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Cheetah run, mountain-man biathlon, prodigal emu: News from around our 50 states

Alabama

Mobile: A new project at the state’s main seaport will open the facility to the shipment of finished automobiles. The Alabama State Port Authority says it has signed a deal to build a $60 million automotive terminal in Mobile. It’s supposed to be ready early next year and will allow for vehicles to roll on and off ships. The 57-acre terminal will be able to handle 150,000 vehicles annually with connections to rail service and highways, officials say. Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai and Honda currently make cars in the state, and Mazda-Toyota is building a factory in north Alabama. A docks official says the new terminal will open a new business stream for the docks. The project is a joint venture between Terminal Zarate, S.A., a Grupo Murchison company based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and Neltume Ports, based in Santiago, Chile.

Alaska

Anchorage: Legislators have proposed changes to key elements of the state’s Village Public Safety Officer Program. About 1 in 3 communities in the state has no police of any kind, Anchorage Daily News reported last week in partnership with ProPublica. The Department of Justice subsequently declared the public safety gap a federal emergency, officials said. The 40-year-old program uses state money to train and pay officers working in remote villages, but the number of officers fell to a record-low 38 compared to the more than 100 in 2012, legislators in the working group said. The working group spent five months seeking ways to fix the program, which includes placing more certified officers in rural Alaska, increasing morale among current officers and retaining village-based first responders who know their communities best, legislators said.

Arizona

Queen Creek: A company’s proposal to take water from farmland along the Colorado River and sell it to this growing Phoenix suburb has provoked a heated debate, and some Arizona legislators are trying to block the deal with a bill that would prohibit the transfer. The legislation introduced by Rep. Regina Cobb would bar landowners who hold “fourth-priority” water entitlements from transferring Colorado River water away from communities near the river. Cobb said this water was supposed to be used for agriculture, and diverting it elsewhere would harm farming communities along the river. “We just needed to get ahead of it and let them know that we’re not for this,” said Cobb, R-Kingman. Cobb said without legislation, she’s concerned hedge funds will try to make more deals to use farmlands for selling off water.

Arkansas

Mountain Home: Forrest L. Wood, who created one of the top brands in the boating industry and was a pioneer of bass tournament fishing, has died at age 87. Wood, born in Flippin, Arkansas, founded the company Ranger Boats in 1968 with his wife, Nina. The business quickly grew and became a household name among fisherman around the U.S. He sold the company in 1987. Wood was known as the “father of the modern bass boat.” Keith Daffron, his grandson, said in a Facebook post that Wood died Saturday surrounded by his family, after a brief illness. In a statement, Gov. Asa Hutchinson said Wood’s death “is a deeply sad moment for our entire state.” Former President Bill Clinton said in a statement that Wood was “ambitious and determined and Arkansas is a better place because he fully invested his time and his talents right here.”

California

Sacramento: Former Gov. Jerry Brown wants to know who is trying to sell his father’s memorabilia related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Private letters and other items that had belonged to Edmund G. “Pat” Brown when he was governor are being offered by the auction house Sotheby’s, which estimates the value at $20,000 to $30,000. Sotheby’s says the seller wants to remain anonymous. The elder Brown, who died in 1996, was California’s top elected official from 1959 to 1967, and eight years later his son started the first of his record four terms as governor. Jerry Brown says he was not consulted or informed of the sale and believes the items should instead reside at the University of California, Berkeley, “with the rest of my father’s papers.” Sotheby’s touts Brown’s materials for sale as unique because “it comes from a single source” and “chronicles a country in mourning.” The auction opened Monday.

Colorado

Denver: The state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dipped to 2.5% in December, the lowest level in at least 44 years. An unemployment rate of 2.6% in October and November tied the previous record-low rate in early 2017. The lowest rate before that, 2.7%, occurred in 2000, The Denver Post reports. Yuma and Kiowa counties in northeastern Colorado had the nation’s lowest seasonally unadjusted unemployment rate of 1.1% in December. Low unemployment is better than high unemployment but can make it hard for employers to find workers, economist Gary Horvath said. “We are in uncharted territory,” Horvath said. “I’m baffled by how companies are making this work.” Colorado has averaged about 84,000 job openings a month since 2001. Colorado had about 150,000 openings in September but only 85,000 people unemployed and seeking work, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates.

Connecticut

Hartford: Voters who are registered with one party but want to vote in a different party’s presidential primary are facing a key deadline. Secretary of the State Denise Merrill said those voters must change their registration by Tuesday. Voters can look up and check their current registration status online and make any changes at myvote.ct.gov/register. Unaffiliated voters, the state’s largest block of voters, have until April 23 to register with a party online, by mail or at the Department of Motor Vehicles if they want to participate in that party’s presidential primary. They have until April 27 to register in person. Connecticut’s Democratic and Republican presidential primary elections are scheduled for April 28. There are currently 2,192,828 active voters registered in Connecticut. Of those, 895,218 are registered as unaffiliated, 803,802 as Democrats, 459,403 as Republicans and 34,405 in some other party.

Delaware

Rehoboth Beach: This tiny coastal town’s environment committee held its first discussion last week on ways to reduce plastic intake. Committee members are in the early stages of suggesting various restrictions on plastic, from banning materials outright to putting a fee on others. Along with Wilmington and Newark, Rehoboth is the “farthest along” in reducing plastic use, like charging a fee for single-use bags, says Dee Durham, president of Plastic Free Delaware. The environment committee is eyeing single-use plastic bags, plastic straws and polystyrene, which Durham calls the “low-hanging fruit” of plastic products, meaning they are typically easier to restrict. Last year, state lawmakers chose to ban single-use plastic bags at large retailers. That law, which goes into effect in 2021, doesn’t really impact Rehoboth Beach because it generally applies only to stores 7,000 square feet or bigger or ones with three or more Delaware locations at least 3,000 square feet.

District of Columbia

Washington: A male harbor seal considered geriatric for his species has died at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo. Luke, 35, was humanely euthanized last week, according to a statement. The zoo said he outlived the median life expectancy for his species – 25 years in the wild and 30 years in human care. Luke had been experiencing ocular discomfort and had trouble orienting himself recently, according to the zoo’s statement. He had also experienced a loss of appetite and an unusual lack of interest in training with keepers and socializing with other animals. Animal care staff decided to euthanize him after trying several methods to treat his symptoms. Luke was born June 17, 1984, at New York Aquarium in Brooklyn, and he came to the nation’s capital in 2011, the statement said. He didn’t father any pups, according to news outlets, but lived at the zoo’s American Trail habitat with another male harbor seal and a gray seal colony.

Florida

Naples: Residents in an upscale community are seeing red over a paint job on a half-million-dollar home. The home was painted in large patches of extremely bright primary colors with random splatters throughout. The home in the Il Regalo Circle Community in Naples resembles a preschool play toy or cartoon home. Even the trees, lawn and mailbox were splattered with paint. Neighbors said the paint job got worse over the course of a week. WBBH News reports that Collier County Code Enforcement are investigating the paint job. Jeffrey Leibman, 40, is listed as the owner of the home, according to property appraiser records. Neighbors said he painted it, but the management company for the neighborhood said he no longer lives there. The company estimated that reversing the paint job could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Georgia

Atlanta: Gov. Brian Kemp is proposing that the state borrow nearly $900 million for construction projects and equipment next year, an amount likely to rise before lawmakers get done with the budget. Key projects in the Republican governor’s plan include $70 million to expand the state-owned convention center in Savannah and $55 million to build a new headquarters for the Department of Public Safety in Atlanta. Lawmakers authorized borrowing of nearly $1.1 billion last year. The agency that forecasts Georgia’s borrowing said the state could issue up to $1.2 billion in bonds this year. In one shift, Kemp wants to move more funding to aid school construction from districts statewide to those that have small property tax bases. Kemp would borrow $155 million for construction in such low-wealth districts, up from $44 million this year.

Hawaii

Honolulu: State lawmakers have proposed initiatives to help reduce the number of traffic-related fatalities after transportation officials confirmed more than 100 deaths in the past year. Those initiatives include installing traffic cameras to capture drivers running red lights, and enforcing zero-tolerance policies for drinking and driving, Hawaii News Now reports. “Every year, you hear of a horrific pedestrian accident that’s occurring at an intersection because someone did not stop at a red light,” state House Speaker Scott Saiki said. The cameras would automatically record anyone who runs a red light, and a ticket would then be mailed to the address associated with the license plate number, officials said. “There could potentially be a bench warrant for someone who doesn’t appear or who doesn’t respond to the ticket,” Saiki said. “And if you have a bench warrant, potentially there could be some jail time.”

Idaho

Boise: Two environmental groups have given notice that they intend to file a lawsuit to stop a proposed underground natural gas pipeline from Idaho to Wyoming that the groups say will harm protected grizzly bears and other wildlife. The Alliance for the Wild Rockies and Yellowstone to Uintas Connection sent a required 60-day notice to sue to the U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last week. The groups contend the Forest Service’s approval of the pipeline project in November violated the Endangered Species Act. The groups also say the 18-mile portion of the 50-mile pipeline would cut a corridor through the Caribou-Targhee National Forest and create a road through six Inventoried Roadless Areas. The 2001 Roadless Rule prevents road construction and timber harvest in designated roadless areas, which are typically 5,000 acres or larger.

Illinois

Springfield: The story of a boy who grew up across the street from Abraham Lincoln’s family and later presided over one the nation’s larger retailers will be told in the annual George L. Painter Looking for Lincoln Lecture. Julius Rosenwald spent his formative years in the shadow of the future president and grew up to be president of Sears, Roebuck & Co. He used the fortune he amassed to help those who faced racial injustices. His life will be recalled as part of the annual lecture series at 8:30 a.m. Feb. 12 at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. It’s presented with the Abraham Lincoln National Heritage Area, which preserves the history of the central Illinois communities touched by Lincoln’s life. The Rosenwald home, part of the Lincoln historic site, will be renamed in his honor and an exhibit panel about his life and legacy unveiled.

