Rosa Parks - Montgomery AL
TAMAQUA - Three varsity sports and some student transportation services are on the chopping block as the Tamaqua Area school board looks for ways to trim an $830,000 deficit from its 2012-13 budget.
The board will decide at a meeting next week whether to eliminate boys' varsity golf and tennis and varsity cheerleading from the slate of extracurricular offerings as well as bus transportation for students who live near the school they attend.
The board discussed the options at Tuesday's meeting, where district Superintendent Carol Makuta said eliminating the two boys' sports and cheerleading would trim about $25,000 from district expenses while keeping equity in the number of activities available to both genders.
Expressing reluctance about the cuts, board member Aaron Frantz asked whether discontinued sports could be reinstated if the district's financial picture improves.
Makuta said that is a possibility.
"This is a provisional budget. We are working with some unknowns," Makuta said. "For this year, this is a worst-case scenario. It could change before June 30," which is the state-imposed deadline for public school districts to adopt a final budget.
Frantz suggested that changes could be made in response to public comment during a 10-day budget examination period required before the final approval.
Board President Larry Wittig said fiscal prudence now could prevent financial difficulties in the future.
"We want to deal with it now. The bottom line is, we could fund everything this year then next year, we're hanging on by our fingernails," Wittig said.
Board member Robert Betz said it's better to eliminate extracurricular activities than employees.
"I'd rather not lay off staff. I'd rather end these now and keep the staff," Betz said.
Wittig said extracurricular activities have value but they're not required by the state.
"Requirements are requirements," Wittig said. "We need to focus on the academic requirements."
The board committee unanimously agreed to place elimination of golf, tennis and cheerleading on the agenda for Tuesday's meeting.
In addition, the committee agreed to vote next week on eliminating bus transportation for all students who live within 1 1/2 miles of the school building they attend.
"This constitutes all of Tamaqua," Makuta said of students who live within the borough limits.
Any transportation that is not mandated by the state, such as preschool day care and non-public schools, would also be eliminated, she said.
"If we are not going to provide transportation for our elementary students, we are not going to provide for non-public students," Makuta said.
If the transportation measure is approved, the district would shave an additional $80,000 off the budget deficit.
An additional recommendation to "curtail and alter" elementary arts failed committee approval. The recommendation targeted vocal and instrumental music, art, physical education, technology education and library.
College kids are moving out - selling everything for peanuts.
Bikes in Antwerp
Keukenhof Gardens
Fields of Tulips
Public toilets common in Europe
Federal workers on top of the Air and Space Museum
Through the columns of the White House
Right now the Washington Monument is closed because of earthquake damage
The crowd at Dulles Airport waiting for the new arrival.
One of Lulu's most prized possessions is a football helmet signed by Warrick Dunn and Bobby Bowden. Here she finally meets her hero.
Mafe Brooks - Lulu (Director of the School Media Program) - Warrick Dunn - Dean Larry Dennis - four experts on Information Science enjoying the big day.
Rob Wilson - Asst AD at FSU - interviews one of the their favorite alumni.
Valenica Davis is there to accept the keys to her new home. Warrick signed the mortgage.
Warrick explains his Homes for the Holidays program.
Please be sure to read until the end of article.
Paul Walck, 22, of 345 W. Bertsch St., Lansford, faces charges from an incident which took place between Feb. 2 and 4. Charges were filed by Det./Sgt. Jack Soberick.
Walck is charged with sexual assault, aggravated indecent assault, corruption of minors (all felonies), and indecent assault. He was arraigned before District Judge Casimir Kosciolek, of Lansford, on April 4 and committed to prison under $100,000 bail. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for April 11.
According to an affidavit of probable cause, Soberick had received complaints from Carbon County Children and Youth services agency that a child under its supervision may have had sexual relations with an adult male.
Soberick was provided with correspondence between the 14-year-old girl and Walck that indicated a romantic relationship. The correspondence included a reference by the girl about the two getting together when she was home on a weekend pass. It also included questions to Walck on sexual topics.
On Feb. 14, Soberick interviewed the girl at the Children and Youth agency's offices. The girl said she was 13 when she met Walck, and was 14 when she first had sex with him. She gave Walck's age as 23 at the time, and gave the date as the first weekend in February of 2012, and the location as Lansford.
A medical exam revealed the girl had a bacterial infection likely caused by sexual intercourse.
On March 22, Soberick interviewed Walck at the Lansford police station. Walck was told he was not under arrest and could leave at any time. He was given his Miranda warnings, and agreed to speak with police.
Police documented Walck's tattoos, and Walck told them he had his own tattoo gun.
He denied any sexual contact with the girl, but said he had bought her stuffed animals. He said she was too young for him, and also was a relative by marriage. He told police she had asked him for sexual favors, but that he refused.
Soberick told Walck he didn't believe him, and that the girl said her name or initials were tattooed on Walck's genitals.
Walck vehemently denied that, and drew for Soberick the dollar sign he said was tattooed on his genitals. He also showed Soberick a photo on his camera of the inked body part, saying it was his.
Soberick expressed skepticism, saying the photo could be anyone.
Walck then proved it, pulling out his private parts and showing police the dollar sign.
- From The Times News
April 10 (Bloomberg) -- Silicon Valley is one of the few places where a 27-year-old Web entrepreneur can parlay a photo- sharing application with no known source of revenue into $1 billion -- in two years.
Evidence of that came yesterday, when Facebook Inc. announced plans to buy Instagram, a startup co-founded in 2010 by Kevin Systrom, a Stanford University graduate and former Google Inc. employee.
