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Soundside

Get to know the PNW and each other. Soundside airs Monday through Thursday at 12 p.m. and 8 p.m. on KUOW. Listen to Soundside on Spotify, iTunes, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Additional Credits: Logo art is designed by Teo Popescu. Audio promotions are produced by Hans Twite. Community engagement led by Zaki Hamid. Our Director of New Content and Innovation is Brendan Sweeney.

Mission Statement:

Soundside believes establishing trust with our listeners involves taking the time to listen.

We know that building trust with a community takes work. It involves broadening conversations, making sure our show amplifies systemically excluded voices, and challenging narratives that normalize systemic racism.

We want Soundside to be a place where you can be part of the dialogue, learn something new about your own backyard, and meet your neighbors from the Peninsula to the Palouse.

Together, we’ll tell stories that connect us to our community — locally, nationally and globally. We’ll get to know the Pacific Northwest and each other.

What do you think Soundside should be covering? Where do you want to see us go next?

Leave us a voicemail! You might hear your call on-air: 206-221-3213

Share your thoughts directly with the team at soundside@kuow.org.


Join the Soundside Listener Network

Enter your number below or text SOUND to 206-926-9955 to get your questions in front of local government officials and share your thoughts on issues in the Puget Sound region. We’ll text you 1-2 prompts per week, and your response may be featured on the show!



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Episodes

  • caption: In this Feb. 18, 2020, file photo, then-Pierce County Sheriff's Dept. spokesman Det. Ed Troyer answers questions during a news conference in Tacoma, Wash. The Washington state attorney general on Tuesday, Oct. 19, 2021, filed two misdemeanor criminal charges against Troyer, now the Pierce County sheriff, stemming from his confrontation with a Black newspaper carrier in January. Troyer has denied wrongdoing. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)

    The unchecked power of the elected sheriff

    Last week, a judge ordered Pierce County Sheriff Ed Troyer to stay 1000 feet away from a local Black newspaper carrier. The carrier, Sedrick Altheimer, had filed an anti-harassment protection order against Troyer. And this isn’t the only legal trouble Troyer is facing. Yet Troyer is still in office. And he says he plans to stay there.

  • caption: The four finalists for Seattle's OPA director answered questions submitted by the public at a June 8 forum livestreamed on the Seattle Channel.

    Who will be Seattle's next director of the Office of Police Accountability?

    Seattle has spent years trying to figure out how to make its police department more accountable and transparent. That's a big reason the Office of Police Accountability, or OPA, exists. The OPA's job is to investigate cases of police misconduct - everything from dishonesty and rudeness from officers, to excessive use of force. Now, a new director will soon take over.

  • It Starts With Listening_Sound it Out

    Sound it out: messages from listeners

    At its core, Soundside is about connecting with our listeners and bringing you stories you care about and that impact those of us living here in the Pacific Northwest. Each week we ask for your thoughts about our stories -- where they've succeeded and where they can improve. Here's what you told us.

  • caption: The logo for United Paizo Workers, which includes a red, clawed hand holding a pickaxe in front of a purple starred background.

    Tabletop Gaming joins the ranks of unionized workers in Western Washington

    Amazon. Starbucks. The Seattle Art Museum. All local companies with workers fighting to unionize. And now that list also includes gaming companies. Employees at Redmond-based Paizo Inc., which publishes tabletop RPGs like Pathfinder and Starfinder, recently voted to form a union, and the company has voluntarily recognized it. That's relatively unique in the gaming industry, which doesn't have a history of labor organizing. The Seattle retail store Card Kingdom is trying to do the same. Members of United Paizo Workers are now tackling the tough work of bargaining for a contract.

  • caption: Carmen Best was Seattle Police Chief from 2018 to 2020.

    Former Seattle police chief admits deleting texts in wake of 2020 Capitol Hill protest

    Two years ago, the Seattle Police Department abandoned the Capitol Hill East Precinct, leading to the creation of the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP). At the time, former Police Chief Carmen Best distanced herself from that decision. Whether Best approved the move remains an open question that is difficult to answer due to missing text messages. In a deposition obtained by Axios, Best said she deleted texts she sent during the 2020 protests.

  • caption: "The Immortal King Rao" paints the picture of a future ruled by algorithms and all-powerful CEOs.

    A tech dystopia in Puget Sound: Vauhini Vara's "The Immortal King Rao"

    The fictional tech company at the center of the new book, “The Immortal King Rao,” is called “Coconut.” It’s a rough amalgamation of Apple and Microsoft of the 1980s and 1990s, driving a personal computer revolution, and later it morphs into a Google, Amazon and Facebook avatar in the way it gobbles up peoples’ data and monetizes human interaction.

  • caption: The eroding bluff at the tip of Point Defiance in Tacoma, with Five Mile Drive atop it.

    How are Washington's parks feeling the effects of climate change?

    Last month, Metro Parks Tacoma announced the closure of the popular Five Mile Drive to vehicles, after a geotechnical assessment found that the erosion of the bluffs posed a safety risk. The report did not explicitly link the erosion to climate change, but park officials say they believe there is a connection. So how are Washington's parks responding to the effects climate change is having on our coastlines, forests, and mountains?

  • caption: Claire Giordano, an expeditionary artist, holds up her latest work showing glacier loss at the Sholes Glacier, on Mt. Baker.

    These artists climb mountains to help document climate change

    In order to study our local glaciers, researchers hike back into some of the most remote outreaches of our wilderness. But they're rarely going alone. Aside from research teams, these expeditions frequently include artists, and through painting, sketching and other mediums, these artists are working with scientists to communicate science in a way that isn't reliant on numbers or heady scientific explanations.