Wednesday, August 09, 2000
Kentucky News Briefs
From Enquirer news sources
Segment of I-65 closing on weekend
The northbound lanes of Interstate 65 through Louisville will be closed from the Watterson Expressway to Spaghetti Junction from 9 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday as a 150-worker super team put together by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet and Gohman Asphalt & Construction Inc. moves in to complete a $2.9 million highway in only two weekends.
The next weekend for the closure of the road is scheduled for Sept. 15-18, a transportation cabinet spokeswoman said.
The team will be conducting repairs on the route that was last overhauled in the early 1980s, according to a news release from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.
Jail commission suspends meetings
COVINGTON — Starting Thursday, the Kenton County Jail Commission will temporarily suspend its meetings, until the question of how to pay for a new jail is resolved.
Last month, Kenton Fiscal Court voted to hire constitutional lawyer Sheryl Snyder of Louisville to file suit to determine whether the county's payroll tax increase to pay for a new jail is legal. The increase is scheduled to take effect Jan. 1.
County officials agreed to file suit to clarify the issue, after some in the business community questioned whether the tax increase could be collected in Kenton County cities that had their own payroll tax.
“The judge(-executive) thought we needed to recess the general meetings (of the jail commission), until we could get this financing thing straightened out,” said Ralph Bailey, Kenton County's project manager. “This is just so we can get an answer on the tax.”
Despite the temporary suspension of jail commission meetings, Mr. Bailey said that committees studying everything from the new jail's design to its operations can continue to meet, as necessary.
Patton seeks laws on garbage cleanup
FRANKFORT — Gov. Paul Patton on Tuesday said he will push the General Assembly to enact garbage cleanup and collection laws next year — in a special legislative session if necessary.
Mr. Patton also admitted “I was AWOL” while the same kind of legislation withered on the vine during the 2000 General Assembly.
That legislation included a “bottle bill” — a deposit on throwaway drink containers. It was the rallying point for grocers, bottlers, beverage distributors and other opponents who succeeded in beating it.
Mr. Patton did not endorse it at the time. Nor did he include it Tuesday in the idea he pitched to a conference of recyclers and county solid-waste coordinators.
Mr. Patton said the next legislation should include mandatory garbage collection, ways to clean up dumps, promote recycling and reduce roadside litter. He also said a public education component was needed to “change the attitude” of people who throw trash on the ground. “You get used to trash. You get immune to it,” he said.
Tobacco warehouse owner, 99, dies
VERSAILLES — Reynolds Bell, a retired Bourbon County farmer and tobacco warehouseman, died at a nursing home after a long illness. He was 99.
Mr. Bell, who died Sunday, was a past president of the Burley Auction Warehouse Association, which included seven states.
A Bourbon County native and a graduate of Berea Academy and the University of Kentucky, Mr. Bell raised tobacco for many years and had formerly owned several tobacco warehouses in Lexington.
After his first wife, Mary Kathryn Young Bell, was killed in a traffic crash on Paris Pike in 1985, Mr. Bell became an avid proponent of the widening of that road.
Background reviews made mandatory
ELIZABETHTOWN — Youth sports leagues that use city facilities or receive municipal funds must perform criminal record checks on coaches and other volunteers under a new city ordinance.
With no discussion, the six-member City Council voted unanimously Monday to make the background reviews mandatory. The council's action came less than a month after Hardin County Attorney Ken Howard announced his staff would perform such checks free.
Youth leagues will receive letters from the city informing them of the new policy, Mayor David Willmoth said. Each league will have about 90 days to comply. Those that do not, risk losing funding or use of city fields.
Study praises racial diversity
FRANKFORT — Harvard researchers report that Jefferson County students, and the community as a whole, reap measurable benefits from having racially diverse schools.
Large majorities of students surveyed earlier this year said they considered themselves prepared to work in a diverse job setting, were likely to do so in the future and would be comfortable with a supervisor of a different race, according to the report being released Tuesday.
White and black students alike said their school experience helped them to work more effectively and to get along with people of other races and ethnic groups, the report said.
The findings are important as schools become increasingly resegregated and as affirmative action continues to be struck down in court, said Gary Orfield, co-director of The Civil Rights Project at Harvard University.
But attorney Michael McLaughlin, who represented a white Boston student who challenged the system's race-based admissions policy, dismissed the study as “pseudo science,” and said it aimed to reach a certain conclusion.
2 levies pass for schools; 1 fails
Police levy funds go unspent
Sale of rights required changes
Truce called on cafe controversy
Lottery winner's a no-show for drunken-driving hearing
Corridor proposal stresses unity
Firefighters dispute rescue credit
Hemophiliac boy's heart, life restored
Judge rules zone change to bar drug clinics illegal
'ER's' Dr. Romano isn't such a bad guy
Viewers vote to evict Richard
Alternative medicine regulation remains inconsistent
Body and Mind
Caring for aging parents can be a daily juggling routine
Internet sites offer advice for seniors
Patching up illness
Scientists find new uses for old drugs
SAMPLES: Strange charm
Butler Co. candidate calls for drug tests
Cabby on work release helped police
Couple give $1 million to WKU
David, 4, has wish: A cure for diabetes
Help the kids adjust to school
Judge asked to order records
Lebanon selects new city auditor
Many N.Ky. races look to be lively
Monroe, Lebanon reach tax deal on switched area
N.Ky. losing top business recruiter
Ousted judge seeks his former post
Schools outline improvements
Voinovich pushes Appalachian commission
Wilkinson bets on book venture
It's time for the political games
Pig Parade: Piganthropy
Get to it
Kentucky News Briefs
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