October 5, 2021 4:01 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Biden administration is reversing a ban on abortion referrals by federally funded family planning clinics. Monday’s action by the Department of Health and Human Services lifts a Trump-era restriction as political and legal battles over abortion grow sharper from Texas to the U.S. Supreme Court. Groups representing the clinics say they hope the rule reversal leads to the return of some 1,300 service providers that left the program to protest the Trump administration’s policy. HHS has estimated that the upheaval led to as many as 180,000 unintended pregnancies. The clinics provide birth control and basic health care mainly to low-income women.
October 5, 2021 3:57 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – A former Facebook data scientist told Congress that the social network’s products harm children and fuel polarization in the U.S. while its executives refuse to change because they elevate profits over safety. And she laid responsibility with the company’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Frances Haugen testified to the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection. She accused the company of being aware of apparent harm to some teens from Instagram and being dishonest in its public fight against hate and misinformation. “Facebook’s products harm children, stoke division and weaken our democracy,” Haugen said. (Photo: AP)
October 5, 2021 3:56 am
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – After 40 drawings without a big Powerball winner, a single ticket sold in California matched all six numbers drawn Monday and was the lucky winner of the nearly $700 million jackpot prize. The winning numbers drawn Monday night were 12, 22, 54, 66 and 69. The Powerball was 15. The Powerball jackpot climbed to $699.8 million, making it the seventh largest in U.S. lottery history. The winner will be able to choose between the annuity option paid over 29 years or the cash option of $496 million. Both prize options are subject to taxes. The was the first jackpot won on a Monday night since Aug. 23, when the game launched a third weekly drawing.
October 5, 2021 3:54 am
Washington County Register of Wills James Roman appeared before District Justice Robert Redlinger on Monday to face charges that he carried a weapon into the courthouse on August 20. Roman faced a misdemeanor charge of possession of a firearm in a court facility. That misdemeanor charge was reduced to a summary charge. According to Roman, the hearing lasted nearly 90 minutes before Judge Redlinger found Roman not guilty. Roman told WJPA Radio that the sheriffs department did not stop him immediately at the security gate in the courthouse. Twenty minutes after Roman arrived at his office sheriffs deputies asked him to remove his bag because they determined that he had a gun. During the hearing sheriffs deputies were unable to produce any physical evidence that Roman in fact did have a gun in the courthouse. Roman stated that he feels that this charge was politically motivated since he began speaking out against Washington County Commissioners, specifically Commissioner Chairwoman Diana Irey-Vaughn.
October 5, 2021 3:38 am
Washington City Council received a draft report of their annual financial audit and it contained good news, considering the audit was for the year 2020. As expected, the audit showed decreases in both revenue and expenses due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Councilman Joe Manning stated that early on in 2020 he had read financial outlooks that predicted that municipalities could have had revenue decreases of up to twenty percent. Revenues in Washington were down $2.5 million and expenses decreased by $1.4 million. Long term debt decreased by $1.5 million in 2020 with hopes of retiring that long term debt by 2026. The city will be receiving about $1.5 million in American Rescue Plan funds. Manning stated that those funds are strictly regulated and cannot be spent on just any project that comes up. Council will meet again on Thursday at 1:00 PM for their regular voting meeting.
October 5, 2021 2:35 am
Junior and senior high school students in the Washington School District will be switching to virtual, at-home synchronous learning Wednesday, October 6th through Friday, October 8th, in an effort to slow the spread of positive Covid cases. District Superintendent Dr. James Konrad says Synchronous learning online will allow the students to log on to each class from the beginning of their regular school day until the end of the day as if they were at school. Konrad says the district plans to reopen at-school learning for the junior-senior high on Monday, October 11th. Konrad says the junior/senior high positive covid cases have spiked to 44 or 7.2% as of Monday, October 4th, with thirteen new cases added since Friday. Konrad says the district will revisit the numbers next week to see if any additional days of virtual learning are needed. District officials say the junior/senior high school closure does not affect Washington Park School students who will still go to their building for in-person classes as normally scheduled. In addition, all extracurricular activities at the junior/senior high school, including athletics, band, and the Prexie Center, a social and tutoring program begun this year, will be cancelled this week effective at 3 p.m. Tuesday. District staff are coordinating breakfast and lunch for those junior and senior high students who wish to take food home at the end of the day on Tuesday for the rest of this week. With the junior/senior high building being closed to students Wednesday through Friday, any WACTC student will need to find his or her own transportation for those 3 days. Parents and junior/senior high students will be notified of changes by phone blasts from the district, as well as updates on Facebook and the school website.
October 4, 2021 12:39 pm
UNDATED (AP) – Facebook and its Instagram and WhatsApp platforms were down in parts of the world on Monday. The company said it was “aware that some people are having trouble accessing Facebook app” and it was working on restoring access. The company did not say what might be causing the outage, which began around 11:45 ET. Users reported being unable to access Facebook in California, New York and Europe. Facebook is going through a major crisis after the whistleblower who was the source of The Wall Street Journal’s series of stories exposing the company’s awareness of internal research into the negative effects of its products went public on “60 Minutes” Sunday.
October 4, 2021 10:22 am
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – After 40 drawings without a big Powerball winner, maybe the 41st attempt will be different. Thanks to nearly four months of futility, Monday’s Powerball jackpot has climbed to an estimated $670 million, making it the eighth largest in U.S. lottery history. No one has won the game’s grand prize since June 5. The jackpot drought is by design, as the game’s long odds of 292.2 million to one are intended to generate massive prizes that draw more players. The $670 million promoted prize is for a winner who chooses the annuity option, paid over 29 years. Nearly all big winners take the cash option, which for Monday night’s drawing is an estimated $474.8 million.
October 4, 2021 7:37 am
The CEO of Washington Health System has some concerns as COVID-19 cases spike in Washington County. Brook Ward says Washington Hospital and WHS Greene had 54 patients with COVID-19, as of late last week. That is approaching the highest peak of 58 reached last November at those facilities. In a Facebook video post, Ward says 83 percent of those patients are not vaccinated. According to Ward, people seeking testing to return to school, work or to travel are driving the positivity rate down but if you take those people out the community is seeing a high incident rate. Ward calls that “concerning”. Ward is also advising residents to prepare for long wait times should you have to go to the emergency room at either facility.
October 4, 2021 4:28 am
NEW YORK (AP) – Facebook prematurely turned off safeguards designed to thwart misinformation and rabble rousing after Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in last year’s elections in a moneymaking move that a company whistleblower alleges contributed to the deadly Jan. 6 invasion of the U.S. Capitol. The whistleblower, former Facebook product manager Frances Haugen, also asserted during an exclusive interview that aired Sunday on CBS’ “60 Minutes” that a 2018 change to Facebook’s news feeds contributed to more divisiveness and ill will in a network ostensibly created to bring people closer together. Facebook contends Haugen’s allegations are misleading and insists that there is no evidence to support the premise that it’s the primary cause of social polarization.
