News from across the USA
ALABAMA Huntsville: Jeffrey Brendan Franklin, 36, who attacked his family, killed his parents and critically wounded three of his siblings in 1998 when he was 17 years old, is up for parole in June, AL.com reported.
ALASKA Juneau: After four meetings of discussion and gridlock, the Planning Commission denied a conditional use permit that would have allowed an asphalt plant to be constructed near the Rock Dump, the Empire reported.
ARIZONA Phoenix: Honeywell International told its 9,500 state employees to take an unpaid week off this quarter, The Arizona Republic reported.
ARKANSAS Hot Springs: Fisherman Eric Couch netted a small alligator on Lake Hamilton, Arkansas Online reported. Jamie Bridges, manager of the Arkansas Alligator Farm and Petting Zoo, said he believed the alligator was one of 13 stolen Aug. 15, 2015.
CALIFORNIA Elk Grove: The City Council delayed permit approval for a proposed Costco store because it wants a more attractive building, The Sacramento Bee reported. Council members want the company to break up the “massiveness” of the building.
COLORADO Denver: Denver’s district attorney won’t pursue charges against police officers who shot and killed Gerardino Cayetano- Gonzalez, a parolee who had hijacked a vehicle, led officers on an afternoon chase in a residential neighborhood and shot at them, wounding one, the Denver Post reported.
CONNECTICUT Glastonbury: The Town Council has given the Historical Society of Glastonbury a year to save the walls of the former Hopewell Woolen Mill, the Hartford Courant reported. The society now has time to evaluate the potential for grants, fundraising and other options to properly protect the 180-year-old walls.
DELAWARE Sussex County: Sussex County has an “extremely significant” issue with heroin addiction characterized by lack of services and a whopping number of related crimes, state officials say. The News Journal reported a 1,854% increase in heroin-related criminal charges over the past five years. Seaford and Oak Orchard are particular hot spots, he said.
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA: Under federal pressure to improve safety on Metro trains, officials in Maryland, Virginia and the District drafted legislation that would create a regional oversight commission with “robust” power to investigate safety lapses, The Washington Post reported.
FLORIDA Pensacola: Escambia County Sheriff ’s deputies and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission were warning residents to stay inside as they looked for a bear spotted roaming around Gulf Beach Highway, the Pensacola News Journal reported.
GEORGIA Gwinnett County: Authorities broke up an alleged illegal dog breeding program in the backyard of a home. Nine chihuahuas and six pit bulls were discovered, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
HAWAII Honolulu: Scientists say they have discovered the largest known sponge in the world in the Northwest Hawaiian Islands, Hawaii News Now reported. The sponge is 7,000 feet below surface and about 12 feet long and 7 feet wide.
IDAHO Idaho Falls: A cleanup contractor says radioactive material contaminated the skin and clothing of three workers during an incident earlier this month at a U.S. Department of Energy site in the Idaho desert, the Post-Register reported.
ILLINOIS Chicago: Misdemeanor charges were filed in the beating of Joseph Kromelis, a fixture on downtown streets who is known to many as “The Walking Man.” Perry McCarlton, 41, was charged with reckless conduct even though Kromelis was reluctant to press charges, the Chicago Tribune reported.
INDIANA Indianapolis: FitzMark, a logistics company that was named one of IndyStar’s Top Workplaces in April, will move downtown in October and add 75 new jobs, The Indianapolis Star reported.
IOWA Sioux City: The Sioux City Community School District paid a total of $40,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by the mother of a student sexually exploited by a former educational specialist, the Sioux City Journal reported.
KANSAS Wichita: Grain elevators are bracing for a bountiful winter wheat crop in Kansas. Many facilities are already brimming with last year’s crops due to lackluster global exports.
KENTUCKY Louisville: The family of an autistic teenager whose legs were broken when a teaching assistant physically restrained him will be paid $1.75 million by the Jefferson County Public Schools, The Courier-Journal reported.
LOUISIANA New Orleans: The team behind Cure will run a neighborhood restaurant inside the former Booty’s location. The Bywater restaurant, to be called Chef Henri, will open May 31, The Times-Picayune reported.
MAINE Bucksport: The Maine Health Access Foundation is giving nearly $150,000 to nonprofit dental clinics around the state in an effort to make affordable dental care more accessible to low-income residents. The grants will go to health centers here, Brewer, Dexter and Belfast.
MARYLAND Berlin: Berlin’s seventh annual Little Mister and Miss Peach Pageant is rapidly approaching, and the town is looking for children all over Worcester County to participate, The Daily Times reported. The event is set for June 18.
MASSACHUSETTS Boston: An annual report from the group Save the Harbor/Save the Bay finds the overall water quality at the Boston Harbor Region’s public beaches was down in 2015 compared to the previous year.
MICHIGAN Sault Ste. Marie: The U.S. Coast Guard is working to free a freighter that ran aground in Whitefish Bay off
Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. There is no timetable for how long it will take.
MINNESOTA Minneapolis: The City Hall’s clock tower bells will not ring this summer as the 110year-old timepiece undergoes about a four-month renovation, the Star Tribune reported. The 24-foot City Hall clock faces are among the largest in the world.
MISSISSIPPI Jackson: Retired Circuit Judge Marcus D. Gordon, who oversaw the 2005 murder trial of Edgar Ray Killen in the FBI’s “Mississippi Burning” case, has died, The Clarion-Ledger reported. Gordon, 84, presided over the trial of Killen, accused of orchestrating the killings of three civil rights workers, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, on June 21, 1964, in Neshoba County.
