Illinois wolves freed in Arizona; court allows pregnancy; prosthetic-arm attack
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Odd and interesting news from the Midwest.
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PIERRE, S.D. (AP) — The state Board of Regents has given preliminary approval to rules governing the sale of beer and wine at special events hosted at South Dakota's public university campuses, a board spokeswoman said Wednesday.
The policy allows sales but doesn't require them, specifies that beer and wine access must be controlled and restricts the beverage sales during student athletic events to those in premium seating. After giving initial approval to the plan Wednesday, a final decision is expected at the board's June meeting, spokeswoman Janelle Toman said.
The move to govern the sales comes after a measure allowing them during sporting events, artistic performances, fundraisers, conferences and other occasions passed during the 2016 legislative session.
Past state law didn't ban serving alcohol, but on-campus sales were prohibited. The new board rules under consideration would require the president of a university to approve events during which beer and wine could be sold by a vendor.
Events would require a security plan, and food would have to be served. And the rules would require reporting to the Board of Regents.
Sales would also have to be approved by local municipalities. Supporters have said the changes are narrow and will make the school facilities more attractive venues for outside groups to book for conferences or other events.
Allowing beer and wine sales will hopefully spur more visitors, increase tax revenues and add amenities to attract workers to Brookings, home of South Dakota State University, said Mayor Tim Reed. They would also help the community, since the city has put funding into campus facilities such as a performing arts center, he said.
"It made a lot of sense for the community as a whole just because of the activities that happen up on campus," Reed said.
Outgoing SDSU President David Chicoine has said the sale of alcohol could help campus venues as well as the school's fundraising abilities. The plan could also allow the university to better promote premium seating at the new $65 million Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium.
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BROOKFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Two Mexican gray wolf puppies born at Brookfield Zoo outside Chicago are starting new lives in the wilds of Arizona as part of a project to save the animals.
In a news release, the zoo says the puppies were born at the zoo last month and flown to Arizona. They were then placed in a den of wild wolves where puppies had recently been born — something that increases the chances the puppies will be accepted by the wild wolves.
Brookfield Zoo officials say there are only 97 of these wolves in the wild and it is important to add new wolves to improve the genetic diversity of the wild wolf population. The effort marks the second time wolves from the zoo have been released to a wild wolf den.
- By LISA CORNWELL Associated Press
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CINCINNATI (AP) — Cincinnati's city council on Wednesday authorized a photo ID card for immigrants, the homeless and others that police and municipal agencies will accept as a valid method of identification.
The council's resolution and an accompanying executive order allow acceptance of cards that members of a coalition advocating for them say will be the first of their type in an Ohio city. Similar cards have been created in other cities around the country, including New York and Greensboro, North Carolina. The cards won't replace driver's licenses, but will give residents another acceptable proof of identity.
The council in Cincinnati voted 5-1 to approve the resolution, with three members abstaining, WCPO-TV reported.
Officials with the Metropolitan Area Religious Coalition of Cincinnati and the city say the cards will help some of the most vulnerable members of the population and the city as a whole.
Mayor John Cranley said the city's Immigration Task Force found that legal immigrants, non-driving older residents, and others who lack the ability to get a driver's license often are reluctant to report crimes, even when they are the victims. He said the police acceptance of the cards will hopefully help victims feel more comfortable to report crimes.
"This will make our city safer," Cranley said in a statement.
The executive director of the coalition that will issue the cards says they will help in many ways.
"It will help those who are the most vulnerable feel more a part of the community," said Margaret Fox. "It's a general ID card that anyone can apply for, but the beauty of it is that it provides photo identification with a residential address for those who don't have other IDs."
Fox said the card will cost $15 dollars, but financial assistance will be available.
Applicants will have to show two forms of identification to receive a card. Those can include birth certificates, consular IDs, passports and letters from social service organizations, Fox said.
A coalition of labor unions, faith-based and social service organizations and other groups in Columbus is working to get a similar card there. The coalition, One ID Columbus, has been talking with city and county officials about the need for such a card, said Ruben Castilla Herrera, an organizer with the Central Ohio Worker Center that's part of the coalition.
"This would be a legitimate and useful identification document that could make this a real opportunity city for everyone," he said.
Castilla Herrera said the coalition hasn't launched its public campaign yet, but hopes to have a formal proposal to government officials possibly as early as the end of this year.
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This story has been corrected to show the spelling of the organizer's last name is Herrera, not Herrara.
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DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The Iowa Court of Appeals has thrown out the sentence for a Mason City woman which prohibited her from becoming pregnant while on probation for a child endangerment conviction.
The court says the sentence violates the woman's "fundamental right to procreation."
Stephanie Fatland appealed her child endangerment convictions and challenged her sentence.
At her sentencing last August District Court Judge James Drew placed her on probation for five years and, among the conditions of probation, prohibited her from becoming pregnant during probation.
The appeals court on Wednesday upheld the conviction but ordered resentencing for removal of the pregnancy prohibition.
Fatland, now 24, admitted to shaking her 5-month-old son after he was hospitalized in July 2014 with bleeding in his retinas and a bulge in the soft spot of his head.
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LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — An Omaha man wants to ban the release of balloons at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln after the University of Nebraska football team scores its first points in a game.
A federal lawsuit filed this week by Randall Krause said the mass release results in the open dumping of solid waste. That violates the 1976 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, the lawsuit said.
Krause has twice sued the city of Omaha in the past to make it clean up deicing solution it puts on streets, calling it dangerous to the environment. Both suits were dismissed.
In the latest complaint, which Krause wrote himself, he listed 60 endangered species that he claims are put in danger as a result of the balloon release.
"The mass release of Husker balloons puts virtually all species of birds, turtles, marine mammals and small animals...in harm's way," the suit said.
He also said small children are at risk of choking or suffocating if they try to eat the popped balloons.