Indiana

Jasper: A one-room schoolhouse where the last lessons were taught in early 1950s has been dismantled after efforts to find a buyer for the small building failed. The Dick School had educated generations of Dubois County residents in rural Jasper from 1892 to 1951. But a few weeks ago, the shed-like building was taken down piece by piece in the city about 40 miles northeast of Evansville. The weatherboard structure with a tin roof was moved to a new location after it was closed, and it had remained in good shape. Robin Pate, the current owner of the property on which it stood, had advertised the old schoolhouse and reached out to the Dubois County Historical Society. But Pate couldn’t find any takers for the school, which had been the region’s last functioning one-room schoolhouse, The (Jasper) Herald reports. She’s selling the 2-acre site on which the building stood.

Iowa

Waterloo: The leaking inflatable dam on the Cedar River in downtown Waterloo has been fixed, officials said. The Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier reports contractors found a slit in the half-inch-thick rubber and repaired it. Associate city engineer Wayne Castle said the final cost of the project will be significantly below the original $388,350 contract approved in November with J.F. Brennan Co., of La Crosse, Wisconsin. “We’re not completely done yet, but we should be just under $220,000,” Castle said. A major reason for the lower cost was that a marine contractor was able to use divers to inspect the riverbed on the downstream side of the dam, Castle said. The original contract anticipated the contractor building a more expensive wall around the inspection area. The city has inflated the bladder dam since 2009, raising the Cedar River level by about 4 feet to enhance boating. It’s usually inflated in June and deflated in October.

Kansas

Lawrence: An effort is underway to more fully tell the story of a boulder that was a sacred prayer rock for a Native American tribe before it was moved to Lawrence and inscribed with the names of the city’s founders. The Lawrence Journal-World reports Pauline Eads Sharp, who serves as secretary and treasurer of the Kanza Heritage Society, and Lawrence artist Dave Loewenstein are leading a wide-ranging team of people, including historians, geologists, artists and filmmakers, to increase interest in the 23-ton red quartzite Shunganunga boulder. At issue is that there currently is no mention on the boulder-turned-monument of the Kanza tribe, which was forcibly removed to Oklahoma in 1873. The approximately yearlong project, called Between the Rock and a Hard Place, will include research, community workshops and the creation of a documentary film and book.

Kentucky

Hopkinsville: A prosecutor has been absent from court in the weeks following the release of the letter in which he asked former Gov. Matt Bevin to pardon a man convicted of sexual abuse. Two judges in Christian County said there is an agreement between them and Commonwealth’s Attorney Rick Boling that he remain absent from their courtrooms for the “foreseeable future,” The Kentucky New Era reports. Dayton Jones was granted a commutation by Bevin on Dec. 9. The letter Boling wrote on official letterhead Dec. 7 asking the former governor to pardon Jones was released Jan. 9. Boling apologized after it was released. Jones pleaded guilty in 2016 to sodomy, wanton endangerment and distribution of matter portraying a sexual performance by a minor. Boling wrote in his letter to Bevin that the prosecution of Jones was politically motivated. He said the case involved intoxicated teenagers and people in their early 20s “being stupid and immature.”

Louisiana

Baton Rouge: Fans of the late Louisiana author Ernest J. Gaines, who wrote such storied works as “A Lesson Before Dying” and “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,” are gathering to remember his work as part of Black History Month celebrations. The Louisiana Center for the Book in the State Library of Louisiana is hosting the discussion Feb. 19, according to a news release from Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser. Gaines died Nov. 5, 2019. He grew up on a small Louisiana plantation, experiences that later translated into his rich literary characters. “A Lesson Before Dying,” published in 1993, was an acclaimed classic. Both “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman” (1971) and “A Gathering of Old Men” (1984) became honored television movies. The program will be hosted by Darrell Bourque, who is a two-time Louisiana poet laureate, a close friend of Gaines and a member of the Ernest J. Gaines Center.

Maine

Portland: The Finance Authority of Maine’s board on Monday approved loan guarantees and a loan necessary for a Boston investment group to proceed with purchasing Saddleback Mountain and reopening the area to skiers next winter. The board unanimously approved $2.5 million in loan insurance on a $12.5 million loan, which was smaller than the original request, along with a $1 million direct loan. Arctaris Impact Fund also raised private funds and received a separate $1 million loan through the Maine Rural Development Association. The finance authority and rural development funds will be part of a $23.5 million funding package that includes private equity, new market tax credits, community loans, and community grants for the purchase of Saddleback, officials said. Bruce Wagner, CEO of FAME, said the agency is pleased to “help restart this historic and beloved Maine ski mountain.”

Maryland

Salisbury: Singer and recording artist CeCe Peniston – who released her signature dance hit, “Finally,” in 1991 – will be the headline entertainer and grand marshal for the city’s first organized LGBTQ+ pride celebration, according to Salisbury’s branch of PFLAG, the United States’ first and largest LGBTQ+ ally organization. The city made the announcement in a video on Facebook. The lovably corny clip features Mayor Jake Day vibing to Peniston’s “Finally” in the city government offices. Peniston rose to fame in the early 1990s, when she rapidly become one of the most successful dance club artists in the history of the U.S. Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play Charts, according to her official website. Salisbury PFLAG announced the city’s inaugural Pride Parade and Festival on National Coming Out Day last October. The event is set for 11 a.m. Sunday, June 7.

Massachusetts

Boston: The state has received more than $160 million from federal immigration authorities since 2012, most of which went to four county jails in exchange for housing and transporting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees, according to a report in The Boston Sunday Globe that cited documents obtained through a public records request. Advocates and immigration attorneys oppose the agreements with the jails. They say the payments are a waste of taxpayer money, and there are better alternatives to deal with people facing federal immigration charges. The sheriff’s offices for Plymouth, Bristol, Franklin, and Suffolk counties that run the jails have defended the arrangements, with at least two saying their relationship with ICE has made Massachusetts safer. But Matt Cameron, a Boston-based immigration lawyer, said there was “no good public safety justification” for local sheriff’s departments to house ICE detainees.

Michigan

Detroit: Home values are projected to increase by an average of 20% across most of the city’s neighborhoods, according to Mayor Mike Duggan. Residential assessments for 2020 also show that property values are up 30% in several parts of the city. The city said that the figures are based on two years of actual market sales and that homeowners are protected by a 2% cap on property tax increases as long as ownership has not changed. Property owners can appeal assessments until Feb. 22. Detroit residential property values rose an average of 13% last year. “This is great news for Detroit homeowners, particularly those who held on to their properties and stayed in the city,” Duggan said. “Home values in nearly every neighborhood are rising and helping to build new wealth, without significant tax increases. This shows as clearly as anything that the city’s revitalization has reached nearly every corner of our city.”

Minnesota

Minneapolis: The city has planted hundreds of trees in the past few years in an effort to green up downtown, but many aren’t surviving past their first year. City staff have been trying to figure out why, and they think they might have found the culprit: salt. Soil tests show that salinity levels in some of the planting spots are much higher than what’s ideal for trees to thrive, said Ben Shardlow, director of urban design for the Minneapolis Downtown Council and the Downtown Improvement District. Salt is used liberally in downtown Minneapolis to keep sidewalks and parking lots clear of ice. After the ice melts, the extra salt left behind piles up or gets pushed to the side – sometimes directly into the places where the trees are trying to grow. For three years in a row, a tree census showed only half of the trees the city planted had survived, Shardlow told Minnesota Public Radio News.

Mississippi

Indianola: A historical marker will commemorate the legacy of civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer. Research for the project was led by a Mississippi Valley State University student and professor, the Greenwood Commonwealth reports. C. Sade Turnipseed is an associate professor of history, and 17-year-old Nigerian native Brian Diyaolu took her public history course during the fall semester. They recently received approval from the Sunflower County Board of Supervisors to place the Hamer sign in front of the county courthouse. It will be unveiled during a ceremony March 27. Students in Turnipseed’s course are assigned a historical topic, and Diyaolu’s was Hamer. He said he wrote three drafts of the historical marker’s narrative before pitching the idea to the supervisors. He said other students helped him edit the narrative and prepare the presentation. Hamer was born to sharecroppers in Montgomery County on Oct. 6, 1917.

Missouri

Creve Coeur: The St. Louis Holocaust Museum & Learning Center will triple in size with an $18 million expansion as officials seek to reach even deeper into issues of bias, bigotry and hate. Details about the expansion were announced Monday, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports. Officials hope to make the building more visible and accessible. The museum, in the suburb of Creve Coeur and operated by the Jewish Federation of St. Louis, draws 30,000 annual visitors, about two-thirds of whom are students. Admission is free. Museum officials are in touch with about 30 Holocaust survivors who live in the St. Louis area. Monday’s announcement came on International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. The museum’s new executive director, Sandra Harris, says groundbreaking will be in May, and the goal is to finish by the end of 2021.

Montana

Ismay: U.S. Postal Service officials say mail service will resume in this town where a fire destroyed the post office. The fire in early January has prompted some residents of Ismay to worry about their mail. Since the fire, they’ve taken turns dropping off and picking up mail in a town almost 20 miles away. Postal officials plan to put a mailbox in a community center in tiny Ismay, population 20, Postal Service spokesman James Boxrud says. Meanwhile, property owners Rita and Gene Nimitz tell the Billings Gazette they’re making tentative plans to rebuild the post office, which dated to the 1920s. A faulty furnace or electrical wiring is believed to have started the blaze.

