Environment

  • With Low-Impact Development, Cities Hope to Better Control Runoff

    WBHM
    Stormwater runoff is what washes off of parking lots, roadways and rooftops when it rains. Eve Brantley, associate professor of crop, soil and environmental sciences at Auburn University, said it may sound harmless, but it has a big impact.

    “I just feel like it’s the forgotten pollution,” Brantley said.

    She said part of the problem is that stormwater picks up other pollutants like trash and fertilizer. The other issue is the sheer volume of runoff that is discharged into area waterways.

    Cahaba Riverkeeper David Butler sees the impact on a daily basis.

    “So we’re pushing so much water into the river so fast now that, you know when it rains, instead of soaking into the ground, it’s all channeled to the river,” Butler said. “So it rises really quick, falls really quick, and you get a lot more erosion like this.”

    He said all along the river, large sections of the bank have collapsed, often during rainstorms. This strips away vegetation that normally acts as a buffer, leaving dirt to erode into the river and fill it with sediment. Read more.

  GovernmentWatch

  Birmingham Schools

  • Harvard Training Leads to Action Plans for BCS

    Birmingham City Schools administrators who participated in Harvard University’s Public Leadership Project presented the school board with actions they’ve implemented as a result of attending the program.

    In the Aug. 13 board meeting, the team cited the district’s troubled history of superintendent turnover, inconsistent instructional guidelines and poorly defined roles for principals as instructional leaders as the reason 72% of the schools currently score “D” and “F” on the state Educational Report Card. The team identified five strategies for improving schools to a “C” grade or higher by 2023. Read more.

  Environment

  • Ethics Charges in North Birmingham Case Survive Challenge

    The Alabama Ethics Commission did not overstep its authority in bringing state ethics charges against Onis “Trey” Glenn and Willie S. Phillips, a Jefferson County Circuit Court judge has found.

    The cases are related to work by Glenn and Phillips in opposition to the addition of a proposed Superfund site in North Birmingham to the Environmental Protection Agency’s National Priorities List.

    Judge Stephen C. Wallace ruled this week that the state acted properly and in compliance with the Ethics Act, and that the cases should not be summarily dismissed.

    Read more.

  BW Recommends

  BirminghamWatch

  • Nunnelley Selected for Distinguished Mass Media Achievement Award at Auburn

    BirminghamWatch founder Carol Nunnelley has been selected for the 2019 Distinguished Mass Media Achievement Award by the Auburn University Journalism Advisory Council.
    Nunnelley, a graduate of Samford University, is among five journalists who were selected for this year’s journalism awards by the Auburn Council.
    Others who will be honored at a luncheon and program on Sept. 13 are Kim Chandler, Associated Press Alabama capital reporter; Connor Sheets, Alabama Media Group investigative reporter; John Underwood, Baldwin County editor/reporter; and John Zenor, Associated Press sports reporter.
    Read more.

  CongressionalWatch

  • Senators Approve Two-Year Budget Deal That Will Suspend the National Debt Limit

    WASHINGTON – The Senate in two votes last week approved a two-year budget deal that will suspend the national debt limit and possibly raise interest payments to more than $400 million a year.

    One of those votes was to pass the budget; the other was to kill an amendment to prohibit increasing the national debt.

    Both of Alabama’s senators — Richard Shelby, R, and Doug Jones, D — voted for the budget and against the amendment. Read more.

  Education

  • Alabama Schools Ranked 46th in New Study

    A new study by WalletHub ranked Alabama’s schools 46th in the country.

    The study also gave Alabama a quality ranking of 44 and a safety ranking of 47. Alabama ranked among the bottom five states in math test scores and in the bottom 10 states for spending,

    WalletHub’s analysis considered 29 metrics that accounted for performance, funding, safety, class size and instructor credentials. Read more.

    Source: WalletHub

    Source: WalletHub

  Birmingham City Council

  Jefferson County

  • JeffCo Commissioners in Split Vote Give Preliminary Approval to a Support Budget That Cuts Discretionary Spending

    When the last of the Jefferson County Commission’s budget hearings were complete Thursday, commissioners decided on a nonbinding, nonpartisan 3-2 vote to support the support budget for 2020, which allots discretionary funds to commissioners as well as money for transit, sewer fee assistance and other programs.

