Top Local and National News Stories category, Page 1065
Doors Open encourages Pittsburghers to embrace their nebbiness
If there are two things Pittsburgh is known for, it’s iconic buildings and curious people. Or in Pittsburgh parlance, people who are “nebby.” Well, all you neb noses can now satisfy your curiosity about what’s inside those historic buildings, as well as some newly designed spaces. The nonprofit Doors Open...
Animal Protectors’ new shelter, built with $1.8M in donations, to hold open house
It’s not surprising that the owner of the Alle-Kiski Valley’s most celebrated cat, Pudgie-Wudgie, would somehow have had a hand (or a paw) in the making of the Animal Protectors of Allegheny Valley’s new shelter in New Kensington. There is a wing dedicated to Pudgie-Wudgie and his owner, the late...
Federal mandate takes vaccine decision off employers’ hands
Larger U.S. businesses now won’t have to decide whether to require their employees to get vaccinated against covid-19. Doing so is now federal policy. President Joe Biden announced sweeping new orders Thursday that will require employers with more than 100 workers to mandate immunizations or offer weekly testing. The new...
Green light: Pittsburgh’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade still on
Pittsburgh’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade in September will proceed, officials said Friday. The parade committee and its parent organization, the Irish Society for Education and Charity, announced they are “committed to move forward with our plan to hold a parade celebrating Irish heritage and culture in the Southwestern region of...
5 things to watch in WPIAL football Week 2: Handmade schedule a hit
Man or machine? The WPIAL heard complaints for years about the way their computer program sometimes paired unequal opponents or created long bus rides for games, nonconference concerns the league’s administration vowed to address. As a result, the WPIAL has matchups this week between successful programs such as Central Valley...
Los Angeles to require vaccine for all students 12 and olderVideo
LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles board of education voted Thursday to require students 12 and older to be vaccinated against the coronavirus to attend in-person classes in the nation’s second-largest school district. The move makes Los Angeles by far the largest of a very small number of districts with...
Excela Health Frick Hospital in Mt. Pleasant sets up tent outdoors for minor cases as patient volume increases
A tent has been erected near the emergency department at Excela Health Frick Hospital in Mt. Pleasant to help treat patients with minor issues as the overall number of patients increases, according to Chief Medical Officer Carol Fox. Hospital officials also have enacted several less visible protocols in an effort...
Biden moves to require vaccines for 100 million AmericansVideo
WASHINGTON — In his most forceful pandemic actions and words, President Joe Biden on Thursday announced sweeping new federal vaccine requirements affecting as many as 100 million Americans in an all-out effort to increase covid-19 vaccinations and curb the surging delta variant. Speaking at the White House, Biden sharply criticized...
Loophole allows some Pennsylvania students to avoid masking
HARRISBURG — An apparent loophole in Pennsylvania’s mask mandate for schools is making it easier for some students to go to class without having to cover their faces, even as state education regulators sought to make an example of one openly defiant school board. The state health secretary’s order requiring...
Justice Department sues Texas over state’s new abortion lawVideo
AUSTIN, Texas — The Justice Department on Thursday sued Texas over a new state law that bans most abortions, arguing that it was enacted “in open defiance of the Constitution.” The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Texas, asks a federal judge to declare that the law is invalid, “to...
Judges orders jail sentence for New Kensington man in girlfriend’s death
Andrew Brown told a judge on Thursday he hadn’t spoken to his mother for more than a year before she was killed by her boyfriend during an altercation four years ago in a Lower Burrell parking lot. “I still loved her, and now I will never have another chance to...
Republicans start election ‘investigation’ in Pennsylvania
HARRISBURG — Republicans in Pennsylvania’s state Senate held their first hearing Thursday in what they call a “forensic investigation” into last year’s presidential election, an underwhelming affair that Democrats nevertheless say is an extension of a national campaign to attack voting rights following former President Donald Trump’s loss. Republicans maintain...
Aspinwall man positive for West Nile Virus, 1st Allegheny County case since 2018
An Aspinwall man has tested positive for West Nile Virus – the first known human case in Allegheny County since 2018, according to the county health department. The man is in his 60s, said spokesman Chris Togneri, though information on his health was not immediately available. He said the health...