Nebraska

Lincoln: The city’s school district is about to take a major step in the recovery from a fire that destroyed the district office more than eight years ago. The school board is expected to vote next month on a nearly $1.15 million construction project agreement to build a backup data center, the Lincoln Journal Star reports. It’ll be constructed in the basement of the building built to replace the office burned in May 2011. The blaze was started by a disgruntled teacher who was later sentenced to prison for arson. The fire wiped out nearly everything in the building, including severely damaging the computer system that held email servers, grades, payroll and other records. District officials worked with University of Nebraska-Lincoln information technology staff to get the data system back online. The district built an off-site data center near Lincoln High School about a year later. The district wants the backup data center finished this summer.

Nevada

Las Vegas: Local tourism officials have canceled several activities tied to the launch of a new city slogan in the wake of basketball star Kobe Bryant’s death. A 60-second spot touting the “what happens here, only happens here” campaign aired during the Grammy Awards as planned Sunday night, but other plans were postponed. The new slogan is a play on the longtime saying that “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” The city had intended to display the new slogan on more than two dozen hotel and casino marquees on and around the Strip. Instead, most resorts showed messages of grief. They included “L.A., OUR HEARTS GO OUT TO YOU” and “#RIPKOBE.” Steve Hill, CEO of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, said all the planned activities will take place at a future date. But Bryant, his daughter and the other lives lost in a helicopter crash were too much on everyone’s minds.

New Hampshire

Concord: State health officials are seeking input on whether the state needs a residential treatment facility for youth with mental health and addiction issues. The Department of Health and Human Services has issued a request for information about the opportunities and challenges associated with establishing a psychiatric facility that would provide the highest level of care next to an acute psychiatric hospital. The state’s only youth drug and alcohol treatment center closed last month after a spate of nonfatal overdoses. Republican Gov. Chris Sununu says a new facility would ensure that young people struggling with addiction, mental illness or both get the right level of care in a safe environment. The deadline for submitting information is Feb. 24.

New Jersey

Galloway Township: Gov. Phil Murphy unveiled a sweeping energy plan Monday that sets goals for shifting the state to 100% clean energy by 2050. The first-term Democratic governor announced the plan at Stockton University alongside two Cabinet officials who will be carrying the plan out, Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Catherine McCabe and Board of Public Utilities President Joe Fiordaliso. Murphy cast climate change as an urgent concern and pointed to a Rutgers study that indicated the state could see 1 foot of sea level rise in the next decade. “Quite frankly it will be hard for future generations to create their Jersey Shore memories if the Jersey Shore is only a memory,” Murphy said. The plan calls for reducing the use of fossil fuels while increasing renewable sources of energy. New Jersey currently gets 94% of its electricity from natural gas and nuclear plants, according to the U.S. Energy Department.

New Mexico

Las Cruces: A former state lawmaker’s emu that has been missing since Thanksgiving is safely back at its home near the city. Former state Rep. Brad Cates learned his emu had resurfaced last week thanks to a barrage of images people shared on social media. Pictures of the large bird around a subdivision near Cates’ home prompted inquiries from a state livestock inspector and a game warden. Later Sunday, Cates with some help corralled the 150-pound emu named “Hey You!” Cates was also the Republican nominee for Dona Ana County district attorney in 2016. He lost to Mark D’Antonio.

New York

Albany: State taxpayers could decide to contribute to a fund that helps pay for abortions under a proposed bill. State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi and Assemblymember Karines Reyes say their bill would create an abortion access fund to which taxpayers could voluntarily contribute when they file their personal income tax returns. The Democrats say the fund’s money would go to not-for-profit groups that provide financial and logical assistance to individuals seeking abortion care. The Legislature passed a sweeping law last year to protect a right to abortion care in New York in case of changes on the federal level. Lawmakers could consider passing the latest bill this year before they depart in early June. The bill would also require a report to lawmakers and the governor about the amount of money deposited in the abortion access fund and how it was spent. The state wouldn’t be able to request the names of anyone who sought money from the fund.

North Carolina

Winston-Salem: Three months after a set of anonymous, threatening, racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic emails sent a wave of fear through the sociology department at Wake Forest University, the department chairman says he’s still waiting for university leaders to announce a meaningful response. The emails to faculty in sociology and two other departments called for a “purge” of minorities and the LGBTQ community. Alarmed by what he deemed white supremacist terrorism, chairman Joseph Soares canceled sociology classes for a week. When they resumed, Wake Forest police officers were stationed outside classrooms and the building itself. Doors normally open were closed and locked. Even a study lounge was locked. “It was the most stressful experience of my academic life,” said Soares, who began his college teaching career in 1991 and has taught at Wake Forest since 2003. “My faculty were afraid.”

North Dakota

Bismarck: A massive 1984 diesel spill in Mandan, North Dakota, has finally been cleaned up. State officials said the cleanup at a rail yard in downtown Mandan was complicated because of limited access to the affected area, the Bismarck Tribune reports. Workers collected about 770,000 gallons of fuel over the years, said Dave Glatt, director of the North Dakota Department of Environmental Quality. “It’s pretty much gone,” Glatt said at a Wednesday meeting. “It seems like a long time, but when you look at, in a downtown area where access is limited, we had 4 to 6 feet on top of the groundwater in some areas. This is a success.” Burlington Northern ran the rail yard when the spill was found in 1984, but BNSF Railway runs it now.

Ohio

Cincinnati: Cheetahs from the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden will have about 5 acres of open terrain where they can run at a facility anticipated to be completed this summer. The cheetahs will be transported from the zoo in suburban Cincinnati in custom, built-in van crates to the “Cheetah Run” at the zoo’s Bowyer Farm in Warren County. The animals will have the space to run but will not be required to do so, said zoo spokeswoman Michelle Curley. Zoning records indicate some residents raised safety concerns, but the Warren County Board of Zoning and Appeals approved the plan last year. The tree-lined “Cheetah Run” project will be enclosed by a fence. Zoo officials have no safety concerns, said Mark Fischer, vice president of facilities, planning and stability for the zoo. He said the cheetahs, raised by humans and dogs, are “docile” and “timid.” Fisher said the run will be fun for the cheetahs – Tommy, Nia, Savanna, Donni, Cathryn, Willow, Redd, and Kris – and give them space to stretch their legs.

Oklahoma

Oklahoma City: A prosecutor has been arrested, accused of domestic abuse. Robert McClatchie, an Oklahoma County assistant district attorney, was booked into Oklahoma County jail about 4 a.m. Saturday on complaints of domestic abuse by strangulation and domestic abuse in the presence of a minor child. Jail records also did not list an attorney for him. District Attorney David Prater said in a statement that McClatchie “will remain in jail until he is released by a judge or when his bond is posted after a judge sets his bond, like any other person arrested on a domestic abuse charge.” Prater said he’s “not intervening in this matter in any way.” He said the case will be assigned by the attorney general to another district attorney to assist Oklahoma City police in their investigation “and ultimately, make a charging decision.”

Oregon

Pendleton: Local police now have an extra set of eyes with them. Each of Pendleton’s 24 sworn police officers has been equipped with body cameras that will record each call of service to which they respond, the East Oregonian reports. “Certainly, the preservation of evidence in real time is something you can’t replace,” Police Chief Stuart Roberts said. The cameras are located on the officers’ left breast pocket and attached using a magnetic plate. Officers must double tap the camera to activate it when responding to a call. The program joins Pendleton police with departments in Boardman and Hermiston as the only agencies with body cameras in Northeast Oregon. All footage collected by the department will be held for a minimum of 180 days, and anything that is a part of an investigation or court case will be held for an additional 30 months, officials said.

Pennsylvania

Harrisburg: Former Mayor Stephen Reed, who served for almost three decades but was later sentenced to probation for accumulating Wild West artifacts he bought with public money for a museum that was never built, has died. He was 70. A statement from the family reported by PennLive.com said Reed died Saturday “surrounded by his family.” “Reed was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2006 and fought it courageously,” the statement said. Reed served seven terms but lost the 2009 primary amid criticism over the millions of dollars he had spent on museum-related items. He and city officials scoured the country for artifacts that would stock the museum, which he had called part of a wider plan to make the city a museum destination for tourists. He pleaded guilty in 2017 to 20 counts of receiving stolen property and was sentenced to two years of probation. Reed apologized and told the judge he took responsibility for his actions, calling his prosecution “a gut-wrenchingly humiliating” process.

Rhode Island

Providence: Gov. Gina Raimondo wants to reform the state’s criminal justice system through a series of proposals in her budget and administrative actions. The Democratic governor released a nearly $10.2 billion state budget plan this month. The Legislature will review the proposals and present its plan before the 2021 fiscal year begins in July. The budget includes recommendations from Raimondo’s working group on criminal and juvenile justice. Among them, the proposal seeks to improve discharge planning, shift staffing to improve access to health care, update the parole statute to include geriatric parole and provide incestives for work release programs. Raimondo is also looking to bring her signature workforce training program to prisons.

South Carolina

Columbia: Residents who want to vote in the state’s Democratic presidential primary next month face a deadline to register this week. The State Election Commission said all voters for the Feb. 29 primary must be registered by Thursday. The first-in-the-South presidential primary is open, which means a voter does not have to be a registered Democrat to cast a ballot. People who are 17 years old can vote in the primary as long as they will be 18 by Election Day on Nov. 3. Registration forms can be downloaded at scvotes.org, and residents can also check to see if their South Carolina registration is current. Voters can also register at their county registration offices. Republicans will not have a presidential primary in South Carolina as President Donald Trump runs for reelection.