The suit doesn't offer any evidence that a child has ever choked on a deflated red balloon from Memorial Stadium. There are several pictures of dead and injured birds and turtles from balloons, but the suit doesn't specifically link the balloons in the photos to the tradition.
A university spokesman declined to comment on the litigation. A corporate sponsor covers the balloon costs, and the balloons are handed out during games.
Krause also asked for an injunction that would keep the university from promoting the balloon release.
The tradition has been a part of Cornhuskers' football games since the late 1950. It was halted temporarily during a nationwide helium shortage in 2012.
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DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The number of parents seeking religious exemptions to Iowa vaccination requirements is still climbing despite health officials' efforts to ease concerns about the shots.
Don Callaghan, who oversees immunization programs for the Iowa Department of Public Health, told The Des Moines Register (http://dmreg.co/1TQg6r9 ) that "it's not the trend we want to be seeing."
A new state report says more than 6,700 Iowa schoolchildren obtained religious exemptions to vaccination this school year, up 13 percent from the year before and more than four times the number 15 years ago. The statewide increase wasn't as big as Polk County's 33 percent leap that was reported earlier this spring.
Iowa doesn't make parents cite specific religious teachings for exemptions. The state merely requires a signed statement that immunization "conflicts with a genuine and sincere religious belief." Public health officials have said that they're unaware of any major religions that oppose vaccination.
Callaghan speculated that the exemption increase is fueled by families who don't understand the dangers of some diseases because vaccines have kept the once-normal illnesses at bay.
Linn County Health Director Pramod Dwivedi said he believes many families who seek exemptions fear that vaccination causes autism, although multiple studies have shown that is not the case.
About 1.3 percent of Iowa schoolchildren now have religious exemptions to vaccination, compared with a national average of 1.5 percent, according to Callaghan. Another 0.4 percent of the state's schoolchildren have medical exemptions to vaccination.
Callaghan believes the state will face more pressure to tighten restrictions on vaccination exemptions if the numbers continue to rise.
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Information from: The Des Moines Register, http://www.desmoinesregister.com
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GERING, Neb. (AP) — Forty counts have been filed against a 16-year-old boy accused of secretly recording activity in the girls locker room at Gering High School.
Court records say the boy faces 20 misdemeanor counts of unlawful intrusion and 20 felony counts of unlawful intrusion via photograph. A document says the recordings show the girls "in a state of undress."
The Associated Press generally doesn't name juveniles accused of crimes. The Scotts Bluff County attorney has filed a motion to transfer the case to adult court.
Schools Superintendent Bob Hastings says parents of the girls seen in the recordings have been notified, and counselors are being made available to any student affected by the incident.
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FENTON, Mo. (AP) — A 28-year-old man is facing charges for allegedly attacking a St. Louis County police officer with his prosthetic arm.
Police say Joshua Stockinger became angry Saturday at the Jim Butler Chervolet car dealership. When a St. Louis County officer arrived, Stockinger allegedly pushed the officer, grabbed him by the neck and hit him over the head with his prosthetic arm.
The officer was treated at a hospital for a cut near the temple, a bruised eye, and other injuries.
Stockinger is charged with first-degree assault on a law enforcement officer and felony resisting arrest.
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JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Authorities say a young girl was hospitalized after her arm was impaled on a fence outside the governor's mansion.
Local media report the incident happened around 2 p.m.
Officials said the girl was walking along the ornamental fence toward the mansion entrance when it happened. Responders cut the fence and transported the girl to a hospital with a piece still in place so doctors could remove it.
KOMU-TV reports the fourth-grader was there on a school trip.
Her condition wasn't immediately known.
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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Police say a 10-year-old girl was shot in an apparent drive-by shooting while she was sleeping on a sofa in a central Ohio home.
Columbus police say the shooting occurred around 1 a.m. Wednesday. They say multiple shots were fired through the window of the home, striking the girl twice.
Police say the child was taken to a hospital in stable condition and was expected to survive her injuries.
Authorities say a woman and another child were also in the home at the time of the shooting.
Police didn't release the girl's name or provide any information about a possible motive or suspects.
- By NATHAN BAIRD Journal Courier
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LAFAYETTE, Ind. (AP) — Alex Morgan can't remember if he even liked baseball when his parents first enrolled him in T-ball.
The 13-year-old Lafayette resident and East Tipp Middle School student knows he loves it now.
Alex is an avid fans of the Cincinnati Reds and their star second baseman, Brandon Phillips. He plays the same position on his Harrison Youth Baseball Organization travel team next to his twin brother, Aaron, the shortstop.
Years ago, teammates and friends weren't aware of a significant difference between Alex and his blond-haired, blue-eyed twin. That changed around age 8 at a pool party for their Pinto League team.
"He came in a bathing suit and had to take his leg off and everybody was like, 'What's going on?' " said his mother, Carrie Morgan.
Alex Morgan was born without a fibular bone in his lower left leg. The condition — fibular hemimelia — affects about one in 40,000 births.
Rather than endure years of painful limb-lengthening surgeries that may or may not have helped — and which would have restricted Alex's physical activity — Jason and Carrie Morgan opted for amputation. Alex has worn a prosthetic since he was nine months old.
That didn't stop Alex from playing baseball — plus football, basketball, soccer and, for the first time this past winter, wrestling. Yet his prosthetic, inflexible and fragile, isn't ideal for a young multi-sport athlete.
A group of Purdue mechanical engineering students spent their school year trying to help Alex and others like him run and move more easily.
A joint effort between Purdue's Engineering Projects in Community Service (EPICS) program and students in mechanical engineering's senior design class culminated Thursday night. The six students presented Alex Morgan with a new ankle and foot design that offers greater range of motion and durability — and at a fraction of the cost of similar prosthetics already on the market.
Purdue mechanical engineering professor Eric Nauman called it the best senior design project he's seen. While the group is looking into patent options, it has also considered handing the design off to non-profit organizations who work with prosthetic patients.
