Friday Evening Headlines

0:00Maybe you've been here. You're staring down a payment screen at a store and asking you to choose a box for a tip. What do you do? How much should you tip? I'm KlamerGrain, I co-host Control-F, a KUW podcast that uses data to reveal the hidden stories in our daily lives. I'm Bryony Fowood, I host Seattle Eats, a show about the city's food scene. On this crossover episode, we dig into data on how much we're tipping and why. Listen to Control-F on the KUW app or wherever you get podcasts. Hope you're staying dry on this rainy, windy Friday. From the KUW newsroom, this is Seattle now. I'm Patricia Murphy with today's top stories. It's September 25th. A quick blast of wind and thunderstorms are coming through Western Washington tonight. Thundershorms could happen on and off through the evening in Seattle. A wind advisory for the south sound is in place until 5 o'clock with gusts forecast up to 45 miles an hour.

1:01A separate wind advisory for the Northern Washington coast and western straight of Wanda Fuka, including the San Wands, is in place until 8 o'clock. Gusts up to 50 miles an hour could hit along the street and islands. For Seattle, gusts could blow up to 31 miles an hour tonight. Court documents say a Bellevue man accused of killing college student Juniper Blessing has a lengthy history of severe mental illness. Amy Rato reports. In June, a King County judge said the man charged with murder in the stabbing death of the 19-year-old University of Washington student was not competent to stand trial. A psychologist report said Christopher Leahy suffered from psychosis and schizophrenia for years leading up to his arrest. Leahy described hearing voices that in one case told him to crash his family's car into a highway barrier. But the psychologist said there's a reasonable probability Leahy could regain competency through medication and treatment. On Monday, the court will assess whether Leahy's condition has changed and he's able to assist in his own defense.

2:05Amy Rato, KUOW News. Instacart has reached a nearly $150,000 settlement with the City of Seattle over complaints that it violated labor laws. City officials say the company failed to provide nearly 850 drivers with mandatory minimum payments. The settlement money will cover the workers' back pay along with civil penalties paid to the city. And speaking of pay, sound transit CEO Dow Constantine is getting a raise and a big bonus. The sound transit board voted yesterday to give Constantine a $30,000 performance bonus and a new contract with a $16,000 increase. Board members cited the connection across Lake Washington and record ridership numbers during this summer's World Cup. Meanwhile, sound transit is still working to expand light rail to Ballard, Everett and West Seattle.

3:05It postponed work on the Ballard extension as it deals with a projected $34 billion shortfall. Officials at the Washington State Toxicology Lab say they're making progress on a major backlog of evidence, but they still have a long way to go. The backlog has led to some DUI prosecutions being delayed or tossed out because the Statue of Limitations ran out. That evidence is supposed to be processed within 90 days. Brian K. Pran with the Washington State Patrol says they've reduced the backlog by about 3000 cases. And so the cases that we are starting working on now are much more recent cases like we're grabbing cases from 2026. We're still trying to finish cases from 2024 and we have about 100 of those left. K. Pran spoke on TVW's The Impact. He says the labs have seen a nearly 60% increase in samples since 2015 and staffing levels have not kept up.

4:05The state opened a second Toxicology Lab in federal way in 2023 to handle the increased caseload. Costco says it got $184 million tariff refund from the federal government and is expecting more money. The Issaquah-based wholesaler made the announcement on its fourth quarter earnings call yesterday. The refunds come after members filed a proposed class action lawsuit against Costco asking for money to be returned to customers who paid tariffs on imported products. The case is still ongoing. Earlier this year the US Supreme Court ruled many of President Donald Trump's tariffs were illegal and that businesses had a right to refunds. Washington's Commissioner of Public Lands, Dave Up the Grove, has announced to change in his pledge to protect legacy forests. As Kay and Kay acts as Annamary Yanny reports, he says financial pressures forced his hand.

5:05About a year ago, Up the Grove made good on a campaign promise by ordering the conservation of 77,000 acres of older trees known as legacy forests. Now he says his agency is forced to harvest some of these structurally complex forests to fund its work and support rural communities. The change means only about 55,000 acres of these legacy forests will be protected from harvesting and only until 2030 unless something changes. But Up the Grove says he's still committed to protecting these ecologically valuable stands. The current model is broken. Today our financial system and our state laws recognize the value of these forests only as lumber. Up the Grove says he plans to ask the legislature for renewed forest conservation funds and authority to participate in the state's regulatory carbon market. I'm Annamary Yanny reporting. A humpback whale is swimming free after crews from the US and Canada worked together to cut it loose from a tangle of fishing gear in the Salish Sea.

6:13The rescue operation took two days after the whale was spotted Friday wrapped in rope and pulling several floats near Vancouver Island. A no-officer is West Coast Rescue Team joined a Canadian unit to cut the whale free. It comes after a separate by national effort saved another entangled whale. This one a humpback calf near the US Canada boundary. A stretch of I-405 will shut down again this weekend. Washdot says all southbound lanes between Cole Creek Parkway and Bellevue to North 30th Street in Renton will shut down at 11.30 tonight and won't reopen until early Monday morning. Crews are working on a project to widen the freeway and add toll lanes. Next week on Seattle now typically people might wait a few weeks before getting their seasonal flu shot this year though. I would actually change that this year because of the fact the flu is circulating so early and recommend that people actually get their flu vaccines now at the same time as they're getting their COVID vaccines.

7:14Hear more about the upcoming respiratory illness season Monday morning. That's all for today from the KUOW Newsroom in Seattle. Our producer is Andy Hearst and I'm Patricia Murphy. Seattle now and KUOW are members of the NPR Network. Have a great weekend. I'm Chris Morgan, host of The Wild. Over the last 35 years I've worked in the wildest places on Earth, track in tigers in Siberia, filming orangutans in Borneo, following humpback whales, migrating jaguars, iridescent hummingbirds and learning from the people devoted to protecting them. These stories changed how I see the world. I think they'll do the same for you. The Wild with Chris Morgan available wherever you get your podcasts.