STATE-BY-STATE

ALABAMA Montgomery: The city moved a statue of country singer Hank Williams to Commerce Street, down the street from the Hank Williams Museum in the heart of the downtown entertainment district.

ALASKA Fairbanks: Marjorie Tahbone’s seal butchering demonstration was one of the first workshops of the 2016 Elders and Youth Conference at the Carlson Center, newsminer.com reported. “I learned to butcher a seal at 16,” Tahbone told a large crowd. “To do that, it’s quite an amazing feeling.”

ARIZONA Cave Creek: The Buffalo Chips Saloon rose from the metaphorical and literal ashes to start anew. The saloon reopened after a hiatus due to a suspicious fire that consumed the building last November, The Arizona Republic reported.

ARKANSAS Little Rock: Joseph Boeckmann, 70, a former district judge accused of taking inappropriate photographs of misdemeanor defendants in exchange for lenient sentences, was indicted on 21 federal charges, according to ArkansasOnline.

CALIFORNIA Sacramento: From 2009 through 2014, the number of people in the state who used a gun to kill themselves outpaced the number who used a gun to commit homicide, according to a Sacramento Bee review of state and federal data.

COLORADO Denver: U.S. Air Force officials disclosed a 150,000-gallon spill of wastewater laced with toxic perfluorinated chemicals, discharged from a tank at Peterson Air Force Base, into the Colorado Springs sewer system, the Denver Post reported.

CONNECTICUT Glastonbury: A plan to modernize the Center Village senior community received a boost when the state Department of Housing and the Connecticut Housing Authority gave the town $6.5 million for the project, the Hartford Courant reported.

DELAWARE New Castle: State Police arrested three women they said stole thousands of dollars in merchandise from several home improvement stores in the past month. Troopers said three women had stolen high-end kitchen and bathroom faucets worth over $20,000.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA: The city has seen a rise in rat complaints, according to The Washington Post.

FLORIDA Pensacola: Those suffering from kidney disease in Northwest Florida are no longer required to travel multiple hours for treatment, the Pensacola News Journal reported. In a collaboration with University of Florida Health, Sacred Heart Health System officials will offer a new kidney transplant program, the only one in the region.

GEORGIA Atlanta: A teen was ejected from a stolen SUV after he lost control of the vehicle and landed on a home, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

HAWAII Honolulu: A dream to convert a 13-acre site between Sand Island and Keehi Lagoon into a village for the homeless took a big step toward becoming a reality. Gov. Ige signed the state land over to the city, Hawaii News Now reported.

IDAHO Hayden: A 43-year-old woman was accused of filling her carts at Walmart but walking out without paying the nearly $2,300 bill, The Spokesman-Review reported.

ILLINOIS Hamilton: Western Illinois Threshers began a fundraising campaign to rebuild the loose hay barn built by Alexander Bolton in 1884. Its mortise and tenon joints hold up beams without nails, The Quincy HeraldWhig reported.

INDIANA Muncie: Fisher Meats, a local meat-packer and butcher will recover from a fire at its Jay County facility by opening a new smoking plant at a former fish processor, The Star-Press reported. Fisher Meats last week closed on the purchase of a former Bell Aquaculture building in Redkey, Ind.

IOWA Keosauqua: A Van Buren County attorney is set to stand trial over accusations of sexual harassment, intoxication and retaliation against employees. Abraham Watkins’ civil trial is scheduled to begin Thursday, according to the Hawk Eye.

KANSAS Overland Park: A 24-year-old man was charged in the drug overdose death of a suburban man, The Kansas City Star reported.

KENTUCKY Lexington: A Florida surgeon was hired to lead the effort to bring complicated pediatric heart surgeries back to the University of Kentucky after a four-year absence. The Lexington Herald-Leader reported that Dr. James Quintessenza will start his new duties Dec. 1.

LOUISIANA New Orleans: A 24-year-old man who was shot on Interstate 10 near the Chef Menteur Highway offramp was wearing a bright yellow neon safety vest and cleaning up trash along the interstate, The Times-Picayune reported.

MAINE Bangor: A lawsuit filed by the sister of state Sen. Andrew Cushing accuses him of siphoning money from the family business and using some of it for his political campaigns. Laura Cushing McIntyre accused her brother, the assistant majority leader, of misappropriating more than $1 million from the family’s business.

MARYLAND Bethesda: Marriott International, based in Maryland for more than 60 years, plans a new $600 million complex and hotel that would keep the company’s headquarters here, Bethesda Magazine reported.

MASSACHUSETTS Waltham: Police investigated after a pedestrian was struck and killed by a vehicle in the vicinity of a large office park on Wyman Street.

MICHIGAN Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan is set to receive $27 million from a Chinese investment firm to aid in the institution’s driverless vehicle and robotics research, officials said.

MINNESOTA Minneapolis: An arbitrator has decided the city was wrong to fire police officer Blayne Lehner earlier this year for using excessive force and ordered the city to rehire him, reduce his discipline to an unpaid suspension of 40 hours, and pay Lehner his lost compensation and benefits, the Star Tribune reported.

MISSISSIPPI Jackson: Officials say the 2016 Mississippi State Fair has set a new attendance record of 733,151 people. That’s a 13% increase from 2015.

MISSOURI St. Louis: One of the nation’s largest Fourth of July celebrations will return to Forest Park in 2017. Fair St. Louis will be July 2 through 4.

MONTANA Missoula: The Missoulian reported that council members voted to allow bird owners to keep up to six chickens or ducks or 10 quail on parcels less than 1 acre. Interested bird keepers will have to pay a $30 fee every three years, similar to a dog license.