"A lot of the projects are strictly concept, and at the end there isn't that satisfying giving it to anyone, or it's not going to go anywhere after you leave," said Rachel Berry, one of the senior design students. "This will actually make a difference."
Unless Alex Morgan is wearing shorts — his preferred outfit these days — one wouldn't assume he wears a prosthesis.
"I've been playing all the sports my brother has been playing and all my friends play," Alex said. "I just like being able to be with my friends and play with them on the same team and go to different places."
Alex and Aaron Morgan play on a travel baseball team with the son of another Purdue engineering professor, Thomas Talavage. That's how Nauman learned about Morgan, and how he came to suggest a prosthesis project to EPICS students Haley Smith, Jennie Boehm and Quinton Lasko.
That group met once a week and began developing a conceptual design. They first met Alex in late summer and began meeting with him regularly for various measurements and tests. They also went to one of his baseball games last summer to observe what an active young person needed from a prosthesis.
"It's not just running," Smith said. "It's stopping on a base, it's sliding, it's twisting. Having him come in and look at his motion, we're able to say, this is what he does. We need to figure out how we can put numbers to that and make sure it's not going to break when he does that motion."
Alex wears a rigid foot-and-ankle prosthesis bolted to a lower leg piece. He slips his own shortened leg into that piece and tightens everything into place with Velcro straps. Such prosthetics cost anywhere from $1,000 to $3,000. Out-of-pocket expenses for the Morgans, who both work for the Tippecanoe Sheriff's Department, are offset by insurance and help from Shriners International.
However, Alex's typical prosthetic allows only forward and back motion. It is also highly susceptible to breakage in the toe area at the ball of the foot.
According to the students, products currently on the market that provide greater range of motion, including side-to-side, range from $10,000 to $15,000. The EPICS students conceived of a ball-and-socket joint that better replicates the motion range of a real ankle, on a foot with a toe hinge, made of a more durable material.
Oh, and it all had to be done at a significantly lower price.
Three people meeting one day a week weren't going to accomplish that by graduation. So senior design students Berry, Ally Gleason and Sami Labban joined the group, which began working on the project daily.
"We have some of the most ingenious students here," said Nauman, "and you kind of let them go on something like this and they come up with just amazing solutions."
Playing football in the backyard one day, Alex planted his left leg to give him leverage to kick with his right.
He heard a crack. Alex looked down at a leg with no foot. His prosthetic had snapped off at the ankle.
"There's not an emergency room for that," Carrie Morgan said. "So he didn't have a leg.
"It happened on a weekend and we couldn't get in (to the prosthetist) for another week. We duct-taped it and he walked carefully."
Alex's prosthetics have broken at least three times. With no tendons or muscles attached to a prosthetic, the limb is essentially dead weight. According to the Purdue students, doctors say limbs that are too heavy is the No. 1 complaint of prosthetic users.
The Purdue students learned that the hard way about halfway through their project.
Their first design consisted of a carbon fiber foot covered in plastic. That product satisfied the need for a lightweight limb with the desired flexibility.
There was only one problem. The design needed to withstand about five times the patient's body weight — in the case of 100-pound Alex, that's 500 pounds of force — to hold up against the running and jumping of a young athlete.
When it came time to test the design in late February, concern turned into panic. The steel base plate in the ankle crushed through the heel at only 30 pounds of force. The students needed something stronger, but they couldn't add much weight. They also had to use components in scale with the size of Alex's other foot.
"We're used to over-engineering everything," Gleason said. " 'Oh, it needs to be stronger? Let's just make it bigger or let's make it out of something that's stronger.' Well, if it's stronger, it's probably heavier.
"We have to make this tiny little piece and it has to hold 500 pounds, and how are we going to do that?"
Previously the students used state-of-the-art 3D printing technology to create their carbon fiber design. Now they turned to a more old-school approach: aluminum. While heavier than carbon fiber, aluminum is light enough to limit the wearer's discomfort yet still holds up to the necessary weight constraints.
The students designed an entire manufacturing process and became regulars in the Purdue machine shop over the next six weeks. They were novices when they first walked in. A few weeks ago, other students started asking them if they were the teaching assistants.
On Thursday night, the team presented Morgan with an aluminum foot protected by a plastic shell and connected at the ankle with a ball and socket. He took his tentative first steps with the foot in the EPICS lab at Armstrong Hall, replicating his pitching motion. Where Alex's heel previously hit the ground with no give, he now had a more natural bend with his plant foot.
According to Boehm, the entire manufacturing cost of the project, including labor, was $633. Even with the standard markup for similar medical devices (about four times cost, according to the team), the design represents a dramatically cheaper alternative to prosthetics with similar mobility.
Alex Morgan can't comfortably wear the design yet. The foot given to him was attached to an older prosthetic leg that doesn't fit well anymore. The Morgans hope the foot can be attached to a new leg, which he could receive later this summer.
Alex is old enough to realize he's not the only one who could benefit from this project.
"I like that maybe people will be able to get them for cheaper," Alex said. "I was basically the guinea pig."
The students say the mold for their design can be configured for 40 different sizes of either right or left feet and for any weight category.
Everyone from the group is graduating except Lasko, a junior who plans to carry the project forward into his senior year. The goal is to eventually merge this design with another EPICS project that endeavors to make prosthetics more active. Sensory technology could help motorize the prosthesis, allowing for improved gait when running and other improvements.
"This whole next year we're going to work on different ways to implement that actuation with this mechanical design," Lasko said. "We want to give them that advantage to have that force output from the foot to get a little more out of it."
The students say the manufacturing cost should continue to plummet as technology advances. Once 3D printing of carbon fibers can handle the weight requirements, total cost of materials and labor could top out around $100.
As of Thursday night, the students hadn't yet received their project's grade.
Watching Alex Morgan strap on their design, raise an imaginary bat above his shoulders and take a swing provided its own satisfaction.