South Dakota

Custer State Park: After the near-decimation of the Custer State Park bighorn sheep herd, wildlife managers are now seeing the group as a success story, the Black Hills Pioneer reports. In 2004 the herd was 200-plus animals strong when members contracted mycoplasma ovipneumoiae, a pneumonia-causing bacteria that killed 70-80% of the animals. Since that time, the adults in the herd obtained an immunity to the bacteria, but the lambs suffered – most died from the disease within months, and on a good year, one would survive. Some wildlife managers even began discussions about destroying the remaining 20-25 animals and starting over with disease-free sheep. Then, three years ago, biologists discovered that only three of the bighorns shed the pathogens responsible for the die-off. Those were removed from the herd, and the population rebound began. The first lambing year, eight of the nine born in the park survived.

Tennessee

Memphis: A new $200 million Amazon distribution center in the city’s Raleigh neighborhood will employ 1,000 workers and should be up and running in time for this year’s holiday season, officials said Monday. With the building’s skeleton and yellow bulldozers in the background, Amazon officials and state and local politicians gathered at the busy construction site in north Memphis to provide details about the project. Workers will make at least $15 per hour as they pack and ship books, electronics and other consumer goods alongside Amazon’s robots, officials said. At 855,000 square feet – the equivalent of 14 football fields – the order fulfillment center will be Amazon’s third in Memphis. The company employs about 6,500 people in Tennessee, Amazon officials said.

Texas

Austin: Local police are inviting people to drop off their unwanted firearms and ammunition, with no questions asked, Tuesday at an East Austin police substation. This is the first of several gun surrender events this year, police said. On Tuesday, people can drop off these items from 3 to 8 p.m. at the Robert T. Martinez Central East Substation. “No questions asked” means police will not attempt to identify those who drop off guns, Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said. “We merely want to get weapons that are no longer wanted off the streets, out of homes, and destroyed so they don’t end up potentially in the wrong hands if there was to be a burglary,” Manley said. “This is a service we want to provide for the community.” Austin police will host similar programs throughout the year on April 28, July 28 and Oct. 27.

Utah

Logan: An event straight out of the Old West is attracting more people with its mountain-man appeal, organizers said. About 50 people gathered in Blacksmith Fork Canyon to compete in the state-organized biathlon – an event combining cross-country skiing and sharpshooting – that features muzzleloader guns, the Herald Journal reports. Many wore traditional mountain-man gear to the event this month dubbed Willy Wapiti’s Smoke Pole Biathlon at Hardware Ranch, which is surrounded by snow-capped mountains and populated by hundreds of elk. Shooters raced along a snowy trail, with or without snowshoes, to five separate shooting stations. Prizes like electronic earmuffs, knives and fire starters were given to the best score out of 10, said Rachael Tuckett, a wildlife recreation specialist with the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, which organized the event. Prizes also are given for the best mountain man outfit. The event has grown by 40% since last year.

Vermont

Montpelier: The completion of a 93-mile rail trail across northern Vermont would help link an ever-expanding network of recreation trails across New England and beyond, advocates say. The effort got a big boost last week when Republican Gov. Phil Scott asked lawmakers to approve $2.8 million as the state’s share of the estimated $14.1 million cost of completing the remaining 60 miles of the Lamoille Valley Rail Trail. It runs from Swanton, near the Canadian border, to St. Johnsbury, not far from the Connecticut River border with New Hampshire. The 30-mile section of the trail currently open is already benefiting businesses and the communities that people visit so they can use it, officials say. Trail advocates say completing one section of the trail boosts other nearby trails.

Virginia

Virginia Beach: The post office where survivors reunited after a mass shooting in a government office building now is named after the man who gave his own life for his co-workers. A plaque was unveiled Friday honoring Ryan Keith Cox at the post office that now bears his name, The Virginian-Pilot reports. Cox was one of 12 people who died in the mass shooting last May 31 at the Virginia Beach Municipal Center. “We are a city of heroes, and Keith is a perfect example of one of them,” Mayor Bobby Dyer said during the ceremony. In interviews, Cox’s co-workers have said he ushered women into a room and told them to barricade the door. Cox then left to see if anyone else needed help. The gunman and shot and killed him soon after that. Cox, 50, had been an account clerk in Virginia Beach’s public utilities department for 12 years.

Washington

Tacoma: A school district has warned parents about a potentially dangerous “penny challenge” spreading on social media. The Tacoma School District said a middle school student in the district took part in the online trend last week, KOMO-TV reports. The school district provided a photo of a burned electrical wall outlet resulting from the penny challenge. No injuries were reported. Social media users are challenged to record a video of themselves sliding a penny between a partially plugged-in cellphone charger and a wall outlet, officials said. Users are asked to film and post the results on the TikTok video-sharing channel. Placing a penny across an active electrical connection will create sparks that can damage the outlet and potentially start a fire and cause injury, officials said.

West Virginia

Charleston: Projects involving sites listed in the National Register of Historic Places are eligible to apply for historic preservation development grants through the West Virginia Historic Preservation Office. Projects should involve the restoration, rehabilitation or archaeological development of historic sites, the state Department of Arts, Culture and History said in a news release. Approximately $369,000 is expected to be available for the grants, depending on appropriations from Congress or the Legislature. Privately owned properties are only eligible where there is evidence of public support or public benefit, the release said. Governmental properties that aren’t accessible to the public are not eligible for funding. Applications must be postmarked by March 31.

Wisconsin

La Crosse: For nearly a century and a half, the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration have said prayers every hour of every day in their chapel in La Crosse. But next month that practice will be coming to an end. The sisters have announced that after a dozen years of study and reflection, they will begin to cut back their prayer ritual, which began in 1878, to 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. daily. In 1997, prayer partners were invited to take the daytime hours while sisters living at St. Rose Convent continued the night hours. As demographics continued changing in the early 2000s, the sisters began studying the future of the practice. “Our thoughtful study over the years has included a growing understanding of a modern way to live in adoration through our prayer lives and actions, no matter where we are,” said FSPA President Eileen McKenzie.

Wyoming

Cheyenne: The city’s police don’t have the authority to enforce the new federal law that increased the legal age to purchase tobacco products from 18 to 21, the agency says. Officers can only legally enforce state laws and Cheyenne city ordinances, spokesman David Inman says. He says city officials posted the clarification on Facebook because they’d been receiving calls from residents and local businesses. Nonetheless, it’s still illegal for someone under the age of 21 to purchase products containing tobacco or nicotine, including vaping products. The Legislature is expected to consider a bill that would change state law to match the new federal law on tobacco sales. If it passes, Inman said the city would likely pass a similar ordinance, and then police would have the power to enforce it.

From USA TODAY Network and wire reports

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memories of 1988

The Hubble Space Telescope Goes into operation to explore deep space and is still in full use today mapping our universe. A bomb is exploded on Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie in Scotland on December 21st . Also Prozac is sold for the first time as an anti-depressant, some of the great movies that year included Rain Man, Die Hard and A Fish Called Wanda.

In the early 1980s, Britain had just begun to slough off its reliance on packet mash and tinned pineapple. With Delia, we discovered kiwi and cranberries; trend-setting restaurants proliferated and "seasonality" started to mean something again. The British tend to mainline on nostalgia, but who hankers for the traditional British culinary experience? Prawn cocktail, steaks that should have been sent to a burns unit, serviettes, frozen food, fondue, gateau festering on pudding trolleys, sliced bread…

In 1988, these were just some of our favourites. "Foreign" meant French. "Vegetarian" meant omelette. "Modern British" meant Garfunkel’s. Food wasn’t invented in Britain until 1987, the year the River Café opened in West London. In the provinces, it was later still. Nostalgia is a dish best served never.

Culinary innovations aside, 1988 boasts no seismic cultural shift – unlike, say, 1966 or 1977. It might have witnessed acid house’s Second Summer of Love, but for most people it was the year Bros stole hearts, Neighbours became must-see after-school viewing and England crashed out of the European Championships in the first round.

Before the deregulating 1990 Broadcasting Act, there was no satellite television in this country. In 1988, British film was in good shape, thanks to the artistically stimulating output of the still-new FilmFour. Spitting Image still mattered, thanks to unbeatable material from the Thatcher government, which was also being wound up by ITV’s documentary Death on the Rock. It was a time before the insane pressures of the global market, when films and TV programmes were made for their own sake, not pitched at demographics.

In 1988 the City of London was coming out of the Big Bang. The deregulation and competition that ensued has transformed London into the biggest international capital market, with banks such as HSBC and the Royal Bank of Scotland taking their place among the world’s best.

1988: when Kylie, Cliff and Ghostbusters ruled

Best-selling single

Cliff Richard’s Mistletoe & Wine

Best-selling album

Kylie Minogue’s Kylie

Highest-grossing movie

Rain Man

Oscar winner

Bernardo Bertolucci, who won nine Oscars for The Last Emperor.

Video game

Super Mario 3 is released. It goes on to sell 18m copies and spawn a television show.

The price of a pint of beer

Around £1

Children’s toys

Ghostbusters toys sell out – with the Slimer toy (complete with bubbles) particularly popular.

Births

Tinie Tempah

Alexandra Burke

Princess Beatrice

Michael Cera

Deaths

Divine

Kenneth Williams

Nico

Roy Orbison

Marriages

Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick

Patsy Kensit and Dan Donavan

Michael J Fox and Tracy Pollan

Mike Tyson and Robin Givens

1988: Jumbo jet crashes onto Lockerbie

A Pan Am jumbo jet with 258 passengers on board has crashed on to the town of Lockerbie near the Scottish borders. Initial reports indicate it crashed into a petrol station in the centre of the town, between Carlisle and Dumfries, and burst into a 300-foot fireball. Hundreds are feared dead as airline officials said flight 103 was about two-thirds full with 255 adults and three children on board. Rescue teams have confirmed there are many casualties at the scene including townspeople who were on the ground. The Boeing 747 left London Heathrow at 1800 GMT bound for New York’s JFK airport. Shortly after 1900 the flight disappeared from radar screens at Prestwick Air Traffic Control Centre.

