Around the nation
News from every state.
ALABAMA Tuscaloosa: A paddlewheel boat race in connection with the city’s bicentennial celebration will be held at 3 p.m. Saturday.
ALASKA Juneau: The House has passed legislation seeking to limit what the state can charge residents of the state-supported elder care facilities known as Pioneer Homes.
ARIZONA Phoenix: Gov. Doug Ducey has signed off on legislation thought up by a Gilbert teenager making lemonade the official state drink.
ARKANSAS Little Rock: A University of Central Arkansas associate professor says Chinese tariffs and bad weather during harvest season have hurt the state’s pecan industry.
CALIFORNIA Los Angeles: The discovery of a novel breeding technique for California condors should help increase the numbers of the critically endangered species, the Los Angeles Zoo says. The approach has adult birds fostering multiple chicks.
COLORADO Denver: The governor has signed a bill establishing college funds for the state’s newborn children for the next two decades.
CONNECTICUT Hartford: The Connecticut Conference of Municipalities has reached a compromise with unionized firefighters and police on legislation that will provide first responders with post-traumatic stress disorder benefits for up to one year.
DELAWARE Dover: The state Senate leader says support for strict gun control measures proposed by fellow Democrats is “almost nonexistent.”
Leaders of churches and a synagogue in South Carolina, Texas and Pennsylvania that were victimized by violent hate crimes in recent years met Monday to talk with leaders and law enforcement in the district about how they helped congregants heal.
FLORIDA Parkland: Fifty special trombones have been given out to band students across the state in honor of Alex Schachter, a teen who died in a school shooting last year.
GEORGIA Atlanta: Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter broke his hip Monday at his home when he fell while leaving to go turkey hunting, a spokeswoman for the Carter Center says, but he was recovering comfortably after a successful surgery.
HAWAII Honolulu: The mayor has proposed a trio of tax increases to cover costs of a forthcoming rail line.
IDAHO Coeur d’Alene: Officials say inspectors have intercepted 14 boats carrying invasive mussels into the state in less than a month.
ILLINOIS Petersburg: The New Salem State Historic Site, the settlement where Abraham Lincoln began his public life, celebrates its centennial as a state park Saturday.
INDIANA Terre Haute: Indiana State University says it has received $15,000 to help provide online access to St. Mother Theodore Guerin’s letters and journals. In 1840, Mother Guerin traveled from France to serve the Catholic community in Indiana.
IOWA Des Moines: Officials and trail advocates in the state are gearing up to be a part of an ambitious coast-tocoast bike trail project. The Great American Rail-Trail would wind through cities including Davenport, Cedar Rapids, Waterloo, Madrid, Brayton and Underwood.
KANSAS Topeka: A state report says safety doors in a Sumatran tiger’s enclosure at a zoo were left unlocked before the animal attacked and injured a veteran zookeeper.
LOUISIANA Baton Rouge: The state saw a record 51.3 million tourists in 2018, Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser says.
MAINE Portland: Officials say they’re getting ready to deal with an infestation of browntail moths in Deering Oaks Park. The moths are capable of killing trees.
MARYLAND Baltimore: A $5.5 billion redevelopment effort in the city is moving forward. Developers and politicians held a ceremonial groundbreaking for the Port Covington initiative Monday.
MASSACHUSETTS Westport: The town has approved a bylaw that would impose a $250 fine on people who take rocks or vegetation from town-owned beaches.
MICHIGAN Detroit: Two national organizations pushing for federal legislation on reparations for descendants of African American slaves – the Reparations Labor Union and the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, also known as N’Cobra – are bringing their agendas and messages to the city with conferences this June.
MINNESOTA Big Lake: Officials have started work on a $4 million development project at the Northstar Operations and Maintenance Facility.
MISSISSIPPI Mayersville: Unita Blackwell, a civil rights activist who was the first African American woman to win a mayoral race in the state, has died at age 86.
MISSOURI St. Louis: A mysterious package addressed to former Sen. Claire McCaskill caused a brief scare when it arrived at a TV station, but it only contained a letter and novelty Trump toilet paper.
MONTANA Kalispell: Glacier National Park officials plan to capture and mark 10 female grizzly bears as part of an ongoing effort to monitor the population in the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem.
NEBRASKA Lincoln: Hunters who use specially trained falcons to kill prey could soon be allowed to deploy those birds to get rid of pest animals that damage property.
