| Friday, June 5, 2015 |
| Revenue gap not hurting state's SEC schools | |
 | While Mississippi's SEC schools bask in new-found wealth, so do their big brothers in the conference. The SEC distributed $31.2 million to its members at the close of last week's spring business meeting in Destin, up from $20.9 million a year ago. For MSU and Ole Miss it's a bold new world of cash, but the gap between Bulldogs, Rebels, Vols, Tigers and others is still quite large. The question is does it matter? Mississippi administrators say it doesn't. "Both Mississippi schools just spent most of the 2014 football season ranked in the top 10. Budget size didn't seem to be a detriment to success then," MSU athletics director Scott Stricklin said. MSU president Mark Keenum says presidents are "thrilled" with the SEC Network. "It's been way beyond my personal expectations, way beyond what I thought we would receive." |
| Starkville Civitan Club Makes Donation To Autism Clinic At Mississippi State | |
 | The Starkville Civitan Club is donating $1,500 to the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Clinic at Mississippi State. The recent gift to the university partially supports a graduate assistant position in the College of Education unit and the counseling and educational psychology department. Located in the Barry Box Building on Morrill Road, the public clinic serves clients with autism spectrum disorders, ages birth to college. In expressing appreciation to the club, clinic director Dan Gadke said, "This will go a long way with helping out." |
| Financing for SPD upgrades clears significant hurdle | |
 | Starkville's administration appears to have solved what past leaders, numerous studies and failed bond referendums could not in the last two decades: Mayor Parker Wiseman and the board of aldermen are on track to finance renovations that will give the city's police department a permanent home. A resolution authorizing the future issuance of up to $3 million in general obligation bonds was unanimously approved on consent Tuesday after no protests emerged against the financing package. What was a divisive topic transitioned into ho-hum business as aldermen approved the resolution authorizing the issuance on consent with no real discussion. |
| Golden Triangle getting cookie delivery service | |
| If you are a Starkville resident who likes the idea of getting fresh baked cookies delivered to your home until 3 a.m., you are in luck. It appears Insomnia Cookies is opening a location in the Cotton Mill Drive shopping center. The eatery's signage is on a door there. And job postings have been popping up online recently indicating that the Pennsylvania-based company is coming to town. The bakery specializes in delivering cookies and is typically open from 11 a.m. to 3 a.m. everyday. There are 50-plus locations across the U.S. The Starkville location would be the first in Mississippi. |
| North Mississippi's Tanglefoot Trail added to national system | |
 | The Tanglefoot Trail in north Mississippi has been named a national recreation trail. The announcement was made Thursday in a news release by Interior Secretary Sally Jewell and National Park Service Director Jonathan Jarvis. The Tanglefoot Trail runs 44 miles between New Albany and Houston. The path, blazed by Native Americans and followed by early explorers, became the route of the railroad built by Col. William C. Falkner, great-grandfather of author William Faulkner. |
| Shrimp season opens with small, medium shrimp being caught | |
 | More than 300 boats filled the Mississippi Sound before sunrise Wednesday to start this year's shrimp season at dawn, but early catches show small to medium shrimp are coming up in the trawls. Officials with the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources said small to medium shrimp have been reported by the fishermen contacted by DMR. "The opening day of shrimp season is something our scientists prepare for all year," said Jamie Miller, executive director of MDMR. "It's part of the culture of the Coast, with generations of fishermen working hard to provide our state and region with fresh, Gulf shrimp." |
| Payroll surge: Employers added 280,000 jobs in May | |
 | The labor market's spring rebound strengthened in May as U.S. employers added 280,000 jobs. The unemployment rate rose to 5.5% from 5.4%, the Labor Department said Friday. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expected employment gains of 220,000, according to their median forecast. Businesses added 262,000 jobs last month, led by solid gains in professional and business services, leisure and hospitality and health care. Federal, state and local governments added 18,000. Also encouraging is that wage growth, which has been sluggish throughout the recovery, picked up a bit last month. |
| Cochran, Butler, Sojourner potential trial witnesses in blogger's trial | |
 | Sen. Thad Cochran, Madison Mayor Mary Hawkins Butler and state Sen. Melanie Sojourner are among potential witnesses in the trial of a political blogger accused of breaking into the nursing home room of Cochran's late wife. The trial is set to start Monday, but numerous motions will likely be dealt with first. Pearl political blogger Clayton Kelly, 29, faces charges of burglary, attempted burglary and conspiracy, and more than 50 years in prison if convicted. District Attorney Michael Guest declined comment on the case or specifics about potential witnesses. |
| Should Ocean Springs consider city manager form of government? | |
