I stopped using delivery apps, but only because I'm broke. Pay me to use the apps, Sara. Credit: HK

Good morning! Expect a rainy day today after 10 am and a high of 59 degrees, according to the National Weather Service. I really need summer to come a little faster because they’ve turned off the central heat in my apartment building. 

City Council to vote on rolling back “Pay Up” ordinance: The council plans to vote at 2 pm today on Council President Sara Nelson’s bill to lower the minimum wage for gig workers in Seattle. Lots to watch here. Will Council Member Tanya Woo vote on the bill despite a conflict of interest? Which amendments does Council Member Tammy Morales plan to introduce? If the bill passes, will Mayor Bruce Harrell veto it and earn his MLK Labor Oscar? Hannah will have a play-by-play. Update: Seattle Times reporter David Kroman the vote may not happen today as CM Woo seeks more input from the ethics committee. 

Speaking of the council fucking over people: Alleged bad boss Council Member Maritza Rivera wants to stop funds to 50 equitable development projects meant to benefit communities of color in Seattle. 

Last note on council stuff: Central staff plans to brief the council’s Public Safety Committee today at 9:30 am with the latest staffing numbers and projections for the Seattle Police Department (SPD). TL;DR is that staffing has basically stayed relatively flat since the big departures in 2020, though the department has consistently fallen short of its hiring goals.

Six King County Sheriff Deputies shot and killed someone during an eviction: On Friday, the King County County Sheriff’s Office placed six deputies on administrative leave after they shot and killed someone during an eviction in Auburn. The department released few details on what led to the shooting, though PhotogSteve18 reported that the person may have shot at deputies first. 

Woman missing, feared to have drowned in Lake Washington Monday: Seattle Fire Department (SFD) officials said that a 24-year-old woman who went for a swim off a boat in Lake Washington may have drowned. SFD responded to a call about the woman at about 10 am, and by 11:30 pm officials told KOMO that rescuers had shifted to focusing on recovering the woman’s body. 

Fare inspection expanding on light rail: Sound Transit has plans to direct its fare inspectors to ask people waiting on the platform whether they have paid their fare, according to the Seattle Times. The new systems give people the option to go up and pay the fare rather than be cited, but it also gives people the option to say, “Hey it’s a free country, I’m just standing here watching the trains, why don’t you kick rocks?” 

Israel kills dozens in Rafah airstrike: At least 45 people died Monday, including women and children, after an Israeli airstrike hit a camp of displaced Palestinians, setting the temporary structures ablaze, according to the BBC. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the strike a “mistake” and said the country has tried to avoid hitting civilians, even as incident after incident shows Israel consistently killing civilians. The Biden Administration needs some time to mull over whether it will make good on its threat to withhold some weapons from Israel for attacking Rafah, or whether it will just keep sending Israel money and weapons to carry out genocide.

Jury to deliberate Donald Trump hush-money trial: Attorneys gave their closing arguments in the Trump hush-money trial today, and jurors must soon decide whether to convict former president Trump on charges he falsified business records to pay Stormy Daniels some, as I call it, shush money. If convicted, Trump would become the first former president to become a felon. 

Basketball Hall-of-Famer Bill Walton dies: The 71-year-old basketball champion, sports broadcaster, and all-around good guy by all accounts died Monday after a long fight with cancer, according to the Associated Press. To be honest, I could not have picked this man out of a line-up before today, but apparently he protested the Vietnam War, and attracted the attention of the Portland Police Bureau for his support of the American Indian Movement. We love a pot-stirrer. RIP Walton. 

Poor eastern side of the country: The weather really did a number on our other half over the weekend. Storms killed more than 20 people in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast, according to USAToday. Twisters and tornados also killed people in parts of Texas and the mid-south. Now, Florida and Texas have to deal with a heat wave.

I survived COVID-19: After managing to avoid succumbing to the virus for about four years, I fell last week. I’m now insanely behind on all things except Stardew Valley and napping with my cat. I’m testing negative now, which is exciting. Anyway, enjoy listening to Narpy’s Cozy album, which I basically played on a loop all weekend as I slept. Stay healthy.

Ashley Nerbovig is a staff writer at The Stranger covering policing, incarceration and courts. She is like other girls.

47 replies on “Slog AM: City Council Votes on Gig Worker Minimum Wage Repeal, Israel Bombs Tent Camp in Rafah, Bill Walton Dies”

  2. “Now, Florida and Texas have to deal with a heat wave.”

    Yup. That tends to happen every year about this time.

    @2

    Agreed. Never understood why this is such an issue or why people feel entitled to a free ride.

  3. Also the KCRHA has a vote scheduled for this afternoon on their new CEO (only one candidate is still in the running). And an Idaho drag queen who was falsely accused of indecent exposure by a moms-for-liberty type (who posted a blurred-out video online as “proof”) won a large judgment against her tormentor.

  4. @2 I agree. But challenging random people on the platform (as opposed to methodically challenging everyone aboard a train car) would create a severe implicit bias hazard, which ST has repeatedly pledged to avoid. At the very least this idea needs to be carefully rethought.