At 1908-hrs there were reports by the Civil Air Traffic Control Authorities of an explosion on the ground 15 miles north of the Scottish border. Details of the accident are still unclear but there are unconfirmed reports the plane has ploughed into cars and houses. An eyewitness said the aircraft has hit a central part of the town in a residential area. "There was just a terrible explosion, you just couldn’t describe it," he told the BBC. "It is just impossible to approach the town but at the time it went up there was a terrible explosion and the whole sky lit up. "It was virtually raining fire – it was just liquid fire."

Parts of the town are being evacuated and a hall has been converted into a refuge centre. Dumfries and Galloway Hospital, about 20 miles away, is on emergency alert.

Ambulances from southern Scotland and Cumbria have been sent to the scene. The RAF has sent personnel and helicopters from Scotland and Northern England, along with mountain rescue teams to help police. The A74 has been cordoned off after police reported several parked cars on fire. It is thought the plane would have been flying at about 31,000 ft over Lockerbie when it exploded.

In total 259 people aboard the flight and 11 on the ground died in the crash which took place 38 minutes after take-off. The debris from the aircraft was scattered across 845 square miles and the impact reached 1.6 on the Richter scale. The subsequent police investigation was the biggest ever mounted in Scotland and became a murder inquiry when evidence of a bomb was found.

Two men accused of being Libyan intelligence agents were eventually charged with planting the bomb. Abdelbaset ali Mohmed al-Megrahi was jailed for life in January 2001 following an 84-day trial under Scottish law, at Camp Zeist in Holland. His alleged accomplice, Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah, was found not guilty. In 2002 Al Megrahi’s appeal against conviction was rejected.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMo2t_MD1s8

1988: IRA gang shot dead in Gibraltar

The IRA has confirmed the three people shot dead by security forces in Gibraltar yesterday were members of an active service unit. They are reported to have planted a 500lb car bomb near the British Governor’s residence. It was primed to go off tomorrow during a changing of the guard ceremony, which is popular with tourists.

The three – two men and a woman – were shot as they walked towards the border with Spain. Security officers say they were acting suspiciously and the officers who carried out the shootings believed their lives were in danger. The three dead have been named as Daniel McCann, 30 and Sean Savage, 24, both known IRA activists and Mairead Farrell, 31, the most senior member of the gang who had served 10 years for her part in the bombing of a hotel outside Belfast in 1976.

The Ministry of Defence confirmed last night military personnel had opened fire on three terrorist suspects. It said no weapons had been found at the scene. The shooting happened in mid-afternoon. One eyewitness said he had seen a man in jeans holding a pistol in both hands. He said the man was only four feet from one of those he killed. Police sealed off the area for several hours after the shooting. A robot was brought in to defuse the car bomb and troops patrolled the streets. Local residents were warned to stay indoors. The terrorists’ target was the band and guard of the 1st Battalion Royal Anglian Regiment, which arrived in Gibraltar recently after a tour of duty in Northern Ireland.

Army intelligence officers have been expecting an IRA attack on a military target for some months after a series of setbacks for the Provisionals. Reports say 20 members of the IRA have been killed in the past 15 months. The Independent’s Ireland correspondent, David McKittrick, said 1987 was "a bad year" for the IRA. They lost eight active service members in an SAS ambush in Country Antrim. He has raised speculation yesterday’s killings in Gibraltar may also have been the work of the SAS.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7MBqTw2vl0

1988: Three shot dead at Milltown Cemetery

A gunman has killed three mourners and injured at least 50 people attending a funeral for IRA members shot dead in Gibraltar. It is understood he also threw four grenades into the crowd of 10,000 people gathered around the Republican plot at Milltown Cemetery in Roman Catholic west Belfast. The casualties have been taken to the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast in a fleet of private vehicles and 10 ambulances. Eyewitness reports describe mourners gripped with panic, screaming and shouting while others collapsed to the floor.

The initial shot was mistaken for an IRA salute as the dead, Mairead Farrell, 31, Daniel McCann, 30, and Sean Savage, 23, were buried. But shortly after 1300 GMT as the last of the three coffins was lowered into the joint grave, another shot was fired. Another shot was quickly followed by two blasts 50 yards away which is said to have sent black smoke and earth into the air. Several more shots were fired amid a burst of what is thought to be grenades.

Funeral stewards made repeated appeals for calm as the course of reconciliation in Northern Ireland faced another setback. There are some reports the man was then pursued by hundreds of youths oblivious to the danger.

The Northern Ireland Secretary Tom King, has condemned the attacks and appealed for calm, echoing calls from other political quarters including Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams. But Mr Adams accused the RUC of collusion in the attack. The RUC had agreed to stay away from the funeral after representations from the Roman Catholic church and political leaders. The Ulster Defence Association, the largest of the Protestant paramilitary organisations, denied any part in the attack. It added the outlawed Ulster Freedom Fighters had no part in today’s events either.

The funerals were for three IRA members shot dead by British special forces in Gibraltar, where they were planning an attack on the British garrison. A lone loyalist gunman, Michael Stone, was chased by mourners at the cemetery but was arrested by police. The east Belfast man had been active on the fringes of loyalist para-militarism before the Milltown killings and was ultimately sentenced for a total of six murders when he eventually came to trial. The Ulster Freedom Fighters member was sentenced to a minimum of 30 years imprisonment by the trial judge.

But he was released in 2000, despite massive outrage, after serving 12 years under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. In November 2006 he had his release licence suspended after he was arrested for bursting into Stormont claiming to have a bomb. He was charged with attempting to murder Sinn Fein’s Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness and with possessing an imitation firearm.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFfhkdHIVgA

Corporals Wood and Howes killed by IRA 1988

When two corporals in the British Army inadvertently drove into the midst of a republican funeral, their car was set upon by the crowd. They were dragged out and beaten before being shot dead by members of the IRA. These brutal killings marked the conclusion of a period of 14 days that was to prove one the darkest of Northern Ireland’s Troubles. The incident was filmed by television cameras and the images have been described as some of the "most dramatic and harrowing" of the conflict in Northern Ireland.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhfgQOLSrTQ

1988 Timeline

January – Elizabeth Butler-Sloss becomes the first woman to be appointed a Lord Justice of Appeal.

3 January – Margaret Thatcher becomes the longest serving British prime minister this century, having been in power for eight years and 244 days.

4 January – Sir Robin Butler replaces Sir Robert Armstrong as Cabinet Secretary, on the same day that Margaret Thatcher makes her first state visit to Africa when she arrives in Kenya.

5 January – Actor Rowan Atkinson launches the new Comic Relief charity appeal.

7 January – Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock calls for a further £1.3 billion to made available for the National Health Service.

9 January – One of the worst incidents of football hooliganism this season sees 41 suspected hooligans arrested at the FA Cup third round tie between Arsenal and Millwall at Highbury.

11 January – The government announces that inflammable foam furniture will be banned from March next year.

14 January – Unemployment figures are released for the end of 1987, showing the 18th successive monthly fall. Just over 2,600,000 people are now jobless in the United Kingdom – the lowest total for seven years. More than 500,000 of the unemployed found jobs during 1987.

22 January – Colin Pitchfork is sentenced to life imprisonment after admitting the rape and murder of two girls in Leicestershire in 1983 and 1986, the first conviction for murder in the UK based on DNA fingerprinting evidence.

22 January – Peugeot’s 405 saloon, winner of the European Car of the Year award, goes on sale in Britain.

23 January – David Steel announces that he will not stand for the leadership of the new Social and Liberal Democratic Party.

24 January – Arthur Scargill is re-elected as leader of the National Union of Mineworkers by a narrow majority.

28 January – The Birmingham Six lose an appeal against their convictions.

1 February – Victor Miller, a 33-year-old warehouse worker from Wolverhampton, confesses to the murder of 14-year-old Stuart Gough, who was found dead in Worcestershire last month.

3 February – Nurses throughout the UK strike for higher pay and more cash for the National Health Service.

4 February – Nearly 7,000 ferry workers go on strike in Britain, paralysing the nation’s seaports.

5 February – The first BBC Red Nose Day raises £15 million for charity.

7 February – It is reported that more than 50% of men and 80% of women working full-time in London are earning less than the lowest sum needed to buy the cheapest houses in the capital.

13 – 28 February – Great Britain and Northern Ireland compete at the Winter Olympics in Calgary, Canada, but do not win any medals.

15 February – Norman Fowler, Secretary of State for Employment, announces plans for a new training scheme which the government hopes will give jobs to up to 600,000 people who are currently unemployed.

16 February – Thousands of nurses and co-workers form picket lines outside British hospitals as they go on strike in protest against what they see as inadequate NHS funding.

26 February – Multiple rapist and murderer John Duffy is sentenced to life imprisonment with a recommendation that he should never be released.

1 March – British Aerospace launches a takeover bid for the government-owned Rover Group, the largest British-owned carmaker.

3 March – The SDP merges with the Liberal Party to create the Social and Liberal Democratic Party. Its interim leaders are David Steel and Robert Maclennan. The merger means that the Liberal Party has ceased to exist after 129 years.

4 March – Halifax Building Society reveals that year-on-year house prices rose by 16.9% last month.

6 March – Operation Flavius: A Special Air Service team of the British Army shoots dead three unarmed members of a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) Active Service Unit in Gibraltar.

7 March – Margaret Thatcher announces a £3 billion regeneration scheme to improve a series of inner city areas by the year 2000.