MISSOURI Butler: The local community is mourning the death of a 12-year-old girl in a freak rodeo accident, The Kansas City Star reported. Kalee Chandler’s horse slammed into the fence and rolled onto Kalee, pinning her beneath him.
MONTANA Bozeman: Gallatin College Montana State University is adding a photonics and optics program in hopes of helping staff nearby employers, The Bozeman Daily Chronicle reported.
NEBRASKA Omaha: NuStyle Development plans to turn the Creighton University Medical Center into a 700-unit apartment building when the hospital moves in 2017, the Omaha World-Herald reported. The apartments will have open-air atriums, a rooftop pool and an enclosed retail corridor that looks out to a new lake.
NEVADA Las Vegas: The University of Nevada, Las Vegas football team received a $2 million donation, the largest ever made to the program.
NEW HAMPSHIRE Concord: A bill that would have regulated drones has died in the state House. Included in the bill, government- and privately owned drones would have needed permission to fly over private property, the New Hampshire Union Leader reported.
NEW JERSEY Trenton: Legalizing, regulating and taxing marijuana in the state could bring at least $300 million a year into the state’s coffers, The Daily Record reported. The report, issued by a policy group and a consortium of legalization advocates, claims the tax windfall could be used for things such as drug treatment, job training and education.
NEW MEXICO Santo Domingo Pueblo: A local housing project will be constructed opposite the New Mexico Rail Runner station, the Santa Fe New Mexican reported. Residents who work or go to school outside the community take the trains to Albuquerque and Santa Fe.
NEW YORK Albany: A bill that would ban electronic cigarette use in workplaces, restaurants and bars across the state got a last-minute push from several organizations, the Press & Sun Bulletin reported. A coalition of supporters urged lawmakers to pass the bill before the end of the state’s legislative session next month.
NORTH CAROLINA Mebane: After more than three years of planning, Morinaga American Foods, a subsidiary of Morinaga, Japan’s largest international confectionery and candy maker, celebrated the opening of its first production facility in the USA, The News & Observer reported. The plant will produce “HICHEW,” a chewy fruit-flavored snack, similar to Starburst, that holds the No. 1 spot in Japan.
NORTH DAKOTA Cannon Ball: Cannon Ball Elementary School completed a $98,000 project to rebuild a playground damaged in an October grass fire, KXMB-TV reported.
OHIO Hamilton: Authorities are warning motorists about gas pump credit card skimmers expected to be in expanded use this summer. Montgomery County Auditor Karl Keith told the Hamilton-Middletown Journal-News that stations along the Interstate 75 corridor have been hit hard. Two more cases were reported in the last few days in Butler County.
OKLAHOMA Oklahoma City: The newest rescue truck in the American Humane Association’s Red Star rescue fleet has been dedicated. The 50-foot-long animal rescue vehicle will be based at Oklahoma State University-Oklahoma City, where it will be ready for disaster deployment in Oklahoma and the Midwest, The Oklahoman reported.
OREGON Portland: Portland Public Schools shut down drinking fountains at all of its schools and will use bottled water for the remaining school year after tests at two schools found high levels of lead.
PENNSYLVANIA Philadelphia: A 160-year-old tree in Laurel Hill Cemetery has been felled, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The Norway maple that stood over the grave of Union Gen. George Meade was brought down because of its weakened condition.
RHODE ISLAND Providence: The state Department of Environmental Management stocked 20 ponds and rivers with 6,000 trout. The daily limit is five.
SOUTH CAROLINA Columbia: The General Assembly unanimously elected Donald Beatty, 64, to be chief justice of the state Supreme Court, The State reported.
SOUTH DAKOTA Vermillion: A loophole around state law may undercut the malt beverage tax revenue approved by local voters last July, the Yankton Press & Dakotan reported.
TENNESSEE Memphis: The Memphis Area Transit Authority has 38 malfunctioning buses that were taken out of service long before completing their anticipated life spans. The Commercial Appeal reported that the buses sit in a parking lot behind the authority’s maintenance facility, where they’ve been for years due to chronic breakdowns.
TEXAS Austin: It’s been confirmed that an invasive species of beetle, the emerald ash borer, is present in Texas. The beetle has killed tens of millions of ash trees in the USA, the Houston Chronicle reported.
UTAH West Valley City: Local police say a skateboarder was fatally shot after a road-rage argument.
VERMONT Montpelier: U.S. Census Bureau population estimates indicate that more than two-thirds of Vermont’s cities and towns have fewer residents today than they did in 2010, Burlington Free Press reported.
VIRGINIA Richmond: Residents took up the fight against tall grass that city officials more or less surrendered, citing budget constraints, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported. Firefighters mowed an overgrown park near their station. High school students stayed after class to trim unkempt landscaping at their schools and anonymous volunteers just started mowing.
WASHINGTON Seattle: Fire crews extinguished a fire at the local homeless camp known as the jungle, KING-TV reported.
WEST VIRGINIA Putnam County: Habitat for Humanity will open a ReStore by the end of the year, the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.
WISCONSIN Madison: A federal judge ruled Thursday there will be no change to Wisconsin’s voting laws before the Aug. 9 primary, including the requirement that photo identification be shown at the polls, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
WYOMING Casper: A study by the Pew Charitable Trusts found that Wyoming promised public employees almost $2 billion more than it currently has in retirement funds, the Casper Star-Tribune reported.