February 16, 2024
Transit workers fight drugs on buses and trains
Written by Joseph Gallivan for Axios Oregon Transit companies are pushing to make it a Class A misdemeanor to use drugs on buses and trains in Oregon. TriMet, the Oregon Transit Association, and Amalgamated Transit Union Local 757 testified yesterday to support amending Senate Bill 1553. The amendment would add the use of illicit drugs…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement | Climate & Energy | Design & Building | Diversity, Equity & Justice | Economy & Development | Health & Well Being | Housing & Homelessness | Infrastructure & Transportation | Land Use & Planning | Natural Resources & Environment | Policy & Law | Security & Privacy
Student Housing Has a New Mantra: Bigger Is Better
Written by Kevin Williams for The New York Times Off-campus complexes are getting larger, with some being home to more than 1,500 students, and being built on prime parcels of land as close to campus as possible. When the Standard, an off-campus student housing complex, opened in the fall in Bloomington, Ind., welcoming its first…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement | Design & Building | Diversity, Equity & Justice | Economy & Development | Education | Health & Well Being | History & Preservation | Housing & Homelessness | Infrastructure & Transportation | Land Use & Planning
February 1, 2024
Should social media pay for addicting kids? Seattle schools lawsuit gains steam
Reported by KUOW Written by Sami West A year into Seattle Public Schools’ lawsuit against social media companies, the case is gaining traction. More than 50 school districts in Washington state — and dozens more across the country — have joined Seattle’s lawsuit. Seattle became the first district to sue social media platforms last January,…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement | Diversity, Equity & Justice | Education | Health & Well Being | Policy & Law
History uncovered: UW research finds thousands of past racial restrictions in Kitsap
Reported in The Kitsap Sun By Peiyu Lin It’s not a secret that Kitsap County possesses a history of segregation, where some areas of the peninsula were only allowed to sell or rent to white people in the early and mid-20th century. But a specific geographic distribution of the over 2,300 properties that carry racial…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement | Design & Building | Diversity, Equity & Justice | Economy & Development | Health & Well Being | History & Preservation | Housing & Homelessness | Land Use & Planning | Policy & Law
New nonpartisan AI nonprofit TrueMedia, led by Oren Etzioni, is making a political deepfake detector
Published in GeekWire By Todd Bishop A new nonprofit, nonpartisan technology organization called TrueMedia is developing an AI-powered tool to detect deepfake videos, photos, and audio, aiming to combat political disinformation in the leadup to the 2024 elections. Founded and led by Oren Etzioni, University of Washington professor and former CEO of the Allen Institute…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement
January 23, 2024
Building community resilience: A $2 million NSF grant will transform disaster response
Amy Sprague January 16, 2024 “Our advantage of being an interdisciplinary project at the University of Washington is that we are drawing from an excellent corps of researchers with complementary expertise at a University whose mission includes working for the greater good across the state of Washington and has excellent ties into our communities.” Professor…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement | Data Science & Spatial Analysis | Diversity, Equity & Justice | Health & Well Being | Land Use & Planning | Natural Hazards | Policy & Law
What Happened to Seattle’s Relationship with Boeing?
The aftermath of the Alaska blowout reveals that the connection is slowly unraveling. From Seattle Met Written by Benjamin Cassidy IN THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH of the fuselage blowout on an Alaska Airlines flight earlier this month, Margaret O’Mara noticed something that would’ve once been unthinkable in Seattle. The University of Washington history professor observed that locals…
Advocacy & Civic Engagement | Climate & Energy | Economy & Development | Infrastructure & Transportation
January 19, 2024
Longevity without vitality: Americans live longer but endure declining health
From KEPR TV By Janae Bowens WASHINGTON (TND) – Americans are living longer, but are also sick for more of their lives. Analysis from the Wall Street Journal‘s Alex Janin shows the estimated average of life spent in good health declined to 83.6% in 2021, which is down from 85.8% in 1990. This is all…
Design & Building | Health & Well Being
Northwest innovators chase the dream of greener concrete
From The Seattle Times By Mike Lindblom PULLMAN — From a onetime speakeasy in North Seattle to a modern lab in the Palouse, inventors are testing recipes that make concrete less lethal to Earth’s climate. Most people understand that the world’s 1.4 billion fossil-fueled cars and trucks spew carbon dioxide, trapping heat in the atmosphere….
Climate & Energy | Data Science & Spatial Analysis | Design & Building | Health & Well Being | Infrastructure & Transportation | Innovation & Technology | Land Use & Planning | Natural Resources & Environment
January 9, 2024
Univ. of Washington set to break ground on 69-acre redevelopment to create Seattle innovation hub
The University of Washington this year expects to break ground on a new building that will anchor an ambitious, innovation-focused redevelopment called Portage Bay Crossing. The project will cover 69 acres of the southwest portion of the Seattle campus, revitalizing and unifying an area of buildings that officials called old and underutilized. UW leaders recently…
Design & Building | Economy & Development | Infrastructure & Transportation | Land Use & Planning | Water