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Three-way duel over app-based drivers’ classification returns to Beacon Hill

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

A three-way duel over benefits, union representation, and employment classifications for app-based drivers is heating up again on Beacon Hill after a failed ballot question campaign last year.Massachusetts for Independent Work Coalition, backed by some of the largest gig companies, is advocating for legislation that would classify app-based rideshare and delivery drivers as independent contractors with some benefits like an earnings guarantee of $18 an hour.An opposing group says the proposal offers no protections to drivers and keeps them working for long hours with little pay. The Drivers Demand Justice Coalition wants state lawmakers to pass legislation that would give rideshare drivers the right to unionize.Some drivers with the Massachusetts Independent Work Coalition say unionization is a bad move that pigeonholes gig workers.Oscar Rendon said he has driven with Uber and Lyft for more than two years, which has allowed him the flexibility to take care of his mother and take her...

Study: Baltimore children moved from high-poverty to low-poverty areas saw their asthma improve

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

Angela Roberts | The Baltimore SunChildren with asthma whose families participated in a Baltimore program that helped move them from high-poverty neighborhoods to low-poverty ones saw their disease get significantly better, according to a study published Tuesday.The children experienced fewer asthma attacks after moving and struggled with symptoms on fewer days — improvements on par with medication used to treat the chronic condition, said Dr. Craig Pollack, a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the Hopkins School of Nursing and one of the study’s lead authors.Between 2016 and 2020, Pollack and a team of about a dozen other researchers followed a group of children whose families were working with the Baltimore Regional Housing Partnership — a housing program established as a result of a legal settlement that seeks to combat housing segregation by providing housing vouchers and support to help families move to better resourced neighborhoods.Before mov...

Bruins defenseman Hampus Lindholm was playing with a broken foot

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

So now we have a clue as to why Bruins’ defenseman Hampus Lindholm’s game dropped off so dramatically in the playoffs.In a communication with the Swedish publication Aftonbladet last week in explaining why he could not represent Sweden in the World Championships, Lindholm revealed that he’d just found out that he’d been playing with a fractured foot “for the past month,” he wrote in a text.Lindholm blocked a shot in the Bruins’ March 11 win over the Red Wings and did not play in the second half of the weekend back-to-back the next day. He was also given the March 26 game in Carolina off to take care of a nagging injury, coach Jim Montgomery said at the time.Those were the only two games he missed all season. Whether the fracture occurred in that March 11 game or there was subsequent trauma that caused the break is not clear.In the first year of an eight-year, $52 million deal, the big Swede enjoyed a breakout season in which he set a career high in poin...

Mississauga, Brampton set to become independent cities, government sources say

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

Senior Ontario government sources say the province will announce Thursday that it is dissolving the Region of Peel, which includes the municipalities of Mississauga, Brampton and Caledon.Mississauga and Brampton are set to become independent cities, but the sources did not say what would happen with the smaller municipality of Caledon.More to come

Rudy Giuliani sued for defamation by supermarket employee he accused of assault

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

New York (AP) — A man who spent a night in jail for smacking Rudy Giuliani on the back and calling him a “scumbag” is suing him and several New York City police officers for false arrest and defamation.Daniel Gill brought the federal lawsuit in Manhattan court on Wednesday, accusing Giuliani of spinning a tale of political violence from an act of harmless heckling. He says members of the NYPD went along with the deception despite video clearly disproving the account.Giuliani made headlines last June after claiming he was attacked by a supermarket employee in Staten Island during a campaign stop for his son, Andrew, who was running for New York governor.He said an irate man accused him of wanting to kill women, then hit him in the back so hard he felt “like somebody shot me.” Gill, who had no criminal record, was arrested on charges of felony assault.Surveillance video of the incident soon appeared to undercut Giuliani’s story. It showed Gill briskly walking by Giuliani and smacking ...

