English Bulldog Puppies for Sale in Seattle, WA

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A nonprofit that’s helped thousands of Washington students get into college is being forced to slash its reach by 80%.

The College Success Foundation, which provides in-school advisers, FAFSA help and scholarship support to low-income and first-generation students, lost more than $12 million in state contracts during the budget cuts in the last legislative session.

This cut is forcing the organization to shrink its staff of 150 to 54, gutting its ability to counsel students from their middle school years up until college graduation, according to an email from the foundation. Its reach will drop from about 25,000 students to just 4,500 next school year. The foundation will no longer directly serve students in King County, including at three Seattle Public Schools campuses — Asa Mercer Middle School and Rainier Beach and Cleveland high schools.

Public dollars made up more than half of the foundation’s budget, according to an annual report from 2023. A new estimate after the cuts makes that number closer to 20%, according to the organization.

“Dropout rates will increase and declines in FAFSA completion and college enrollment are imminent. The ripple effects could be long-lasting and severe, threatening the well-being of families, the future of our children, and the strength of Washington’s workforce for years to come,” James Dorsey, the foundation’s CEO, wrote in an email.

The news at CSF is a part of a larger financial blow to the effort to get more Washingtonians enrolled in college. The state’s college financial aid program was also scaled back in cuts to the state budget this year, reducing aid for thousands of students.

The state’s economy depends on students pursuing higher education, according to state projections. The data shows that 70% of the state’s open jobs between 2024 and 2029 are expected to require some degree of schooling beyond high school. At the same time, a report from 2023 estimated around 40% of the high school class of 2021 were projected to earn credentials by age 26.

CSF, which celebrated its 25th anniversary this year, had just expanded its reach to meet this need. For most of its history, students had to apply to receive support from CSF staff throughout their high school and college careers. But in 2022, backed by $11 million in federal pandemic relief, it began offering its services to every student in 28 public high schools, more than 20,000 kids total. The foundation embedded full-time advisers on campus and made help available to all. “A student can engage at any point in their journey,” CSF leaders said at the time.

Early signs showed promise: college enrollment rates in CSF-supported high schools jumped 10 percentage points after the program’s first year, according to the foundation. But now, that expansion is unraveling.

“We suddenly are not going to be there,” Mary Theisen, CSF’s director of marketing and strategic communications, said Friday. “There’s going to be a direct consequence.”

The foundation will continue to offer scholarships to college, which was its original mission. But its direct services to students will look different.

The foundation formerly served students across a number of schools and colleges, including the three Seattle Public Schools campuses. A grant from the Gates Foundation will preserve services in 15 rural high schools on the Olympic and Kitsap peninsulas. Around five schools in the Yakima and Tacoma area will also keep CSF staff.

Coaching will continue at four Washington colleges that have yet to be determined.

The need for CSF’s services is only growing, Dorsey said. The organization played a crucial role last year helping a broad range of students navigate the overhauled FAFSA system — a level of support it can no longer sustain. Dorsey warned the cuts will ripple far beyond education, stalling college enrollment and setting back workforce readiness at a time when demand for skilled workers is high.

In the meantime, the foundation will focus on securing more funding through private fundraising, with the hope of sustaining services in the years ahead, Theisen said.

Dahlia Bazzaz: 206-464-8522 or dbazzaz@seattletimes.com.

Washington has 29 union labor agreements, and new contracts for all were funded in the state’s most recent budget — except one: the Washington Public Employees Association.

That exclusion has led to finger-pointing, with the union claiming that the state’s negotiating tactics led them to miss a deadline to ratify a new contract, while the state is pushing back on those claims.

The WPEA, which represents over 5,300 employees at agencies such as the Department of Natural Resources, Department of Agriculture, and several community colleges, is pleading with the governor to veto a budget bill because it doesn’t include the $55.8 million requested over the next two years for a 5% pay raise for its members.