9 March – It is revealed that the average price of a house in Britain reached £60,000 at the end of last year, compared to £47,000 in December 1986.

10 March – The Prince of Wales narrowly avoids death in an avalanche while on a skiing holiday in Switzerland. Major Hugh Lindsay, former equerry to the Queen, is killed.

15 March – Chancellor Nigel Lawson announces that the standard rate of income tax will be cut to 25p in the pound, while the maximum rate of income tax will be cut to 40p from 60p in the pound.

16 March – Milltown Cemetery attack: Three men are killed and 70 are wounded in a gun and grenade attack by loyalist paramilitary Michael Stone on mourners at Milltown Cemetery in Belfast during the funerals of the three IRA members killed in Gibraltar.

17 March – The fall in unemployment continues with just over 2,500,000 people now registered as unemployed in the UK. However, there is a blow for the city of Dundee, when Ford Motor Company scraps plans to build a new electronics plant in the city – a move which ends hopes of 1,000 new jobs being created for this city which has high unemployment.

19 March – Corporals killings in Belfast: British Army corporals Woods and Howes are abducted, beaten and shot dead by Irish republicans after driving into the funeral cortege of IRA members killed in the Milltown Cemetery attack.

29 March – Plans are unveiled for Europe’s tallest skyscraper to be built at Canary Wharf. The office complex will cost around £3 billion to build and is set to open in 1992.

9 April – The house price boom is reported to have boosted wealth in London and the south-east by £39 billion over the last four years, compared with an £18 billion slump in Scotland and north-west England.

10 April – Golfer Sandy Lyle becomes the first British winner of the US Masters.

21 April – The government announces that nurses will receive a 15% pay rise, at a cost of £794 million which will be funded by the Treasury.

24 April – Luton Town FC beat Arsenal in the Littlewoods Cup final at Wembley 3-2. The match was won in the 92nd minute with a goal by Brian Stein after Luton had come back from being 2-1 down and goalkeeper Andy Dibble saving a penalty in the 79th minute. Luton scorers Brian Stein and Danny Wilson. Attendance 96,000

May – The first 16-year-olds sit General Certificate of Secondary Education examinations, replacing both the O-level and CSE. The new qualifications are marked against objective standards rather than relatively.

2 May – Three off-duty British servicemen are killed in The Netherlands by the IRA.

6 May – Graeme Hick makes English cricket history by scoring 405 runs in a county championship match.

7 May – The proposed Poll tax, which is expected to come into force next year, will see the average house rise in value by around 20%, according to a study.

14 May – Wimbledon F.C., who have been Football League members for just 11 seasons and First Division members for two, win the FA Cup with a 1–0 win over league champions Liverpool at Wembley. Lawrie Sanchez scored the winning goal in the first half, while Liverpool’s John Aldridge missed a penalty in the second half. In Scotland, Celtic beat Dundee United 2-1 in the Scottish Cup final with two late goals from Frank McAvennie to complete the Scottish double.

19 May – Unemployment is now below 2,500,000 for the first time since early 1981.

House prices in Norwich, one of the key beneficiaries of the current economic boom, have risen by 50% in the last year.

24 May – Local Government Act becomes law. The controversial Section 28 prevents local authorities from "promoting homosexuality". Local authorities are also obliged to outsource more services, and dog licences are abolished (except in Northern Ireland).

Albert Dock in Liverpool reopened by Prince Charles as a leisure and business centre including the Tate Liverpool art museum.

31 May – the BBC controversial film, Tumbledown is broadcast despite Ministry of Defence concern.

2 June – U.S. President Ronald Reagan makes a visit to Britain.

11 June – Some 80,000 people attend a concert at Wembley Stadium in honour of Nelson Mandela, the South African anti-apartheid campaigner who turned 70 on that day and has been in prison since 1964.

15 June – Five British soldiers are killed by the IRA in Lisburn.

16 June – More than 100 English football fans are arrested in West Germany in connection with incidents of football hooliganism during the European Championships.

18 June – England’s participation in the European Football Champions ended when they finished bottom of their group having lost all three games.

23 June – Three gay rights activists invade the BBC television studios during the six o’clock bulletin of the BBC News.

July – The Freeze art exhibition is held at Surrey Docks in London Docklands, it is organised by Damien Hirst and is considered significant in the development of the Young British Artists.

5 July – The Church of England announces that it will allow the ordination of women priests from 1992.

6 July – Piper Alpha disaster oil rig in the North Sea explodes and results in the death of 167 workers.

A contractor’s relief driver pours 20 tonnes of aluminium sulphate into the wrong tank at a water treatment plant near Camelford in Cornwall, causing extensive pollution to the local water supply.

18 July – Paul Gascoigne, 21-year-old midfielder, becomes the first £2 million footballer signed by a British club when he leaves Newcastle United and joins Tottenham Hotspur.

28 July – Paddy Ashdown, MP for Yeovil in Somerset, is elected as the first leader of the Social and Liberal Democratic Party.

28 July – Paddy Ashdown an ex-Royal Marine commando is elected leader of the Social Democrats and Liberal Democrats.

29 July – Most provisions of the Education Reform Act come into effect in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Act introduces Grant-maintained schools and Local Management of Schools, allowing schools to be taken out of the direct control of local government; a National Curriculum with Key Stages; an element of parental preference in the choice of schools; published league tables of school examination results; controls on the use of the word ‘degree’ by UK institutions; and abolition of tenure for new academics.

31 July – Economists warn that the house price boom is likely to end next year.

1 August – A British Army soldier is killed by IRA terrorists at Inglis Barracks in North London.

2 August – Everton F.C. pay £2.3 million for West Ham United striker Tony Cottee, 22, breaking the national record set six weeks ago by Paul Gascoigne’s transfer.

8 August – The first child (a girl) of TRH The Duke and Duchess of York is born at Portland Hospital in London. She was fifth in line to the throne until the birth of Prince George of Cambridge on the 22 July 2013. She is currently sixth in line.

14 August – Scunthorpe United F.C.’s Glanford Park is opened; the first new stadium to be built by a Football League club since the 1950s. Their last game at their original ground, Old Showground, was on 18 May.

18 August – Ian Rush becomes the most expensive player to join a British club when he returns to Liverpool F.C. for £2.7 million after a year at Juventus in Italy.

20 August – Six British soldiers are killed by an IRA bomb near Belfast. 27 other people are injured.

22 August – New licensing laws allow pubs to stay open all day in England and Wales.

The Duke and Duchess of York’s 14-day-old daughter is named Beatrice Elizabeth Mary.

29 August – 14-year-old Matthew Sadler becomes Britain’s youngest international chess master.

31 August – Postal workers walk out on strike over a dispute concerning bonuses paid to recruit new workers in London and the South East.

3 September – Economic experts warn that the recent economic upswing for most of the developed world is almost over, and that these countries – including Britain – face a recession in the near future.

9 September – The England cricket team’s tour to India is cancelled after Captain Graham Gooch and seven other players are refused visas because of involvement in South African cricket during the apartheid boycott.

13 September – Royal Mail managers and Union of Communication Workers representatives agree a settlement to end the postal workers strike.

17 September – 2 October – Great Britain and Northern Ireland compete at the Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, and win 5 gold, 10 silver and 9 bronze medals.

24 September – The house price boom is reported to be slowing as a result of increased mortgage rates.

30 September – A Gibraltar jury decides that the 3 IRA members killed on 6 March were killed "lawfully".

October – Vauxhall launches the third generation of its popular Cavalier family saloon.

9 October – Labour MP and Shadow Chancellor John Smith, 50, is hospitalised with a heart attack in Edinburgh.

12 October – As Pope John Paul II addresses the European Parliament, Ian Paisley heckles and denounces him as the Antichrist.

13 October – The House of Lords rules that extracts of the banned book Spycatcher can be published in the media.

18 October – Jaguar unveils its new Jaguar XJ220 supercar at the Motor Show. It is set go into production in 1990, costing £350,000 and being the world’s fastest production car with a top speed of 220 mph.

27 October – Three IRA supporters are found guilty of conspiracy to murder in connection with a plot to kill Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Tom King.

28 October – British Rail announces a 21% rise in the cost of long distance season tickets.

2 November – Victor Miller is sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Stuart Gough.

4 November – Margaret Thatcher presses for freedom for the people of Poland on her visit to Gdańsk.

9 November – The government unveils plans for a new identity card scheme in an attempt to clamp down on football hooliganism.

15 November – The Education Secretary, Kenneth Baker, says that the national testing will place great emphasis on grammar.

30 November – A government report reveals that up to 50,000 people in Britain may be HIV positive, and that by the end of 1992 up to 17,000 people may have died from AIDS.

A bronze statue of former prime minister Clement Attlee, who died in 1967, is unveiled outside Limehouse Library in London by fellow former prime minister Harold Wilson.

3 December – Health minister Edwina Currie provokes outrage by stating that most of Britain’s egg production is infected with the salmonella bacteria, causing an immediate nationwide fall in egg sales.

6 December – The last shipbuilding facilities on Wearside, once the largest shipbuilding area in the world, are to close with the loss of 2,400 jobs.

10 December – James W. Black wins the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly with Gertrude B. Elion and George H. Hitchings "for their discoveries of important principles for drug treatment".

12 December – 35 people are killed in a collision between three trains at Clapham in London.

15 December – Unemployment is now only just over 2,100,000 – the lowest level for almost eight years.

16 December – Edwina Currie resigns as Health minister.

19 December – The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors publishes its house price survey, revealing a deep recession in the housing market.

PC Gavin Carlton, 29, is shot dead in Coventry in a siege by two armed bank robbers. His colleague DC Leonard Jakeman is also shot but survives. One of the gunmen gives himself up to police, while the other shoots himself dead.

