Officials say closures of state parks are among the potential impacts of proposed budget cuts to the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
Department leaders and others met at Oak Mountain State Park today. State Parks Director Greg Lein says additional cuts could be devastating and officials want lawmakers to preserve the department's funding. Lein says the parks system's emergency and reserve funds are depleted.
Lawmakers will spend a second special session working to pass a general fund budget by Oct. 1. That’s when Alabama's fiscal year begins. Alabama faces a projected $200 million shortfall.
Republican Gov. Robert Bentley has tried garnering support for a proposal to use $300 million in new taxes rather than cut state services.
Tuscaloosa City Schools is giving parents an opportunity to learn about the system’s new drug and alcohol screening program.
The policy goes into effect this school year. The screenings will be done at random for students who participate in extracurricular activities. Students who have a permit to park on campus may be tested as well.
Anthony Harris is Tuscaloosa City Schools District Coordinator of Athletics. He says the program is designed to help students become more aware of drugs and alcohol and find ways to avoid using them…
“I think the goal is for it to be a deterrent as a program giving students a way out. If they are being pressured by someone else, it would give those activity students a way out.”
Tuscaloosa City Schools will be talking about the program tonight at Northridge High at 6 p.m.
Around 300 immigrant detainees in Etowah County are at the heart of a debate over abuse and visitation rights.
An inmate support group says these inmates are being abused and filed a formal complaint earlier this month. The Etowah County Detention Center is paid by Washington to hold hundreds of immigrant detainees from across the country.
Eunice Cho is a staff attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center working on the case. She explains what happened when local volunteers tried to schedule their latest visit.
“They received a message the next day from the Etowah County Sheriff’s Department stating that the project was terminated, with no explanation. The only possible explanation that we have is this complaint alleging serious abuse taking place at Etowah County Detention Center was retaliation.”
The SPLC is demanding the detainees’ visitation rights be reinstated.