NEVADA Carson City: Democrats in the state Senate have rolled out a bill that aims to overhaul how the state allocates education funding.
NEW HAMPSHIRE Rochester: The Homeless Center for Strafford County has settled on a new location thanks to a land donation.
NEW JERSEY Newark: Gov. Phil Murphy signed a bill Monday that could allow for the proliferation of electric scooters and bikes.
NEW MEXICO Albuquerque: Environmentalists say the U.S. government must go back to the drawing board or risk violating federal laws if it moves ahead with a plan to restore portions of a national forest in the Sacramento Mountains. They worry about the effects on Mexican spotted owls and other wildlife.
NEW YORK Buffalo: The state is launching a competition to find a new plan for the Buffalo Skyway.
NORTH CAROLINA Corolla: A group that keeps an eye on wild horses on the coast says dogs have become a threat. Meg Puckett, herd manager of the Corolla Wild Horse Fund, says tourists are leaving their pets unleashed, and those pets are chasing and even biting the horses.
NORTH DAKOTA Bismarck: The state’s Agricultural Products Utilization Commission meets Wednesday and Thursday to discuss nearly $900,000 worth of grant requests.
OHIO Port Clinton: High water levels on Lake Erie have been flooding streets and houses along the shoreline, and levels are expected to approach record heights this summer.
OKLAHOMA Oklahoma City: Ridership on the city’s streetcar system has improved with spring weather.
OREGON Bend: Gracie, an adored trumpeter swan at the Sunriver Nature Center, has been alone since losing her mate, Chuck, in 2017, when he was illegally shot. She was introduced to a new mate Monday.
PENNSYLVANIA Erie: In a region that gets about 10 feet of snow a year, imagine never having to shovel it again. Five engineering students at Gannon University have built a snowremoval robot that does the job, the Erie Times-News reports. They say it has 16 miles of battery life and can sweep up to 4 inches of snow.
RHODE ISLAND Portsmouth: The state’s last one-room schoolhouse, on Prudence Island, will remain open at least another year.
SOUTH CAROLINA Greenwood: Tourism officials in one of the state’s lesser-known places want its residents to share stories about why it’s a great place to be. The newly named Discover Greenwood is asking people to submit stories, pictures and videos to mygreenwoodstory.com saying why they love the city.
SOUTH DAKOTA Pierre: Nearly a quarter of the state’s school districts have opted for a four-day school week over the past decade, according to the South Dakota Department of Education.
TENNESSEE Memphis: The Transportation Security Administration at Memphis International Airport has a request: Please do not bring your barbecue sauce with you in your carry-on luggage.The Memphis in May World Champion Barbecue Cooking Contest starts Wednesday, with events lasting through Saturday.
TEXAS Nacogdoches: Downtown walking tours of the city boast a unique new component this year. The Daily Sentinel reports one of the stops on the tour, the Milam Masonic Lodge No. 2, recently completed a second-floor museum displaying artifacts such as the sword of Henry C. Hancock, killed at the Battle of Mansfield.
UTAH St. George: A giant creature has found a new job guarding a southern Utah business. The “Giant Spider” sculpture will be the new mascot of Morgan Pest Control starting this week. Artist Deveren Farley says he built the 17-foot sculpture from steel and Utah licenses plates he had bought from the Salt Lake City evidence department.
VERMONT East Burke: Volunteers have planted hundreds of trees along the banks of the Passumpsic River to keep the water healthy for trout and other river life.
VIRGINIA Herndon: Newly elected Del. Ibraheem Samirah, who is Muslim, says he was harassed by protesters and asked how he planned to implement Sharia law at his first town hall Saturday.
WASHINGTON Seattle: Gov. Jay Inslee has signed a bill aimed at erasing old misdemeanor marijuana convictions, seven years after voters in the state approved an initiative that legalized the drug.
WEST VIRGINIA Pipestem: A zip line course has opened at Pipestem Resort State Park.
WISCONSIN Madison: The Legislature’s budget committee on Tuesday voted to spend $3.25 million to combat homelessness as it continues to review Gov. Tony Evers’ state budget.
WYOMING Cody: The Wild Bunch street gunfighter show will use a real firearm starting next month for the first time since an actor mistakenly wounded bystanders with live ammunition three years ago.