    Finance Chairman Joe Knight, a Republican, voted with Democratic commissioners Lashunda Scales and Sheila Tyson in favor of the action. Commission President Jimmie Stephens and Commissioner Steve Ammons voted no.

    The complete budget will be considered for official approval at the commission’s Aug. 8 meeting. Read more.

  Birmingham Schools

  Downtown Revitalization

  • Revitalization Planned for Historic Black Business District

    During the days of segregation, African Americans in Birmingham were restricted on where they could shop, eat, and do business. The historic Fourth Avenue District downtown became the place for the growing African American business community to set up shop.

    The community thrived with professional offices, barber shops, a bowling alley, motels, theaters and restaurants. Now there’s renewed focus on revitalizing the district. Read more.

  Mueller Testimony

  Transportation

  • Biometric Technology Comes to Birmingham Airport

    Travelers flying out of Birmingham can now identify themselves with the touch of a finger or an eye scan. At a ribbon cutting ceremony Thursday, officials at the Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport unveiled new fingerprint and identity verification technology from the biometrics company Clear. Read more.

  Black Warrior River

  • Putting a Price Tag on a Fish Kill

    WBHM

    At about 10:30 a.m. on a recent Monday in Walker County, Martha Salomaa parks her white pick-up truck, walks to the edge of a parking lot and points to the river below, the Mulberry Fork.

    “And so the plant, it’s in Hanceville, which is 28 to 30 miles upstream from here,” she says.

    Salomaa is referring to the Tyson Foods Inc. chicken rendering plant. That’s where an estimated 220,000 gallons of partially treated wastewater emptied into this section of the Black Warrior River on June 6th.

    “So by June 10th, you could see hundreds of fish, like floating by, either dead or dying,” Salomaa says.

    According to state officials, it was Alabama’s largest fish kill in recent years. And Salomaa, who is president of the Walker County conservation group Sipsey Heritage Commission (SHC), said the spill didn’t just kill fish, it contaminated the river with high levels of bacteria. In the days following the incident, SHC and the Black Warrior Riverkeeper found unsafe levels of E. coli almost 30 miles downstream from the site of the spill.

    As a result, the Sipsey Heritage Commission cancelled its annual kayak race, scheduled for mid-June, and Salomaa said residents avoided the water for several weeks.

    “You know, like, this river is a way of life,” Salomaa said. “You can’t, you just cannot put a price on that.”

    But state agencies are tasked with putting a price on it. Read more.

  Agriculture

  Economic Development

  • DC BLOX Sponsors a $10,000 Computer Lab at Memorial Park Rec Center in Titusville Community

    When Sheila Tyson asked DC BLOX CEO Jeff Uphues what his company could do for the Titusville Neighborhood it was joining, he offered a fun day in the neighboring park.

    Tyson, the Jefferson County commissioner in whose district the company sits, had other ideas. “We want you to invest in our children’s education,” she said.

    As DC BLOX held the grand opening of its data center on Thursday, Uphues talked about a $10,000 investment in a computer lab just across Sixth Street at Memorial Park Recreation Center. He said the lab is set for use by the entire community.
    Read more.

  Economy

  • Partnership Aims to Make Birmingham’s Economic Growth More Equitable

    WBHM

    Birmingham has gained attention for its downtown rebirth. But the Birmingham area economy still falls behind similar cities, particularly when it comes to job growth. A partnership announced in December between the city and the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C. think tank, aims to boost the Birmingham economy with an eye toward making those gains more equitable. Read more.

  Jefferson County Commission

  • Jefferson County Commission Approves Funding for New Bus Routes

    Lashunda Scales said she finally got what she wanted today when the Jefferson County Commission agreed to supply additional funding for new bus routes without trimming support of those routes in fiscal 2020.

    The commission today added $9,207 to the previously approved $100,000 to expand bus service into Fairfield, Brighton, Lipscomb, Adamsville and Forestdale for three months, through September. Commissioners had talked earlier about cutting transit funding for those areas in half during the next fiscal year. But they opted today to delay action on funding in the new year.

    Commissioner Jimmie Stephens said he believes the $109,207 the commission has approved will fund the new routes into the coming calendar year, perhaps through February.

    Read more.

