(File Photo of Open Sign)
Beaver County Radio News
(Beaver County, PA) McNutt’s Flower Shop upon purchase will be doing business as Flower with Smith. The shop is in the process of being purchased by Renee Smith of Flower with Smith. The business will be going to Beaver County’s Route 68 Sunflower Corners as Flower with Smith. According to owner Renee Smith, there will also be a grand opening on Saturday, February 8th from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Source for Photo: Gov. Josh Shapiro’s Pennsylvania state budget proposal would strengthen efforts to reintroduce vocational education into Pennsylvania classrooms, with a $5.5 million boost for Career and Technical Education. (Adobe Stock)- Danielle Smith, Keystone News Service
(Reported by Danielle Smith of Keystone News Service)
(Harrisburg, PA) Governor Josh Shapiro’s proposed state budget includes a significant increase for public education, to address Pennsylvania’s school funding issues and educator shortage. The proposed budget would boost funding for basic and special education, and the state’s student-teacher stipend program. Pennsylvania State Education Association President Aaron Chapin is praising the commitment to education, and sees the billion-dollar proposal as a vital investment in public schools. Chapin notes an additional 75-million dollars will be distributed to all school districts through the basic education funding formula, which he calls “a big step forward.” The state House and Senate will need to vote on the budget by June.
(Photo Courtesy of the United States Marshall Service)
(Reported by Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano)
(West Aliquippa, PA) Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano reports that Aliquippa Police announced that wanted suspect Brett Ours was taken to jail without incident on Thursday. Ours was found in a West Aliquippa home and surrendered after a short standoff with police. Ours was given an arrest warrant for the assault of Preston Coleman at the Aliquippa VFW Post 3577 on January 5th, 2025. Ours is pending arraignment on his charges which includes a charge of attempted first degree homicide. Ours is in the Beaver County Jail and his bond was denied. Ours’ preliminary hearing will be on Thursday, February 20th.
(File Photo of Congressman Chris Deluzio)
Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News
(Center Township, PA) According to a release from Congressman Chris Deluzio’s office, Deluzio made an announcement Wednesday about the plans of upgrading and replacing a 1.3-mile part of Route 68 in Rochester Borough. Deluzio also achieved federal funding for this endeavor worth $500,000. PennDOT is expecting to have highway reconstruction efforts through Adams Street and Virginia Avenue beginning this spring. The project that is totaled at around $7.5 million will be completed in the fall of 2026.
(Photo Provided with Release)
Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News
(Monaca, PA) According to a release from the Community College of Beaver County, CCBC announced Thursday that it was selected to participate in Cohort 4 of the Transfer Student Success Intensive. This program which lasts one year helps transfer students through guidance from experts, learning with help from peers, and strategies driven by data. CCBC is part of a group of thirteen community colleges to take part in this program.
(File Photo: Source for Photo: FILE – In this photo reviewed by U.S. military officials, flags fly at half-staff at Camp Justice, Aug. 29, 2021, in Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Newly unsealed documents give one of the most detailed views yet of the evidence gathered on the accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, including how prosecutors allege he and others interacted with the hijackers who carried out the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
The summaries of evidence released Thursday include Mohammed’s own statements over the years, phone records and other documents alleging coordination between Mohammed and the hijackers, videos included in al-Qaida’s planning for the attacks and prosecutors’ summaries of government simulations of the flights of the four airliners that day. But few other details were given.
Also to be presented are the photos and death certificates of 2,976 people killed that day at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in a Pennsylvania field, where the fourth airliner commandeered by the al-Qaida hijackers smashed into the ground after a revolt by passengers.
The newly revealed framework of military prosecutors’ potential case against Mohammed, who prosecutors say conceived of and executed much of al-Qaida’s attack, is contained in a plea agreement that the Defense Department is battling in court to roll back.
Mohammed and two co-defendants agreed in the plea deal with military prosecutors to plead guilty in the attack in return for life sentences.
The Associated Press, The New York Times, NPR, The Washington Post, Fox News, NBC and Univision are suing to get the plea bargains unsealed. The summaries of the prosecution evidence were released Thursday in a partially redacted version of Mohammed’s agreement.
The evidence summaries point to the possibility of additional revelations about the attacks yet to come.
As part of the plea agreement, prosecutors, defense and the senior Pentagon official overseeing the cases at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, agreed to an unusual step — a hearing that would allow them to make public the evidence compiled against the three.
It appears designed to address complaints from families and others that a plea bargain typically would otherwise keep the evidence from fully being revealed.
Another unusual part of the deal mandated Mohammed to agree to answer questions from the families of victims.
Military prosecutors, defense attorneys and Guantanamo officials negotiated the deal over two years under government auspices. The negotiations were an attempt to bring a resolution to the 9/11 case, which has remained in pretrial hearings for more than two decades since the attacks.
Then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin interceded to try to void the plea agreement after it was announced, saying that waiving the possibility of the death penalty in so grave an attack was a decision that defense secretaries should handle.
