- Williams considers changing state's math curriculum and ending CATS
Kentucky should consider changing how math is taught in its public schools and ending its student testing system, Senate President David Williams said Monday.
- Eagle Watch Weekends At Dale Hollow Lake
Looking for an unforgettable encounter with nature? Why not visit us for an opportunity to view America's national symbol, the Bald Eagle, in its natural habitat? Our Eagle Weekends are devoted to the observation, education, and conservation of our national symbol. We will be working with the KY Dept. of Fish & Wildlife and Trooper Island to provide you with a weekend you won't soon forget. Each weekend, we will offer guided boat tours on Dale Hollow Lake to view these majestic birds in the wild and educational programs such as a live birds of prey program.
We've never seen so many eagles!!! A success story of species conservation and education in the United States, the American Bald Eagle is a spectacular bird with a captivating history - including its reintroduction to our beautiful Lakes region. Enjoy watching this bird from land and from the water. This annual event includes boat and van eagle-viewing tours, live bird-of-prey programs, conservation and education exhibits and more.
Eagle Watch Weekends
1/16/2009 to 1/17/2009
1/23/2009 to 1/24/2009
2/20/2009 to 2/21/2009
For more Eagle Watch Weekend information, please contact Jamie Avery by email: Jamie.Avery@ky.gov
Dale Hollow Lake State Resort Park
6371 State Park Road
Burkesville, KY 42717-9728
Telephone: (270) 433-7431
Toll Free: (800) 325-2282
- Resolution No. 1: Really Quit Smoking
As if you need to add to the long list of reasons to stub out your smokes for good, new research published online today in the journal Neurology suggests a family history of stroke makes smokers six times more likely to also suffer a stroke. The specific type of aneurysm, called a subarachnoid hemorrhage, is fatal in approximately 35 to 40 percent of cases.
Sounds plenty unappealing, but a nicotine addiction can be as enslaving as heroin. Recent reporting by U.S. News found that going cold turkey-while the most common approach wannabe quitters attempt-is almost always doomed to fail. Smokers who successfully quit tend to recruit multiple resources-and sometimes more than one resource at a time-experts say. From support groups to online smoking cessation help to prescription medications and hypnotism, drawing on a range of options to become a former smoker seems to your best bet.
Occasional smokers are not free of potential damage. A lighter habit-even one that burns through less than a pack a week-can inflict early cardiovascular disease on otherwise healthy young adults.
Kentucky state government is again helping provide free over-the-phone counseling for smokers who want to kick the habit.
Anyone who wants to quit smoking or chewing tobacco can call the tobacco quit line.
1-800-QUIT NOW (1-800-784-8669)
- Putting A Price On Smoking
More than one-fourth of Kentuckians will smoke a cigarette today. The collective costs of those cigarettes add up. In one year, 7,700 Kentuckians die from smoking-related illnesses, Kentuckians spend $1.5 billion on smoking-related health problems and employers lose $2.1 billion in productivity.
Those costs, calculated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, are why health advocates and business leaders say Kentucky should increase its cigarette tax: It's a proven way to get active smokers to stop and, more important, to keep teenagers from starting.
"Smoking is clearly the most preventable cause of illness and death in Kentucky," said Dr. William Hacker, Kentucky's public health commissioner.
According to the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, in just five years, Kentuckians would spend $45 million less on preterm births, low-weight babies, heart attacks and strokes.
Studies have shown that for every 10 percent increase in the cost a pack of cigarettes, 2 percent of adult smokers quit and 6.5 percent of teenagers quit. The health benefit also stems from the teens who decide not to start smoking.
At 28.2 percent, Kentucky has the highest smoking rate in the nation. It has the second highest percentage of youth who smoke and the second-highest percentage of pregnant women who smoke.
Businesses pay for smoking through higher health insurance premiums and taxes to pay for Medicaid, Ridenour said. The chamber first endorsed an increase last year, when members saw the CDC estimates on the cost of smoking. They were stunned, Ridenour said. "Smoking-related diseases are such an economic drag, not only to our economic activity but our productivity," he said. Smoking affects productivity because of smoking breaks and days missed because of sickness, Ridenour said.
- Southern Kentucky Bucks Smoking Ban Trend
Supporters of smoking bans in public places have had a good deal of success in Kentucky the past four years, except in one large swath of the state.
There are no laws against lighting up in restaurants and public places across southern Kentucky, a traditional tobacco-growing region where the political landscape is conservative with a shot of libertarian.
In August 2007, city commissioners in Bowling Green voted 3-2 against a ban on smoking indoors in public places.
In Pulaski County, a coalition asked magistrates to bar smoking in public places and workplaces, but the fiscal court has never voted on the measure, said Dr. Al Perkins, a pathologist active in the group Smoke-Free Pulaski County.
"What we found is, the fiscal court is a complete roadblock," Perkins said.
And at a meeting last June that turned contentious, the board of the 10-county Lake Cumberland District Health Department voted down a resolution in support of initiatives to eliminate smoking in public places in the area.
Then the board approved a motion limiting the ability of smoke-free advocates to bring up the measure again.
Cumberland County Judge-Executive Tim Hicks, who chaired the Lake Cumberland district health board at the time, said one reason he voted against the resolution was that a smoking ban would infringe on business owners' rights.
"I think it should be left up to the business owner whether he allows smoking in his business," Hicks said.
In its 2004 ruling upholding Lexington's indoor smoking ban, the Kentucky Supreme Court said the government's power to promote and safeguard public health trumps individual rights.