  About News

  • Investigative Reporting Must Overcome Obstacles From Without and Within

    This week’s child sex trafficking charges against wealthy financier Jeffrey Epstein are a testament to the impact of investigative reporting, in this case by determined journalists from The Miami Herald, who dug through documents, tracked down victims and told a story not only of horrendous crimes but also of enablers and leniency from the court system. It wasn’t easy. Investigative journalism never is. And alarmingly, it’s getting harder to do.
    Uncovering malfeasance is becoming more difficult for multiple reasons. Start with rising government restrictions on access to information (laws and court rulings), non-compliance with open-records statutes, and threats of costly lawsuits by news subjects. Further, the boffo investigations by major national outlets are not being replicated to the same extent at the local and regional levels. The well-documented shrinkage of newsrooms across the U.S. has taken a big bite out of community watchdog journalism, reflected not only in fewer staff to do the job but also in newsroom priorities.
    Read more.

  Birmingham

  • The Story Behind Parcak’s “Archaeology From Space”

    In a coworking space just off of Lakeshore Parkway sits a potential game changer for the future of archaeology – the headquarters of the non-profit GlobalXplorer. The web-based platform invites just about anyone to become a space archaeologist by scanning satellite images in search of undiscovered archaeological sites and signs of looting. It is the brainchild of Sarah Parcak, who is well known for her work using infra-red technology to locate lost tombs, pyramids and settlements in ancient Egypt. Read more.

  Border Crisis

  Birmingham City Council

  Civil Rights History

  • Birmingham Celebrates Historic A.G. Gaston Motel Anniversary

    The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. often planned strategy for the civil rights movement in room 30 at the A.G. Gaston Motel. For others, it was a place for wedding receptions and fancy dances. As restoration of the famed but deteriorating structure begins, Birmingham celebrated the motel’s anniversary and its founder on Monday. Read more.

    WBHM

  Education

  • The 15-Year Fight to Integrate Public Schools

    WBHM

    In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Brown v. Board of Education struck down racial segregation in schools. While the court ordered public schools to desegregate “with all deliberate speed,” the vague language allowed Southern officials to delay and resist school integration for years. It wasn’t until 1969 that the court forced school integration in a case called Alexander v. Holmes. Read more.

  Economy

  The Legislature

  UA-Culverhouse Feud

  Community Foundation

  Abortion Fallout

  • Woodfin Says Abortion Law Is Costing Birmingham Tech Business

    Updated — Two IT companies have canceled or put on hold discussions about moving to Birmingham because of the abortion ban signed into law last week, according to Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin.

    Woodfin told author Diane McWhorter about the changes for an opinion piece published Saturday on CNN.

    McWhorter wrote that Woodfin “confirmed to me today that the abortion ban affected two IT companies considering moves to the city – one canceled outright, while the other ‘put the brakes on negotiations.’” Read more.

  Census Bureau

  • Huntsville Area Leads the State in Population Growth

    The Birmingham-Hoover MSA grew by just 2,116 people in 2017-2018. The area ranked 251th out of 383 MSAs in terms of population growth rate, according to an analysis of census data conducted by the Public Research Council of Alabama.

    The Huntsville MSA led the state in percentage of population growth, ranking it 64th in the country. It added 6,952 people to its ranks in the period.

    Other large metros in the state fell below Birmingham-Hoover in terms of growth, with Mobile ranked 324th and Montgomery 327th. However, those two areas lost population in 2017-2018, as did some other metro areas in the U.S. Read more.

  BirminghamWatch

  • Hank Black Inducted Into UA Student Media’s Wall of Fame for His Service in Journalism

    BirminghamWatch’s Hank Black was inducted into the Wall of Fame for the University of Alabama’s Office of Student Media during an event April 26.

    Black, who covers the environment for BW, was honored for his role as editor in chief of the Crimson White during one of the most turbulent years in the university’s history. Black was editor in 1963, when Vivian Malone and James Hood became the first two black students to successfully enroll at UA, following Gov. George Wallace’s infamous “Stand in the Schoolhouse Door.” Read more.

  BirminghamWatch

  Doug Jones

  • Doug Jones Recounts Church Bombing Prosecution in New Book

    WBHM

    The Klansmen who bombed Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church in 1963, killing four black girls, did not face justice for years. In 1977, then-Alabama Attorney General Bill Baxley won a conviction against Robert Chambliss for his role in the attack. It wasn’t until the early 2000s that two others were tried and convicted. Senator Doug Jones led those later prosecutions and writes about it in his memoir “Bending Toward Justice: The Birmingham Church Bombing that Changed the Course of Cvil Rights.” Read more.