July 19, 2019 4:13 am
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – Revenue from regulated gambling in Pennsylvania climbed to a new record high above $3.3 billion in the just-completed fiscal year. The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board said Thursday that revenue rose by nearly $60 million, or almost 2%, over the 2018 fiscal year. Slot machine play at the state’s 12 casinos grew by $26 million and newly legal sports betting and fantasy sports contests contributed another $43 million. Table games play shrank by $10 million. Online casino gambling is just starting, as Pennsylvania mounts an aggressive gambling expansion to help shore up its treasury. American Gaming Association figures show that revenue at Pennsylvania’s commercial casinos was No. 2 in the nation last year, second to Nevada.
Pennsylvania is No. 1 in tax revenue from casino gambling, netting $1.5 billion last year.
July 19, 2019 4:08 am
The DICK’S Sporting Goods PONY League World Series Thursday revealed details for their 68th annual championship. Five of the ten teams have qualified for the tournament: Washington County, the host, along teams from Mexico, Puerto Rico, defending champion Chinese Taipei and, for the first time ever, London, United Kingdom. The events will begin on the evening of August 8th with the Ansys FanFest at DICK’s Sporting Goods in Washington. The games will begin on Friday August 9th, concluding with the championships on Thursday, August 15th. WJPA-AM 1450 has been the radio home of the PONY League World Series since 1952. Longtime Pirates broadcaster Lanny Frattare and 10-year Voice of the Wild Things Randy Gore will anchor our coverage.
July 19, 2019 4:04 am
MEDIA, Pa. (AP) – Penn State is keeping in-state college tuition flat across the sprawling university system for a second year and for the third time in five years. The school’s board, meeting in the Philadelphia suburb of Media, voted Thursday for a plan that will maintain full-time tuition for lower-division Pennsylvania resident undergraduates at its main campus at about $17,400 annually.
Out-of-state college students at the University Park flagship will have to pay $660 a year in additional tuition. Smaller increases for students who are not Pennsylvania residents will be coming to other Penn State campuses. The move follows recent decisions by Temple University and the 14-school State System of Higher Education to keep tuition at current rates for the coming school year.
July 19, 2019 3:33 am
UNIONTOWN, Pa. (WPXI) – Two brothers, ages 1 and 3, drowned in Fayette County Wednesday evening, police confirmed to Channel 11. Police said it happened in a backyard pool on Whiteman Avenue in Uniontown. According to our partners at TribLive, the two boys were identified as Hayden and Hunter Smith. They were pulled from the family’s pool by their grandfather. The incident is under investigation.
July 19, 2019 3:29 am
JEFFERSON TOWNSHIP, Pa. (WPXI) – A man was killed when a car exploded in Fayette County on Wednesday night. Police were called to Fayette City Road in Jefferson Township just before 8 p.m. The Rostraver West Newton Emergency Services Facebook page shared the attached photo. According to their department, it was a natural gas car explosion.
July 18, 2019 5:53 pm
WASHINGTON (AP) – The House has approved legislation to raise the federal minimum wage for the first time in a decade, to $15 an hour. Democrats pushed through the bill Thursday with a party-line vote of 231-199, but it has almost no chance in the Republican-controlled Senate. A hike in the $7.25 hourly wage has been a top Democratic campaign promise. It’s intended to address income inequality that’s driving the 2020 political debate. The legislation, for the first time, would pay tipped workers the same as others earning the minimum, boosting their pay to $15 an hour, too. It’s now $2.13. Republicans balked at the wage hike, saying it would cost jobs. States are already able to raise the wage beyond the federal minimum, and many have done so.
July 18, 2019 5:48 pm
NEW YORK (AP) – A U.S. senator and a Florida congresswoman are praising a federal judge’s decision to keep financier Jeffrey Epstein behind bars. Republican Sen. Ben Sasse, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Oversight Subcommittee, says the judge’s decision Thursday to keep Epstein jailed until trial “wasn’t a close call.” He calls Epstein a “molester” who “stole the innocence of many little girls.” U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, former chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, says the judge “made the right call.” She says “survivors deserve more answers and true justice” and Epstein “will never spend enough time behind bars.” The 66-year-old Epstein was arrested on sex trafficking charges on July 6. He has pleaded not guilty. His defense lawyers left Manhattan federal court Thursday without commenting. (Photo: CNN)
July 18, 2019 12:27 pm
MARIANNA, Pa. (AP) – Authorities say an ATV rider was killed when he was thrown off it and struck by another vehicle on a road in Washington County. Marianna police say 21-year-old Tyler Raymond Markoff of Marianna was driving his ATV on Rosewood Avenue when it overturned around 5:15 p.m. Wednesday as he tried to make a right turn. Markoff landed in the opposite lane of traffic and ended up in the path of the other vehicle, which wasn’t able to stop in time. Markoff was taken to a hospital but died there a short time later. No other injuries were reported. Authorities say the accident remains under investigation.
July 18, 2019 5:52 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – A Republican senator has blocked a bipartisan bill that would ensure a victims’ compensation fund for the Sept. 11 attacks never runs out of money. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul questions the bill’s 70-year time frame and notes that the federal government already faces a $22 trillion debt. He says any new spending such as the 9/11 bill should be offset by cuts. Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York is criticizing Paul for playing what she calls “political games.” The bill has 73 co-sponsors in the Senate and easily passed the House last week. Gillibrand says 9/11 first responders and “the entire nation are watching to see if this body actually cares about the men and women who answered the call of duty” after the 2001 attacks.
July 18, 2019 5:49 am
TOKYO (AP) – A Japanese fire official says the death toll from the Kyoto Animation studio fire is now 33 and nobody else is believed to be still missing. Kyoto fire department official Kazuhiro Hayashi says 36 others have been injured, 10 of them critically. Hayashi says firefighters found the largest number of victims on the top floor of the three-story building, including some who had collapsed on the stairs leading to the roof. Two of the dead were found on the first floor, 11 on the second and 20 on the third floor. Japanese media reports said the suspect may have set the fire at the front door, forcing people to try to find other exits and slowing their escape. The outcome makes the case the deadliest fire since a 2001 fire that killed 44 in Tokyo’s Kabukicho entertainment district. The suspect was injured and is in a hospital.
