August 7, 2019 4:16 am
BEIJING (AP) – China’s yuan has weakened again after signs its decline was stabilizing helped to reassure jittery financial markets. The currency edged down to 7.0488 to the U.S. dollar on Wednesday, about 0.4 percent below its level late the previous day. Financial markets tumbled after Beijing allowed the yuan to fall to an 11-year low against the dollar this week. That prompted Washington to label China a currency manipulator, opening the way to possible sanctions. The central bank promised to keep the currency stable, which helped to reassure investors. Despite that, the central bank set the opening level for trading Wednesday at 6.9996 to the dollar, almost 0.5 percent below Tuesday’s starting level. The central bank allows the yuan to rise or fall 2% during the day.
September 19, 2024 4:48 am
On September 12, Donegal Township Supervisors voted unanimously to lay off their four person road crew. The reason for the layoffs according to township supervisors was lack of productivity by the road crew. On September 18, labor negotiators for the township and the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 66 held an effects bargaining meeting to discuss the ramifications to the road crew regarding the supervisors decision to call for the layoff. According to Phil Binotto, the Labor Negotiator for the township, they are waiting for a proposal from the union regarding terms of the layoff. He expects to hear from the union in a day or so. The layoff takes effect on Friday. Contract negotiations between the township and the union have been ongoing for several years. The road crew has been working under the terms of a contract that expired on December 31, 2022. Efforts to reach Union Representative Larry Cardillo for comment have been unsuccessful.
November 20, 2023 9:46 am
A challenge has been filed in connection with the City of Washington Mayoral race from the November 7 election. Democrat Jo Jo Burgess won the race by 39 votes over Independent candidate Mark Kennison. Washington County Elections Director Melanie Ostrander says there are 20 petitioners who are all registered voters in the City who voted in the election. Ostrander says they are requesting to review all of the election materials including; voted ballots, voting lists and poll book lists. She says they believe there were activities that occured at the 6th Ward-Precinct 1 that could have caused the election to be swayed towards one candidate. Results show that Burgess beat Kennison by 68 votes in that precinct. A hearing on the challenge will be heard before Washington County Common Pleas Court Judge Gary Gilman Wednesday morning at 10 a.m.
December 29, 2022 5:27 pm
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) – The U.S. Justice Department is alleging that a major drug wholesaler contributed to the deadly toll from opioids by turning a blind eye to warning signs about suspicious sales to its pharmacy customers. An 87-page civil enforcement action filed Thursday accuses AmerisourceBergen Corp. of failing to properly scrutinize orders for suspicious activity. AmerisourceBergen says the federal complaint is cherry-picking pharmacies among their tens of thousands of customers “while ignoring the absence of action” by the Drug Enforcement Administration. Opioids have been linked to more than 500,000 U.S. deaths during the past two decades.
February 17, 2022 4:14 am
UNITED NATIONS (AP) – A U.N. official says 80% of Tonga’s 105,000 people were affected by the undersea volcanic eruption and ensuring tsunami that lashed the Pacific island nation on Jan. 15. Sanaka Samarasinha is the U.N. resident coordinator for Tonga and he said Wednesday that the country needs over $90 million to repair damage and restore the farming and fishing that are its economic mainstays. Samarasinha says that “the anxiety hasn’t gone away with the receding waters of the tsunami.” He says cyclone season is still in full swing, and there are almost weekly earthquakes in the region, the latest a magnitude 5.0 quake a few hours before his comments.
March 24, 2021 4:18 am
LOS ANGELES (AP) – George Segal, the banjo player turned actor who was nominated for an Oscar for 1966’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?,” and starred in the ABC sitcom “The Goldbergs,” has died. Segal’s wife Sonia Segal said in a statement that he died Tuesday in Santa Rosa, California, of complications from bypass surgery. He was 87. Segal was always best known as a comic actor, but his most famous role was in a harrowing drama, 1966’s “Virginia Woolf.” More recently he played magazine publisher Jack Gallo on the NBC series “Just Shoot Me” and grandfather Albert “Pops” Solomon on the “The Goldbergs.”
May 26, 2020 9:32 am
BANGKOK (AP) – As Brazil and India struggle with surging coronavirus cases, a top health expert is warning that the world is still smack in the middle of the pandemic. Those comments from Dr. Mike Ryan of the World Health Organization are dampening hopes for a speedy global economic rebound. A U.S. travel ban takes effect Tuesday for foreigners coming from Brazil. On top of that, the South American country got a warning from the U.N. health agency not to reopen its economy before it can perform enough tests to control the spread of the coronavirus. India reported a record single-day jump in new infections for the seventh straight day and Russia had a record number of daily coronavirus deaths.
August 7, 2019 4:14 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – A veteran FBI agent who was fired over derogatory text messages about President Donald Trump has sued the FBI and Justice Department. Peter Strzok says in the lawsuit filed Tuesday that the FBI’s decision to fire him was “the result of unrelenting pressure” from Trump and his allies. The suit also says the Justice Department violated Strzok’s privacy by disclosing hundreds of the text messages to reporters. Strzok was a veteran counterintelligence agent who helped lead FBI investigations into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server and ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. He was removed from special counsel Robert Mueller’s team after the texts were discovered, and was fired from the FBI last August. Representatives of the FBI and Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
September 19, 2024 2:17 am
(AP) – Voters in Pennsylvania are not yet able to cast ballots, despite confusion over a state law concerning applications for mail ballots. Pennsylvania counties have been waiting for the state Supreme Court to rule in multiple cases regarding whether third-party candidates could be listed on the ballot, and the last ruling came Monday. County election officials say they will need time to test, print and mail the ballots — a process that could stretch into October. Experts say confusion over the availability of ballots in Pennsylvania stems from a law that requires that counties start processing voters’ applications for mail ballots by Sept. 16. But counties didn’t need to have ballots ready by that date.
November 20, 2023 5:14 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal appeals court appears inclined to reimpose at least some restrictions on Donald Trump’s speech in his election subversion case. But during several hours of arguments on Monday, the judges seemed to wrestle with how to craft a gag order that doesn’t infringe on the former president’s free speech rights or prevent him from defending himself on the campaign trail. The three judges on the panel asked skeptical and at times aggressive questions of attorneys on both sides while weighing whether to put back in place an order from a trial judge that barred Trump from inflammatory comments against prosecutors, potential witnesses and court staff.
