SEATTLE — Terra Plata on Capitol Hill isn't just a spot to snag paella on Monday nights. This restaurant is one of Washington's many LGBTQ-owned businesses represented by the GSBA.
"Terra Plata has always been about a gathering space and bringing people together, and the GSBA has been emblematic of that," owner Linda Di Lello Morton says.
The GSBA, or Greater Seattle Business Association, is a business chamber for LGBTQ and allied businesses, started by nine gay business owners in 1981.
"We first started to support each other and keep that pink dollar circulating in the community," president Louise Chernin says. "And then they said, 'Hey, we have some clout. We can use that clout to address the rampant discrimination for the LGBTQ community'."
From there, the GSBA has become not online an online and paper directory of these small businesses, but an advocate for them as well.
"For us, it's about strengthening those small businesses, giving them resources, education, training," Chernin says.
Terra Plata is just one of the businesses they represent, a farm-to-table restaurant that's been a Seattle staple since 2011.
"There was a time, I think a few years after being involved in the GSBA, that I realized I had a voice, and that I didn't want to be a restaurant that just served food. I wanted to serve my community," Chef Tamara Murphy says.
A lot has changed since the GSBA's founding, but there's still work to do. Sponsors like Premera support the GSBA in other projects, like the GSBA Scholarship Fund, and Travel Out Seattle, a travel guide tailored to LGBTQ visitors.
"As a community of small businesses and restaurants, it's like, we need all the help we can get," Di Lello Morton says.
And in the midst of a pandemic, that support is more important than ever.
"I just can't imagine my life without the GSBA and what it brings to me personally," Di Lello Morton says.
Sponsored by Premera as part of KING 5 Konnected. KING 5's Evening celebrates the Northwest. Contact us: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Email.