WPEA’s request for pay raises is small compared to the hard-fought contract for the largest state employees union, the Washington Federation of State Employees (WFSE), which was funded at a cost of more than $500 million in the budget.

But the overall cost of state labor contracts negotiated under the Inslee administration loomed large as lawmakers faced a multibillion-dollar budget shortfall in the next four years. Early in the session, Gov. Bob Ferguson also proposed furloughs for staffers represented by WFSE, but ultimately the union won fully funded contracts with no furlough days attached.

The collective bargaining agreements covered in the $78 billion for the 2025-27 biennium include raises for unions such as the Washington State Patrol Troopers Association, SEIU 1199 and the Teamsters Local Union 117, and total nearly a billion dollars in the two-year period.

Asked if Ferguson is taking the lack of pay increases got WPEA into consideration as he prepares to either sign or veto the budget, a spokesperson for his office said he is “carefully reviewing the budget” and will soon have more to say on Tuesday.

Leaders for the WPEA say a failure to fund a new contract could impact thousands of state government employees such as food safety officers, commercial vehicle enforcement officers, and wildfire fighters.

Some contracts for WPEA locals were funded, including for employees at the Yakima Valley College and for Senate and House Democratic legislative staff. But WPEA contracts for general government and higher education employees, which represent the bulk of the union, were not. Many state agencies employ a mix of those represented by WPEA or WFSE.

Raises of 3% in 2026 and 2% in 2027 were part of the contract ratified by WPEA members in April, similar to the contract approved by WFSE members in October and included in the state 2025-27 budget.

WPEA President Amanda Hacker said she believes the potential discrepancy in pay between WFSE and WPEA workers could have an impact in critical state services, such as wildfire response for the Department of Natural Resources.

If Ferguson signs the budget as is, firefighters represented by WSFE will make $1 an hour more in hazard pay, and up to 9% more in regular and overtime pay, compared to their WPEA firefighting counterparts, she said.

“It will be considerably more lucrative for the WFSE members to respond to fires and our members are the majority of the firefighting workforce, so hopefully nobody’s got a home within distance of a tree,” Hacker said.

The lack of wage increases puts WPEA-represented employees lagging behind others in similar jobs who are represented by WFSE, she said, and while Hacker thinks most will still show up for their jobs, firefighters may not be as compelled to do so.

Michael Kelly, communications director for DNR, said in an email the agency “supported fully funding WPEA’s contract,” but would not elaborate on whether the commissioner was concerned about the potential pay discrepancies among firefighters.

The reason for WPEA contracts not being included in the budget depends on who you ask.

After five months of bargaining with the state, WPEA members voted down a contract agreement, just before an Oct. 1 deadline. Union negotiators had sought a 30% hike in wages, and said the proposed 5% increase over two years “would not enable worker salaries to keep pace with rising costs of food, housing and health care.”

Hacker says the union then sued the Office of Financial Management in November because OFM “refused to come back to the table.”

Had OFM “bargained meaningfully,” WPEA wouldn’t be in this position, Hacker said. “I don’t have a lot of hope in them getting us out of this mess,” she added.

But Hayden Mackley, a spokesperson for OFM, argued that the agency was communicative with the union throughout the process.

The no vote by WPEA members in October “was the first time since the State of Washington engaged in collective bargaining that a union did not ratify a tentative agreement,” Mackley said. Due to the “uniqueness” of the situation, Mackley said, OFM Director Pat Sullivan sent a letter to Hacker on Sept. 27 about the impacts of the membership voting against ratification would have on the tentative agreements.

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Negotiations continued through March, and Mackley said OFM “made it clear” to WPEA that the agency would bargain in good faith. After an expedited hearing, the state Supreme Court in March ruled in favor of OFM.

After negotiations during the legislative session, the union ratified a contract and sent it to OFM on April 3. WPEA was then told by OFM that they had blown their deadline by two days. Had they known there was a deadline on April 1, the union would have submitted the ratified contract by then, Hacker said. The final ratified contract was similar to the one turned down by union members late last year.