Animal rights group says chickens were abused, but Tyson Foods cut ties with the farm on its own

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

An animal rights group said Wednesday that a Virginia farm that raised chickens for Tyson Foods mistreated the animals, allowing some of them to go without feed and water at times. But Tyson says it cut ties with the farm in January after it uncovered animal welfare issues there on its own. The group, Animal Outlook, said it had an investigator working undercover at Jannat Farm from August to November of last year observing as 150,000 birds were raised from chicks until they were ready for slaughter. In addition to seeing chickens go without feed for up to 52 hours, the group said it documented instances of physical abuse and filthy conditions at the farm.The Associated Press could not immediately locate a contact at the farm itself. A spokesman for Springdale, Arkansas-based Tyson, which processes 20% of U.S. beef, chicken and pork, denounced the conditions Animal Outlook documented in video and pictures shot at the farm and said the company ended its contract with the farm because...

EPA rule would force clean-up of toxic coal ash dumped in landfills, ponds near power plants

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency is strengthening a rule aimed at controlling and cleaning up toxic waste from coal-fired power plants. A proposal announced Wednesday would for the first time require safe management of so-called coal ash dumped in hundreds of older landfills, “legacy” ponds and other inactive sites that currently are unregulated at the federal level. EPA Administrator Michael Regan said the plan would hold polluters accountable for controlling and cleaning up coal ash, a byproduct of burning coal in that can pollute waterways, groundwater, drinking water and the air. Coal ash contains contaminants such as mercury, chromium and arsenic associated with cancer and other health problems.“Ensuring the health and safety of all people is EPA’s top priority, and this proposed rule represents a crucial step toward safeguarding the air, groundwater, streams and drinking water that communities depend on,” Regan said in a statement.If finalized, the r...

Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky signals focus on family values in closely watched fall race

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

VERSAILLES, Ky. (AP) — As Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear prepares for what could be the most hotly contested election of the year, the first-term Democrat insisted on Wednesday that he would not cede so-called family values issues to his Republican opponent.In his first sit-down interview since Tuesday’s primary, Beshear also tried to contrast his steady leadership with the just-concluded bitter GOP campaign in which state Attorney General Daniel Cameron prevailed in a 12-candidate field. The governor told The Associated Press that he intends to make the general election race about helping families and not trying to “rile people up,” and he accused Cameron of doing just that in his victory speech.“I think sadly from the other side, what we saw last night and what we’ll see is name-calling, stoking division, trying to incite fear or anger or maybe even hatred. And that’s not how we’re supposed to run these elections,” Beshear said.Cameron, buoyed by an endorsement from former Presi...

Federal attorneys agree to pause litigation for water violations in Mississippi’s capital

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Attorneys for the federal government, Mississippi and the state’s capital city have agreed to request to delay litigation from a complaint filed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that said the city wasn’t meeting standards for providing reliable drinking water. In a Wednesday court filing, Government attorneys asked for a six-month stay, which would be the second such order. It’s part of a broader federal push to fix Jackson’s water system, which nearly collapsed last summer and continues to have problems with broken pipes and leaks. In November, the Justice Department filed a complaint on behalf of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, arguing that Jackson has failed to provide drinking water reliably compliant with the Safe Drinking Water Act. An agreement between federal officials and the city put that litigation on hold for six months. U.S. District Court Judge Henry Wingate then appointed Ted Henifin, who spent 15 years mana...

Biden says there’s ‘work to do’ on global stage as he heads to Japan; US debt limit standoff looms

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:14:00 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden said there’s “work to do” on the global stage as he headed to Japan on Wednesday to consult with allies on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s assertiveness in the Pacific at the same time that a debt limit standoff looms at home.With high-stakes talks to head off a federal default underway in Washington, Biden pledged to remain in “constant contact” with negotiators in the capital city while he conducts international diplomacy.The president departed Washington aboard Air Force One a day after scrapping plans for a historic stop in Papua New Guinea and a key visit to Australia amid the showdown with House Republicans over raising the federal debt limit. The three-nation trip had been meant as a triumphant global leadership showcase, and instead threatened to become a truncated reminder of how partisan disagreements have undercut U.S. standing on the global stage.“I’ve cut my trip short in order to be here for the final negotiations an...