Every week we talk about the most fascinating stories in the news and what they say about the Pacific Northwest. We call it Front Page.

It’s our chance to talk about the latest news with a rotation of plugged-in journalists and guests, taking a look at the headlines from the weekend and the stories that we'll be following as the week moves forward.

Guest

Jim Brunner, political reporter for The Seattle Times

Related Links

Duffy Defends Road Trip Reality Show In Tense Senate Hearing
Foes of WA high-earners income tax launch repeal initiative

Meet the Seattle woman behind a national effort to end same-sex marriage
Seahawks’ Jaxon Smith-Njigba gets his trophy — but for wrong award

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sports superfans may seem to have been born bleeding their teams’ colors, but really, they’re created. 

It happens around formative events: a buzzer-beating come-from-behind win, a once-in-a-generation athlete or a championship season. 

This year probably saw a few Seattle uberfans get converted during the Seahawks’ dominating Superbowl performance. 

Tonight, some more sports fanatics may be formed. Game 4 of the Professional Women’s Hockey League finals begins in a few hours, and new champions could be crowned. 

Sadly, Seattle’s PWHL team, the Torrent, is not among those vying for the title. But the team still managed to capture its own share of superfans during their inaugural season.

One of those is our producer Jason Burrows. If you’ve noticed that we mentioned the Torrent a lot this year, it’s because of him. 

We decided to let him have one more go, talking about his new favorite team. We were more than a little surprised to learn how far he has fallen. 

RELATED LINKS: 

• Seattle Torrent | Home | PWHL
• Season Ticket Memberships | Seattle Torrent
• Seattle Torrent • Instagram
• Gloves Off Seattle | Instagram
• 365 HOCKEY GIRL | Instagram

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Tacoma author Tamiko Nimura's father died when she was just 10 years old. 

Among the things he left behind was an unpublished manuscript about his family’s incarceration at the Tule Lake camp for Japanese Americans. 

Nimura ultimately made a pilgrimage to Tule Lake in 2014, to see where her father was forced to spend part of his childhood.

She used her father's manuscript and her own experience to write a new book called “A Place for What We Lose: A Daughter’s Return to Tule Lake,” which is out now. 

Guest

Tamiko Nimura, author, “A Place for What We Lose: A Daughter’s Return to Tule Lake”

Related Links

Exploring Tamiko Nimura’s New Book “A Place For What We Lose” - Densho

Nimura's event in Seattle on June 6th

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In April 2024, the Everett School District launched a third-party investigation into a teacher at Henry M. Jackson High School over allegations of an inappropriate physical relationship with a student. 

Later that year, the teacher resigned. Not long after, he voluntarily gave up his K-12 teaching license.

That decision stopped further investigation and the gears of oversight meant to provide transparency about problem teachers. And the teacher soon got a faculty job at a nearby community college.

Guests

• Moe Clark, investigative reporter for InvestigateWest
• Eliza Aronson, investigative reporter for The Daily Herald in Everett

Related links

InvestigateWest: An Everett teacher resigned over a relationship with a student. Shoreline Community College hired him months later.

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

From high ticket prices to questions about how the games are used by authoritarian leaders to bolster nationalism, the World Cup coming to town raises questions about the organization running the event. FIFA has also been dogged by scandal over host country selection and TV marketing rights. 

But, it's the World Cup – probably the biggest sporting event of all – and one that is so fun to watch. 

So how do we relate to a game that is both beautiful and run by an entity as complicated as FIFA?

Guest:

Jules Boykoff, professor of Political Science at Pacific University and the author of the forthcoming book Red Card: The 2026 World Cup, Sportswashing and the FIFA Greed Machine

Relevant Links:

Red Card: An excerpt from Jules Boykoff's new book on the 2026 FIFA World Cup

Jules Boykoff’s ‘Kicking’ Is Clear-Eyed And Warm-Hearted

‘Green card for the planet’? Fifa’s World Cup is on pace to be a climate catastrophe

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Every week we talk about the most fascinating stories in the news and what they say about the Pacific Northwest. We call it Front Page.

It’s our chance to talk about the latest news with a rotation of plugged-in journalists and guests, taking a look at the headlines from the weekend and the stories that we'll be following as the week moves forward.

Guest: Melissa Santos - Axios

Related Links:

• UW student Juniper Blessing, 19, remembered as ‘full of life’
• Seattle weighs pause on large data centers
• An AI hate wave is here
• Five large data centers eyed for Seattle
• His daughter called him crying, and then another voice got on the phone. Only one of them was real

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ben Shuldiner just hit 100 days in his role as the superintendent of Seattle Public Schools.... and he’s had to tackle some pretty big issues in that short window.  

Like a budget deficit, which could be as much as $100 million.

And student safety, after two Rainier Beach High School students were shot and killed at a bus stop in January. 

And screen time in the classrooms (Shuldiner recently implemented a new cell phone policy limiting student screen time during the school day)

Shuldiner sat down for a live interview to answer a whole bunch of questions from us here on Soundside and from our listeners.

Guest: Seattle Public Schools Superintendent Ben Shuldiner 

Related links: 

• Can new superintendent Shuldiner the burden of Seattle Public Schools? | KUOW
• 100 days for Seattle’s new superintendent. How is he doing? | The Seattle Times
• Seattle’s new superintendent takes aim at administrative bloat | The Seattle Times
• Why U.S. Test Scores Are in a ‘Generation-Long Decline’ | The New York Times

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It might not be the prettiest weekend, but there ARE a lot of things to do! Go enjoy your weekend!

LINKS:

• Seattle International Film Festival
• GeekCraft Expo
• Viking Fest
• Seattle Pierogi Fest 2026 – Polish Home Association
• The Seattle Super Saunter
• U District Street Fair
• Mariners vs San Diego Padres
• Reign vs NJ/NY Gotham FC
• Sounders vs LA Galaxy
• Storm AWAY vs Indiana Fever

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If you’re planning to head across the border to Canada for a weekend trip this summer, you've got to pack the essentials. Keys, wallet and of course your phone.

But you may want to also consider something new – who might want to take a look at that phone as you cross the border.

Last fiscal year, Customs and Border Protection reported a 16% increase in searches of digital devices compared to 2024.

Should you expect your phone to be searched at the border? And what steps can you take to protect your data?

In February, Soundside broadcast a conversation with New York Times reporter Gabe Castro-Root and talked about some of those questions.

GUEST: Gabe Castro-Root, New York Times

RELATED LINKS: 

• Phone Searches at the Border Are Up: How to Protect Your Privacy
• Traveling to the U.S. Under Trump: Visas, Border Control and What to Know
• Border Search of Electronic Devices at Ports of Entry

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network. 

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Spring is here which means a malignant force is around us, stalking our parks, beaches and grassy medians. 

I’m talking about the Canada Goose. You turn a corner and you see two geese and small goslings.

They hiss, they honk, they’re aggressive, their poop closes Lake Washington swim spots and, I hate to implicate you, but they are here because of us.

Western Washington wasn’t home to abundant year round Canada Geese until the mid to late 20th century. Humans purposefully moved them here in an operation dubbed “Mother Goose.” 

Guest: 

David B. Williams, author and historian of books like Wild in Seattle: Stories at the Crossroads of People and Nature and the newsletter The Streetsmart Naturalist

Relevant Links: 

History Link: Operation Mother Goose begins to distribute Canada geese across the state starting on April 11, 1968

The Street Smart Naturalist: Operation Mother Goose

Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes

Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.