"A lot of the projects at the end of the semester are just scrapped and put in a locker for other projects to use," Labban said. "He just walked out the door with ours."
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Source: (Lafayette) Journal-Courier, http://on.jconline.com/1sbdyLM
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Information from: Journal and Courier, http://www.jconline.com
This is an AP-Indiana Exchange story offered by the (Lafayette) Journal Courier.
- By STAN POLANSKI Effingham Daily News
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EFFINGHAM, Ill. (AP) — When the weather gets warm at the start of spring, people flock to wooded areas across the region in search of mushrooms.
They go every year, checking hillsides and around dead trees for different kinds of morel mushrooms. The fungi, considered delicacies, can run $50 per pound if store bought.
"A lot of the price comes from increased demand," said Sean Morris, owner of Sean's Produce in Effingham. "More people like cooking with mushrooms."
Steve Ballinger, 51, of Neoga has been mushroom hunting every spring since he was a young child.
"We started mushroom hunting as soon as we were old enough to walk in the woods with grandma and grandpa," he said.
Because of a cold spell, Ballinger said on April 6 that he had yet to prowl the woods for morels. He said that he would wait for a few more warm days before doing so. The hunting usually begins at the beginning of April, but it depends on the weather.
During the spring, Ballinger said his family cooks and eats the mushrooms they gather. If they have too much for themselves, they'll give some mushrooms away.
With a strong flashlight, Ballinger said he used to mushroom hunt in the night, but doesn't anymore.
"We can't because of the coyotes," he said.
Though morels are a highly sought-after and "exquisite" food, there are mushrooms that hunters need to avoid because they're toxic.
That means anyone clamoring to head out for their first hunt should do so with a veteran, Ballinger said.
"You pick and eat the wrong ones, and you're done," he said.
But the trick is finding a veteran willing to give away their hunting spots.
"Around here, we guard our mushrooms like our wallets," Ballinger said.
Before a hunter enjoys their spoils, Morris suggests cutting the mushrooms in half. If the stem and cap is hollow, then it's a morel. If it's not hollow, it's a false morel that shouldn't be eaten.
The morels should be disinfected before cooking them. Deb McKay of Neoga said her family lets the mushrooms soak in saltwater overnight. Putting them in saltwater kills bugs and preserves the mushrooms, Morris said.
Despite strong winds and cold temperatures that have been constant in the area from the end of March through the first week of April, the middle of March saw above average temperatures. And one area hunter capitalized on that.
Rebecca Ashley found a handful of mushrooms while looking in woods at the edge of Effingham County on March 23.
"I just knew it in my heart," she said that day. "But I had to walk a long ways just to find a few little mushrooms."
Even though Morris said that some days his supplier doesn't have enough mushrooms to ship to him because of high demand, he said he likely wouldn't buy from a local hunter unless they had certification and insurance.
But Morris said he did buy some from a local enthusiast once.
"The mushrooms went from the picker's hands, to my hands, to the customer's hands," Morris said.
In general though, he said either locals aren't looking to sell or they aren't finding much.
Morris' supplier of morels is a family operation based in Keno, Oregon. The lack of mushroom harvesting in the Midwest has kept the prices up, he said.
For those in the area that want to be successful morel hunters year after year, and possibly avoid buying the costly mushrooms, Morris has a tip: pinch the morel off from above the dirt line. Pulling from below the surface could keep the mushroom from growing back the next spring.
Ballinger also has a tip: make sure to have a strategy.
"They're not easy to see," he said. "There's a method to the madness. You've got to know where you're going to find them. You have to be able to read the terrain and know what you're looking for."
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Source: Effingham Daily News, http://bit.ly/1qVKzKB
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Information from: Effingham Daily News, http://www.effinghamdailynews.com
This is an AP-Illinois Exchange story offered by the Effingham Daily News.
- By JOHN HANNA AP Political Writer
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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas officials' emails about public business on private accounts or devices will be subject to public disclosure starting in July under a bill Gov. Sam Brownback signed into law Wednesday.
The law closes a big loophole in the Kansas Open Records Act . That decades-old law generally requires government records to be accessible to the public, but it hasn't specifically applied to officials' private email accounts or communications with private cellphones.
Legislators approved the measure after months of scrutiny of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server as U.S. secretary of state. The issue also arose in Kansas following disclosures about Brownback and his budget director's use of private communications.
The new law won't apply to officials' communications about personal matters, and government agencies will still be able to cite any of dozens of exceptions to deny access to some material, such as personnel records. But Doug Anstaett, executive director of the Kansas Press Association, said the law is "a huge step forward."
"It's a great day for open government in Kansas," Anstaett said. "I think we've shown that no matter where you do public business, the public has a right to hear about it and a right to read about it."
The new law contains other trade-offs. One provision backed by law enforcement groups declares that footage from officers' body cameras is an investigation record, so that its disclosure will be restricted. Also, it continues for five more years 29 exceptions to the records act's general requirement for disclosure of documents.
The private-email loophole grabbed legislators' attention in January 2015 after The Wichita Eagle reported that Budget Director Shawn Sullivan had used a private email account to give two well-connected lobbyists a preview of the Republican governor's budget proposals before they were formally presented to the GOP-dominated Legislature. Brownback later acknowledged using a private cellphone for years for most of his communications.
"The governor's office followed the law that was in place when Governor Brownback came into office, and now our office will continue to follow the new law he signed today," spokeswoman Eileen Hawley said in an emailed statement.
Attorney General Derek Schmidt, a Republican, said the measure brings the Open Records Act "into the 21st century." And Anstaett said the measure was written so that, "If a new technology comes along next year, it will be covered."
Schmidt faced some criticism after issuing a legal opinion in 2015 saying the records law did not apply to officials' emails on private accounts or devices, but he backed the changes. The final version of the bill passed both chambers unanimously.
"Elected and appointed officials should not be using their private email accounts to conduct public business," said Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat who had pursued his own proposal last year.
