Putting cows on the front page since 1885.
Putting cows on the front page since 1885.
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Charter and cyber schools were a hot topic for the General Assembly and Gov. Tom Wolf in 2019 and remain a hot topic in the new year. Gov. Wolf issued an executive order focusing on charter schools in August, asking regulators to create new rules that would tighten financial restrictions on the schools and limit enrollment in schools where students are not improving academically. The order drew praise from some but criticism from others who said Wolf exceeded his authority. Charter school advocates protested in Harrisburg in September. In Decem...
Pennsylvania lawmakers will consider several bills relating to the state’s criminal statutes when they return, but the one expected to attract the most attention involves the legalization of marijuana. Sens. Daylin Leach, D-King of Prussia, and Sharif Street, D-Philadelphia, have introduced a bill that would legalize the drug’s recreational use for Pennsylvanians 21 and older. The bill would also expunge the criminal records of some nonviolent offenders charged with marijuana possession. The bill also allows residents to grow up to 10 mar...
Farming is big business in Pennsylvania – it accounts for 18 percent of the state’s economic output. Pennsylvania lawmakers passed a flurry of agriculture-related bills in 2019, including a comprehensive farm bill in 2019 first introduced by Gov. Tom Wolf in August 2018. The bill signed by Wolf in July was the “most comprehensive package of legislation ever made in agriculture” according to Agriculture Secretary Russell Redding. Agriculture officials began implementing parts of the bill just a few days after it was signed. Grant applica...
Anyone can become a scam victim, said Capt. Anthony O’Hara, the intelligence director of the Pennsylvania State Police. He knows because it happened to him during the last holiday season. It happened after he woke up after his Christmas nap and saw an email that he thought was from Apple. “It looked like a legitimate bill that I wasn’t familiar with, and I clicked through it,” O’Hara said. “I made that mistake of clicking through an email, and in that moment, in a hurry, I gave up my ID and my password. Moments after, I realized what I had...
The Pennsylvania House Transportation Committee recommended approval of a bill that would allow some local police departments to use radar detectors to enforce speeding laws – a bill that is “long past time,” said Mike Carroll, Democratic chairman of the committee. An amendment introduced by Rep. Greg Rothman, R-Cumberland, drew some opposition over a clause that would make the bill applicable only to municipalities with full-time police departments. Such a move is unfair to the 200 part-time police departments that have the same issues and the...
After years of debate, Sunday hunting in Pennsylvania appears to be on a path for approval. The bill passed by the House of Representatives last month will allow hunting on three Sundays. The Senate is expected to take up the bill soon and reports indicate that Gov. Tom Wolf is inclined to sign it. The bill is a “positive step in the right direction,” said Bryan Burhans, executive director of the Pennsylvania Game and Fish Commission. He has worked in several states where Sunday hunting passed and fought off the same arguments. “There’s religio...
Three words kept coming up at a joint meeting of the House and Senate Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committees this week – African swine fever. The committees meet to discuss biosecurity and animal health with much of the meeting focused on the disease, which has killed as much as half the pigs in China and could have a devastating effect on not only Pennsylvania but the U.S. “This is a virus that, unfortunately, if it comes to the U.S., very quickly would result in 100 percent mortality of any of the herds it came into,” said Kevin Brigh...
More than $4.25 billion was diverted from Pennsylvania’s Motor License Fund to the State Police over the past six years, according to a report by Auditor General Eugene DePasquale, leaving the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation without enough money to address the state’s 2,829 structurally deficient bridges. Speaking near Harrisburg’s Market Street Bridge, DePasquale said the state constitution says money from the Motor License Fund was supposed to be used solely for transportation projects. “That $4.25 billion could have cut that li...
