Chicago teachers return to class
Chicago teachers return to class
CHICAGO (AP) — Mayor Rahm Emanuel secured an extension of Chicago’s school day and empowered principals to hire the teachers they want. Teachers were able to soften a new evaluation process and win some job protections.
As students returned to the classroom Wednesday following a seven-day teachers strike, both sides found reasons to celebrate victory. But for all the rhetoric, the wider effects of the walkout were difficult to gauge, and experts said the walkout might not resonate far beyond Chicago, a union-built city where organized labor still wields much power.
“I think a lot of what went on to a certain extent is peculiar to Chicago,” said Martin Malin, director of the Institute for Law and the Workplace at the Kent College of Law in Chicago.
A report that characterized the relationship between the teachers union and Emanuel as “toxic” was on point, Malin said. Now that a deal has been reached, the challenge for both parties “is to seize that and work on really transforming the relationship.”
Everyone involved in the dispute emerged with an achievement to trumpet: Teachers said the strike sparked an important national conversation about school reform. Union activists said it provided inspiration for public employee unions that have lost ground nationally. And Emanuel declared it a boon for students trapped in failing schools.
Endeavour has Houston stopover
HOUSTON (AP) —Waving American flags and space shuttle toys, hundreds of people lined the streets and crowded the airport Wednesday as they watched space shuttle Endeavour touch down in Houston on its way to be permanently displayed in California.
But for many, the experience was bittersweet, tinged with an aftertaste of having been cheated of something they believe should rightfully have been theirs.
“I think that it’s the worst thing that they can do, rotten all the way,” said 84-year-old Mary Weiss, clinging to her walker just before Endeavour, riding piggy back on a jumbo jet, landed after flying low over Gulf Coast towns, New Orleans and then downtown Houston and its airports.
Space City, partly made famous by Tom Hanks when he uttered the line “Houston, we have a problem” in the movie “Apollo 13,” has long tied its fortune to a mix of oil and NASA. Astronauts train in the humid, mosquito-ridden city. Many call it home years after they retire. The Johnson Space Center and an adjacent museum hug Galveston Bay.
Yet Houston’s bid for a shuttle was rejected after the White House retired the fleet last summer to spend more time and money on reaching destinations such as asteroids and Mars. Instead, Houston got a replica that used to be displayed at the Kennedy Space Center.
Agency faulted in gun trafficking
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department’s internal watchdog on Wednesday faulted the agency for misguided strategies, errors in judgment and management failures during a bungled gun-trafficking probe in Arizona that disregarded public safety and resulted in hundreds of weapons turning up at crime scenes in the U.S. and Mexico.
A former head of the department’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and a deputy assistant attorney general in Justice’s criminal division in Washington left the department upon the report’s release — the first by retirement, the second by resignation.
In the 471-page report, Inspector General Michael Horowitz referred more than a dozen people for possible department disciplinary action for their roles in Operation Fast and Furious and a separate, earlier probe known as Wide Receiver, undertaken during the George W. Bush administration. A former acting deputy attorney general and the head of the criminal division were criticized for actions and omissions related to operations subsequent to and preceding Fast and Furious.
Town’s rental ban
for illegals mulled
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A Dallas suburb asked a federal appeals court Wednesday to uphold an ordinance that would ban illegal immigrants from renting homes in the town.
The full 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed to rehear the case after a three-judge panel from the court ruled in March that Farmers Branch’s ordinance is unconstitutional and impermissibly interferes with the federal immigration system.
The court’s 15 judges didn’t indicate when they would rule after hearing arguments Wednesday from attorneys for the town and a group of landlords and tenants who sued to block the ordinance’s enforcement.
Arguments largely focused on how the case is affected by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June on Arizona’s tough immigration law. That ruling rejected major parts of the law, but upheld the so-called “show me your papers” requirement, which gives law enforcement authority to check a person’s legal status if officers have reasonable suspicion he or she is in the U.S. illegally.
Man arrested in LSU bomb threat
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Police have arrested a suspect in the bomb threat that led to the evacuation of the LSU campus earlier this week but don’t believe he is connected to threats made against three other universities recently.
LSU Police Capt. Cory Lalonde said officers arrested William Bouvay Jr., 42, of Baton Rouge late Tuesday night after an investigation by multiple law enforcement agencies.
Lalonde said Bouvay was not an LSU student and appeared to have no connection to the campus. He did not know what the suspect’s motive might have been. Investigators don’t think Bouvay is connected to threats made last week at college campuses in Texas, North Dakota and Ohio.
“We don’t believe at this point that there is any connection to the bomb threats at other universities,” Lalonde said.
Lalonde said police tracked Bouvay down after determining the 911 call received Monday at 10:32 a.m. CDT came from a deactivated cellphone that could only make emergency calls.
Lalonde said investigators were able to pinpoint the location of the cell phone on Tuesday and searched homes in the Baton Rouge neighborhood before identifying Bouvay as a suspect.
“Upon questioning, he admitted to making the phone call,” Lalonde said, adding that Bouvay has been cooperative.
The threat set into motion a massive evacuation of the sprawling campus that sparked traffic jams as thousands left.
The caller didn’t specify where on campus bombs might be planted, so bomb-squad officers with explosives-sniffing dogs were called in to search all buildings.
As with the threats made last week at the University of Texas, North Dakota State University and Hiram College, the search failed to turn up explosives.
Lalonde said authorities believe Bouvay is the person who called the East Baton Rouge Parish 911 Center, claiming multiple bombs would detonate on campus within two hours.
According to police documents, the caller said, “Yes, I planted three bombs at LSU’s school campus,” and added, “This is not a joke.” Authorities believe he was the only person involved in the Baton Rouge scare and Lalonde said they don’t anticipate making any further arrests.
Authorities said he will be charged with communicating false information of a planned bombing and could face other charges.
Moore said Bouvay does not have a lawyer yet. Calls to a listing for Bouvay in Baton Rouge rang unanswered.
The university was upbeat before Monday’s threat after LSU rose to No. 2 in The Associated Press college football poll with a win over Idaho on Saturday.
Officials believe a majority of the university’s 30,000 students, professors and employees were on campus when the threat was made.
Students were allowed to return to dormitories late Monday night and classes resumed on Tuesday. An estimated 6,000 students live on campus.
Interim LSU President William Jenkins said he’s pleased at how swiftly a suspect was identified and apprehended, but doesn’t know why Bouvay targeted LSU.
“I’m very proud of our resilience, as disruptive and as harmful as this episode was. We’re back at work and once again we’re a productive, thriving university,” he said.