  5. “Alleged bad boss Council Member Maritza Rivera wants to stop funds to 50 equitable development projects meant to benefit communities of color in Seattle.”

    First, it’s a request for status on various projects; if status cannot be provided, funding will be delayed or denied. This is part of the Council’s oversight function for public spending, and that it hasn’t been done all along is an indictment of previous Councils.

    Second, as far as the “bad boss” jab goes, the Stranger’s previous darling on the Council, Sawant, hired and fired staffers at City Hall’s District 3 office based upon staffer members’ standings within Socialist Alternative, not according to performance or merit in their work at City Hall. The Stranger never uttered a word of criticism about Sawant doing this. (https://sccinsight.com/2019/01/07/sa-sawant-tldr/)

  7. @2 alternatively, public transit should be free at point of service. Drivers don’t pay a toll to use the roads (aside from 520 and the 99 tunnel).

    @1 no, the workers walked out over the exhibit falsely conflating anti-Zionism with antisemitism. Now that I’ve opened the door let’s hear your snide comments.

  13. @10 if it was feasible I’d be for a system that logs miles driven on all city roadways and bills registered owners accordingly, revenue from which is used to finance free-at-POS transit.

  14. @15 Given that Sharia law in the US isn’t a thing, being anti-Sharia in the US is just Islamophobia in stupider clothes.

    In other countries it’s up to the locals to make that decision. I may not like how they run things in Iran, but that’s not my decision.

  18. Netanyahu said immediately that he didn’t care about Biden’s “red lines” and made it clear he knew Biden could and would do nothing. Now that they’ve crossed it, expect Biden to possibly just apologize and send more money and weapons while his polls drop further.

  19. he’s made it clear that he doesn’t gaf what anyone thinks. all the toothless court orders in the world obvi won’t do shit. maybe if we all just comment harder

  20. @19 Theodore I suggest we offer to volunteer at the Wing Nut so they can open again. That way we can add “political scab” to our LinkedIn profiles. You bring a couple fold up directors chairs, I’ll have a poster tube hidden in my trousers. When the staff aren’t looking I will tape up a new panel headlined “Fighting Hate on the Slog.” The panel itself will be emblazoned with our proudest zingers. You can explain to passing visitors the context of each and why they were so devastating between puffs of obnoxiously large cigars.

  21. @9 drivers pay a healthy gas tax that mostly goes to road maintenance (also used by transit) as well as annual registration fees on their vehicle. As part of the registration fees in KC we also already pay to subsidize transit (not to mention the levy in Seattle that includes transit paid by property owners). Metro fare recovery is targeted at 30% and there are many programs for lower income individuals. Is it really too much to ask someone to pay that small portion of their total fare?

  22. @2, @5 – turnstiles have no implicit bias issue. We should install them ASAP.

    @10 – the roads being free has not led to freeways becoming de facto shelters and drug zones to the extent that people who merely want to get where they are going are deterred from using them.

    And I very rarely agree with @27, but this time they are right.

  23. Tons of people jump the turnstyles in the DC metro as nobody enforces them. The staff doesn’t even look up when the alarm goes off.

  26. @30 who knows but at least the people using it are generally contributing something unlike the scofflaws you are upholding as some noble person.

  27. @25,

    The shooting Garb is referencing occurred on planet Tatooine, located in a different galaxy far, far away. Even if Washington state law were deemed to be both non-fascist, AND somehow applicable to events taking place in such a distant locale, they happened an incredibly long time ago, presumably long before the relevant statutes were even enacted.

    Dumbass.

  28. @28 the roads are a cesspool of disorder, crime, and substance abuse. People speed, drive erratically, hit and kill pedestrians and bikers, and drive drunk or high all the time. I used to love using the roads but now I’m scared to even go near them. The only solution to this public safety crisis is to make people pay $2.75 to use the roads. Then to ensure compliance we’ll need to have fare enforcement agents approach drivers waiting at red lights to ensure they’ve paid, or maybe install turnstiles at every entrance to the road system.

    @17 the point, to spell it out explicitly, was that you can criticize or be against certain beliefs or policies held by some people in an ethnic or religious group without being bigoted against the entire group. Many people feel sharia, as enacted in several countries, violates the human rights of women and/or other groups. That doesn’t make those people Islamophobic. Just like being anti-Zionist doesn’t make a person antisemitic no matter how hard the Zionists insist otherwise.

  29. Israel bombed people in a tent camp who have literally nothing and who are starving to death.

    Israel is a terrorist state and committing crimes of war just as horrific as the Holocaust.

    The United States is paying for this genocide with hundreds of billions of working Americans’ taxpayer dollars (since no one else is paying taxes, certainly not the assholes sending all of the money to Israel).

    Children (and adults) are being starved to death.

    A man held a dead, headless child after the bombing.

    The starving who are wounded have maggots eating them alive like it’s the zombie apocalypse.

    Fuck Israel. It is a terrorist state. It must be destroyed.