 | When Ocean Springs incorporated as a municipality in September 1892, it adopted the mayor-aldermen form of government, the form used by 95 percent of the cities in Mississippi. But a study by the Mississippi Municipal League calls the mayor-aldermen government "archaic" and a report by the National League of Cities notes that the city manager-council form of government is the most widely used in the U.S. -- with more than 55 percent of cities utilizing it. Recently, longtime Ocean Springs alderman Greg Denyer suggested it may be time for the city to take a look at switching to the city manager style. A study by the Stennis Institute of Government and Community Development at Mississippi State University compiled a report on the history of municipal government in Mississippi, as well as the features of each and their pros and cons. |
| Rick Perry 2016 campaign staff: The power players | |
 | Rick Perry has launched his second presidential bid, seeking redemption and another shot at the White House after a disastrous attempt in 2012. The former Texas governor, the longest-serving executive in Lone Star State history, is seeking to run as an experienced leader with a hawkish foreign policy. Key players in his campaign include Austin Barbour -- senior adviser to the super PAC. Barbour is a prominent Mississippi-based operative who worked for Mitt Romney in 2012. His brother, Henry Barbour, has no official role with Perry but is a supporter and informal adviser and is also a Mississippi-based strategist and the state's Republican National Committeeman. |
| Global Warming 'Hiatus' Challenged by NOAA Research | |
 | For years, scientists have been laboring to explain an apparent slowdown in global warming since the start of this century, which occurred at the same time that heat-trapping emissions of carbon dioxide were soaring. The slowdown, sometimes inaccurately described as a halt or hiatus, became a major talking point for people critical of climate science. Now, new research suggests the whole thing may have been based on incorrect data. The change prompted accusations on Thursday from some climate-change denialists that the agency was trying to wave a magic wand and make inconvenient data go away. Mainstream climate scientists not involved in the NOAA research rejected that charge. |
| Oil industry raves about EPA fracking study; environmentalists call it suspect | |
 | Oil industry supporters rejoiced Thursday when a newly released draft of an Environmental Protection Agency report found no evidence that hydraulic fracturing does widespread damage to drinking water. Oil industry advocates said the assessment finally confirmed that fracking is safe. But environmental groups, which have long fought fracking techniques for allegedly damaging natural resources in pursuit of the fossil fuels that are producing global warming, claim the report's preliminary conclusions are suspect. The draft released Thursday was the result of a congressional push for examination into the impacts hydraulic fracturing techniques could have on drinking water. |
| Data Breach Linked to China Exposes Millions of U.S. Workers | |
| The Obama administration on Thursday announced what appeared to be one of the largest breaches of federal employees' data, involving at least four million current and former government workers in an intrusion that officials said apparently originated in China. The compromised data was held by the Office of Personnel Management, which handles government security clearances and federal employee records. The breach was first detected in April, the office said, but it appears to have begun at least late last year. The target appeared to be Social Security numbers and other "personal identifying information," but it was unclear whether the attack was related to commercial gain or espionage. |
| NIH Suspends Drug Production for 46 Clinical Trials After Finding Contamination | |
 | The National Institutes of Health suspended production of clinical-study drugs for 46 different clinical trials, after two vials of drugs were found to have fungal contamination and federal inspectors found deficiencies in the way drugs are made there. Two vials of albumin derived from human blood were found to be contaminated with fungus. Vials from the same batch had been given to six patients, but none has developed signs of infection or illness, the NIH said. NIH Director Francis S. Collins called the developments a "distressing and unacceptable situation," adding that "the fact that patients may have been put in harm's way... is deeply troubling." |
| Appalachia gripped by hepatitis C epidemic, bracing for HIV | |
| Patton Couch shook his head and clenched his teeth, recounting the night four years ago when he plucked a dirty needle from a pile at a flophouse and jabbed it into his scarred arm. He knew the odds; most of the addicts in the room probably had hepatitis C. "All I cared about was how soon and how fast I could get it in," he says. "I hated myself, it was misery. But when you're in the grips of it, the only way I thought I could escape it was one more time." Couch, 25 years old and one month sober, is one of thousands of young Appalachian drug users recently diagnosed with hepatitis C. Yet public health officials warn that it could get much worse. Hepatitis C once was an urban problem that mostly afflicted minorities, said Dr. John Ward, director of the CDC's Division of Viral Hepatitis. The recent outbreak is centered in rural areas among young, white drug users. |
| Outgoing chancellor Jones to join UMMC's obesity research team | |
| Outgoing Ole Miss chancellor Dan Jones will join University of Mississippi Medical Center's obesity research center on Sept. 15. His start date is the day after his contract as chancellor expires. The state College Board voted March 20 to begin preparations to search for Jones' successor. Dr. John Hall, UMMC's Arthur Guyton Professor and Chair of Physiology and Biophysics and director of the Mississippi Center for Obesity Research, said he turned to Jones when the search for the center's clinical and population sciences position stalled two years and five candidates into the process. Hall said Jones was "uniquely qualified" for the post. In his new role, Jones will be asked to confront Mississippi's most common and expensive health problem. |
