Seattle

Seattle ranks fourth globally in a new Oxford Economics index, beating San Francisco, Tokyo and Berlin on a $632 billion GDP. So why does the mayor need a sales tax hike just to expand transit?

— via The Stranger, Charles Mudede

Britney's albino python from the 2001 VMAs apparently weighed around 20 pounds then and ballooned to roughly 100 by 2016. Also inside: Gen Z's reviving "I'm a Slave 4 U," Madonna crashed her own VMAs comeback with two confused speeches, and SZA met Danny DeVito in Crocs.

— via The Stranger, Audrey Vann

Seattle's Northwest Film Forum is dropping its "dark days" and opening all seven days a week with full staff, just a year after cutting nearly half its workforce. Attendance is up 62 percent since 2024, and the nonprofit is betting the expansion keeps that growth going.

— via The Stranger, Chase Hutchinson

Seattle's police budget just topped half a billion dollars for the first time, driven mostly by a union contract, not new hires. Council centrists are calling Mayor Wilson soft on cops anyway, even as her budget funds 66 previously unfunded officers and a path to 1,250 by 2028.

— via PubliCola, ericacbarnett

The $8 million KCRHA couldn't account for? Never missing at all. A one-time ledger error explains it, officials now say, though similar mistakes could still be lurking in the books.

— via PubliCola, ericacbarnett

A Seattle cop filmed inside weapons lockers and his patrol car while promoting Chinese smart glasses with facial-recognition features state law bans for police use. He's now on leave, and SPD just banned all personal recording devices department-wide.

— via PubliCola, ericacbarnett

Fifteen people asked Governor Ferguson for mercy on his own board's recommendation. He's said yes to zero. Also today: new Amtrak Cascades cars finally ditch the ashtrays, and a Pierce County ballot measure could strip an ICE-friendly sheriff of his badge by making the job appointed.

— via The Stranger, Hunter Pauli

An open letter with nearly 400 signatures wants $8 million pulled from SPD's proposed budget hike and handed to arts groups, arguing summer World Cup arts funding helped produce Seattle's first zero-homicide June since 1970. Organizers say the real bottleneck isn't police funding but SPOG's own contract limits on the unarmed CARE responder program.

— via The Stranger, Amanda Manitach

Seattle council members spent $78 million in one-time funds last year with no repayment plan, and now they are stunned those programs disappeared from this year's budget. One yelled that ending one-time funding "is not technically a cut"; the budget director had to explain it anyway.

— via PubliCola, ericacbarnett

Five men were arrested outside a UK base tied to the Iran bombing campaign, but police haven't confirmed a motive or found explosives. Meanwhile Boeing admits a new 737 Max software flaw airlines say they're avoiding, and two PNW weekend warriors survived only because they packed backup rescue gear.

— via The Stranger, Cedar Attanasio

This week's picks: a punk trio that adds pigeons and breakbeats to distorted banjo-driven hardcore, a 1995 sapphic teen romance where nobody dies tragically, and Tricky's trip-hop landmark turning the '80s into rubble.

— via The Stranger, Julianne Bell, Todd Hamm, Amanda Manitach, Charles Mudede, Langston Thomas, and Audrey Vann

A state watchdog cleared a conservative initiative group of buying podcast support from Brandi Kruse, despite 157 flagged episodes and an ad deal tied to its own co-founders. Kruse says the complaint was never meant to win, just to bury her in bad headlines before the election.

— via The Stranger, John Stang

Robert Pattinson plays Chris Hansen as a hollow man who believes his own hype, in a horror satire about the To Catch a Predator host who became more famous than the predators he caught. It's his best work since Cosmopolis, and Merritt Wever matches him scene for scene.

— via The Stranger, Kathy Fennessy

Lily Allen turned her split from David Harbour into a full-blown stage production, complete with a Brooklyn-townhouse set, a Birkin bag dump and a live recitation of her "Madeline" emails. At the Paramount, cellists, karaoke lyrics and a crowd chanting "Fuck You" in British accents set up a night of public shaming as performance art.

— via The Stranger, Audrey Vann

Three Capitol Hill restaurants went dark at once, and leaky brickwork just killed two more. Meanwhile Sound Transit's CEO landed a $30,000 bonus and a $490,086 salary, and a 700-pound sea lion turned up dead with projectiles inside it.

— via The Stranger, Vivian McCall

Missed connections roundup: a TJ's bike bag, a "too sweet" drink at a pride afterparty, broken glass at OpenForm, and a light blue singlet at Shadowplay dance night. One reader's still wondering months later if she blew her shot with a stunning redhead.

— via The Stranger, Anonymous

Hans Zimmer brings a 19-piece band and his Dune and The Lion King scores to Climate Pledge Arena next spring. Tickets for that show plus Ha*Ash and Charlie Berens go on sale Friday, September 25.

— via The Stranger, EverOut Staff

A grab bag of Seattle news: a 1,006-pound pumpkin, three Capitol Hill businesses shuttering over an unpaid-tax landlord dispute, and a judge ordering Trump to readmit CNN, MS NOW and Politico to the White House, only for reporters to say they're still locked out.

— via The Stranger, Cedar Attanasio

Trump's approval rating hits 29 percent, free preschool expands statewide, Starbucks quietly shutters 250 more cafes, and a 105-year-old man faces a Nazi war crimes probe. Plus: Mamdani gives away 70,000 opera tickets, and yes, candy corn is good.

— via The Stranger, Megan Seling

Seattle's council just made it official: Denny Blaine's nude beach is queer heritage, not a nuisance to be zoned away. The vote caps a fight involving a wealthy neighbor's playground scheme, a police chief's apology, and a chain-link fence still splitting the park in two.

— via The Stranger, Cedar Attanasio