WJPA News

PennDOT has announced a full slate of work for the week of May 11 for Washington County. Maintenance Manager Brian Malik announced this includes bridge replacement work along Brush Run Road in Canton Township. The road will be closed between Maple Road and Jefferson Avenue with a detour from Brush Run Road to Jefferson Avenue and Scenic Drive. Various routes in Washington County will see crack sealing work done. Culvert cleaning and repair work will be along Rt. 18 (Prosperity Pike in Morris Township), State Line Road in Jefferson Township, and Crosscreek Road in Crosscreek and Smith townships. Crews will be cleaning ditch lines on State Route 221 S Bridge Road in Buffalo Township, along State Line Road in Jefferson Township, and mowing will be along Rt. 22 the Ramp 8046 in Hanover Township, Rt. 837 in Donora, and I-70 Ramp 8014, Jefferson Avenue in the city of Washington. There will be patching at various routes throughout the county, and rock lining on State Line Road in Jefferson Township. Shoulder cutting and slide repair work will take place throughout California Borough. Due to road construction, the route between SR 481 (Scenic Drive) and Route 2079 (South Ridge Road) will detour motorists from Scenic Drive to California Drive and South Ridge Road. There will be underdrain installation and ditch line along Rt. 40 (National Pike) in Claysville Borough. Crews will pick litter, replace downed signs, update existing signs, and address work orders on various state routes throughout the county. Drivers can anticipate detours, flaggers, moving operations, and/or single-lane restrictions. Please drive cautiously through all work areas and be alert for signed work zones requiring headlights. Safety is everyone’s responsibility. And all work is weather permitting.

More than 350 people turned out Friday at the Hilton Garden Inn at Southpointe to celebrate strong female leaders for the presentation of the 23^rd annual Washington County Athena Award. Leanna Spada, executive director of the Mon Valley Regional Chamber of Commerce in Charleroi, took home the honor. “We have so many strong women in this county, and I worked alongside so many of them,” said Spada, who has led the chamber since 2018. “So I feel like I’m accepting this award for all of them as well.” Aliesha Walz, president and CEO of the Washington County Community Foundation, won the Diana Irey Vaughan Athena Young Professional Leadership Award. “I know so many of the previous honorees, the women who are part of the Athena program … and so to be included in this group of influential, powerful change-makers is something I could have only aspired to,” she said. The awards were presented by the Washington County Chamber of Commerce with Dollar Bank as the title sponsor.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says the leaders of Russia and Ukraine have agreed to his request for a three-day ceasefire and an exchange of prisoners. Trump said Friday that such a halt to hostilities could be the “beginning of the end” of the long war between them. Trump announced on social media that the ceasefire would run Saturday through Monday. Saturday is Victory Day in Russia, a holiday that commemorates victory over Nazi Germany in World War II. The Republican president says the ceasefire includes a suspension of all kinetic activity and the exchange of 1,000 prisoners by each country. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Kremlin foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov both confirmed the agreement.

WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s employers a delivered a surprising 115,000 new jobs last month despite an economic shock from the Iran war. Hiring was better than the 65,000 that economists had expected, though it decelerated from the 185,000 jobs created in March. The unemployment rate remained at a low 4.3%. The war has caused the biggest disruption of global oil supplies in history and sent average U.S. gasoline prices surging past $4.50 a gallon this week. But the conflict hasn’t done much damage to the American job market so far.

The Virginia Supreme Court has struck down a Democratic congressional redistricting plan that had won voter approval. The court’s decision on Friday marked a major setback for Democrats in a nationwide redistricting battle with Republicans ahead of the midterm elections. The plan approved April 21 by voters could have helped Democrats win up to four additional U.S. House seats. But the court said state lawmakers violated procedural requirements when referring the plan to the ballot. A recent U.S, Supreme Court ruling that weakened the Voting Rights Act has been used by Republicans in several Southern states to try to eliminate congressional districts held by Black Democratic lawmakers.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal court has ruled against the new global tariffs that President Donald Trump imposed after a stinging loss at the Supreme Court. A split three-judge panel of the Court of International Trade in New York found the 10% global tariffs were illegal after small businesses sued. The court ruled 2-1 Thursday that Trump overstepped the tariff power that Congress had allowed the president under the law. The tariffs are “invalid″ and “unauthorized by law,” the majority wrote. At issue are temporary 10% worldwide tariffs the Trump administration imposed after the Supreme Court in February struck down even broader tariffs the president had imposed last year on almost every country on Earth.

MADRID (AP) — Spanish authorities are preparing to receive over 140 passengers and crew from a hantavirus-stricken cruise ship headed for the Canary Islands. Health officials plan careful evacuations when the ship arrives in Tenerife this weekend. At least three passengers have died, and several others are sick. The United States and the U.K. are arranging flights to repatriate their citizens. The World Health Organization says the risk to the wider public is low. Health authorities are tracking passengers who disembarked before the outbreak was detected. None of the remaining passengers or crew is currently symptomatic.

(AP) – The NFL and the NFL Referees Association have agreed on a new seven-year collective bargaining agreement that avoids a potential work stoppage and use of replacement officials. The deal runs through the 2032 NFL season. The league began the on-boarding process for replacement officials last month because negotiations weren’t progressing. But they won’t be necessary. A stalemate in 2012 resulted in a 110-day lockout and replacement referees were used.