Apply SAFE ruff check auto-fixes

[Padraic Shafer (padraic-shafer)]

Linter updates automatically applied by running:

uvx ruff check --fix

Changes include:

• Removed unused imports.
• Import order enforced.
• Prefers | over older Union[].
• Prefers list, tuple over older List, Tuple, etc.
• Prefers f-string conversion flags, such as !s over str()
• Removes explicit pass if not required [I manually added a comment in its place]
• Logical idiom: min operator
• Wanted to remove #noqa: E712 [I kept it and added a reason why]

This PR stacks onto #261.