The Instagram app, owned by Burbn Inc., fetched $1 billion in cash and stock after building an audience of more than 30 million people, mostly users of Apple Inc.'s iPhone. That kind of growth was enabled by the spread of social networking and smartphones, and the plummeting costs required to build an Internet company. Instagram has just 13 employees, up from four a year ago, when the app was used by 4 million consumers.
"It's a massive accomplishment," said Shervin Pishevar, a managing director at Menlo Ventures in Menlo Park, California. Pishevar backs social-media companies, though he didn't invest in Instagram. "This is an indicator of what great teams and great products with amazing execution can accomplish in historic amounts of time," he said.
While the deal may raise concerns about another technology bubble, the price tag is only about 1 percent of Facebook's projected valuation when the world's largest social-networking site sells shares to the public. And Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg, who founded the company in a Harvard University dormitory, understands the model of establishing an audience before generating sales. That's how he built Facebook.
Tap water in the United States is among the safest in the world. And it is much more closely monitored than bottled water. Cities must test their water every few hours and report any safety issue within 48 hours. Bottled-water companies are required to test their water only once a week, and they are not required to report problems.
Anyone who is worried about safety should use a commercial faucet or pitcher filter. And anyone who thinks tap water tastes bad compared with bottled water should remember that you usually buy bottled water from a cold case, when you’re really thirsty. That’s why it tastes so great. Keep a pitcher or bottle of tap water in your refrigerator, and it will taste just as good as bottled water. In fact, in blind taste tests, people can’t reliably pick bottled from tap.
I enjoyed this shot of the B-29 being powered by a 2000W Honda generator - made in Japan.
Here you see the B-29 with a P-51 fighter accompanying it.
The B-29 has an unmistakeable roar with 4 Pratt and Whitney propeller engines.
For $5 - people lined up to crawl in the cockpit - the pilot's cabin.
The Commemorative Air Force is a non-profit company dedicated to keeping these historic planes flying.
Enthusiasts entered the cabin through the bomb bay lined with 250 pound bombs.
The wingspan is about 150 feet and the fuselage body is 100 feet long.
The red tail was the trademark of the Tuskegee Airmen - they used to escort B-17 bombers over Europe. The B-29 was used in the Pacific near the end of World War II.
The B-29 was called the Superfortress - compared to the B-17 Flying Fortress used over Germany.
The gun blisters were remote controlled - this provided the gunners a little bit of safety.
Rick Santorum insists, for now, in going forward to compete in Pennsylvania on April 24. He understandably wants to wipe out the memory of his humiliating los in 2006. But it could happen again, for 10 reasons:
1. His housing scandal. Home state voters may recall the scandal concerning his residence. In 2004, his hometown paper reported: “U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum said last night that he and his wife, Karen, are withdrawing their five school-age children from the Western Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School. Santorum has come under criticism from officials in Penn Hills, where he owns a house, who say the school district should not have to foot the $38,000 annual bill to educate his children.The Santorums do not live in the district full time and spend most of their time in Leesburg, Va., outside Washington, D.C.”
2. The Philly suburbs. Mitt Romney has consistently won in affluent suburbs of metropolitan areas. In his 2006 senatorial reelection race, Santorum lost the suburban vote 57 to 43 percent to Robert Casey Jr. He lost the Philly suburbs by 20 points.
3. His personality. Pennsylvania voters by 2006 had soured on Santorum’s aggressive, belligerent style of politics. It is not clear whether they have entirely forgotten or forgiven. His insistence on remaining in the race may rekindle those memories.
4. He lives in Northern Virginia. He may wax lyrical about his grandfather the miner, but Santorum hasn’t lived in Pennsylvania for some time. Since 2007, he’s lived in a house in Great Falls, Va., purchased via a trust and paid for by a wealthy supporter.
5. Pat Toomey. Conservative Pennsylvanians remember well that Santorum backed Sen. Arlen Specter over conservative Pat Toomey in 2004. Specter cast the deciding vote for Obamacare. Toomey is now in the Senate, with a decidedly different voting record than Specter acquired.
6. Arlen Specter. Santorum backed him for president in 1996 and has defended his tenure on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Specter is intensely disliked by the conservative base in Pennsylvania.
7. Wisconsin. Romney’s win there and in two other contests essentially locked this race up. Republican voters may have had enough and be increasingly anxious to move on to the general election.
8. President Obama. He is now attacking Romney by name, setting the battle lines for the general election. the race moves to Obama vs. Romney, the base is likely to rally to Romney’s side.
9.Contraception. As it did in 2006, Santorum’s jaunt into extreme social issues in the primary hurts him with the diverse Pennsylvania electorate. Even within his party, his position on everything from working women to contraception to public schools has been a bridge too far.
10. Catholics. In 2006 Santorum lost the Catholic vote in the general election 42 to 58 percent. In Wisconsin,he lost the Catholic vote to Romney 35 to 48 percent.
Romney, in all likelihood, will win the other April 24 contests and pick up a chunk of delegates in Pennsylvania. He doesn’t need to win in that state, any more than Santorum needed to win in Massachusetts. The risk is all Santorum’s: He’s not going to be the nominee, but he could be beaten once again in the Keystone State, thereby sending him packing permanently from GOP politics. Critics and potential competitors in 2016 or 2020 may be rooting for just such a result. It’s not clear whether there is anyone around him who could save him from himself. But stay tuned.
