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Southern Baptist leader selection process fails amid dispute

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

A powerful Southern Baptist committee was looking to appoint a new leader Monday who could navigate controversies over its handling of sexual-abuse reforms and the ousting of churches with women serving as pastors.Instead, the Executive Committee found itself tangled in yet another dispute, voting down a recommendation to make its own former chairman its president in what had become a racially fraught decision.That 50-31 vote came after some of the denomination’s prominent Black clergy questioned the selection process, which they saw as bypassing an African American pastor who has led the committee as interim president for more than a year. The selection process hit a nerve in a denomination that has lost some Black clergy in recent years over what they have seen as a failure of the mostly white-led denomination to make good on its pledges to reform after its history of supporting slavery and segregation. While the SBC elected its first Black president in 2012, no African Amer...

Jackson needs federal funds to cover repairs, appointee says

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The manager appointed by the U.S. Department of Justice to oversee reforms to the beleaguered water system in Mississippi’s capital city says he won’t have enough money to cover expenses until more federal funds arrive. Ted Henifin was appointed in November after the Justice Department won a federal judge’s approval to carry out a rare intervention to fix Jackson’s water system, which partially failed in August. For days, people waited in lines for water to drink, bathe, cook and flush toilets in the majority-Black city of about 150,000. Henifin, who has begun to implement a range of reforms, said he is still waiting for hundreds of millions of dollars in funds the federal government set aside for Jackson’s water infrastructure. Meanwhile, the city is waiting to pay companies it has done business with for water system improvements. Current monthly transfers are no longer enough to cover operations, maintenance and repairs, Henifin says.“We’re&...

Muslim mayor blocked from White House Eid celebration

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. Secret Service said Monday it blocked a Muslim mayor from Prospect Park, New Jersey, from attending a White House celebration with President Joe Biden to belatedly mark the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.Shortly before Mayor Mohamed Khairullah was set to arrive at the White House for the Eid-al-Fitr celebration, he received a call from the White House stating that he had not been cleared for entry by the Secret Service and could not attend the celebration where Biden delivered remarks to hundreds of guests, according to the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.U.S. Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi confirmed that Khairullah was not allowed into the White House complex, but declined to detail why. Khairullah was elected to a fifth term as the borough’s mayor in January.“While we regret any inconvenience this may have caused, the mayor was not allowed to enter the White House complex this evening,” Guglielmi...

Texas Gov. Abbott to Chicago Mayor Lightfoot: Tell Biden to secure the border

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) — Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday responded to calls from the mayor of Chicago to stop sending migrants to her city, saying she should instead call on President Joe Biden to secure the border. ‘We simply have no more shelters:’ Lightfoot implores Abbott to stop sending migrants Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot had penned a letter to Abbott, asking him to stop sending people, even as more migrants were expected to arrive Monday, adding that Chicago had no more shelter, space, or resources to accommodate an increase of individuals at this level.In response to Lightfoot, Abbott said Texas' busing strategy was needed to "provide much-needed relief to overwhelmed, small border communities amid the Biden Administration's growing border crisis.""If you truly want to 'work together to find a real solution' to this border crisis gripping our nation, you must call on the Biden Administration to do its job by securing our border, repelling the illegal immigrants f...

Police: Chicago carjacking suspect could be elementary student

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

CHICAGO -- The Chicago Police Department believes a recent car jacking suspect could be an elementary school student.An attempted car jacking in Chicago's South Shore neighborhood happened on the 7000 block of South Merrill around 12 a.m. Friday.Chicago police sent out a community alert Sunday. A half an hour before Friday nights incident, CPD said someone grabbed a victim's keys near the 2100 block of East 70th Street, taking their vehicle. Both incidents happened within block of O'Keefe Elementary School. 6 dead after dust cloud cause 60-car crash, closes I-55 for 28 miles "She came face to face with a young boy that couldn’t be any more than ten-years-old," Block President of Paradise on Merrill Diane Hodges said.The suspects in two car jackings in Chicago's South Shore neighborhood have different descriptions. The first incident, involved a man wearing a furry jacket and a red and black ski mask. The younger offender wore a hooded sweatshirt, black jeans, and a mask."It’s...