This prompted Hacker to attempt to hand-deliver a letter to the governor in recent weeks, but Hacker said she was escorted out of the governor’s office by security. Hacker eventually resorted to sending the letter to Ferguson, urging him to not sign the budget and outlining the timeline of events between WPEA and OFM.

A spokesperson for Ferguson’s office denied those claims and said “they did not have anyone attempt to drop off a letter,” and that “no one was escorted out by security.”

Shauna Sowersby: 206-652-7619 or ssowersby@seattletimes.com. Seattle Times political reporter.

Lucia Flores-Wiseman, the Maple Valley singer turning heads and chairs to make it all the way to the final five of the singing competition series “The Voice,” is all about local music. Though she’s made a name for herself on one of the most-watched and longest-running music shows in the country, which kicks off its two-night finale at 8 p.m. Monday on NBC, she’s most interested in returning home to continue growing her career here.

“The show has really given me lots of opportunities, lots of exposure, and after this I know there are so many opportunities that are going to be coming my way. I’m just really hoping I can stay in Seattle and build a music thing even more,” Flores-Wiseman said in an interview. “There are so many great musicians from Seattle, and if I can add my name to the roster, that would be so wonderful.”

Flores-Wiseman said that when she was growing up she was most inspired by Washington’s own Brandi Carlile, who she listened to “all the time” for her beautiful songwriting. She said that, having grown up in Maple Valley on the outskirts of Seattle, she felt a connection to Carlile and her origins as a small-town Washingtonian who then became one of the most acclaimed singers out there. Flores-Wiseman even performed with Carlile at a local concert put on by the Tahoma Schools Foundation in June 2018, where they sang the Leonard Cohen song “Hallelujah.”

“I just love the power that she brings, that she really writes about what it’s like to be human and the stories and the pains and the accomplishments,” Flores-Wiseman said. “Then my parents would definitely play Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Nirvana and Soundgarden. So many of those.”

In a full-circle moment on the show, Flores-Wiseman even sang the beloved Soundgarden song “Black Hole Sun.” The song became an indelible part of the region’s music history because of the vocals of the quiet cook at Ray’s Boathouse who became a rock god: the iconic late Seattle singer Chris Cornell. Reflecting on her choice to sing the song, Flores-Wiseman said she knew there would be a lot of expectations to live up to, but she’s happy with the performance that she gave.

“It was so challenging in that I grew up listening to the song all the time,” Flores-Wiseman said. “There was some doubt and some concern going into the song because it’s so important to the Seattle music scene and I was so worried that Seattle would be disappointed. There were so many thoughts that I had, and even to this day, when I’m looking back at some of the comments, some people love my version of it and some people really just hate it. What I really learned from that song is pushing boundaries and, then at the end of the day, not caring what people thought about my cover.”

Specifically, she said she focused on conveying the emotion of the song in her own unique way and that she remains really proud of what she did with the song, trusting that being herself is what’s most important rather than being perfect.

Whatever happens in the finale (the winner will be announced in Tuesday’s episode), Flores-Wiseman said that this won’t be the end for her as an artist. She’s currently working on an EP, has an upcoming show at THING Festival in August at Remlinger Farms in Carnation and is hoping to perform at more other big local venues soon.

“I want to make sure that top five on ‘The Voice’ isn’t the last thing, you know? I just really want to be able to expand more, so I’m crossing my fingers that I can continue making Seattle proud and have people thinking of going back to Seattle for music.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated which network to watch “The Voice” on. It’s on NBC.

“The Voice”

The finale of the 27th season will be a two-part event. The final five will compete at 8 p.m. May 19 and 9 p.m. May 20 on NBC, with the winner being announced during the May 20 episode.

Chase Hutchinson: chase.hutchinson.writer@gmail.com.

North America boasts several charming towns reminiscent of popular destinations in the Alps, the most famous mountain range in Europe. For instance, Alpine is known as the Swiss Alps of Arizona, while Mont-Tremblant, one of the continent's best resorts, is dubbed the French Alps of Eastern Canada.

