If what’s now being called the Old PA Pike Trail project comes to pass as envisioned — despite some opposition and pessimism that has evolved regarding it — the entire Southern Alleghenies region could reap substantial benefits. As people from near and far would hear about the new ...
Although infrequent, it’s not unheard of for there to be a topic of community disagreement at which the local volunteer fire department is at the center. Some communities have dealt with the question of whether longtime town fire whistles should be deactivated due to the modern ...
The three boys — two 11-year-olds and one 9-year-old — who caused major damage at the East End Ball Field on Oct. 27 presumably will pay a heavy price for plunging into the abyss of criminal behavior. Their immature, arrogant, stupid, shortsighted, destructive spree targeted at five of ...
Voting in last week’s national mid-term election was one of Americans’ duties as citizens of this great country, and the size of the voter turnout was indicative of how important voters viewed casting their ballots to be. Meanwhile, the intensity of the campaigns leading up to Election ...
Despite the intense voter interest that it generated, primarily due to what’s been happening on the federal level, Tuesday’s mid-term election didn’t deliver much in the way of big surprises to people of Blair and adjacent counties. An exception was in Cambria County’s 71st state ...
The problem of people ignoring jury duty summonses in Blair County isn’t new, and the court system has been a big cause of why the troubling situation has persisted for so long. For too long, the court system failed to initiate a tough stance against the no-shows, despite having the ...
People across America, including thousands here in central Pennsylvania, are breathing the proverbial sigh of relief today — that the long, bitter, divisive 2018 mid-term election campaign finally is ending. Fortunately for this part of the Keystone State, the campaign landscape was ...
It was in mid-October that Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale urged Keystone State residents to take advantage of available mental health services, at which time he also stressed the importance of improving mental health services at schools. DePasquale’s statement, made in ...
Whoever is elected to succeed retiring Republican U.S. Rep. Bill Shuster in the newly created 13th Pennsylvania Congressional District will start at the bottom rung in committees and party roles. That’s a fact of life in Washington when a longtime incumbent steps aside; seniority means ...
The new police internship program to which Hollidaysburg Borough Council gave unanimous support earlier this month might have benefits beyond the borough’s borders. It could encourage some other communities served by municipal police departments, in this county and beyond, to implement ...
In what has become far too commonplace in this country, another mass shooting occurred over the weekend — this time, right here in Pennsylvania — as an anti-Semitic gunman rampaged through the Tree of Life Synagogue on Saturday morning in the Squirrel Hill section of Pittsburgh, killing 11 ...
Enrollment at the 14 state-owned universities in Pennsylvania is down by 4 percent this year, including nearly 38 percent at Cheyney University, the nation’s oldest historically black college. This is the latest batch of bad news for our state universities system, as enrollment has been ...
The cover of the April 15, 1996, issue of Time magazine, which focused on then-Unabomber suspect Theodore J. Kaczynski, referred to the Berkeley math professor-turned-recluse as “Mad Genius.” Time began what it referred to as a Special Report with the words, “The Power of Paranoia.” ...
This early in the criminal justice proceedings, no one can predict with any 100 percent degree of certainty how the murder charges against Michael Copley will play out. The same can be said regarding Samantha J. Musselman, who is charged with helping Copley dispose of his dead wife’s ...
As the end of October creeps closer, so, too, do trick-or-treat nights for local children. Blair County’s trick-or-treat is tonight. How many who are now adults remember the excitement that came with putting on that Halloween costume and canvassing the neighborhood knowing you’d return ...
Clearly, officials in some Central and South American countries are capitalizing on U.S. domestic policies to handle some of their own problems. The fact that they get to embarrass President Donald Trump’s administration seems to be a bonus for some of them. Rampant violence and poor ...
Pennsylvania’s decision to walk away from heavy-handed reliance on the Keystone Exams as a basis for high school graduation acknowledges that standardized testing alone isn’t a reliable mechanism for upping students’ prospects for achieving success as adults. While the ...
Thoughtful Americans ought to be concerned about the disappearance and murder of a Saudi journalist who wrote columns for the Washington Post. But what about the other 44 journalists who have met violent deaths this year? What about the 48 who perished in 2017? Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi ...
The Roman Catholic Church, so much at the center of bad news over the past couple of years due to the child sex-abuse scandal involving hundreds of priests over much of the past half-century, experienced a happy, proud and prayerful day last Sunday as Pope Francis elevated to sainthood a former ...
There’s nothing wrong with Altoona’s ordinance placing the responsibility for tree maintenance on property owners, even if the city planted the trees. Many other places have such a requirement. However, if certain trees have not been a problem but something new comes along suddenly ...