VIDEO: Black bear surprises principal at West Virginia school dumpster

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

NICHOLAS COUNTY, W.Va (WOWK) – The principal at Zela Elementary School in West Virginia's Nicholas County got quite a surprise while checking the dumpster Monday morning.According to security footage posted by the Nicholas County Board of Education, Zela Elementary School Principal James Marsh was unlatching the lid of a dumpster outside the school around 7:15 a.m. Monday, May 1. As he removed the latch, the lid began to move and a black bear poked its head out of the dumpster, inches away from Marsh. 7 bodies found in search for two missing Oklahoma teens: authorities The video shows Marsh dart away from the dumpster as he spots the bear. The bear then immediately runs in the opposite direction around a shed and toward a wooded area."Who says principals don't deserve hazard pay????" the Nicholas County BOE said in a Facebook post accompanying the video.There is no word at this time how the bear ended up in the dumpster. Nexstar's WOWK has reached out to the school board to learn ...

White House estimates 20K Russians killed in Ukraine war since December

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

The Biden administration estimates that since December Russia has suffered 100,000 casualties, including more than 20,000 killed, White House national security council spokesman John Kirby said Monday.  Among those killed, Kirby estimates that nearly half were soldiers from the private military company Wagner Group, which is heavily involved in the grinding fight for Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine.  “Russia has exhausted its military stockpiles and its armed forces,” Kirby told reporters. “Just since December, we estimate that Russia has suffered more than 100,000 casualties, including over 20,000 killed in action. . . . It’s really stunning, these numbers.” Kirby said the source of the new 100,000 figure is “based on some downgraded intelligence that we’ve been able to collect,” though he did not elaborate. He would not give the estimated number of casualties for Ukrainians, deferring to Kyiv on the information.  “We've never talked about Ukrainian casualties in the war,” Kirby sa...

Giddings bus driver faces DWI charge after hit-and-run crash with 14 kids onboard

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

GIDDINGS, Texas (KXAN) — A Giddings ISD bus driver faces a charge of DWI with a child passenger after an incident Monday involving a hit-and-run accident.According to the Giddings Police Department, Sherry Francis, 65, was taken into custody after police received a report of a hit-and-run crash on North Orange Street at 7:47 a.m. At the time of the crash, officers said there were 14 children in the bus but no one was injured and damage to the car Francis hit was "minimal."GPD said during the investigation that "probable cause was established that Ms. Francis was impaired by a substance other than alcohol," and was then taken into custody. GPD said Francis consented to have her blood drawn for testing, and she was given a $7,500 bond and released on personal recognizance. The charge is a State Jail Felony, GPD said.

Austin bar builds bat homes with season underway

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) — A southeast Austin bar taught a class on how to care for some of our most loyal and beloved creatures.The Buzz Mill, in partnership with ecologist Merlin Tuttle's Bat Conservation, held a class on how to build bat houses. Tuttle dedicated his career to bat conservation, researching the species across the world for more than 60 years.The conservation said these houses are important, because bat populations are declining, in large part due to a lack of available roosts. How Austin Bat Refuge cares for bats affected by cold snap "When you have a bat house and it's occupied, it's a really fun activity to have friends over and watch the bats come out, and it's an easy way to teach people about how important bats are just to have them around," Teresa Nichta, who is a co-founder of Merlin Tuttle's bat conservation, said.Austin is home to the largest urban bat colony in the world. Texas Parks and Wildlife estimates there are about 1.5 million bats living under the Congres...

After latest burglary at Lowertown coffee shop and restaurant, owners find community support ‘amazing’

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:24:40 GMT

A string of burglaries at a downtown St. Paul coffee shop and restaurant has been discouraging for the owners, but they’ve been buoyed by the outpouring of community support they’ve received.The latest incident — and the one that caused the most damage — happened early Friday at Lost Fox in Lowertown. The business’s motion detector went off about 4:30 a.m. Large windows to the building had been shattered, but not much was taken, said Annie Rose, who owns Lost Fox with her husband.After Friday’s break-in on Fourth Street, across from Union Depot and its Green Line light-rail station, a Lost Fox Facebook post displayed photos of the damage and read, “I am so tired. Come have a coffee this weekend so we can pay our deductible. We could probably use some words of encouragement.”The support has “been amazing,” Rose said Monday. “There’s been a line out the door. … We’ve had people come in to get a coffee,...