    And when this country is decimated by MAGAts (who will eat through every dying and dead body in the country as they kill everyone and everything in it) because Biden and the Democrats chose to arm and fund genocide, the only people to blame will be the Democrats.

    Fuck Biden.

  31. Israel should be destroyed? Jesus, you’re going to give tensorna and Ahab priapism with that eliminationist rhetoric.

    Israel should not be destroyed, but they should revisit the Oslo Accords and elect a new government that can be trusted to follow international law and which pursues a two state solution in good faith.

  32. A lot of Americans see Israel as an extension of our country’s shitty foreign policy in ways that don’t extend to countries like Syria. We never armed Assad when he was slaughtering his own citizens but our tax dollars are currently being spent to incinerate tents full of innocent civilians in their own homeland. It should be understandable why this is upsetting to people even if you’re personally okay with it.

  33. @44, Take that up with the person who made that comparison in the first place. I’m explaining why they got the analogy wrong, something you could at least try to do instead of just saying nuh-uh with a bunch of fancy-sounding words.

  36. SotH Johnson’s invited

    bibi to come over and

    Lecture Congress and

    curry Support for his

    ON-Going Genocide

    on Palestinians — I

    hope he is welcom-

    ed Appropriately

    “Republicans” are

    an Embarrassment to

    civilized human beings

    the reptilian

    brain stem

    is Strong

    in them.

  37. @36 “Israel is a terrorist state and committing crimes of war just as horrific as the Holocaust.” “ Fuck Israel. It is a terrorist state. It must be destroyed”

    Jesus, what a uniformed sociopath (Xina is why we should have civil commitment – it’s only a matter of time before she hurts someone or herself).

  39. @12

    Self explanatory.

    Folks on the left like to dress up their anti-semitism so they can still consider themselves superior to other anti-semites. Were the college kids chanting Death to Zionists? No. The ones I heard were chanting Death to the Jews and Death to America. Were they barring Zionists from using certain entrances to buildings? Again, no. They were blocking Jewish students just as the SA did prior to WWII.

    @15

    Islamophobia is just another buzzword that was made up to stifle discussion. The same can be said for all of the other -phobias that people are accused of when they have the audacity to disagree or even question the progressives.

  40. @52

    “Republicans” are

    an Embarrassment to

    civilized human beings

    now Which did you

    say was your

    Affiliation

    wormmy?

    oh wait —

    ‘it ain’t

    Genocide!’

    nevermind

  41. @54: You didn’t answer the question. Is the “Republican” “reptilian brain stem” what produced rhetoric such as @36?

    It’s a simple yes-or-no question. My (non-existent) party affiliation has nothing to do with it.

  42. @10 Road tolls are too blunt of a tool as long as mass transit infrastructure is inadequate since poor suburban voters have little to no choice to get to work. Increasing licensing fees on newer high powered cars seems more what we need.

  43. “Anti-Zionism is the belief that Jews do not deserve a homeland”

    That is blatantly false for a number of reasons since anti-zionism is multifaceted. As far the political left is concerned anti-zionism is anti-colonialism, which is the opposite of racism. Jews can have all the homeland they wish as long it doesn’t entail stealing land from native populations, and or discriminating against non-Jews. The left has the same position towards all colonial ethno states.

  44. @58 the Jews are the native people of Israel going back thousands of years (example, see al-Aqsa – your holy site beung built upon the ruins of a previous holy site is a textbook example of colonialism). But keep telling yourself it’s not about Jews.

  45. @59 Nonsense. Most Jews living in Israel result from modern immigration from other places. They have no right to the land over people who already live there. We can’t correct what happened 2000 years ago even if we assume that we actually know what happened then or that modern Jews are direct descendants from the old tribes (after literally millennia of miscegenation with other people). Do you want to give North America back to native Americans who have been here at least ~10,000 years? come on it has only been 6 centuries since Europeans started to colonized the place.

  46. @61 are you drunk or is it that you can’t read? Just asking because I said most immigrated (or their parents did), which doesn’t mean that “none” used to live there by any stretch of the imagination. Palestinian Jews were a small minority of the population before immigration started at the turn of the 20th century. I have read ~10% but I am sure it is arguable. However it is not arguable that most Israeli Jews result from immigration given over 3 million immigrated (and had babies) since 1948 out of the current ~7 million Jews in Palestine today.

    I can’t remember how many times you have claimed that someone said something they, in fact, haven’t said in your haste to pin the label of antisemitism on them. Your arguments are as vacuous as can be and don’t support the claims you make. Antisemitism is a real problem and likely will get worse in part thanks to people like you who corrupt its meaning because they use it to gratuitously bludgeon critics of Israel in order to shut them up. Anyway, I have already explained to you how defending the colonizer made YOU a racist.

  47. “Do you want to

    give North America back

    to native Americans who have

    been here at least ~10,000 years?”

    no!

    NO Reparation$!

    and to Hell with their

    so-called “Treaties.” that

    was, Obviously, a long L O N G

    time ago and very far, Far Away. fool

    have We learned Nothing from our

    very Own “Genocide!”?

    yes.

    Obviously.

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