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Follow John Hanna on Twitter at https://twitter.com/apjdhanna .
PIERRE, S.D. (AP) — The state Board of Regents has given preliminary approval to rules governing the sale of beer and wine at special events hosted at South Dakota's public university campuses, a board spokeswoman said Wednesday.
The policy allows sales but doesn't require them, specifies that beer and wine access must be controlled and restricts the beverage sales during student athletic events to those in premium seating. After giving initial approval to the plan Wednesday, a final decision is expected at the board's June meeting, spokeswoman Janelle Toman said.
The move to govern the sales comes after a measure allowing them during sporting events, artistic performances, fundraisers, conferences and other occasions passed during the 2016 legislative session.
Past state law didn't ban serving alcohol, but on-campus sales were prohibited. The new board rules under consideration would require the president of a university to approve events during which beer and wine could be sold by a vendor.
Events would require a security plan, and food would have to be served. And the rules would require reporting to the Board of Regents.
Sales would also have to be approved by local municipalities. Supporters have said the changes are narrow and will make the school facilities more attractive venues for outside groups to book for conferences or other events.
Allowing beer and wine sales will hopefully spur more visitors, increase tax revenues and add amenities to attract workers to Brookings, home of South Dakota State University, said Mayor Tim Reed. They would also help the community, since the city has put funding into campus facilities such as a performing arts center, he said.
"It made a lot of sense for the community as a whole just because of the activities that happen up on campus," Reed said.
Outgoing SDSU President David Chicoine has said the sale of alcohol could help campus venues as well as the school's fundraising abilities. The plan could also allow the university to better promote premium seating at the new $65 million Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium.
BROOKFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Two Mexican gray wolf puppies born at Brookfield Zoo outside Chicago are starting new lives in the wilds of Arizona as part of a project to save the animals.
In a news release, the zoo says the puppies were born at the zoo last month and flown to Arizona. They were then placed in a den of wild wolves where puppies had recently been born — something that increases the chances the puppies will be accepted by the wild wolves.
Brookfield Zoo officials say there are only 97 of these wolves in the wild and it is important to add new wolves to improve the genetic diversity of the wild wolf population. The effort marks the second time wolves from the zoo have been released to a wild wolf den.
- By LISA CORNWELL Associated Press
CINCINNATI (AP) — Cincinnati's city council on Wednesday authorized a photo ID card for immigrants, the homeless and others that police and municipal agencies will accept as a valid method of identification.
The council's resolution and an accompanying executive order allow acceptance of cards that members of a coalition advocating for them say will be the first of their type in an Ohio city. Similar cards have been created in other cities around the country, including New York and Greensboro, North Carolina. The cards won't replace driver's licenses, but will give residents another acceptable proof of identity.
The council in Cincinnati voted 5-1 to approve the resolution, with three members abstaining, WCPO-TV reported.
Officials with the Metropolitan Area Religious Coalition of Cincinnati and the city say the cards will help some of the most vulnerable members of the population and the city as a whole.
Mayor John Cranley said the city's Immigration Task Force found that legal immigrants, non-driving older residents, and others who lack the ability to get a driver's license often are reluctant to report crimes, even when they are the victims. He said the police acceptance of the cards will hopefully help victims feel more comfortable to report crimes.
"This will make our city safer," Cranley said in a statement.
The executive director of the coalition that will issue the cards says they will help in many ways.
"It will help those who are the most vulnerable feel more a part of the community," said Margaret Fox. "It's a general ID card that anyone can apply for, but the beauty of it is that it provides photo identification with a residential address for those who don't have other IDs."
Fox said the card will cost $15 dollars, but financial assistance will be available.
Applicants will have to show two forms of identification to receive a card. Those can include birth certificates, consular IDs, passports and letters from social service organizations, Fox said.
A coalition of labor unions, faith-based and social service organizations and other groups in Columbus is working to get a similar card there. The coalition, One ID Columbus, has been talking with city and county officials about the need for such a card, said Ruben Castilla Herrera, an organizer with the Central Ohio Worker Center that's part of the coalition.
"This would be a legitimate and useful identification document that could make this a real opportunity city for everyone," he said.
Castilla Herrera said the coalition hasn't launched its public campaign yet, but hopes to have a formal proposal to government officials possibly as early as the end of this year.
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This story has been corrected to show the spelling of the organizer's last name is Herrera, not Herrara.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The Iowa Court of Appeals has thrown out the sentence for a Mason City woman which prohibited her from becoming pregnant while on probation for a child endangerment conviction.
The court says the sentence violates the woman's "fundamental right to procreation."
Stephanie Fatland appealed her child endangerment convictions and challenged her sentence.
At her sentencing last August District Court Judge James Drew placed her on probation for five years and, among the conditions of probation, prohibited her from becoming pregnant during probation.
The appeals court on Wednesday upheld the conviction but ordered resentencing for removal of the pregnancy prohibition.
Fatland, now 24, admitted to shaking her 5-month-old son after he was hospitalized in July 2014 with bleeding in his retinas and a bulge in the soft spot of his head.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — An Omaha man wants to ban the release of balloons at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln after the University of Nebraska football team scores its first points in a game.
A federal lawsuit filed this week by Randall Krause said the mass release results in the open dumping of solid waste. That violates the 1976 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, the lawsuit said.
Krause has twice sued the city of Omaha in the past to make it clean up deicing solution it puts on streets, calling it dangerous to the environment. Both suits were dismissed.
In the latest complaint, which Krause wrote himself, he listed 60 endangered species that he claims are put in danger as a result of the balloon release.
"The mass release of Husker balloons puts virtually all species of birds, turtles, marine mammals and small animals...in harm's way," the suit said.
He also said small children are at risk of choking or suffocating if they try to eat the popped balloons.
The suit doesn't offer any evidence that a child has ever choked on a deflated red balloon from Memorial Stadium. There are several pictures of dead and injured birds and turtles from balloons, but the suit doesn't specifically link the balloons in the photos to the tradition.
