Features

2018 Year in Review: Seattle’s Highs and Lows

It's been a year of ups and downs

By Linda Morgan December 3, 2018

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This article originally appeared in the December 2018 issue of Seattle magazine.

This article appears in print in the December 2018 issue, as part of the Year in Review featureClick here to subscribe.

Law Enforcement
HIGH: Seattle Police Department meets the lip-sync challenge from Virginia police with awesome video set to Macklemore’s “Downtown,” featuring rapping cops, flying fish and the Mariner Moose.
LOW: A plainclothes King County sheriff’s detective pulls a gun on an unarmed motorcyclist for reckless driving. 

Communications
HIGH: Governor Inslee to President Trump: “A little less tweeting, a little more listening.”
LOW: Sinclair-owned affiliate KOMO-TV and other Sinclair stations are forced to broadcast promotional messages warning of “fake news.” 

Soft Drinks
HIGH: Seattle’s new soda tax generates more than $10 million (a portion earmarked for healthy food and early learning programs) in its first six months, exceeding expectations.
LOW: Capitol Hill’s mystery soda machine mysteriously disappears, thoughtfully leaving a note that reads, “Went for a walk.”

International Relations
HIGH: Mayor Jenny Durkan travels to the Mexico border with a bipartisan group of U.S. mayors to protest the Trump administration’s family separation policy.
LOW: A helpful reader contacts The Seattle Times and reports the Confederate flag is flying in front of a Greenwood-area home. Well, no. Make that a Norwegian flag.

Stoner Ideas
HIGH: A duplicate of the 20-foot-tall orange “Trump Baby” blimp, launched when the president went to London, arrives on Vashon Island in August.
LOW: Seattle glassblowers build Bongzilla, a 24-foot-tall, 800-pound functional bong, for the Cannabition museum in Las Vegas. But because the piece is in a public space, its use is prohibited.

Air Space
HIGH: The genius who flew his drone into the Space Needle on New Year’s Eve 2016 pays a $250 fine and has to give up his drone.
LOW: Four Korean Delta desk and gate agents at Sea-Tac airport claim they were fired for speaking too much Korean. 

Civil Pursuits
HIGH: Superior Court Judge Julie Spector rejects a request from two police officers to dismiss a negligence suit against them and the city of Seattle in the death of Charleena Lyles, who was shot by the officers after she reported a burglary.
LOW: U.S. Representative Pramila Jayapal is arrested in June at the Washington, D.C., women’s rally protest of the Trump “zero tolerance” immigration policy.

Warm and Fuzzy
HIGH: Seattle is named number-one hygge city in the U.S., based on virtues such as the number of cold days, and a population that loves books, board games, coffee, wine and beer. 
LOW: A trucker ferrying feathers from Foster Farms flips near Federal Way after falling fast asleep, forcing 40,000 pounds of feathers to flood the freeway.

Surprises
HIGH: A U.S. Army Special Operations command conducts a training exercise at the downtown Seattle Library—in the name of refining “techniques needed for overseas operational missions,” according to an Army source—complete with homemade “bombs.”
LOW: But, oops—the Army neglected to warn anyone at the library about the exercise, resulting in 911 calls and a near-evacuation of the 363,000-square-foot building. 

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