20 December – The three-month-old daughter of the Duke and Duchess of York is christened Beatrice Elizabeth Mary.

21 December – Pan Am Flight 103 explodes over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, Dumfries and Galloway killing a total of 270 people – 11 on the ground and all 259 who were on board. It is believed that the cause of the explosion was a terrorist bomb.

Inflation remains low for the seventh year running, now standing at 4.9%.

1988 in British television

4 January – BBC1 moves the repeat episode of Neighbours to a 5:35pm evening slot, the decision to do this having been made by controller Michael Grade on the advice of his daughter.

6 January – All ITV regions network Emmerdale Farm in the Wednesday and Thursday 6.30pm slot.

11 January – The first episode of the game show Fifteen to One airs on Channel 4.

25–29 January – TV-am airs a week of live broadcasts from Sydney to celebrate Australia’s bicentenary.

5 February – Comic Relief airs its Red Nose Day fundraiser on BBC1.

13–28 February – The 1988 Winter Olympics are held in Calgary, Alberta and broadcast to television audiences around the world.

15 February – Red Dwarf makes its debut on BBC2.

20 February – London’s Burning makes its debut as a regular series on ITV, having been developed from Jack Rosenthal’s original 1986 film.

19 March – Two off-duty British soldiers are killed after stumbling into an IRA funeral procession in Belfast. Footage of the incident is captured by journalists and widely broadcast.

22 March – Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher tells the House of Commons that journalists have a "bounden duty" to assist the police investigation into the corporals killings by handing over their footage. Many have refused to do so fearing it could place them in danger.

23 March – Film of the corporals killings is seized from the BBC and ITN under the Prevention of Terrorism and Emergency Provisions Acts.

4 April – The original series of Crossroads airs for the last time on ITV. It returns in 2001 before being axed again in 2003.

6 April – ITV’s chart show The Roxy airs for the last time.

15 April – The Pogues perform their controversial hit Streets of Sorrow/Birmingham Six – a song expressing support for those convicted over the Guildford and Birmingham pub bombings – on the Ben Elton Channel 4 show Friday Night Live. The song is cut short, however, by a commercial break.

28 April – ITV broadcasts Death on the Rock, a hugely controversial episode of Thames Television’s This Week current affairs strand, investigating Operation Flavius, which resulted in the SAS killing three members of the IRA in Gibraltar on 6 March.

16 May – The youth strand DEF II is launched on BBC2.

30 May – Debut of Charles Wood’s screenplay Tumbledown about the experiences of Scots Guard Robert Lawrence, who was left paralysed after being shot in the head by a sniper at the Battle of Mount Tumbledown during the Falklands War.

8 June – Television presenter Russell Harty dies aged 53.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch announces to the British Academy of Film and Television Arts his intention to launch a new news service. Sky News is launched at 6.00pm on 5 February 1989.

11 June – The Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute concert is staged at Wembley Stadium, London, and broadcast to 67 countries and an audience of 600 million. It was broadcast on BBC 2.

23 June – Three gay rights activists invade the BBC studios during a six o’clock bulletin of the BBC News.

19 July – The Bill broadcasts the first episode of its fourth season and switches to a year-round serial format.

3 August – Brookside is moved from Tuesdays to Wednesdays which means the soap can now be seen on Mondays and Wednesdays.

31 August – ITV airs a version of The Hound of the Baskervilles starring Jeremy Brett and Edward Hardwicke.

8 September – Channel 4 drops plans to invite Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams to appear on an edition of its late night discussion programme After Dark following

objections from other contributors.

17 September–2 October – The 1988 Summer Olympics are held in Seoul, South Korea and broadcast to television audiences around the world.

30 September – Television presenters Mike Smith and Sarah Greene are seriously injured in a helicopter crash in Gloucestershire.

3 October – The magazine programme This Morning makes its debut. It is presented by Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan until 2001.

19 October – Home Secretary Douglas Hurd issues a notice under clause 13 of the BBC Licence and Agreement to the BBC and under section 29 of the Broadcasting Act 1981 to the Independent Broadcasting Authority prohibiting the broadcast of direct statements by representatives or supporters of 11 Irish political and military organisations. The ban lasts until 1994, and denies the UK news media the right to broadcast the voices, though not the words, of all Irish republican and Loyalist paramilitaries. The restrictions – targeted primarily at Sinn Féin – means that actors are used to speak the words of any representative interviewed for radio and television.

25 October – As the 25th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy approaches ITV airs the two part documentary The Men Who Killed Kennedy, a film which explores discrepancies and inconsistencies in the US Government’s official version of events.

2 November – In the House of Commons, an amendment introduced by the opposition Labour Party condemning the government’s decision over the broadcasting ban as "incompatible with a free society" is rejected, despite some Conservative MPs voting with Labour.

Evacuation, an episode of ITV’s The Bill features one of the series early prominent events – an explosion at Sun Hill police station.

8 November – BBC1 airs Episode 523 of Neighbours featuring the wedding of Scott Robinson and Charlene Mitchell, which is watched by 20 million viewers.

13 November–18 December – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, one of C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia, is aired as a six-part TV serial by the BBC, featuring actors including Ronald Pickup, Barbara Kellerman and Michael Aldridge.

23 November – The BBC science fiction series Doctor Who celebrates its 25th anniversary and begins the three part serial Silver Nemesis.

24 November – Frank Ruse, a left-wing Labour councillor for Liverpool City Council accompanies Liverpool’s Pagoda Chinese Youth Orchestra to London for an appearance on Blue Peter. He is given a Blue Peter badge, but later receives a BBC headed letter requesting its return. The letter (later discovered to be a forgery) claims the programme had been approached by the office of Labour leader Neil Kinnock expressing concern that a councillor with hard-left views had been given a Blue Peter badge. Upon receiving the returned badge, the BBC writes back to Ruse stating that it had not sent the letter. The incident prompts Ruse to start an enquiry to find out who sent the hoax letter.

26 November – Tugs a children’s model animated series made by Clearwater Features (the company behind the first two seasons of Thomas the Tank Enigne & Friends) debuts on ITV.

1 December – ITV’s ORACLE Teletext service launches Park Avenue, a teletext based soap opera. It is written by Robert Burns and runs until ORACLE loses its franchise at the end of 1992.

3 December – Comedian Steve Tandy wins New Faces of ’88.

11 December – Launch date of the Astra Satellite. The satellite will provide television coverage to Western Europe and is revolutionary as one of the first medium-powered satellites, allowing reception with smaller dishes than has previously been possible.

13 December – Central airs the final episode of Sons and Daughters making it the first ITV region to complete the series.

22 December – BBC1 airs Civvy Street, a spin-off episode of EastEnders set during World War II.

25 December – The final edition of It’s a Knockout to air on BBC1 is another celebrity special, It’s a Charity Knockout From Walt Disney World, featuring teams of celebrities from the United Kingdom, United States and Australia. The series returns to S4C in 1991.

26–30 December – As part of a Christmas special, Channel 4 soap Brookside airs five episodes over five consecutive days.

Ulster Television in Northern Ireland is the last in the ITV network to begin 24-hour transmission.

BBC1

3 January – First of the Summer Wine (1988–1989) 3 May – 4 Square (1988–1991) 30 May – Tumbledown 3 September – Noel’s Saturday Roadshow (1988–1990) 12 September – Stoppit and Tidyup (1988) 18 September – On the Record (1988–2002) 17 October – Playdays (1988–1997) 20 October – Charlie Chalk (1988–1989) 29 December – You Rang, M’Lord? (1988–1993)

BBC2

15 February – Red Dwarf (1988–1999, 2012–present) 9 May – DEF II (1988–1994) 18 October – Colin’s Sandwich (1988–1990)

ITV

4 January – After Henry (1988–1992) 20 February – You Bet! (1988–1997) London’s Burning (1988–2002) 16 April – All Clued Up (1988–1991) 19 July – Wheel of Fortune (1988–2001) 26 July – I Can Do That (1988–1991) 3 September – The Hit Man and Her (1988–1992) 6 September – Count Duckula (1988–1993) 3 October – This Morning (1988—present) 24 November – Children’s Ward (1988–2000) 26 November – TUGS (1988–1989) 1 December – Park Avenue on ORACLE (1988–1992) 3 December – How to Be Cool (1988)[14]

Channel 4

11 January – Fifteen to One (1988–2003, 2013–present) 23 September – Whose Line Is It Anyway? (1988–1998)

Charts Number-one singles

"Always on My Mind" – Pet Shop Boys "Heaven Is a Place on Earth" – Belinda Carlisle "I Think We’re Alone Now" – Tiffany "I Should Be So Lucky" – Kylie Minogue "Don’t Turn Around" – Aswad "Heart" – Pet Shop Boys "Theme from S-Express" – S’Express "Perfect" – Fairground Attraction "With a Little Help from My Friends" – Wet Wet Wet / Billy Bragg "Doctorin’ the Tardis" – The Timelords "I Owe You Nothing" – Bros "Nothing’s Gonna Change My Love For You" – Glenn Medeiros "The Only Way Is Up" – Yazz and the Plastic Population "A Groovy Kind of Love" – Phil Collins "He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother" – The Hollies "Desire" – U2 "One Moment in Time" – Whitney Houston "Orinoco Flow (Sail Away)" – Enya "First Time" – Robin Beck "Mistletoe and Wine" – Cliff Richard

Posted by brizzle born and bred on 2018-01-05 15:38:29

Tagged: , memories of 1988 , 1988 , UK news headlines

The post memories of 1988 appeared first on Good Info.

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junker-town · 7 years

Text

Dino Babers is here to ‘strike fear into defensive coordinators’

If you’re writing a movie about the Syracuse head coach, you’re gonna want to make it a thriller.

