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Average long-term US mortgage rates come back down to 6.6%

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

The average long-term U.S. mortgage inched back down this week after five straight weeks of increases, good news for homebuyers as the housing market’s all-important spring buying season gets underway.Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac reported Thursday that the average on the benchmark 30-year rate slid back to 6.60% from 6.73% last week. The average rate a year ago was 4.16%.The average long-term rate hit 7.08% in the fall — a two-decade high — as the Federal Reserve continued to raise its key lending rate in a bid to cool the economy and quash persistent, four-decade high inflation.At its first meeting of 2023 in February, the Fed raised its benchmark lending rate by another 25 basis points, its eighth increase in less than a year. That pushed the central bank’s key rate to a range of 4.5% to 4.75%, its highest level in 15 years. Many economists expect at least three more increases before the end of the year, though some have dialed those expectations back due to the recently devel...

Iowa lawmakers send school bathroom bill to governor

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Transgender students won’t be allowed to use a public school restroom in Iowa that aligns with their gender identity under a bill that Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds was expected to sign into law after it got final legislative approval Thursday.The bill received support only from Republicans, who argued it was needed to protect children who might feel uncomfortable sharing a restroom with a student whose gender identity does not match the sex they were assigned at birth. Opponents countered that the bill was unnecessary and could lead to harassment against transgender students.The House approved the measure 57-39, with five Republicans joining the 34 Democrats present in opposing the proposal. The vote came a week after the Senate approved the bill.Republican Rep. Steven Holt said the bill “applies to everyone equally.” Holt said children have long used different restrooms based on biological and physiological characteristics and this tradition should con...

Mississippi governor OKs longer postpartum Medicaid coverage

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed legislation Thursday to solidify a full year of Medicaid coverage for women after they give birth, saying it’s part of a “new pro-life agenda” to help mothers now that abortion access is restricted.Mississippi usually allows two months of postpartum Medicaid coverage. The state has allowed a full year of the coverage since the COVID-19 public health emergency started in 2020, although many patients have said the state did little to let them know postpartum coverage continued after the usual two months.With national public health emergency set to expire in May, Mississippi officials intensified their debate over committing to a full year of postpartum benefits. Reeves is seeking reelection, and Democrats hammered him for his long refusal to support the extension. The governor endorsed the idea Feb. 26, even though he said he had not seen financial information he wanted to justify the roughly $7 million annual ...

Michigan adds LGBTQ protections to anti-discrimination law

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed legislation Thursday codifying LGBTQ protections into the state’s civil rights law, permanently outlawing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity in the state.The legislation follows a state Supreme Court ruling last year that the Michigan’s Elliot-Larsen Civil Rights Act, which outlaws discrimination in employment, housing, public accommodations and education on the basis of sex, extended to sexual orientation as well.Whitmer’s signature Thursday ensures that the high court’s ruling cannot be reversed in the future and goes one step further in extending protections to include gender identity or expression. It comes at a time, Whitmer said, when there’s a “nationwide assault on our LGBTQ-plus community, especially our trans neighbors, family and friends.” “There are state legislatures across this country dedicating themselves to legalizing discrimination,” Whitmer said. “In Michigan,...

Feds spend $2.4 million on cloud seeding for Colorado River

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

DENVER (AP) — The Southern Nevada Water Authority on Thursday voted to accept a $2.4 million grant from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to fund cloud seeding in other Western states whose rivers feed the parched desert region. The weather modification method uses planes and ground-based cannons to shoot silver iodide crystals into clouds, attracting moisture to the particles that falls as additional snow and rain.The funding comes as key reservoirs on the Colorado River hit record lows and booming Western cities and industries fail to adjust their water use to increasingly shrinking supplies.“This money from Reclamation is wonderful, we just have to decide how exactly it’s going to benefit us,” said Andrew Rickert, who coordinates Colorado’s cloud seeding for the Colorado Water Conservation Board.The federal funding will go toward upgrading manual generators to ones that can be remotely operated, and using planes to seed clouds in key parts of the Upper Colorado Riv...