A university spokesman declined to comment on the litigation. A corporate sponsor covers the balloon costs, and the balloons are handed out during games.
Krause also asked for an injunction that would keep the university from promoting the balloon release.
The tradition has been a part of Cornhuskers' football games since the late 1950. It was halted temporarily during a nationwide helium shortage in 2012.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The number of parents seeking religious exemptions to Iowa vaccination requirements is still climbing despite health officials' efforts to ease concerns about the shots.
Don Callaghan, who oversees immunization programs for the Iowa Department of Public Health, told The Des Moines Register (http://dmreg.co/1TQg6r9 ) that "it's not the trend we want to be seeing."
A new state report says more than 6,700 Iowa schoolchildren obtained religious exemptions to vaccination this school year, up 13 percent from the year before and more than four times the number 15 years ago. The statewide increase wasn't as big as Polk County's 33 percent leap that was reported earlier this spring.
Iowa doesn't make parents cite specific religious teachings for exemptions. The state merely requires a signed statement that immunization "conflicts with a genuine and sincere religious belief." Public health officials have said that they're unaware of any major religions that oppose vaccination.
Callaghan speculated that the exemption increase is fueled by families who don't understand the dangers of some diseases because vaccines have kept the once-normal illnesses at bay.
Linn County Health Director Pramod Dwivedi said he believes many families who seek exemptions fear that vaccination causes autism, although multiple studies have shown that is not the case.
About 1.3 percent of Iowa schoolchildren now have religious exemptions to vaccination, compared with a national average of 1.5 percent, according to Callaghan. Another 0.4 percent of the state's schoolchildren have medical exemptions to vaccination.
Callaghan believes the state will face more pressure to tighten restrictions on vaccination exemptions if the numbers continue to rise.
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Information from: The Des Moines Register, http://www.desmoinesregister.com
GERING, Neb. (AP) — Forty counts have been filed against a 16-year-old boy accused of secretly recording activity in the girls locker room at Gering High School.
Court records say the boy faces 20 misdemeanor counts of unlawful intrusion and 20 felony counts of unlawful intrusion via photograph. A document says the recordings show the girls "in a state of undress."
The Associated Press generally doesn't name juveniles accused of crimes. The Scotts Bluff County attorney has filed a motion to transfer the case to adult court.
Schools Superintendent Bob Hastings says parents of the girls seen in the recordings have been notified, and counselors are being made available to any student affected by the incident.
FENTON, Mo. (AP) — A 28-year-old man is facing charges for allegedly attacking a St. Louis County police officer with his prosthetic arm.
Police say Joshua Stockinger became angry Saturday at the Jim Butler Chervolet car dealership. When a St. Louis County officer arrived, Stockinger allegedly pushed the officer, grabbed him by the neck and hit him over the head with his prosthetic arm.
The officer was treated at a hospital for a cut near the temple, a bruised eye, and other injuries.
Stockinger is charged with first-degree assault on a law enforcement officer and felony resisting arrest.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Authorities say a young girl was hospitalized after her arm was impaled on a fence outside the governor's mansion.
Local media report the incident happened around 2 p.m.
Officials said the girl was walking along the ornamental fence toward the mansion entrance when it happened. Responders cut the fence and transported the girl to a hospital with a piece still in place so doctors could remove it.
KOMU-TV reports the fourth-grader was there on a school trip.
Her condition wasn't immediately known.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Police say a 10-year-old girl was shot in an apparent drive-by shooting while she was sleeping on a sofa in a central Ohio home.
Columbus police say the shooting occurred around 1 a.m. Wednesday. They say multiple shots were fired through the window of the home, striking the girl twice.
Police say the child was taken to a hospital in stable condition and was expected to survive her injuries.
Authorities say a woman and another child were also in the home at the time of the shooting.
Police didn't release the girl's name or provide any information about a possible motive or suspects.
- By NATHAN BAIRD Journal Courier
LAFAYETTE, Ind. (AP) — Alex Morgan can't remember if he even liked baseball when his parents first enrolled him in T-ball.
The 13-year-old Lafayette resident and East Tipp Middle School student knows he loves it now.
Alex is an avid fans of the Cincinnati Reds and their star second baseman, Brandon Phillips. He plays the same position on his Harrison Youth Baseball Organization travel team next to his twin brother, Aaron, the shortstop.
Years ago, teammates and friends weren't aware of a significant difference between Alex and his blond-haired, blue-eyed twin. That changed around age 8 at a pool party for their Pinto League team.
"He came in a bathing suit and had to take his leg off and everybody was like, 'What's going on?' " said his mother, Carrie Morgan.
Alex Morgan was born without a fibular bone in his lower left leg. The condition — fibular hemimelia — affects about one in 40,000 births.
Rather than endure years of painful limb-lengthening surgeries that may or may not have helped — and which would have restricted Alex's physical activity — Jason and Carrie Morgan opted for amputation. Alex has worn a prosthetic since he was nine months old.
That didn't stop Alex from playing baseball — plus football, basketball, soccer and, for the first time this past winter, wrestling. Yet his prosthetic, inflexible and fragile, isn't ideal for a young multi-sport athlete.
A group of Purdue mechanical engineering students spent their school year trying to help Alex and others like him run and move more easily.
A joint effort between Purdue's Engineering Projects in Community Service (EPICS) program and students in mechanical engineering's senior design class culminated Thursday night. The six students presented Alex Morgan with a new ankle and foot design that offers greater range of motion and durability — and at a fraction of the cost of similar prosthetics already on the market.
Purdue mechanical engineering professor Eric Nauman called it the best senior design project he's seen. While the group is looking into patent options, it has also considered handing the design off to non-profit organizations who work with prosthetic patients.
