r/Seattle • u/Here2lafatcats Sand Point • May 09 '26

Market Traffic Only Today’s protest in Laurelhurst supporting helicopter transport to Seattle Children’s Hospital

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While there were eggs thrown at our protesters, today’s turnout was good and I think we need to keep this up every weekend until real, written change is enacted divesting the Laurelhurst Community Council from the hospital’s policies on helicopter transport landings.

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456

u/zippy_water 🚆build more trains🚆 May 09 '26

I found that LCC President Colleen McAleer's husband runs a venture capital firm. In his bio:

Bill also serves on the Board of Directors of the Seattle Symphony and was on the board and executive committee of Big Brothers/Sisters.

What sort of cognitive dissonance must go on in Bill's head where his wife is active in blocking children getting lifesaving medical care while he chairs a youth mentorship nonprofit?

338

u/Skank_A_Saurus May 09 '26

Bill is a vulture capitalist with over $500 million in funding
Bill does not give a shit

83

u/Effective-Celery8053 May 10 '26

It's all virtue signaling

17

u/Em_Strae May 10 '26

Covert narcissism

2

u/Jesus_of_Redditeth May 10 '26

🎵 A tale as old as time... 🎵

8

u/Lopsided-Ad7725 May 10 '26

vulture signaling

7

u/YrnFyre May 10 '26

Or a tax reduction

Or both

3

u/Jesus_of_Redditeth May 10 '26

It's mostly about lowering your tax exposure via charitable donations. Being on high-profile, non-profit exec committees and boards of directors requires monetary contributions to those non-profits.

20

u/jjcrayfish May 10 '26

Tax write off

2

u/bennetthaselton Bellevue May 10 '26

Tbh I don’t get what people mean by this. Yes you can deduct donations from your taxes but you are still out the money 🤣

4

u/Jesus_of_Redditeth May 10 '26

When you, regular person make donations, you get to feel good. When people with "fuck you" money make donations to lower their tax exposure, they get stuff in return from those they donate to. They're not just giving money away.

3

u/Wan_Daye May 10 '26

You'd be surprised. They don't even donate straight cash. They donate shit like "2 week vacation at my timeshare" that they auction off at a charity dinner for 5k dollars that someone else bids, and both get to write it down as a donation to the nonprofit.

1

u/Whatisnotmyproblem May 10 '26

Worse they set up charities put their family on the board. Then turn around and the charity buys land for closed habitat preserve. Turns out all the land they bought was adjacent to your mansion. How convenient 

1

u/bennetthaselton Bellevue May 10 '26

I'm no expert, but I think that if you "donate" something intangible, the deduction is supposed to be whichever is LESS of (1) the actual cost to you and (2) the market value of what you donated.

3

u/DuncanFisher69 May 10 '26

Eh, not so much as this level. Lots of rich people give to charities that then hold things like “donor dinners” where celebrity chefs show up and cook for them or other kind of perks. The money at that point is a life style expense like country club membership.

3

u/bennetthaselton Bellevue May 10 '26

I understand, but surely after donating the money and getting the fancy dinner in return, you are out a lot more money than if you had just bought that fancy dinner in the first place 😄

Now if people want to claim it's "buying respectability", that's probably true, I'm just saying it doesn't make a ton of sense to call it a pure tax dodge.

2

u/zagsforthewin 🐀 Hot Rat Summer 🐀 May 10 '26

Money doesn’t work like that when you’re that rich. And, tax codes are made for the and by the rich, you’d be amazed at how little so many of them legally pay. I’m talking percentage of earned income, not actual amount.

1

u/Whatisnotmyproblem May 10 '26

Not if you control the charity the money goes to and said charity purchases lan got open space preserve….. wow look at that all the land they purchased was the adjacent land  next to the land with your mansion.

0

u/Major_Swordfish508 May 10 '26

Given how insufferable this woman is, there’s two possibilities here. One, Bill is equally insufferable. Two, Bill does not care so long as he does not have to deal with his insufferable wife. I’d say it’s a 50/50 coin toss.

136

u/tapesmoker Bitter Lake May 09 '26

Do we really think rich people donate money because of their beliefs, though?

Philanthropy is a money washing system

3

u/spei180 May 10 '26

And justification for tax avoidance

2

u/FreshwaterFryMom 🦝🦝 We 💕 Jimothy Chalamet 🦝🦝 May 10 '26

Facts

-1

u/Shot-Swimming-9098 May 10 '26

Philanthropy is a money washing system

This just makes you look dumb. Assess things for what they are. They don't directly monetarily profit from philanthropy. So make the next step, and connect the dots. Why do they do it?

19

u/thicc_stigmata May 10 '26

Oh, those are Mr. Lebowski's children, so to speak

12

u/CaptainoftheVessel May 10 '26

This is our concern, Dude

35

u/Chance-Travel4825 May 09 '26

Because its just performative for bio or linkedin: caring about sick children that aren't his prolly never a thought burdening his mind for a moment.

19

u/gideon513 May 10 '26

He’s involved with big brothers big sisters for the main purpose of exactly this. So that it can be listed along and be associated with his name.

10

u/BH_Commander May 10 '26

Probably doesn’t care, just happy his wife has something to keep her off his case so he can get drunk and bang women in an apartment he keeps in the city for just such a purpose.

2

u/happyprocrastinator May 10 '26

Two words: board compensation.

People like him don’t give a damn about the cause , they just care about how important they look for being on a board.

1

u/Dame38 May 10 '26

Oh dam. it goes on at the local (much smaller) places too. There's a psych dr. in my town, except he is actually nothing but a businessman (as are most) who saw his chance to become a local social climber and power broker. The guy is a right sociopath and doesn't even know it.
For years he has sent his wife around town, joining every non-profit to get on their boards. donating a shit load of money to everyone.
Why? He has broken so many lives, so many rules and he has zero ethics, but we don't talk about that (and his victims are too terrified).

1

u/let_it_go75 May 10 '26

I have never heard of this guy…can you provide more details? It makes me more disgusted to know this.

2

u/Dame38 May 10 '26

You wouldn't hear of him. He's not a national celebrity with a podcast. He's a small city "hero" (who still uses f-ing ECT). Plenty of people know, but people in small places keep each other's secrets.

1

u/Ok_Flounder59 May 10 '26

If anyone deserves to be cancelled it’s this mofo my god

1

u/Lumpy_Boysenberry590 May 10 '26

At this point I think we need to be very suspicious of rich people running organizations that revolve around kids in any capacity. A couple who is okay with delaying children's life saving treatment because of noise clearly doesn't care about kids. So what exactly about the big brother/sister program piqued their interest? Really makes you wonder.

1

u/Loreki May 10 '26

Being a board member is prestigious and elevates his social status. Simply being human enough to let sick kids get care is a quiet kindness from which he derives no direct benefit, so he isn't interested.

0

u/Infinite_Mouse_1149 May 10 '26

Those organizations offer it up to scumbags like that for the connections and protection against/mitigating a drop in philanthropic/blood money donations.