Family: Video of man’s death shows ‘absolute brutality’

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

DINWIDDIE, Va. (AP) — Video from a state mental hospital shows a Black Virginia man who was handcuffed and shackled being pinned to the ground by deputies who are now facing second-degree murder charges in his death, according to relatives of the man and their attorneys who viewed the footage Thursday.Speaking at a news conference shortly after watching the video, the family and attorneys condemned the brutal treatment they said Irvo Otieno, 28, was subjected to, first at a local jail and then at the state hospital where he died March 6. They called on the U.S. Department of Justice to intervene in the case, saying Otieno’s constitutional rights were clearly violated. Otieno’s case marks the latest example of a Black man’s in-custody death that has law enforcement under scrutiny. It follows the the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols in Memphis, Tennessee, and the killing of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis.Ben Crump, who represented Floyd’s family and...

Supreme Court agrees to hear appeal from media over Quebec secret trial

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

OTTAWA — The Supreme Court of Canada will hear an appeal from the media over a so-called secret trial involving a police informant held in Quebec.The high court said Thursday it has agreed to hear the appeal brought by media organizations including Radio-Canada, La Presse, the Montreal Gazette and The Canadian Press, which had sought a partial or complete lifting of seals imposed on the case.In July, the Quebec Court of Appeal ruled it could not release any information, saying the right of informants to remain anonymous supersedes the principle of court proceedings being open to the public.The original case involved an informant who was convicted of participating in a crime that he or she had revealed to police.The existence of the trial was first reported by La Presse and only became public because the informant appealed his or her conviction and the Court of Appeal in March 2022 released a redacted decision that set aside the conviction and was highly critical of the secrecy surro...

‘Nowhere for him to go’: Ontario parents of son with autism struggling to find care

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

An Owen Sound couple is frustrated by a lack of options available for their son with autism, who has spent the last eight months in the psychiatric unit of a hospital waiting to get the care he needs.Michelle and Sean Crooks have 23-year-old twin sons who both have been diagnosed with autism. During COVID-19, both of their sons struggled without a regular routine, but Aidan started exhibiting violent tendencies.“A year ago, we had been dealing with Aiden through the outpatient psychiatric unit and trying to try out some medications to see if that would help with sleeping and with lessening his aggressive behaviours. And it didn’t really work, and we ended up with more violence,” explained Michelle.It got to the point where the Crooks were forced to call 911, and the police and the mental health unit came to place him in psychiatric care.“Aiden was pretty out of control. In the end, he was attacking anybody. We were afraid and didn’t even want to go to w...

Man who spent 30 years in prison for Chicago murder he said didn't commit released

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

CREST HILL, Ill. — A man who has claimed his innocence for 30 years in a Chicago murder case was released from prison Thursday afternoon.A judge vacated Lee Harris' conviction Thursday morning and in the afternoon, prosecutors said there's not enough evidence to re-try the case. Man convicted of Gold Coast ‘ATM murder’ says he was framed Harris has proclaimed his innocence for all these years and was the subject of a WGN Investigates report that exposed serious questions about his conviction and the investigation that sent him to prison. "I've been unjustly convicted of a crime I had no part in," Harris said at the time. "I trusted the wrong people and that's what got me a 90 year prison sentence."Six years after WGN Investigates shared Harris' story, and 33 years after he was branded a murderer and sentenced to prison, his release essentially confirms his claims."I got 90 years for killing sombody I have never seen, somebody I never seen a day in my life," Harris said.In 1989, Ri...

AG: Illinois lottery employee stole, redeemed winning tickets

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:05:49 GMT

CHICAGO -- An Illinois lottery employee has been charged for stealing and redeeming winning lottery tickets Wednesday.57-year-old Dean Derrick, of SpringfieldAccording to the Illinois Attorney General's Office, 57-year-old Dean Derrick, of Springfield, allegedly stole books of instant lottery tickets from retailers while working as a Lottery sales representative for the Illinois Lottery.Derrick reportedly removed certain books, which he then took to separate retailers to redeem for prize money. His actions are believed to occur between March 23 and April 13, 2022.Derrick was charged Wednesday with four counts of theft of governmental property greater than $500 but less than $10,000, class 2 felonies punishable by three to seven years in prison; seven counts of official misconduct, class 3 felonies punishable by two to five years in prison; and three counts of wire fraud, class 3 felonies punishable by two to five years in prison.The Attorney General's Office alleges Derrick gave a c...