| UM, Chinese university form educational partnership | |
 | The University of Mississippi is partnering with a Chinese college in effort to establish an international relationship for education, research and development. Ole Miss officials say an agreement was established with North China University of Technology and will take effect this fall. It will bring 15 to 20 Chinese students to visit the North Mississippi college each year with their tuition funded through a scholarship with the Chinese government, and it will also give Ole Miss students a chance to study abroad. |
| Cecil Burt retires after 43 years at Pearl River Community College | |
 | Cecil Burt says there are a few things he'll miss when he retires June 30 as Pearl River Community College's vice president for Forrest County Operations. "Working for great presidents, currently Dr. William Lewis," he said. "He has been instrumental in me staying, or I would have retired earlier. "Having great faculty and wonderful students." It's those students Burt, 66, can't say enough about. "We have a bright and active student body," he said. "They're motivated and committed to educational excellence." Many of those students were present Thursday at Burt's retirement party at the Forrest County Center. A hefty crowd had gathered a half-hour before the event was even supposed to start. |
| U. of Alabama names interim business dean | |
 | The University of Alabama on Thursday named the associate dean of its graduate business school the interim leader of the Culverhouse College of Commerce. J. Brian Gray's appointment as interim dean begins July 1. Gray's appointment follows the announcement of plans by Dean J. Michael Hardin to leave June 30 to become provost at Samford University. The university is conducting a national search to find a permanent replacement. |
| Auburn University lab technician indicted on six counts | |
 | The Auburn University lab technician who was charged last month with distributing the date rape drug GHB has been indicted on six counts, court documents show. The grand jury in U.S. District Court has indicted Stephen Howard, 64, on three counts of possessing with an intent to distribute the controlled substance 1,4-butanediol, which converts to GHB, better known as the "date rape drug," when ingested; two firearms charges relating to and during a trafficking crime; and one count of possessing methamphetamine. |
| U. of Florida trustees examine ways of measuring push to pre-eminence | |
 | The University of Florida is poised to begin its next 10-year run, "looking at where we want to go," Provost Joe Glover told the board of trustees Thursday before going into a presentation on the yardsticks by which the board and administration want to measure progress. The board's job is to decide which of those yardsticks -- or "metrics," to use the term in vogue right now -- are important and which are distractions, which are stable and which are all over the map. Which metrics UF uses will be important as the university embarks on a faculty-driven, goal-setting task force headed by Win Phillips, executive chief of staff to current UF President Kent Fuchs. |
| UGA President Jere Morehead makes scholarship donation | |
 | University of Georgia President Jere Morehead will donate a big part of his upcoming pay raise to student scholarships. Morehead announced Wednesday he will give $100,000 to the University of Georgia Foundation to establish a scholarship endowment to help students fulfill the university's new "experiential learning" requirement. The announcement comes three weeks after the state Board of Regents approved a 43 percent raise for Morehead, who will be making $811,353 per year beginning July 1 -- about $244,000 more than he was making at the beginning of the 2015 fiscal year that ends June 30. |
| News of Rick Perry's 2nd bid for president earns mixed reviews from Aggies | |
 | The crowded room of Republican presidential candidates squeezed in one more Thursday at an airplane hangar in Addison. With an Aggie Ring on his hand, former Texas governor and Texas A&M University class of 1972 graduate Rick Perry announced his intention to make another run for the White House in 2016. The former yell leader wasted little time giving a nod to his alma mater in his speech, which renewed a sense of school pride in current and former students on both sides of the aisle. Demetrius Hollins, a computer engineering major from the class of 2018, said he doesn't agree with all of what Perry stood for in his speech, but plans on backing him because of their shared experience at A&M. |
| Proposals to ban women in U. of Missouri fraternity houses, require drug tests prompt backlash | |
 | Social media erupted this week with complaints about a set of proposals from the Mizzou Fraternity Alumni Consortium to address sexual assault and safety in fraternity houses. Although the proposals were written by the Alumni Consortium, a group of men who serve on MU fraternity housing boards or as fraternity advisers, most of the negative reaction was directed at Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin, although it is not clear if the chancellor requested the recommendations. Christian Basi, associate director of the MU News Bureau, said Loftin had met several times with the consortium, and they agreed the consortium would make the proposals. |