"A lot of the projects are strictly concept, and at the end there isn't that satisfying giving it to anyone, or it's not going to go anywhere after you leave," said Rachel Berry, one of the senior design students. "This will actually make a difference."
Unless Alex Morgan is wearing shorts — his preferred outfit these days — one wouldn't assume he wears a prosthesis.
"I've been playing all the sports my brother has been playing and all my friends play," Alex said. "I just like being able to be with my friends and play with them on the same team and go to different places."
Alex and Aaron Morgan play on a travel baseball team with the son of another Purdue engineering professor, Thomas Talavage. That's how Nauman learned about Morgan, and how he came to suggest a prosthesis project to EPICS students Haley Smith, Jennie Boehm and Quinton Lasko.
That group met once a week and began developing a conceptual design. They first met Alex in late summer and began meeting with him regularly for various measurements and tests. They also went to one of his baseball games last summer to observe what an active young person needed from a prosthesis.
"It's not just running," Smith said. "It's stopping on a base, it's sliding, it's twisting. Having him come in and look at his motion, we're able to say, this is what he does. We need to figure out how we can put numbers to that and make sure it's not going to break when he does that motion."
Alex wears a rigid foot-and-ankle prosthesis bolted to a lower leg piece. He slips his own shortened leg into that piece and tightens everything into place with Velcro straps. Such prosthetics cost anywhere from $1,000 to $3,000. Out-of-pocket expenses for the Morgans, who both work for the Tippecanoe Sheriff's Department, are offset by insurance and help from Shriners International.
However, Alex's typical prosthetic allows only forward and back motion. It is also highly susceptible to breakage in the toe area at the ball of the foot.
According to the students, products currently on the market that provide greater range of motion, including side-to-side, range from $10,000 to $15,000. The EPICS students conceived of a ball-and-socket joint that better replicates the motion range of a real ankle, on a foot with a toe hinge, made of a more durable material.
Oh, and it all had to be done at a significantly lower price.
Three people meeting one day a week weren't going to accomplish that by graduation. So senior design students Berry, Ally Gleason and Sami Labban joined the group, which began working on the project daily.
"We have some of the most ingenious students here," said Nauman, "and you kind of let them go on something like this and they come up with just amazing solutions."
Playing football in the backyard one day, Alex planted his left leg to give him leverage to kick with his right.
He heard a crack. Alex looked down at a leg with no foot. His prosthetic had snapped off at the ankle.
"There's not an emergency room for that," Carrie Morgan said. "So he didn't have a leg.
"It happened on a weekend and we couldn't get in (to the prosthetist) for another week. We duct-taped it and he walked carefully."
Alex's prosthetics have broken at least three times. With no tendons or muscles attached to a prosthetic, the limb is essentially dead weight. According to the Purdue students, doctors say limbs that are too heavy is the No. 1 complaint of prosthetic users.
The Purdue students learned that the hard way about halfway through their project.
Their first design consisted of a carbon fiber foot covered in plastic. That product satisfied the need for a lightweight limb with the desired flexibility.
There was only one problem. The design needed to withstand about five times the patient's body weight — in the case of 100-pound Alex, that's 500 pounds of force — to hold up against the running and jumping of a young athlete.
When it came time to test the design in late February, concern turned into panic. The steel base plate in the ankle crushed through the heel at only 30 pounds of force. The students needed something stronger, but they couldn't add much weight. They also had to use components in scale with the size of Alex's other foot.
"We're used to over-engineering everything," Gleason said. " 'Oh, it needs to be stronger? Let's just make it bigger or let's make it out of something that's stronger.' Well, if it's stronger, it's probably heavier.
"We have to make this tiny little piece and it has to hold 500 pounds, and how are we going to do that?"
Previously the students used state-of-the-art 3D printing technology to create their carbon fiber design. Now they turned to a more old-school approach: aluminum. While heavier than carbon fiber, aluminum is light enough to limit the wearer's discomfort yet still holds up to the necessary weight constraints.
The students designed an entire manufacturing process and became regulars in the Purdue machine shop over the next six weeks. They were novices when they first walked in. A few weeks ago, other students started asking them if they were the teaching assistants.
On Thursday night, the team presented Morgan with an aluminum foot protected by a plastic shell and connected at the ankle with a ball and socket. He took his tentative first steps with the foot in the EPICS lab at Armstrong Hall, replicating his pitching motion. Where Alex's heel previously hit the ground with no give, he now had a more natural bend with his plant foot.
According to Boehm, the entire manufacturing cost of the project, including labor, was $633. Even with the standard markup for similar medical devices (about four times cost, according to the team), the design represents a dramatically cheaper alternative to prosthetics with similar mobility.
Alex Morgan can't comfortably wear the design yet. The foot given to him was attached to an older prosthetic leg that doesn't fit well anymore. The Morgans hope the foot can be attached to a new leg, which he could receive later this summer.
Alex is old enough to realize he's not the only one who could benefit from this project.
"I like that maybe people will be able to get them for cheaper," Alex said. "I was basically the guinea pig."
The students say the mold for their design can be configured for 40 different sizes of either right or left feet and for any weight category.
Everyone from the group is graduating except Lasko, a junior who plans to carry the project forward into his senior year. The goal is to eventually merge this design with another EPICS project that endeavors to make prosthetics more active. Sensory technology could help motorize the prosthesis, allowing for improved gait when running and other improvements.
"This whole next year we're going to work on different ways to implement that actuation with this mechanical design," Lasko said. "We want to give them that advantage to have that force output from the foot to get a little more out of it."
The students say the manufacturing cost should continue to plummet as technology advances. Once 3D printing of carbon fibers can handle the weight requirements, total cost of materials and labor could top out around $100.
As of Thursday night, the students hadn't yet received their project's grade.
Watching Alex Morgan strap on their design, raise an imaginary bat above his shoulders and take a swing provided its own satisfaction.
"A lot of the projects at the end of the semester are just scrapped and put in a locker for other projects to use," Labban said. "He just walked out the door with ours."
