The League of Women Voters of Alabama is expanding its work to give the public access to what goes on in the Legislature. The league’s Education Fund and Alabama State University are collaborating to recruit interns to record House and Senate public meetings that are not live-streamed and make them available on its Alabama Channel. Read more.
Angela Dixon, Jefferson County’s chief finance officer, was praised Tuesday during the Jefferson County Commission’s committee meeting for having received a certificate of achievement for excellence in financial reporting from the Government Finance Officers Association.
Jefferson County has completed its refinance of $2.24 billion in sewer revenue warrants for a gross savings of $1.17 billion, which reduces the county’s payments on the overall sewer debt. Additionally, the refunding was accomplished without extending the maturity of the sewer debt. The refinance includes a provision for a customer assistance program and stabilizes rate increases. Read more.
Republican lawyer Bryan Brinyark will head to Montgomery to represent House District 16, which includes Fayette County, parts of Tuscaloosa and western areas of Jefferson counties. Read more.
The Birmingham City Council on Tuesday voted to spend $150,000 on a project to transition junior developers and engineers in the tech industry into more senior-level positions. The group tasked with developing this program, called the Birmingham Upskill Partnership Initiative, is the regional technology association TechBirmingham. Deon Gordon, president and CEO of TechBirmingham, said stakeholders in the tech industry have noticed a dearth of workers with senior-level skill sets. Read more.
Voters in House District 16 go to the polls Tuesday to elect a new representative to the state House. Republican nominee Bryan Brinyark will face Democratic nominee John Underwood in the election for the district, which extends from Fayette County to north Tuscaloosa and western Jefferson counties. Read more.
It was early morning on July 8, 2018, when Joseph Pettaway’s family was told by a neighbor that he had been badly injured by a police dog overnight and taken to the hospital. He’d been rehabbing a home a block away from where he lived with his mother. His sister, Nancy, set off to see what had happened at the blighted house on the outskirts of Montgomery. She came upon a grisly scene. Blood was pooled on the pavement, and police officers were hosing it down. The front door was open, and Nancy Pettaway peeked at the hallway inside. “I seen blood, like they had dragged him,” she said. “One of the police told me to get back, and I said I ain’t going nowhere, cause that’s my brother, that’s my brother’s blood, and you gotta tell me what’s going on.” But the Montgomery police refused to give her any information and later that day confirmed to the news media only that a suspected burglar had died on the scene. The police who were there when Pettaway was killed wore body cameras that recorded what happened, but Montgomery’s department repeatedly refused to show the footage to the Pettaways, saying the video was “confidential,” and under Alabama law, the family had no right to access the video. It’s a recurring theme in Alabama, which is among the most restrictive states for disclosing body cam footage when police kill. Read more.
Courtney Jones said he was surprised when the Birmingham City Council voted on Tuesday to deny a zoning change as part of his plans to create an events center in the East Lake community. “I was floored, to put it in layman’s terms,” he said in an interview after the meeting. Jones owns the building at 6900 Second Ave. S., where he hopes to establish Atlas 360, a business hosting weddings, corporate events and private parties. Read more.
The city of Birmingham released its most recent crime stats Friday, showing that, while nonviolent crimes such as burglary, auto theft and theft numbers have increased this year, violent crimes still are down somewhat. Read more.
The Jefferson County Commission on Thursday forgave about $1 million of debt owed by a development authority, setting the stage for the county coroner’s office to move to that authority’s industrial park. County Manager Cal Markert said Jefferson County Economic and Industrial Development Authority developed the Jefferson Metropolitan Park Lakeshore industrial park on Lakeshore Parkway. One of its three remaining lots was targeted as the new home of the coroner’s office. “Instead of paying for it, we're forgiving the debt,” Markert said. “It's all ours anyway. We loaned them the money. They bought all the property, set it up, developed the whole industrial park and created a tremendous number of jobs.” Read more.
