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2 new invasive insects confirmed in Minnesota, state Department of Agriculture says

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

Two new invasive insects have been found in Minnesota, according to the state Department of Agriculture.The MDA said Wednesday that “vigilant homeowners” spotted the insects separately and reported them to the agency’s “Report a Pest” service in August.They were then confirmed as the elm seed bug (Arocatus melanocephalus) and Asiatic garden beetle (Maladera formosae).Asiatic garden beetle (U.S. Department of Agriculture)Elm seed bug (Utah State University)MDA said the elm seed bug primarily feeds on elm seeds but can also feed on linden and oak. The elm seed bug is mostly considered a nuisance pest like the box elder bug, as they can enter homes in large numbers. Box elder bugs are active in late summer and fall, but the elm seed bug is active in mid-June.Native to Europe, elm seed bug was first confirmed in the United Stated in 2012. It is established in several Western states, such as Oregon, Washington and Utah.The Asiatic garden beetle feeds on over 100 hosts, including fruit, v...

Shmuly Yanklowitz: This Rosh Hashana, let’s commit to repairing the injuries of injustice

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

All around the world, in preparation for the High Holy Days, Jews are doing the inner spiritual work right now of cheshbon hanefesh, or accounting of the soul. This typically entails examining ourselves for all our moral failures and ethical shortcomings and planning how we might do better in the new Jewish year to come.This kind of practice isn’t unique to the Jewish community. We all in one way or another look to improve ourselves and our actions, and sometimes we even succeed at it. As difficult as self-improvement is, even greater is the task of collective teshuva, or repentance. (The English word “repentance” often carries a heavy connotation. Teshuva in Hebrew describes more of a return. When we change our behavior for the better, we return toward our best, truest selves.)On Yom Kippur, which this year begins on the evening of Sept. 24, the congregation all stands together and recites a confession that goes, “We have trespassed. We have betrayed. We hav...

Regional tribes urge feds to reject new power plant on shores of Lake Superior

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

MADISON, Wis. — Indigenous tribes in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin have asked federal officials to deny a utility’s request for a loan to help build a natural gas-fired power plant on the shores of Lake Superior, calling the project unthinkable in the face of climate change.Chippewa tribes located across the northern third of the three states sent a letter to U.S. Department of Agriculture officials on Sunday asking them to deny Dairyland Power Cooperative’s request for a $350 million public loan. The request is intended to cover the utility’s share of the cost of building the Nemadji Trail Energy Center power plant.“As our shared climate rapidly continues to destabilize, it is unconscionable that Dairyland Power Cooperative has not canceled its request for a $350 million public loan and permits to build Nemadji Trail Energy Center,” the tribes said in the letter. It added later, “In short, this location was never the place, and now is obviously not...

Vos creates panel to investigate criteria for impeaching Justice Janet Protasiewicz

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

MADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin’s Republican Assembly leader announced Wednesday that he’s created a panel to investigate the criteria for impeachment as he mulls taking that unprecedented step against a liberal state Supreme Court justice.Republicans are targeting Justice Janet Protasiewicz over comments she made during her winning campaign about redistricting and nearly $10 million in donations she received from the state Democratic Party.The impeachment criteria panel being created by Assembly Speaker Robin Vos will consist of three former Wisconsin Supreme Court justices whom Vos told the Associated Press he would not name until after their work is done. Vos said they were not being paid and he expected their work to be complete in the “next few weeks.”The move to further investigate possible impeachment against Protasiewicz comes the day after Vos and Republicans introduced a bill, modeled after the law in Iowa, where new maps would be drawn by nonpartisan legislative sta...

San Francisco city employee stabbed while working in Tenderloin

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) – In San Francisco’s Tenderloin, a city employee was stabbed while working at one of the city’s SRO hotels, which provide permanent supportive housing. Now, city workers and union officials are calling on the city to do more to ensure workers' safety. The city worker was stabbed four times. They will survive, and a suspect has been arrested, but city workers want more to be done before something like this happens again.San Francisco’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing confirmed that on Wednesday morning, the staffer was attacked at the Windsor Hotel on Eddy Street. VIDEO: Good Samaritan tries to stop thieves outside Fentons Creamery in Oakland “A resident from the Windsor Hotel barged into the office of a case manager with a knife or something that appeared to be a knife and proceeded to stab the case worker four times in front of another worker,” said Cheryl Thornton, a Service Employees International Union member. Thornton also works for...