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Source: (Lafayette) Journal-Courier, http://on.jconline.com/1sbdyLM
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Information from: Journal and Courier, http://www.jconline.com
This is an AP-Indiana Exchange story offered by the (Lafayette) Journal Courier.
- By STAN POLANSKI Effingham Daily News
EFFINGHAM, Ill. (AP) — When the weather gets warm at the start of spring, people flock to wooded areas across the region in search of mushrooms.
They go every year, checking hillsides and around dead trees for different kinds of morel mushrooms. The fungi, considered delicacies, can run $50 per pound if store bought.
"A lot of the price comes from increased demand," said Sean Morris, owner of Sean's Produce in Effingham. "More people like cooking with mushrooms."
Steve Ballinger, 51, of Neoga has been mushroom hunting every spring since he was a young child.
"We started mushroom hunting as soon as we were old enough to walk in the woods with grandma and grandpa," he said.
Because of a cold spell, Ballinger said on April 6 that he had yet to prowl the woods for morels. He said that he would wait for a few more warm days before doing so. The hunting usually begins at the beginning of April, but it depends on the weather.
During the spring, Ballinger said his family cooks and eats the mushrooms they gather. If they have too much for themselves, they'll give some mushrooms away.
With a strong flashlight, Ballinger said he used to mushroom hunt in the night, but doesn't anymore.
"We can't because of the coyotes," he said.
Though morels are a highly sought-after and "exquisite" food, there are mushrooms that hunters need to avoid because they're toxic.
That means anyone clamoring to head out for their first hunt should do so with a veteran, Ballinger said.
"You pick and eat the wrong ones, and you're done," he said.
But the trick is finding a veteran willing to give away their hunting spots.
"Around here, we guard our mushrooms like our wallets," Ballinger said.
Before a hunter enjoys their spoils, Morris suggests cutting the mushrooms in half. If the stem and cap is hollow, then it's a morel. If it's not hollow, it's a false morel that shouldn't be eaten.
The morels should be disinfected before cooking them. Deb McKay of Neoga said her family lets the mushrooms soak in saltwater overnight. Putting them in saltwater kills bugs and preserves the mushrooms, Morris said.
Despite strong winds and cold temperatures that have been constant in the area from the end of March through the first week of April, the middle of March saw above average temperatures. And one area hunter capitalized on that.
Rebecca Ashley found a handful of mushrooms while looking in woods at the edge of Effingham County on March 23.
"I just knew it in my heart," she said that day. "But I had to walk a long ways just to find a few little mushrooms."
Even though Morris said that some days his supplier doesn't have enough mushrooms to ship to him because of high demand, he said he likely wouldn't buy from a local hunter unless they had certification and insurance.
But Morris said he did buy some from a local enthusiast once.
"The mushrooms went from the picker's hands, to my hands, to the customer's hands," Morris said.
In general though, he said either locals aren't looking to sell or they aren't finding much.
Morris' supplier of morels is a family operation based in Keno, Oregon. The lack of mushroom harvesting in the Midwest has kept the prices up, he said.
For those in the area that want to be successful morel hunters year after year, and possibly avoid buying the costly mushrooms, Morris has a tip: pinch the morel off from above the dirt line. Pulling from below the surface could keep the mushroom from growing back the next spring.
Ballinger also has a tip: make sure to have a strategy.
"They're not easy to see," he said. "There's a method to the madness. You've got to know where you're going to find them. You have to be able to read the terrain and know what you're looking for."
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Source: Effingham Daily News, http://bit.ly/1qVKzKB
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Information from: Effingham Daily News, http://www.effinghamdailynews.com
This is an AP-Illinois Exchange story offered by the Effingham Daily News.
- By JOHN HANNA AP Political Writer
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas officials' emails about public business on private accounts or devices will be subject to public disclosure starting in July under a bill Gov. Sam Brownback signed into law Wednesday.
The law closes a big loophole in the Kansas Open Records Act . That decades-old law generally requires government records to be accessible to the public, but it hasn't specifically applied to officials' private email accounts or communications with private cellphones.
Legislators approved the measure after months of scrutiny of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server as U.S. secretary of state. The issue also arose in Kansas following disclosures about Brownback and his budget director's use of private communications.
The new law won't apply to officials' communications about personal matters, and government agencies will still be able to cite any of dozens of exceptions to deny access to some material, such as personnel records. But Doug Anstaett, executive director of the Kansas Press Association, said the law is "a huge step forward."
"It's a great day for open government in Kansas," Anstaett said. "I think we've shown that no matter where you do public business, the public has a right to hear about it and a right to read about it."
The new law contains other trade-offs. One provision backed by law enforcement groups declares that footage from officers' body cameras is an investigation record, so that its disclosure will be restricted. Also, it continues for five more years 29 exceptions to the records act's general requirement for disclosure of documents.
The private-email loophole grabbed legislators' attention in January 2015 after The Wichita Eagle reported that Budget Director Shawn Sullivan had used a private email account to give two well-connected lobbyists a preview of the Republican governor's budget proposals before they were formally presented to the GOP-dominated Legislature. Brownback later acknowledged using a private cellphone for years for most of his communications.
"The governor's office followed the law that was in place when Governor Brownback came into office, and now our office will continue to follow the new law he signed today," spokeswoman Eileen Hawley said in an emailed statement.
Attorney General Derek Schmidt, a Republican, said the measure brings the Open Records Act "into the 21st century." And Anstaett said the measure was written so that, "If a new technology comes along next year, it will be covered."
Schmidt faced some criticism after issuing a legal opinion in 2015 saying the records law did not apply to officials' emails on private accounts or devices, but he backed the changes. The final version of the bill passed both chambers unanimously.
"Elected and appointed officials should not be using their private email accounts to conduct public business," said Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat who had pursued his own proposal last year.
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Follow John Hanna on Twitter at https://twitter.com/apjdhanna .
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