Federal court hearings in the Defense Department’s attempts to roll back the plea agreements are ongoing.
Legal arguments over whether the sustained torture that Mohammed and other 9/11 defendants underwent in CIA custody has rendered their statements in the case inadmissible and has slowed the case. So have repeated staffing changes at the Guantanamo court and the logistical difficulties of holding a trial in a courtroom a plane flight away from the U.S.
(File Photo: Source for Photo: President Donald Trump attends the National Prayer Breakfast at Washington Hilton, Thursday, Feb. 6, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Thursday that he wants to root out “anti-Christian bias” in the U.S., announcing that he was forming a task force led by Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate the “targeting” of Christians.
Speaking at a pair of events in Washington surrounding the the National Prayer Breakfast, Trump said the task force would be directed to “immediately halt all forms of anti-Christian targeting and discrimination within the federal government, including at the DOJ, which was absolutely terrible, the IRS, the FBI — terrible — and other agencies.”
Trump said Bondi would also work to “fully prosecute anti-Christian violence and vandalism in our society and to move heaven and earth to defend the rights of Christians and religious believers nationwide.”
Hours after the two events, Trump signed an executive order directing the new task force to identify unlawful policies, practices, or conduct by all executive departments and agencies, and recommend any additional presidential or legislative action.
Early in the day, the president joined the National Prayer Breakfast at the Capitol, a more than 70-year-old Washington tradition that brings together a bipartisan group of lawmakers for fellowship. He told lawmakers there that his relationship with religion had “changed” after a pair of failed assassination attempts last year and urged Americans to “bring God back” into their lives.
An hour after calling for “unity” on Capitol Hill, though, Trump struck a more partisan tone at the second event across town, announcing that, in addition to the task force, he was forming a commission on religious liberty. He criticized the Biden administration for “persecution” of believers for prosecuting anti-abortion advocates.
And Trump took a victory lap over his administration’s early efforts to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion programs and to limit transgender participation in women’s sports.
“I don’t know if you’ve been watching, but we got rid of woke over the last two weeks,” he said. “Woke is gone-zo.”
Trump’s new task force drew criticism from Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
“Rather than protecting religious beliefs, this task force will misuse religious freedom to justify bigotry, discrimination, and the subversion of our civil rights laws,” said Rachel Laser, the group’s president and CEO.
At the Capitol, Trump said he believes people “can’t be happy without religion, without that belief. Let’s bring religion back. Let’s bring God back into our lives.”
The Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush, a Baptist minister and head of the progressive Interfaith Alliance, accused Trump of hypocrisy in claiming to champion religion by creating the task force.
“From allowing immigration raids in churches, to targeting faith-based charities, to suppressing religious diversity, the Trump Administration’s aggressive government overreach is infringing on religious freedom in a way we haven’t seen for generations,” Raushenbush said in a statement.
Kelly Shackelford, head of First Liberty Institute, a conservative Christian legal organization, disagreed, praising the creation of the task force and religious liberty commission.
“All Americans should be free to exercise their faith without government intrusion in school, in the military, in the workplace, and in the public square. We are ready to stand with President Trump to ensure that the religious liberty of every American is safe and secure,” Shackelford said in a statement.
Trump also announced the creation of a White House faith office led by Paula White-Cain, a longtime pastor in the independent charismatic world. An early supporter of Trump’s 2016 presidency bid, she led Trump’s Faith and Opportunity Initiative in 2019, advising faith-based organizations on ways to partner with the federal government.
At Thursday’s prayer breakfast, she praised Trump as “the greatest champion” any president has been “of religion, of faith and of God.”
She’s the religious advisor “that he appears to trust the most,” said Matthew Taylor, a Protestant scholar and author of “The Violent Take It By Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy,” a 2024 book about the roles of White-Cain and other charismatic leaders who have been among Trump’s most fervent supporters.
He said the faith-based office — depending on its mandate — may not raise major concerns. Past presidents have had similar ones.
“I’m actually much more concerned about this anti-Christian bias task force,” he said. In a majority Christian country, “it’s a bit absurd to claim that there is widespread anti-Christian bias. … When a majority begins to claim persecution, that is often a license for attacks on minorities.”
In 2023, the National Prayer Breakfast split into two dueling events, the one on Capitol Hill largely attended by lawmakers and government officials and a larger private event for thousands at a hotel ballroom. The split occurred when lawmakers sought to distance themselves from the private religious group that for decades had overseen the bigger event, due to questions about its organization and how it was funded.
Trump, at both venues, reflected on having a bullet coming within a hair’s breadth of killing him at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last year, telling attendees, “It changed something in me, I feel.”
“I feel even stronger,” he continued. “I believed in God, but I feel, I feel much more strongly about it. Something happened.” Later at the prayer breakfast sponsored by a private group, he remarked, “It was God that saved me.”
He drew laughs at the Capitol event when he expressed gratitude that the episode “didn’t affect my hair.”
The Republican president, who’s a nondenominational Christian, called religious liberty “part of the bedrock of American life” and called for protecting it with “absolute devotion.”