Documents on Greensburg attorney’s death in YMCA sauna say he died of ‘natural causes’
Documents from emergency responders who were called after the body of a Greensburg attorney was discovered last year inside the sauna of the Greensburg YMCA run counter to multiple claims made in a lawsuit filed by the man’s family. The two-count wrongful death lawsuit, filed in Westmoreland County court by...
Lawrenceville’s Arsenal Bowl has a buyer, but real estate group mum on who
Pittsburgh’s iconic Arsenal Bowl has sold, according to the real estate firm marketing the bowling alley, though the buyer remains under wraps. Terri Sokoloff, of the commercial real estate firm Specialty Group, said only that the sale brought together two initially separate buyers. She said the group met with more...
Pittsburgh council supports $500 monthly payments to 200 residents
Pittsburgh City Council members support a program to provide a no-strings-attached $500 monthly payment to 200 low-income residents as part of an experiment being done by dozens of cities across the country to measure the impacts of guaranteed basic income. “This is the right thing to do at the right...
Immersive Van Gogh Exhibit reveals Pittsburgh location, new dates
Organizers build anticipation for the traveling Original Immersive Van Gogh Exhibit by withholding location information for each city it visits until the opening date approaches. It was announced in March that it would travel to Pittsburgh — now it’s been revealed that the location is Lighthouse Artspace Pittsburgh, a former...
AP source: Biden requiring federal workers to get covid shot
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Thursday is toughening covid-19 vaccine requirements for federal workers and contractors, according to a person familiar with the plans, as he aims to boost vaccinations and curb the surging delta variant that is killing thousands each week and jeopardizing the nation’s economic recovery. Just...
From election to covid, 9/11 conspiracies cast a long shadow
Korey Rowe served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and returned to the U.S. in 2004 traumatized and disillusioned. His experiences overseas and nagging questions about Sept. 11, 2001 convinced him America’s leaders were lying about what happened that day and the wars that followed. The result was “Loose Change,” a...
Woman dies in Lower Burrell house fire
A woman was killed in a house fire late Wednesday in Lower Burrell. The Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the woman Thursday morning as Kimberly George, 50. George had been taken to Allegheny Valley Hospital in Harrison, where she died shortly after midnight. A neighbor reported the fire about...
Greensburg Salem postpones meeting after audience members defy mask requirement
The Greensburg Salem School Board meeting this week ended before it began. The board postponed its voting meeting until Sept. 15 after several people attending Wednesday refused to don required masks. Board President Ron Mellinger Jr. told the crowd of about 40 gathered in the middle school auditorium that the...
Fourth Pittsburgh police ‘blitz’ on abandoned vehicles results in 12 tows
The Pittsburgh Bureau of Police completed its fourth “blitz” to remove abandoned vehicles from city streets in the Brookline, Beechview, Elliot and Sheraden neighborhoods, the department announced Wednesday. Motorcycle units and abandoned vehicle officers addressed 43 complaints on Tuesday. Of the 43 vehicles, a dozen were towed away while the...
Wounded man walks into hospital as Pittsburgh police investigate Larimer shooting
A man walked into a Pittsburgh hospital with a gunshot wound Wednesday, police said. According to Pittsburgh Public Safety, police and medics responded to a shooting around 1:40 p.m. at Auburn and Lowell streets in the city’s Larimer neighborhood. Officers found evidence a shooting had happened, but no victims. Police...
Gov. Wolf, teachers say kids are cool with masks: ‘It feels like an adult problem’Video
PHILADELPHIA — Wearing masks all day isn’t a big deal for Brooke Vaught’s 375 students. They compliment each other on their cool choices — bright colors, Batman, funky designs — they put them on, and get down to the business of learning. “We haven’t had any issues,” said Vaught, principal...
The day the school shook: 20 years later, former Shanksville area students recall 9/11Video
The morning of Sept. 11, 2001, started out like any other for those in the Shanksville-Stonycreek School District. The yellow building in Stonycreek Township bustled with the start of a new school year as elementary and high school students went about their lessons in the combined building, completed art projects...
