Seattle rolls out $1.7M grocery plan including security funding to thwart shoplifting — but will it reach Capitol Hill and the Central District?

(Image: Lam’s Seafood Asian Market)

Seattle will spend $1.7 million in an effort to support grocery stores including a new Office of Economic Development program that will offer one-time facility and facade upgrade grants to grocers powered by Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design standards and Seattle Police Department crime data.

The boost for “local neighborhood grocery stores” is a last minute rollout for Mayor Katie Wilson’s administration of an item from last year’s budget debate as City Hall is preparing to dig in on its new 2027 spending plan. In 2025, West Seattle council rep Rob Saka pushed for the spending over concerns of food deserts taking shape in the city including in Delridge, South Park, and Georgetown in Saka’s district. Seattle was “not gonna bodega our way out of this” when large supermarket chains pull out, Saka said last year.

The $1.7 million might end up being spread pretty thinly. The plan announced this week directs resources across three core areas:

• Market Analysis: The Independent Grocers Alliance will study grocery retail conditions across eight Seattle neighborhoods to assess market demand and create an “attraction strategy” to draw new grocers into underserved areas. Those eight neighborhoods were not identified in the announcement.
• Technical Assistance and Grants: A cohort of 10 independently owned grocery stores will receive one year of operational consulting from IGA alongside funding for capital improvements, with priority given to legacy markets in underserved communities
• Storefront Security Funding: A new program to provide funding for security and design upgrades for grocers suffering high rates of shoplifting

The city says the effort will build on an initial pilot with Lam’s Seafood Asian Market where city permitting help and security funding enabled the long-standing business to reactivate a Rainier Valley grocery site that had sat vacant for eight years.

It is unclear how the Central District and Capitol Hill would fit into the effort. For now, Capitol Hill has maintained a steady roster of big chain grocery options including multiple QFC and Safeway stores within walking distance of the area’s most densely populated blocks. Those crime-plagued stores could be first in line for storefront security relief, however.

In the Central District, fears of food deserts hit a little more closely to home. While the 22nd and Madison Safeway serves the surrounding area, and a PCC and Grocery Outlet support neighborhoods up and down the Union core, the abrupt closure last year of the Amazon Fresh at 23rd and Jackson has left southern reaches around Jackson with an uncertain grocery future.

A new PCC is opening in the area — but the Madison Valley store is more positioned to serve the wealthy nearby areas stretching to the shores of Lake Washington.

The city will finalize merchant cohort selections, target neighborhoods, and grant distribution guidelines in the coming months.

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