions make one call to us; we coordinate all the details for them across all City departments and with multiple county and state agencies. In 2025, we coordinated and issued 360 Master Film Permits for productions working on City of Seattle property.

On top of making it easy to film in Seattle, we create policies and initiatives that support film industry job growth and film production attraction and retention while putting an emphasis on great customer service. When you factor in our natural and urban location beauty, Seattle is the premier film permitting program in the country.

Check out the full list of film permit data.

City and State opportunities and resources

📣 Hiring a new tech industry strategic advisor

Are you interested in developing a tech sector strategy that attracts, retains, and grows businesses? Join our team! You’ll connect stakeholders, advance initiatives that promote inclusive growth, and align workforce development with industry needs.

📅Application is due Tuesday, February 24 at 4 p.m.

Learn more and apply for the tech industry strategic advisor position.

2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup Information Session ⚽

Join the SODO business improvement area and the Seattle Local Organizing Committee, SeattleFWC26, to learn more about the plans for the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup with information specific to SODO. They’ll answer your questions about transportation, safety, opportunities to promote your business, and others.

📅Thursday, February 19, 11 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

Register for SODO's free Road to the World Cup Info Session.

💻 Training option: Using the new food permitting system

King County issues food business permits for local businesses and community feeding programs. They also review and approve construction plans for retail food businesses. The Food Safety Program is using a new system for these permits called the Public Health Permit Center. They’re offering free virtual sessions to cover how to create your account, access your permits and records, renew your food business permits, and answer questions.

📅Thursday, February 19, 4 – 5 p.m. and Monday, February 23, 9:30 – 10:30 a.m.

Register for a food permit system training.