| Losing hope in Wisconsin: Faculty members protest tenure, shared governance changes | |
 | With Wisconsin legislators poised to remove public university tenure from state statute, many faculty members were hopeful that a Board of Regents committee would respond forcefully Thursday. But the committee meeting ended with faculty leaders feeling that they had been let down. The University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents' Education Committee did vote to preserve tenure in the system regulations even if it is removed from state statute, but many professors said the committee could have done more to oppose proposed legislation making it much easier for faculty members in good standing to be laid off. Last Friday, in a surprise to many, the Legislature's influential Joint Finance Committee passed an omnibus budget motion striking tenure from state law, effectively leaving its fate up to the regents. |
SPORTS
| Mississippi State freshmen began basketball rebuilding process Thursday | |
| A new era of Mississippi State basketball began at 1 p.m. in a class named Life Skills for Athletes. Malik Newman, Quinndary Weatherspoon and Aric Holman went to McCool Hall for their first class as collegiate student-athletes on Thursday. "It was fun. I'm not going to say I liked it," Weatherspoon said. "It was fun. We're going to get through it." The trio acts as the foundation of Ben Howland's rebuilding project of Mississippi State basketball. After the class they participated in their first MSU practice. "It was great," Newman said. "Coach Ben Howland did a lot of explaining to us and just teaching us about things that we have to work on to develop." |
| Starkville ranked as nation's 16th-best baseball home | |
| A recent study backs what most Mississippi State fans already believe: Starkville is one of the best baseball spots in the country. Wallet Hub, a web site geared to helping consumers and businesses make financial decisions, ranked the top 272 baseball cities in the United States. Starkville came in 16th. It was fourth among college towns behind Stanford, California (No. 6), Cullowhee, North Carolina (Western Carolina No. 7) and Chapel Hill, North Carolina (No. 12). Dudy Noble Field ranked as the second most accessible college baseball stadium. |
| Mississippi State's SEC champ Hearn turns attention to nationals | |
| Mississippi State track & field coach Steve Dudley says there are no surprises at this point. With his team set to travel to Eugene, Oregon, for the NCAA Outdoor Championships, Dudley will carry a talented, title-hungry team to the Great Northwest, where he hopes to sneak up on teams with how good the Bulldogs can be. "If they're making the trip, there's nothing surprising about how good these guys are," said Dudley. "I hope if there are surprises, it will be that teams are shocked at how good we are." Scottie Hearn got his surprise out of the way early. Hearn, a junior hurdler from Meridian, emerged as a serious contender nationally two weeks ago when he stepped into the spotlight by winning a Southeastern Conference championship in the 400-meter hurdles. |
| Mississippi State has 25 freshmen football players enroll | |
| The majority of Mississippi State's incoming freshmen on the football team enrolled in the first summer semester. The Bulldogs released an updated roster on Thursday, which included 25 true freshmen. MSU signed 28 players in the 2015 signing day class. Three of Mississippi State's four freshmen basketball players enrolled. Joseph Struggs was the lone player who didn't. Malik Newman, Quinndary Weatherspoon and Aric Holman all enrolled and attended the first day of classes. |
| Former Bulldog Stratton promoted to Triple A Sacramento | |
| Tupelo's Chris Stratton, the former first-round draft pick from Mississippi State, is one step away from the major leagues. Stratton, a pitcher, was called up to Triple-A Sacramento late Tuesday from the San Francisco Giants' Double-A team in Richmond, Va. The right-hander, who turns 25 in August, was 1-5 in nine starts at Richmond this season with a 4.14 ERA. He had struck out 39 and walked 22 in 50 innings at Richmond. Batters were hitting .215 against him. |
| Vols get rings for bowl victory; 150 ordered at $175 apiece | |
 | Tennessee's players got one more piece of hardware for their TaxSlayer Bowl victory over Iowa this week when their rings came in. Pictures of the rings appeared on social media on Wednesday. Tennessee spokesman Jason Yellin said Thursday that the Vols used a bid process to find a ring manufacturer. Balfour, a company that specializes in commemorative rings and other materials, submitted the lowest bid and made 150 rings at $175 each for a total cost of $26,250. Tennessee was given $1,418,880 from the SEC for the bowl game and claimed $1,254,059 for expenses to end with a profit of $164,811. |
| Chapel Hill Lacked 'Institutional Control' Over Athletics, NCAA Says | |
 | The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill "lacked institutional control" over athletics, according to the NCAA's notice of allegations against it, released on Thursday by the university. The document relies heavily on a report, issued last year by Kenneth L. Wainstein, that found thousands of students at Chapel Hill had benefited from a system of fake classes that advisers used to pad athletes' grade-point averages to keep them eligible to play. In its allegations, the NCAA focuses most prominently on Jan Boxill, a former chair of the faculty whose apparent active participation in the fake-classes scheme shocked fellow faculty members when it was made public in the Wainstein report. Ms. Boxill, an ethics expert, resigned this year from her position as a lecturer in philosophy. |
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