At Seattle Department of Neighborhoods, we make it a priority to work with Women and Minority Owned Businesses (WMBE). Through our WMBE contracts and purchases, we support businesses that are state-certified or self-identified as being at least 51% owned by people of color and/or women. We will be sharing the amazing work of some of these businesses in this new quarterly profile series.
La Roxay Productions (LRP) is a consulting agency centered on BIPOC healing and liberation, with a powerful origin story.
“In its purest and most vulnerable form, LRP exists because of an angry young child, an angry teenager, and angry young adult. Angry that my educators didn’t look like me, angry that I was growing up in poverty, angry that I didn’t have books or art or artists that looked like me. I did not see my truth reflected in the world around me. LRP is an intentional, purposeful decision and action to change, influence and challenge this reality for so many in my Community.”
Roxana Pardo Garcia, Owner – La Roxay Productions
This March, Seattle Department of Neighborhoods contracted with LRP to curate the Latinx COVID-19 Healing and Education Project, an ambitious multi-day event merging art-making, personal testimonies about COVID and the vaccine, and resources from health professionals. A collaboration with two other Latinx women-owned businesses, Samara Almonte of Raíces Verdes and Val Gonzalez of Fuego and Soul Productions, the project culminated in an art showing and community health vaccination clinic at El Mercadito, the regular public farmers market in South Park.
Seattle Department of Neighborhoods is guided by the belief that community holds the power to forge their own solutions, and Roxana Pardo Garcia’s work exemplifies that belief. When asked to name one of her proudest accomplishments, Garcia told us about Alimentando al Pueblo, a collective response to her community’s food insecurity, stress, and isolation that had only been intensified by the pandemic. The collaborative organized regular community food drives of culturally relevant food, distributing 6,300 boxes of produce and non-perishable items to over 1,100 families in their first year. By mid-2021, the project had grown into its own non-profit organization with a mission to “promote healing through comunidad, comida, and celebración.” Read Alimentando al Pueblo’s 2021 Annual Report to learn more about their work.
In addition to their work with the City of Seattle, La Roxay Productions has contracted with King County’s Communities of Opportunity initiative, the City of Burien, and numerous universities and high schools across the country to deliver workshops, strategic advising, and training.
For more inspiration, please visit their website at laroxay.com.
La Roxay Productions is registered as a Women Minority Business Enterprise (WMBE) in the City’s Online Business Directory.