Trump and his administration have already clashed with some religious leaders. He assailed the Rev. Mariann Budde for her sermon the day after his inauguration, when she called for mercy for members of the LGBTQ+ community and migrants who are in the country illegally.
Vice President JD Vance, who’s Catholic, has sparred with top U.S. leaders of his own church over immigration issues. And many clergy members across the country are worried about the removal of churches from the sensitive-areas list, allowing federal officials to conduct immigration actions at places of worship.
Dwight D. Eisenhower was the first president to attend the prayer breakfast, in February 1953, and every president since has spoken at the gathering.
Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire and Republican Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas are the honorary co-chairs of this year’s prayer breakfast.
In 2023 and 2024, President Joe Biden, a Democrat, spoke at the Capitol Hill event, and his remarks were livestreamed to the other gathering.
Marjorie Dianne Schermerhorn, 85, of Beaver, passed away on February 4th, 2025 at Passavant McCandless. She was born in Sewickley on March 16th, 1939, a daughter of the late Earl J. and Margaret Sutton Schermerhorn. She is survived by a sister, Margaret (Maggie) Schermerhorn Kern of McCandless and several cousins.
Marjorie resided in Ambridge, Beaver and Pittsburgh during her life. She was employed for twenty-two years by U.S. Steel Corporation, five years by Ketchum Communications, and eighteen years by Mellon Bank (now the Bank of New York Mellon), from which she retired in 2008. She was a 1957 graduate of Beaver High School and a 1961 graduate of Vassar College. She also took evening courses during her working years at the University of Pittsburgh and Point Park University, and earned a paralegal certificate from Duquesne University. At various times, she was a member of Presbyterian churches in Ambridge, Beaver and Shadyside (Pittsburgh). She most recently attended Trinity Anglican Church in Beaver, where she was a lay reader and money counter.
Friends will be received on Friday, February 7th from 2 p.m. until 5 p.m. in the Noll Funeral Home, Inc., 333 Third Street, Beaver. Interment will be beside her parents in Sewickley Cemetery. Online condolences may be shared at nollfuneral.com.
Roberta J. “Bobbi” LeMasters, 87, of Midland, passed away with her family at her side on February 4th, 2025.
She was born on October 30th, 1937, a daughter of the late Clarence and Kathryn (Gallagher) White. In addition to her parents, she was preceded in death by her sister, Retta Steele, brothers, Billy and Thomas White, fiancé, Peter Mowad, grandsons, Ryan and Jacob and three infants. She is survived by her four daughters: Sharon (Joseph) Znidarsic of Ocala, Florida, Cindy Williams of Stow, Ohio, Sabrina Granito of Industry, and Stephanie (Steve) Brunning of Center Township; her sister, Patricia (Robert) Grosser of Parrish, Florida, her brother, James (Debbie) White, twenty grandchildren and twenty-three great-grandchildren.
Roberta was a real people person and loved her career as a hairdresser. She also loved working with the public as a counter manager for Elizabeth Arden in the former Kaufman’s Department Store.
She spent a lot of time with her family. She enjoyed eating, laughing, dancing, attending family reunions and playing cards with them. She also loved traveling. After retiring, she became very involved in the cattle business with her fiancé in Wellsville, Ohio. She was a parishioner at Saints Peter and Paul Church in Beaver.
Friends will be received on Sunday, February 9th from 12-3 p.m. and 6-8 p.m. in the Noll Funeral Home, Inc., 333 Third St., Beaver. A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated on Monday, February 10th, at 10 a.m. at Saints Peter and Paul Church, 200 3rd Street, Beaver. Interment will take place at Beaver Cemetery. Online condolences may be shared at nollfuneral.com.
Memorial donations in her name may be made to the Humane Society of Beaver County, in honor of her love for all pets.
The family gives thanks and sincere appreciation to the staff at Good Samaritan Hospice for their unconditional support.
Glenna M. Casto, 83, of New Sewickley Township, passed away on February 4th, 2025 in UPMC Passavant Cranberry. She was born in Ireland, West Virginia on August 25th, 1941, a daughter of the late Perry and Lena Ellen Knight Pritt. In addition to her parents, she was preceded in death by three brothers, Eugene, Leonard and Jimmy and four sisters, Marlene, Betty, Frances and Darlene. She is survived by her husband, Esker D. Casto, two sons and daughters-in-law, Michael D. and Cathy Casto of New Sewickley Township and Bradley K. and Teresa Casto of Patterson Township. She is also survived by five grandchildren: Tim, Jacob, Matthew, Amanda and Marsha; as well as four great-grandchildren: Brianne, Brett, Brynleigh and a special great-grandson, Jonathan and four sisters: Margie, Bonnie, Charlene and Mary Ann; as well as one brother, Kenneth. Glenna was a retired nurse’s aide with Sherwood Oaks of Cranberry. Glenna’s wish was to be cremated with no service. Arrangements are entrusted to William Murphy Funeral Home, Inc., 349 Adams Street, Rochester.