(bright music) (inquisitive music) - Welcome to "The Newsfeed."

In today's episode, we're going behind the scenes of one of Cascade PBS's newest local shows, "The Nosh" with creator, longtime broadcast journalist, and podcaster Rachel Bell.

We'll also look at how a Cascade PBS report sparked an investigation that uncovered how a state pilot program contractor misused funds meant to help youth coming out of foster care and juvenile detention.

And it's hard enough to get into college, now, students are dealing with FAFSA issues.

I'm Paris Jackson.

Today's top story: we're going inside a new Cascade PBS original series, "The Nosh" That it's much more than a cooking or restaurant review show.

We sat down with its host.

This month, the new show hit the Cascade PBS airwaves, blending the marriage between food and beverage through interesting and curious storytelling.

Host Rachel Bell says, "'The Nosh' explores the region's most delicious stories through the lens of art, nature, and community."

Bell is also the host of "Your Last Meal" podcast, a longtime broadcast journalist and a food writer.

This first season features four wide-ranging episodes.

Producers say next spring, season two will be eight full episodes.

Bell cites her love of Julia Child, who started her career later in life, as her inspiration.

- The thing that I always loved about her is that she was 49 years old when she came out with her first cookbook, she was 51 years old when she started her TV show.

And even in my 20s, I just liked this idea of thinking that decades into my career, I could reinvent myself.

- Every Friday this month, "The Nosh" airs on Cascade PBS at 8:50 PM or you can catch it anytime on demand or at cascadepbs.org.

Rachel Bell wears many hats: journalist podcaster, and her latest venture, television show host.

I caught up with her to understand what inspired her to create "The Nosh" at this stage in her life.

Welcome, Rachel.

Thank you for joining us today on "The Newsfeed."

- Thank you so much for having me.

- Absolutely.

Now, your new show, "The Nosh," debuted this month.

- Yes.

- It's not a typical cooking show.

What's the inspiration behind it?

- Yeah, so it's not a cooking show, it's not a restaurant review show.

It is storytelling through the lens of food and drinks.

So whether that's art or community or things that are trending, or the outdoors, which is my favorite, just telling these stories because in the city, in Seattle, we've lost a lot of food coverage and everyone is obsessed with food.

You know, it's all over Instagram and people, I don't know if they still watch the Food Network, they watch food TV, but like the local coverage has shrunk.

So I thought this could be a fun way to bring a little bit of that back through storytelling.

- One thing that, from watching the episodes that have have already debuted, is I like the balance that you're striking because you're hitting on some issues.

But then its, you're bringing the fun because I mean, that's totally your personality.

How do you navigate the two?

- I think it's just, if a story is interesting, we'll do it.

We're kind of not trying to put ourselves in a box.

So for example, the first episode is all about bagels.

Super light, but people care about bagels a lot.

I just kept getting told like, "There's no good bagels here."

Or people would ask me, "Where can you get a good bagel?

I can never find one."

So I felt like, "The people need to know."

- And you tell them.

- I tell them.

I take them.

Because in the past few years, a lot of new bagel places have opened up, and I think, we actually don't talk about this in the episode so much, but I think it has to do with the pandemic because a lot of businesses that had to pivot, this is just flour, water, yeast, and salt, that's so much easier than running a whole restaurant and everyone was doing to-go.

So a lot of businesses just kind of transitioned into doing simpler things.

But yeah, everything from just talking about bagels to the episode that came out last Friday, which is all about the non-alcoholic movement, which is happening all over the country, but we focus on specifically what's happening in Seattle.

And some people are just sober-curious, but we also touch on people who are in recovery, who want things to do with their life on a Friday night and kind of didn't know what to do once they stopped drinking.

- So Cascade PBS, we are part of the PBS family and someone that is iconic in the food space- - Yeah.

- kind of inspired you in a way.

- Oh, we are in the house of Julia Child.

I can't believe that I get to do a show on the same network that she did.

- Right.

- Yeah.