For its part, Washington State is home to a Seattle suburb with similar landscapes and vibes. This hidden gem is surrounded by natural beauty and brimming with fun activities for outdoor lovers throughout the year.

Take a closer look at the City of Issaquah, bordered by highlands which locals and visitors alike call the “Issaquah Alps.”

Issaquah And The "Alps Of Seattle" At A Glance

The Mountains to Sound Greenway National Heritage Area is a lush, 1.5-million-acre corridor running from Seattle, Washington’s coolest city, to the charming small mountain town of Ellensburg, along Interstate-90. It offers many hiking and cycling trails, and in its heart lies Issaquah, brimming with exciting outdoor adventures and excellent restaurants.

Incorporated in 1892, Issaquah, meaning “the sound of birds,” was first developed as a mining town. It’s bordered by Lake Sammamish to the north. On the other three sides, it’s surrounded by Cougar Mountain, Squak Mountain, and Tiger Mountain — i.e., the highlands referred to as the Issaquah Alps.

Issaquah Promises Many Outdoor Adventures

The Lake Sammamish and Issaquah Alps area is an idyllic destination for many recreational activities that include hiking, swimming, kayaking, paddling, paragliding, fishing, horseback riding, biking, yoga, archery, skiing, snowboarding, snow tubing, and geocaching.

As such, Issaquah can be visited year-round, not to mention that it enjoys a warm-summer Mediterranean climate.

For instance, one of the most pleasant forested hikes is the Poo Poo Point Trail, on Tiger Mountain. This moderate, 6.6-mile route welcomes leashed dogs, goes by several creeks, and culminates in beautiful views of Mount Rainier.

The point itself, a prime picnicking spot, is also a launching pad for hang gliders and paragliders.

What Else To Do In Issaquah City, Washington Besides Visit The Issaquah Alps

Issaquah isn’t just for nature lovers and thrill-seekers; venturing into the city itself can be equally exciting, especially around the downtown area.

The culinary scene there is quite eclectic, spanning Japanese, Italian, American, Mexican, and Thai restaurants, quaint bakeries, cozy bistros and cafés, and brew pubs.

You’ll also find various art galleries, specialty shops, and wellness venues, such as Art by Fire, Boehm’s Candies and Chocolates, Experience Tea, and One Mind Yoga.

There are many mountain towns in the U.S. that look like Europe’s Alps, and Issaquah may just be the most underrated of them all. Conveniently reachable from Seattle, it’s an adventurer’s dream destination, offering activities like paragliding, hiking, fishing, snow tubing, boating, and horseback riding.

The Brief

Police and fire crews have contained a ruptured gas line in Seattle's Fremont neighborhood.

What we know:

The Seattle Fire Department confirmed that a two-inch gas line was ruptured near Phinney Ave N and N 36th St, near the 7-Eleven.

Puget Sound Energy is currently on-scene and has taken over the investigation from fire officials. They reported that no one was injured.

Officials blocked N 36th St between Dayton Ave N and Greenwood Ave N, and evacuated all nearby buildings while they worked to seal the leak.

"The worst case scenario is either an explosion or a large-scale fire," said Seattle Fire Department spokesperson, David Cuerpo.

Due to those concerns, business owners and employees were forced to shut down early and move from the area.

"Are they worried about an explosion? Because that’s what it kind of felt like. If you have to evacuate somewhere, and you have to go to a certain spot, a range," said Cory Fillingim.

Fillingim tells FOX 13 Seattle he had to cancel orders at the restaurant where he works, and temporarily close its doors to get to safety.

SFD said they evacuated a three-block radius around where the ruptured gas line was leaking. Officials also closed the road for several hours during the incident.

Around 12:30 p.m., SFD said the leak had been contained.

SFD said they are still investigating what caused the leak.

The Source: Information in this story comes from the Seattle Fire Department and the Seattle Department of Transportation.

FremontCrime and Public Safety