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Officials in Peters Township have entered into a purchase agreement for land located on Bebout Road for the construction of a new fire station. According to Township Manager Paul Lauer, new home construction on the eastern side of the township has caused the need for a new fire station. Design is in the very early stages and cost estimates are not available. No timeline has been set for the completion of the project.
PITTSBURGH (AP) – At least eight Democratic presidential candidates plan to participate in a forum Saturday in Pittsburgh to answer questions about their plans for public schools. Organizers of the Public Education Forum 2020 say the committed candidates are Michael Bennet, Joe Biden, Cory Booker, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, Tom Steyer and Elizabeth Warren. Organizers include labor unions and the NAACP. They say topics will include school investment, student services, special education, student debt, teaching conditions, and education equity and justice issues. The event is at the city’s convention center but isn’t open to the public.
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – Seven of nine House Democrats from Pennsylvania now say they will support the two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump that were under consideration in the House. Freshman Rep. Conor Lamb, of suburban Pittsburgh, added his support Thursday to six of his colleagues from Pennsylvania, saying in a statement that he believes that Trump “abused his power and obstructed Congress.” Two Democrats, freshman Rep. Chrissy Houlahan of suburban Philadelphia and fourth-term Rep. Matt Cartwright of northeastern Pennsylvania, have declined to say how they’ll vote. All nine Republican House members from Pennsylvania say they’ll vote against the articles.
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Elizabeth Warren’s campaign is moving to become the first in the Democratic presidential primary to hire field staff and open field offices in Pennsylvania. It’s a late primary state that could become an important prize. Warren’s campaign said it has hired a Pennsylvania campaign strategist and will bring on staff and open a field office in Philadelphia in the coming weeks. Pennsylvania’s primary is April 28. It has the fifth-most Democratic primary delegates. Warren may have ground to make up in Pennsylvania. Former Vice President Joe Biden has his campaign headquarters in Philadelphia and deep political inroads in the state.
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration wants a federal court to reject a challenge to its certification of voting machines bought by Philadelphia and two other Pennsylvania counties. Also Thursday, the machine’s maker accepted responsibility for problems that led to badly undercounted returns in a judicial race last month in Northampton County. The machines are the ExpressVote XL touchscreen system made by Omaha, Nebraska-based Election Systems & Software. ES&S acknowledged that incorrect results in last month’s election in Northampton County resulted from human errors in formatting the ballot. Ultimately, election workers counted the vote on paper ballots.
PITTSBURGH (AP) – Pittsburgh police shot and killed a pit bull after it charged at an officer following a fight with a poodle. Officers found a woman caring for her poodle, which was covered in blood, when they responded to a report of dogs fighting Wednesday. Police say the pit bull’s owner told them he had stabbed his pet and used pepper spray to get it to release the poodle. When the wounded pit bull lunged at police, an officer shot it to death. The poodle was taken to a veterinarian.
HARRISBURG (AP) – Faculty at Pennsylvania state universities will go without a pay raise this year but see their pay climb at least 12% over the next three years. The four-year contract approved Wednesday covers about 5,000 professors and instructors at 14 schools. Spokesman David Pidgeon of the state System of Higher Education says the raises are expected to cost about $22 million.? A similar deal has been reached with about 700 other employees who work in student services. The agreement comes three years after prolonged contract talks between the educators’ association and the state led to a three-day faculty strike.
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump reacted quickly after the House Judiciary Committee approved two articles of impeachment against him. Using the words he’s embraced nearly every day for weeks, he called the proceedings “a witch hunt, a scam, a hoax.” The charges approved Friday now go to the full House for an expected vote next week. They were approved strictly along party lines, 23 Democrats to 17 Republicans. Trump is accused of abuse of power, a charge stemming from his July phone call pressuring the Ukrainian president to announce an investigation of Democrats as Trump was withholding US aid. He’s also accused of obstructing Congress’ investigation.
NEW YORK (AP) – Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg has released a plan to eliminate all coal power plants and slow the expansion of the natural gas sector. It’s part of a sweeping policy to fight climate change that he says would cut carbon emissions across the U.S. economy by 50% over the first 10 years. The New York billionaire on Friday said his new plan is the first of several that would ultimately move the nation toward phasing out fossil fuels completely “as soon as humanly possible” – ideally before 2050. The plan is a sharp shift away from President Donald Trump’s moves to weaken environmental safeguards. But Bloomberg’s plan is not likely to win over his party’s loudest environmental activists. It stops well short of the goals of the so-called “Green New Deal.”
(AP) The House Judiciary Committee has approved two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump. The charges now go to the full House for an expected vote next week. The abuse of power charge stems from Trump’s July phone call with the Ukraine president pressuring him to announce an investigation of Democrats as he was withholding US aid. The obstruction charge involves Trump’s blocking of House efforts to investigate his actions. Trump has denied wrongdoing.
(AP) With Christmas less than two weeks away, finding the perfect tree might take some searching. The availability of real Christmas trees is tight across the United States, especially for procrastinators looking for a certain type of tree. But industry officials say everyone who wants a tree should be able to find one, they just might have to pay a little more. Merchant Sandy Parsons of Charleston, West Virginia, says she never got her order for 350 trees from a North Carolina farm, citing short supply. But local seller Robert Cole, whose business supplies its own trees, has never been busier.
