Eagle drama, Electoral College, T-shirt cannon crime: News from around our 50 states

Colorado State University could have its first female president, pending the approval of the school’s governing board. Joyce McConnell has been chosen to replace outgoing President Tony Frank following a five-month, nationwide search. McConnell is currently provost and vice president for academic affairs at West Virginia University. CSU officials say that during her time at West Virginia University, she led efforts to improve gender equity, focused on raising faculty salaries, and promoted diversity and inclusion. McConnell says she’s excited to bring her passion to CSU and to “help continue the thriving spirit that created this university and is still evident today.” If her selection is approved, she will start her new role July 1 as Frank transitions to his full-time role as chancellor.

Florida Gulf Coast University research released Friday shows airborne cyanobacteria toxins can travel more than a mile inland, raising questions about health consequences for those exposed to the region’s massive blue-green algae blooms last year. Air samplers found two blue-green algae toxins – microcystin and BAMA – at the university’s Buckingham complex, said lead scientist Mike Parsons, a professor of marine biology. Both have been linked by some scientists to grave health problems, including liver cancer and neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s. The devices previously found them at a Cape Coral canal-front home and at the university’s Vester Field Station in Bonita Springs, in particle sizes able to deeply penetrate human lungs.

The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis removed three Michael Jackson items from exhibits this month, joining a handful of organizations that have reassessed connections to the late singer following HBO’s airing of documentary film “Leaving Neverland.” The two-part film focuses on two men who allege Jackson sexually abused them when they were children. A fedora and glove Jackson wore onstage as well as a Jackson poster are no longer on display at the museum. The fedora and glove were displayed in the “American Pop” exhibit in the museum’s Galleries for American Arts and Popular Culture. A Jackson poster was seen as part of a Ryan White tribute in the museum’s “Power of Children” exhibit. White, an Indiana teenager diagnosed with AIDS following a blood transfusion, died in 1990.

Uniquely trained dogs will converge upon Johnson County this spring to round up a rare turtle species for a wildlife conservation project of Bur Oak Land Trust. The concern is for the ornate box turtle, Iowa’s only native terrestrial turtle, which lives on sandy prairies and open forest land. These box turtles are listed as “threatened” in Iowa, so removing them from the wild is illegal, but poaching the turtles to sell as pets is another factor in the species’ decline. Enter John Rucker, a Montana dog trainer and turtle expert who travels in a modified van with his Boykin spaniels. When the dogs find a box turtle, they bring it unharmed to researchers for weighing, shell measuring and photos. The data are valuable for tracking the species health and location, plus managing its habitat to improve survival rates.

Roughly half of Kentuckians surveyed about needle exchanges support the programs that let injection drug users trade used syringes for sterile ones, a new Kentucky Health Issues Poll shows. Interact for Health and the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky partnered to pay for the 2018 poll, released last week. The survey shows that 49 percent of Kentuckians reached support needle exchanges, and 40 percent oppose them. Another 10 percent weren’t sure. Those who were familiar with exchange programs were more likely to favor them. Young adults, ages 18 to 29, and those with a college degree are most likely to support the exchanges, the poll’s demographic results show. Those who live in urban areas are more likely than those living in rural areas to favor the programs.

U.S. Rep. Ralph Abraham is urging President Donald Trump to consider the state for the future headquarters of Trump’s proposed Space Force. The Republican congressman wrote a letter to the president, suggesting Louisiana was an “ideal location” because of its strong existing relationships with the military and NASA. Abraham, who is running for governor, says Space Force would “fit perfectly” at Barksdale Air Force Base in Bossier City. He notes NASA’s existing Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans has built components for the nation’s space program for decades. Space Force would be the first new military service since 1947. Congress first must authorize the new service, making its fate unclear. Critics have questioned the need to create a separate Space Force.

The state has already lost over half a billion dollars in property value because market growth has been impeded by increased tidal flooding linked to sea level rise, according to a new study. Crisfield, Ocean City and West Ocean City top the chart for the state with a combined $87 million in unrealized growth from 2005 to 2017. The study, by Brooklyn nonprofit First Street Foundation, does not measure a decline in home values. Instead it looks at property value appreciation, calculating how much more home values would have risen without the impacts of tidal flooding. The analysis concluded that property values in the Mid-Atlantic region would be worth almost $900 million more without tidal flooding increases over 12 years.

A mild winter coupled with an excessively rainy 2018 may lead to a surge in the number of ticks capable of transmitting Lyme disease this spring, according to researchers at Rutgers University. More black-legged ticks will be out in force as temperatures begin to rise after thriving last summer and fall and surviving the winter thanks to favorable weather. Climate change, which has fostered warmer winters, has contributed to the higher numbers by allowing more ticks and their animal hosts to survive the colder months and spread out to regions that have not typically hosted the arachnid, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states experienced above-average temperatures and precipitation from December through February.

A TV producer hopes a play premiering in the city will help start a national conversation about the rise of white nationalism on college campuses. Paul Grellong wrote “Power of Sail,” which made its worldwide premiere at Greenville’s Warehouse Theatre, opening this past Friday and running through the end of the month. Grellong is a co-executive producer and writer for “Hawaii Five-O” on CBS. “Power of Sail” is about a college professor who has invited a white nationalist speaker to campus, says Mike Sablone, Warehouse Theatre’s producing artistic director. College students find out about the guest speaker, and they, along with some college administrators, become angry. The play explores the professor’s viewpoint as “a free speech absolutist,” Sablone says, in the context of a hateful movement.

Accident victims who receive care from health providers will be protected from unfair billing practices under a new law approved by Gov. Kristi Noem last week. The law would require health providers to submit bills to a patient’s health insurance company rather than holding out for more money by taking a patient’s personal injury settlement. The new law will take effect July 1. The bill’s prime sponsors were Sen. Stace Nelson and Rep. Timothy Johns. It had the support of the South Dakota Trial Lawyers Association. In the controversial billing practice, some providers were making claims against an accident victim’s monetary settlement award. It meant accident victims were being deprived of settlement money they otherwise would have received.

A 750-acre property seen as a linchpin in preserving Vermont’s wild Worcester Mountains likely will be conserved thanks to an anonymous $5 million gift, says the executive director of the Stowe Land Trust. “We have an amazing, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to conserve this outstanding property for our community,” Kristen Sharpless said in a statement last week. “This is the last conservation project of its kind that could happen in our town. It is truly exceptional to have everything coming together to make it possible.” The $5 million gift came through the Vermont Community Foundation, which Executive Director Dan Smith says was the largest grant the foundation has ever made in its 33-year history.