Player of the Week: Gainesville’s Cassie Sengul

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

Each week, WTOP is picking one student athlete to be featured on air and online as our Player of the Week. This week’s WTOP Player of the Week is Cassandra Sengul of Gainesville High School in Gainesville, Virginia.Sengul is entering her fourth year of varsity golf for the Cardinals and is coming off a 2022 season that saw her place top five in qualifying for The Optimist International Junior Golf Championship at Trump National Golf Course in Doral, Florida. Sengul represented Virginia and the greater D.C. area in the tournament, which featured competitors from Thailand, Argentina and other countries around the world.Last season, Sengul also placed third in the mid-Atlantic Junior PGA Shenandoah Valley Open and first at the PGA First Tee tournament at Caves Valley Country Club.Despite having cerebral palsy, a motor disability that affects the ability to control muscles, Sengul takes no exemptions as a competitor for Gainesville and walks the course with her teammates and opponents. ...

PHOTOS: San Diego sky lit up by rocket-like light trail

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- San Diegans looked up to the sky Thursday night as a rocket-like light trail blazed over the county. The mysterious object was first seen over the region around 7:30 p.m. While some speculated that it was a SpaceX mission, that doesn't appear to be the case. According to the SpaceX website, the company's last scheduled launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base in Santa Barbara was on Sept. 11.A rocket-like light trail over San Diego on Sept. 14, 2023. (KSWB/FOX 5)A rocket-like light trail over San Diego on Sept. 14, 2023. (KSWB/FOX 5)A rocket-like light trail over San Diego on Sept. 14, 2023. (KSWB/FOX 5)Some social media users as far east as Nevada and Arizona also reported catching a glimpse of the rocket-like object as it soared through the sky.The National Weather Service station in Las Vegas reported seeing what appeared to be the rocket's contrail from their backyard in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.FOX 5 is currently working to confirm what was seen in the...

Escondido school district's gender identity policy blocked by federal judge

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

ESCONDIDO, Calif. -- A preliminary injunction blocking an Escondido Union School District privacy policy aimed at protecting transgender students' identities was issued by a federal judge on Thursday, siding with the two teachers who sued the district over the policy earlier this year.The lawsuit was brought by Rincon Middle School Teachers, Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori Ann West, arguing that a policy that requires teachers to get a transgender students' consent to disclose their identity to their parents was a violation of their First Amendment rights.According to the lawsuit, EUSD teachers are required to refer to students by their preferred names and pronouns at school, while reverting to biological pronouns and legal names when speaking with the students' parents.Nondiscrimination policies that prevent harassment based on a students' actual or perceived identity were not included in the scope of the case.District officials say that the policy was put in place to protect transgen...

Citing sustainability, Starbucks wants to overhaul its iconic cup. Will customers go along?

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

TEMPE, Ariz. (AP) — Bethany Patton steps up to the counter and places her pink mug into a shoebox-sized dishwasher. It spins. It whirs. Water splashes inside. After 90 seconds, the door opens and steam emerges. A barista grabs the mug, dries it and prepares Patton’s order — a 16-ounce Starbucks double espresso on ice.For bringing her own cup, Patton gets $1 off her drink.“Saving the environment is important and all, but I probably come here more in knowing that I’m going to get a dollar off,” says Patton, 27, a cancer researcher at Arizona State University. Two friends who came on the afternoon coffee run nod as they hold the cups that they, too, brought along. Just as noteworthy as what they’re carrying is what they are not: the disposable Starbucks cup, an icon in a world where the word is overused.For a generation and more, it has been a cornerstone of consumer society, first in the United States and then globally — the throwaway cup with the emerald logo depicting a longha...

More than 700 million people don’t know when – or if – they will eat again, UN food chief says

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:31:24 GMT

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — A global hunger crisis has left more than 700 million people not knowing when or if they will eat again, and demand for food is rising relentlessly while humanitarian funding is drying up, the head of the United Nations food agency said Thursday.World Food Program Executive Director Cindy McCain told the U.N. Security Council that because of the lack of funding, the agency has been forced to cut food rations for millions of people, and “more cuts are on the way.”“We are now living with a series of concurrent and long-term crises that will continue to fuel global humanitarian needs,” she said. “This is the humanitarian community’s new reality — our new normal — and we will be dealing with the fallout for years to come.”The WFP chief, the widow of the late U.S. senator John McCain, said the agency estimates that nearly 47 million people in over 50 countries are just one step from famine — and a staggering 45 million children under the age of five are now estimate...