Bill Radke discusses the week’s news with Seattle Times Jonathan Martin, PubliCola’s Erica Barnett, and Puget Sound Business Journal’s Alex Halverson.
This week, Amazon’s CEO told employees it’s ‘past’ time to come back to the office. If you don’t “it’s probably not going to work out for you at Amazon.” The company told employees In February they had to be in the office at least three days a week. Tens of thousands of workers protested, some refused. CEO Andy Jassy said this week one of the company’s principles is “Have Backbone, Disagree and Commit,” and everybody gets a chance to speak up. He said, “It’s past the time to disagree and commit.” Will enough Amazon employees either RTO or leave that the wider city will notice?
The last 24-hour pharmacy in Seattle is going away. The Bartell Drugs on Lower Queen Anne slash Uptown is about to close. The pharmacy generally saw customers until at least 2 a.m. and again starting at 5 a.m. why do Bartell stores keep closing?
T-Mobile is laying off 5,000 of its 71,000 employees. 400 of those layoffs are happening in Bellevue. The company said that the layoffs were a result of the rising cost of acquiring and retaining customers. Is this just about T-Mobile or is this a bigger deal?
A King County hotel shelter program collapsed earlier this year. This program was run by the Lived Experience Coalition — people with direct experience being homeless. An independent consultant has just produced a draft report on the program. It says LEC was in over its head when it accepted $1 million in federal funding to run its first shelter program. What does LEC say?
Marijuana has been legal in Washington for a decade. But the Federal Government still classifies it as a schedule 1 drug, meaning it has no medical purpose, even though Washington state sells medical marijuana. Schedule 1 drugs also have a high potential for abuse, and the potential to create severe psychological and/or physical dependence. Schedule 1 drugs, include heroin, LSD, ecstasy, and marijuana. The federal government is considering changing it. What changes must be made?
Sound Transit has decided to start running the Eastside line without waiting for it to connect to Seattle. There are huge construction delays getting it across Lake Washington. So, they’ll run it between Redmond and South Bellevue supposedly starting in the springtime. Meanwhile, Sound Transit is considering moving around the light rail stations in South Lake Union and the I-D or Pioneer Square or SoDo. What are the best arguments for the different proposals?
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