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — “A., I like movies, but B., it’s a time for me to go out in public, when the lights turn down and no one can see who I am,” Syracuse Orange coach Dino Babers told SB Nation.

“And I can actually be like everybody else and just laugh and make a noise in a theater and be normal. Because as soon as the lights go back on, I’ve been a head football coach in smaller towns, and everybody knows who I am, and I’m back on again.”

He’s far ahead of his fellow football coaches when it comes to keeping up with pop culture, but movies are about more than that. Movies were his escape as a young man and a constant for the son of a Navy man whose family moved often. Now, trips to the “movie house” are an offseason indulgence.

Dino isn’t a nickname, either; he’s named after the Italian movie star Dino Verde. Not many head coaches see Oscar winners until years later, but Dino’s seen Moonlight. A former wide receivers coach, Babers noticed the in-cut route run by Get Out character Walter, the one that spawned the viral Get Out challenge.

Back when he was a kid, sequels weren’t the backbone of the movie industry that they are now. Babers’ career has twice been propelled by second acts. A 7-5 Eastern Illinois became a 12-2 FCS quarterfinal squad. His 8-6 Bowling Green Falcons went 10-2 the next year, before he left for Syracuse.

The opening of his Syracuse tenure was a 4-8 2016. He admits his offensive system lends itself to leaps in aptitude the second go-around, but it will not be easy in Part II. Our protagonist faces his toughest antagonists yet, with LSU, Miami, Florida State, Louisville, and Clemson on the schedule.

If you’re writing the Babers biopic, your title character is complex.

To play him, perhaps you’d call Denzel Washington (his choice) or Will Smith (whom his wife and daughters think it should be).

You’d have to find someone to channel both old-school and new-school sensibilities. There’s a record player in his office with vinyls under it and music from his home state of Hawaii playing softly. He says he’s selfish with his music, but his players get to choose everything that plays during practices.

Of course, there are two exceptions.

“The first song is ‘Smooth,’ Santana,” Babers said. “The last song: ‘I Feel Good,’ James Brown. Every black guy, white guy, pink guy, green guy will learn the words of those songs. Now, in between those two songs, they get to play whatever they want, as long as there’s not cuss words or N-bombs.”

Babers does not run his team like a former military brat and says he doesn’t care how long your hair is.

“I want [my team] to be loose,” he said. “I want them to be freewheeling, and I want there to be interaction between them and their coaches. Now that being said, there’s a discipline to this game, and that’s where all that stuff kicks in.

“But the discipline — go to a baking analogy — discipline is in the cake. It doesn’t have to be in the icing. All that baking you do — the cake, ‘Oh, what kinda icing you gonna put on there?’ — it doesn’t matter what you put on it if the cake’s no doggone good. You bake the cake.”

(Babers can bake, although he doesn’t eat chocolate.)

As you develop the screenplay, you’d have to channel the most theatrical moment of his career so far, the speech after last year’s 31-17 victory over Virginia Tech. Appropriately, it looks ripped from a sports movie.

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That moment was close to the vision he’d promised. In his introductory press conference, Babers asked those in attendance — even the media — to close their eyes and envision a team that could win in all three phases and bring a din to the Carrier Dome.

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“I think that defensively, that was probably the closest that it came,” Babers said in his office about the win. “I would say offensively, I’d probably go more to the Pittsburgh game [a 76-61 loss]. I think [the VT game] was a fabulous defensive game by us. We did some things on offense and we made some plays, but I really believe that game was a defensive win.”

You probably don’t associate Babers with defense.

Babers has been a product of many systems during a career that goes back to 1984, when he was a graduate assistant at his alma mater, Hawaii. But this system is an air raid variation that can be categorized as the veer and shoot.

“It absolutely strikes fear, in my opinion, into the defensive coordinators the night before the game,” he says.

The system was honed at Baylor, where Babers coached wide receivers from 2008 to 2011. It was borne out of necessity when former BU head coach Art Briles was a high school coach during the 1990s in Stephenville, Texas. Briles pushed for Babers to go to Eastern Illinois and told him to bet on himself.

“We’re not big phone guys,” Babers said of his contact with Briles. “But we text every blue moon. Recently. I’ll say that.“

The events and reporting most frequently associated with the sexual assault scandal that rocked Baylor and resulted in Briles’ 2015 firing occurred mostly after Babers left for Eastern Illinois in December 2011.

Babers was on staff while Tevin Elliot was a member of the Bears. Four months after Babers left, the defensive end was arrested on two counts of sexual assault and removed from the team. He was sentenced in 2014 to 20 years in prison. Baylor was later sued by five women who say Elliot raped them from 2009 to 2012, four of them testifying against him.

When asked about the scandal, Babers said:

“I can talk about from 2008 to 2011, and Tevin Elliot was there. Heard he did bad, heard he got kicked off the team. And I became a head coach. And that’s not, how do I say this? That’s not to cover me. It’s just what happened.

“I’m military. Boom, boom, next. There are certain things that you don’t get second chances for. I got four daughters. I’m down with that.”

If you made the Babers biopic, you’d have a ready-made heart-stopping moment.

The car crash nine years ago, on a recruiting trip for Baylor, should have killed him. A tire blew out, and a panicked Babers hit the brakes at 80 miles per hour. His car spun, and he ended up facing oncoming traffic on an interstate near Houston. Babers recalled in detail the face of the semi driver who swerved to miss him.

“I don’t use the word s-c-a-r-e-d anymore either, because I nearly died nine years ago. Since then, I don’t use that word,” Babers said.

He was content to stay at Eastern Illinois for 25 years like his predecessor, Bob Spoo, who gave Babers his first full-time job as a running backs coach in 1987. Both started their head coaching careers at Eastern at age 50.

But with experience playing DB in college and so much time as a WR coach, Babers brings a WR’s sensibility to teaching the system he took from Baylor. Despite his background, he’ll tell you the QB is still the most important part.

“When a quarterback throws a receiver a ball, a receiver should be able to throw that same ball back to that quarterback,” Babers said. “And that is what’s been missing. What that means is that you and I have played catch so much that you’re the pitcher and I’m the catcher. You throw me a ball, I throw you a ball, you throw me a ball, I throw you a ball. We take our mitts off, and you’d have to say, ‘Which one’s the catcher, and which one’s the pitcher?’ because we’ve exercised that skill so many times.”

He calls plays without a sheet, takes calculated risks on fourth downs, and recalls the little things, like the fact that his quarterback got hurt on play No. 14 of the Clemson game. I checked, and he’s right, if you don’t count punts as offensive plays, which many coaches don’t.

“Our quarterback has to be a thrower, not a runner,” Babers said. “It’s not a wishbone offense. It’s not Navy’s offense. We do want to run the football, but our quarterbacks need to be NFL quarterbacks. They need to be guys that, after they have a fantastic college career, they go to the pros and they have a pro career.”

Under Babers, EIU’s Jimmy Garoppolo threw for over 5,000 yards and 53 touchdowns as a senior against only nine interceptions. He would finish in the top three of FCS’ most meaningful statistical categories and lead the Panthers to FCS’ most prolific offense. Garoppolo now backs up Tom Brady and appears in major NFL trade rumors, with the assumption he could be a franchise QB.

“Now, all that being said, if they do have legs that can get them out of trouble, that’s an advantage. But that’s the No. 1 thing. The No. 1 thing: has to be able to touch the entire football field; 53 and a third wide, 120 yards long. They’ve got to be able touch it all.”

Since Babers’ relocation to New York, he’s been able to see Broadway shows for the first time.

He wanted to see Hamilton last offseason, but there was a problem: his whole family wanted to go too.

“They were so fricking expensive,” Babers said. “This was like in the last two weeks of the original cast before they were about to close down. I’m like, the heck? One I mighta saw, me, but they were all like, ‘We wanna go.’ We’re talkin’ about six big ones. I’m like, ‘oh heck no.’ Because I know it’s supposed to be good, but to me the best Broadway show is West Side Story, which is my favorite movie. So I’m like, I’m not gonna go see this Hamilton thing.”

Tickets for that performance were going anywhere from $5-$20,000 each on the resale market, but he did enjoy the cast’s parody of Garoppolo.

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Babers did see The Lion King and Jersey Boys with his family. In the latter, he saw the future of his program.

“The thing that cracked me up was the opening line of Jersey Boys. Now I’m sitting here, first and second Broadway show, never been to one live,” Babers said, “and in the Jersey Boys, the opening line says — they’re singing — but the first time the guy talks, he goes, ‘Hi, my name’s Tommy DeVito, and I put New Jersey on the map.’”

Babers was recruiting a young quarterback by the same name from the same state.

“And I’m sitting there going, ‘Are you sending me a message?’”

One "Jersey Boys" name sounded familiar,but I can't put my finger on it... #TheyPutJerseyOnTheMap #Broadway #AWEsome http://pic.twitter.com/rhqarrTQG3

— Dino Babers (@CoachBabersCuse) July 6, 2016

DeVito ended up signing with the Orange, an Elite 11 participant and the No. 15 pro-style QB in his class, per the 247Sports Composite. He’ll arrive in the summer.

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QB recruit Tommy DeVito believes Syracuse can return to greatness

Our partners with SB Nation College Football spoke to QB recruit Tommy DeVito, who is all-in with the Syracuse Orange. He explains why and what his future plans are in this video.

Posted by Troy Nunes Is An Absolute Magician on Thursday, July 7, 2016

For now, Eric Dungey leads the team through spring. Dungey ran Syracuse’s option system in 2015, then shifted to Babers’ system and improved his completion percentage while more than doubling his pass attempts.

Babers told his future QB to go see Jersey Boys. He’s not sure if that’s happened yet, but they can see it together later this offseason.

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