NEBRASKA Omaha: Authorities arrested 26 men and 15 women in eastern Nebraska and western Iowa as part of an annual nationwide operation targeting human trafficking, the Lincoln Journal Star reported.

NEVADA Reno: Weekend rainstorms damaged 19 Washoe County public schools because of leaky roofs, the Reno Gazette-Journal reported. District spokesman Riley Sutton said the district had not estimated the cost of the damage, but the leaks were a direct result of $31 million of roof work the district needs.

NEW HAMPSHIRE Lebanon: Dartmouth-Hitchcock announced it will lay off 84 employees in an effort to reduce overall expenses after it recently discovered a $23 million quarterly operating deficit, the Valley News reported.

NEW JERSEY East Rutherford: A New York Giants fan sued her beloved team after she claims she was injured when a large photo of the squad fell on her in the stadium gift shop two years ago. NJ.com reported that Laura Gallagher, 53, filed the lawsuit against the team and MetLife Stadium.

NEW MEXICO Santa Fe: Officials are considering requiring businesses to secure licenses to sell authentic Native American art, The Santa Fe New Mexican reported. The City Council is scheduled to consider the proposal Oct. 26.

NEW YORK Buffalo: City public school teachers have a new contract for the first time in more than a decade. The Board of Education approved the three-year contract with a 7-2 vote and the Buffalo Teachers Federation ratified it.

NORTH CAROLINA Raleigh: The International Bluegrass Music Association’s annual festival drew a record-breaking 208,755 people, The News & Observer reported.

NORTH DAKOTA Stanley: Cleanup was underway after a spill of nearly 3,000 gallons of oil and saltwater in Mountrail County.

OHIO Marietta: A former Ohio trooper already accused of stalking a subordinate’s wife after an affair was charged with finding or keeping personal information about 10 other women obtained from a law-enforcement database without authorization. William Elschlager previously pleaded not guilty to charges including abduction, criminal trespassing, theft and menacing by stalking, and that trial is scheduled for January.

OKLAHOMA Oklahoma City: Oklahoma County District Judge Patricia Parrish sided with eight school districts that sued the Oklahoma Tax Commission over the new way it has been distributing motor vehicle tax collections, the Tulsa World reported. A June lawsuit by Sand Springs, Muskogee and six other school districts claimed that the Tax Commission had misinterpreted a new law and beginning July 1, 2015, incorrectly distributed more than $14 million of motor vehicle collections from across the state among Oklahoma’s 419 independent school districts.

OREGON Salem: A report released by the Employment Department shows most of the net gain of 7,185 jobs over August was in government, which added 3,300 jobs. The majority of new government jobs were for education. The state Employment Department said professional and businesses services added 1,200 jobs.

PENNSYLVANIA Pittsburgh: The Symphony Orchestra canceled all concerts through Nov. 18 because of a strike by musicians.

RHODE ISLAND Providence: The Department of Human Services Center will extend customer hours until 6:30 p.m. every Tuesday and Wednesday in an effort to reduce wait times and assist more residents with their benefits.

SOUTH CAROLINA Greenville: The Greenville County Sheriff ’s Office is receiving $135,000 from the state of South Carolina to implement its first body cameras, The Greenville News reported.

SOUTH DAKOTA Rapid City: A prairie fire that burned 65 square miles was human-caused. The Cottonwood Fire scorched private land and part of the Buffalo Gap National Grassland.

TENNESSEE Knoxville: A screening of Tom Cruise’s new film brought the actor to the event here, where it raised $600,000 for the Children’s Charity of Eastern Tennessee, the Knoxville News Sentinel reported.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back is a sequel to the 2012 film Jack Reacher and hits theaters Friday.

TEXAS El Paso: The County Commissioners Court voted to ban smoking on most countyowned property, starting in 2017.

UTAH West Valley: Crews extinguished a fire at a junkyard that sent plumes of black smoke over the Salt Lake Valley, KSL-TV reported.

VERMONT Montpelier: Joyce Yoo Babbitt, librarian at the Browns River Middle School in Jericho, has been named the 2016 Vermont humanities educator of the year.

VIRGINIA Charlottesville: The Economist named the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business the third-best “overall MBA program” in the world, according to The Daily Progress.

WASHINGTON Spokane: The population of stink bugs is increasing dramatically. This fall, the agricultural pest has turned up in significantly larger numbers in traps and inside people’s homes in 19 counties.

WEST VIRGINIA Charleston: A free medical clinic for flood victims and others in need is set for this weekend in Kanawha County. The clinic will be held Saturday and Sunday at Elkview Middle School. Services will be offered beginning at 6 a.m. each day.

WISCONSIN Milwaukee: Harley-Davidson on Tuesday said it expects to lay off about 225 salaried employees between now and the end of the year as the company cuts costs amid a sluggish U.S. motorcycle market, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

WYOMING Casper: A 24-yearold woman was charged in connection to a hit-and-run crash that injured three people, KTWO-AM reported. Cecilia Warren was accused of driving her vehicle at the victims after having a verbal argument with a fourth person. The fourth person dodged her vehicle.

Compiled from staff and wire reports by Tim Wendel, with Jonathan Briggs, Carolyn Cerbin, Linda Dono, Mike Gottschamer, Ben Sheffler, Michael B. Smith, Nichelle Smith and Matt Young. Design by Tiffany Reusser. Graphics by Alejandro Gonzalez.