- Julia Child is the only person that I've ever called a hero.

Maybe inspiration is a better way to say it, but the thing that I always loved about her, besides her personality that everybody loved, is that she was 49 years old when she came out with her first cookbook.

She was 51 years old when she started her TV show.

And even in my 20s, I just liked this idea of thinking that decades into my career, I could reinvent myself.

She had never done food before.

I think a lot of people know by now, she was, you know, in government or people say she was a spy, she wasn't.

But I just love that I'm 44 years old and doing my first TV show, which, you know, we live in a youth-obsessed culture, so I'm so glad that PBS gives, you know, not just the youngsters opportunity to do these shows.

And I think about Julia Child, I'm like, she wasn't getting botox and everyone liked her, so.

Yeah.

I've been inspired by her my whole life pretty much.

- Now, there are so many food stories out there, and I know you're still kind of ruminating on what's to come, and we're still in season one, and of course season two's, you know, it's around the corner.

- She's coming.

- She's coming.

(Rachel laughs) What are some stories that you're still interested in telling?

- The story that I really wanna tell is about cruise ships, because we're such a big cruise port here.

- We are.

- I've never taken a cruise, but I always think about the buffets.

That's like the number-one reason I'd wanna go.

These ships are so huge.

There's literally thousands of people and they're feeding them all day and all night.

So I want to get on that cruise ship.

I wanna explore, how much food, are they putting the food on at the beginning, and then that's it for the whole cruise?

Who's making this food?

You know, where do they come up with the recipes?

I don't know.

I think it's really interesting.

It's one of those things, I like doing stories about things that you maybe don't notice and you're just used to in everyday life, and then kind of explaining how it works in the background.

- And you're the perfect person to do that.

- I'm gonna get a little sailors hat.

I've always wanted one with my name in like gold rope cursive.

(Paris laughs) Yeah.

- Thank you, Rachel.

We appreciate you joining us.

- Thanks for having me.

- Absolutely.

If you wanna see new episodes of "The Nosh," they air every Friday evening this month at 8:50, or you can check it out on cascadepbs.org.

(inquisitive music) A lobbying firm tasked with managing a state pilot program to help youth who have experienced foster care or juvenile detention closes under the radar after a Cascade PBS investigation raises red flags.

a state pilot program aiming to help homeless youth and young adults in Washington closed quietly following questions Cascade PBS reporters raised that sparked an investigation into how it managed its funding and how many people it actually helped.

The $1.5 million initiative, Lifeline WA, was created to assist hundreds of vulnerable young people with cash assistance and to connect them to social services.

In 2022, the Office of Homeless Youth Department selected lobbying firm SDM Consulting to run the program, but last fall, a Cascade PBS and Youth Today report detailed service delays and questionable financial practices.

Initially, the State Department of Commerce, which oversees the Office of Homeless Youth, defended SDMC.

However, after review in December, the agency ordered SDMC to pay back more than $330,000 in what officials called misspent funds.

In January, SDMC said it couldn't manage the program, and then the state contract was terminated entirely.

(serious music) A hefty amount of financial aid is available to Washington students, but low FAFSA filing rates may be one of the largest barriers to access that money.

Washington's low FAFSA filing rates highlight higher-education barriers for many students.

That low turnout has high school counselors and federal lawmakers concerned about the impact to first-generation college-bound youth.

Officials say there is a generous amount of financial aid available to Washington students, but filling out FAFSA forums can be complicated, especially for students without family members who have gone to college.

Last year, the state ranked 47th for FAFSA completion with just under 45% of high school seniors completing an application, according to the National College Attainment Network.

Some counselors are working to assist these students through things like FAFSA nights at school for multilingual and migrant students.

Some new online tools could also help as well.

But FAFSA also had nationwide delays this year in its launch due to technical problems, which is fueling more concerns about access for students.

I'm Paris Jackson.

Thank you for watching "The Newsfeed," your destination for nonprofit Northwest news.

Go to crosscut.com for more.

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