Fight over cash-paying video games hits crucial stretch
By MARC LEVY Associated Press
As part of an unfolding court battle, Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration wants to outlaw proliferating cash-paying electronic game terminals and accuses them of siphoning more than $200 million in revenue last year from the Pennsylvania Lottery. An ally in the fight is Pennsylvania’s competition-wary casino industry. The court fight comes down to whether Pennsylvania law prohibits the machines as an unlicensed slot machine, even if the outcome is supposedly based on skill, rather than chance. Court arguments scheduled for Wednesday are on whether to continue a halt to police seizures of the Pennsylvania Skill brand of game terminals.

Under pressure, Iran admits it shot down jetliner by mistake
By NASSER KARIMI and JOSEPH KRAUSS Associated Press
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard says it accidentally shot down the Ukrainian jetliner that crashed earlier this week, killing all 176 aboard. The government had repeatedly denied Western accusations that it was responsible for the crash. The plane was hit hours after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack on two military bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq in retaliation for the killing of its top general. The acknowledgement is an embarrassment for the armed forces and was likely to anger the Iranian public. A senior Guard commander accepted “full responsibility” and said that when he learned of the shootdown he wished he was dead. He said the plane was mistaken for an incoming U.S. cruise missile.

And now it’s time for the Business Minute report…brought to you by…Minuteman Press:

Two Beaver County school districts have received grants totaling 50-thousand dollars that will help match school ciricula to workforce needs. Funding from the PDE in the amount of $50,000 will allow teachers from Freedom and Hopewell to visit area businesses so they can shape classroom instruction to fit its latest skills demanded by area employers, State Representative Rob Matzie announced this week. He said the funding, $25,000 each to the districts will advance career readiness for Beaver County students seeking jobs in high-demand fields. The funding will help provide a successful path from the classroom to the workplace by allowing teachers to learn what skills employers need and to supplement their teaching in a way that equips students to hit the ground running.

The Beaver County Board of Commissioners approved an agreement between the county and Tyler Technologies for the reassessment of all real property consisting of approximately 96,000 parcels within the county. Reassessment commences on January 9,2020. The cost, to be funded by the county is $6,422,349.00. Twenty nine resolutions, including the reassessment one were unanimously approved by the commissioners.

IKEA is agreeing to pay $46 million to the parents of a 2-year-old boy who died of injuries suffered when a 70-pound recalled dresser tipped over onto him. The family’s lawyers disclosed the agreement Monday. Jozef Dudek died in 2017 of his injuries, and his parents sued the Swedish home furnishings company in a Philadelphia court in 2018. The Dudeks accused IKEA of knowing that its Malm dressers posed a tip-over hazard and that they had injured or killed a number of children, but that the company had failed to warn consumers that the dressers shouldn’t be used without being anchored to a wall.

The new jobs report just come out this morning. Brandon McConahay reports….

…and U.S. stocks edged higher in early trading on today but lost some of their momentum from a record-setting rally a day earlier as investors digested a weak jobs report. Technology and health care stocks rose. Chipmaker Nvidia and Intuitive Surgical, a surgical device maker, were among the earlier winners. Banks fell broadly. Energy stocks slid along with declining oil prices. The government reported that employers added 145,000 jobs in December, short of forecasts. The benchmark S&P 500 index was up 0.2%. Bond prices rose, sending yields slightly lower. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 1.83%. And that’s today’s Business Minute report, brought to you by Minuteman Press.

UPDATE: The 43rd annual Beaver County Maple Syrup Festival will be hosted this year by PUSH Beaver County in coordination with the Beaver County Conservation District. Regis Collins – the Director of Community Development for PUSH Beaver County – tells Beaver County Radio newsman Pat Septak that  the goal is for his organization to eventually take over the event completely…

Collins has confirmed that the festival will be held – as usual – at Brady’s Run Park..

Collins says festival-goers shouldn’t notice anything different this year…

Collins says the goal is to’ keep the festival going without missing a beat…

Collins was asked where the funding will come from for this year’s festival…

Collins says because they’re getting such a late start on the festival this year, volunteers will be more needed than ever before…

Collins says with the dates for this year’s festival right around the corner, they’re pleading for people to volunteer their time and get involved…

The Maple Syrup Festival will be held at Brady’s Run Park on Saturday and Sunday, April 4th and 5th from 8:30 to 4:30 each day.

(Photo of Alex Scott, who was hired as street superintendent, was taken by Sandy Giordano).

Aliquippa’s new Street Superintendent has some words of advice for city residents this winter season. Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano has details…

 

UNDATED (AP) — Comedian Bill Cosby is appealing a court decision last month that upheld his conviction for drugging and sexually assaulting a woman in 2004. The brief filed Thursday with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court focuses on four key trial issues. They include the judge’s decision to let five other accusers testify and to send Cosby to trial despite a prosecutor’s earlier promise not to charge him. The 82-year-old Cosby is serving a three- to 10-year prison term at a maximum-security state prison near Philadelphia. He calls the encounter consensual. But a jury in April 2018 convicted him on all three felony counts in the first celebrity trial of the #MeToo era.

(Photos of Mayor Walker swearing in Councilman Art Piroli, Jr., who was re-elected, and Denise Taylor, who was elected to her first official term as controller, taken by Sandy Giordano).

All of Aliquippa’s newly elected officials have been sworn in…as we hear in this report from Beaver County Radio News Correspondent Sandy Giordano. Click on ‘play’ to hear Sandy’s report…