- Coal Ash Spill Is Much Larger Than Initially Estimated
A coal ash spill that blanketed residential neighborhoods and contaminated nearby rivers in Roane County, Tenn., earlier this week is more than three times larger than initially estimated, the Tennessee Valley Authority said on Thursday.
Coal ash, a byproduct of burning coal, contains toxic heavy metals like arsenic, lead and selenium that can cause cancer and neurological problems.
Authority officials initially said that about 1.7 million cubic yards of wet coal ash had spilled when the earthen retaining wall of an ash pond breached, but on Thursday they released the results of an aerial survey that showed the actual amount was 5.4 million cubic yards, or enough to flood more than 3,000 acres one foot deep. The amount now said to have been spilled is larger than the amount the Authority initially said was in the pond, 2.6 million cubic yards.
The spill occurred at the Kingston Fossil Plant, one of the authority's largest electrical generating sites, located on the banks of the Emory River about 40 miles west of Knoxville. The ash ponds were separated from the river only by earthen walls. Environmentalists have long argued that coal ash, which can contaminate groundwater and poison aquatic environments, should be stored in lined landfills. But hundreds of plants around the country, most located near rivers that supply the water they need to operate, have similar ponds and mounds of coal ash on site.
- Wal-Mart Will Pay Up to $640 Million in Settlement
Dec. 23 -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, will pay as much as $640 million to settle 63 federal and state class actions claiming the company cheated hourly workers and forced them to work through breaks.
The settlement is "fair and reasonable" for Wal-Mart and Sam's Club hourly workers, said attorney Frank Azar, who represents employees in 14 states. "Wal-Mart has made tremendous strides in wage-and-hour compliance."
Settling these cases shows Wal-Mart is "scared and throwing dead weight overboard" ahead of a possible U.S. congressional vote on legislation making it easier to unionize companies, David Nassar, executive vice president of Wal-Mart Watch, said in a statement.
The Washington-based group has pressed the retailer to raise wages and benefits and supports the Employee Free Choice Act, which would allow unions to side-step secret ballots that employers can require when workers vote on union representation.
Wal-Mart's "decision to settle these cases so suddenly is clearly driven by the knowledge that having such cases pending is strong evidence for the need" for the legislation, Nassar said.
- Presents Passed Out To Needy
Saturday, gifts were passed out to needy families from Cumberland County.
The presents had been donated by church members from Louisville. Some of the church members drove to Burkesville to deliver the presents to the Cumberland County Elementary School and helped load the presents into various vehicles from several local organizations. Staff and volunteers then passed out the presents to needy individual families from Cumberland County.
There were also hats, mittens and gloves given out along with coats for the kids.
- Medicare Rates Nursing Homes
In a new nursing home ranking system by the federal government, 23 percent of Kentucky's 287 nursing homes ranked "much below average" while 10 percent were "much above average." Medicare's new online ratings, available at www.medicare.gov, give consumers a way to compare the quality of care in nursing homes, based on state inspection records, staffing and other measurements.
- Early-Release Injunction Rejected
The state can continue a program under which more than 1,800 convicted felons have been released from prison earlier than under previous rules, a circuit judge ruled Wednesday.
Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip J. Shepherd denied a request for a temporary injunction to shut down the program. Prosecutors have argued that releasing the inmates puts the public at risk.
This year, lawmakers put language in the state budget to change how the Department of Corrections calculates when people get out of prison. The goal was to cut spending on prison costs.
- Beshear's proposals include higher cigarette tax
Gov. Steve Beshear called on Kentucky lawmakers to more than double the state's tax on cigarettes to help offset a $456 million revenue shortfall and avoid deeper cuts in government spending.
- 61 North Water Line Relocation Underway
Road crews are in the process of relocating water utility lines along Highway 61 north of Burkesville between Jones Chapel and KY 704. The purpose of the current work is for the water line to be moved away from where the new road will be located.
Crews are using large track hoes to bust rock and to dig the ditches. The water line is being placed in the ditch, covered with dirt and then straw is spread over the dirt. The crews are working in segments in the existing right of way to avoid going on property that hasn't been acquired by the relocation project from the current owners.
Traffic is being controlled by flagmen when crews need to work near the existing roadway and drivers on KY 61 should expect short delays during the relocation.
- Ralston agrees with proposal
Jerry Ralston grew up in the heart of tobacco country and now is superintendent of Barren County schools, a county where tobacco was once king.
- The High Price of Cheap Eats
Dollar "value meals" at fast food restaurants may not be such a bargain when you look at the potential health costs.
- Road Work At The "Saw Mill Cut"
The "Saw Mill Cut" is a curvy stretch of roadway that cuts through the hillsides where Highway 90 comes from the west through the hills to Burkesville. The KY State Highway Department has planned to straighten out this piece of Highway 90 and contract work has begun.
A few weeks ago the crews began by clear cutting the trees from the area to be leveled. Since then, the bulldozers have cut small roads on angles up the hillsides for the track hoes to move to the top and the dump trucks to go up and down.
Now, they have flagmen controlling the traffic, while the large dump trucks are being loaded and are hauling the rock debris away from the track hoes. Some of the rock debris is piled close to the work site and the rest is being hauled to the north of town where State Road 61 is being relocated.
- Beshear working on relationship with legislature
Steve Beshear's first year as governor produced its share of frustration. He inherited a badly out-of-whack budget and he couldn't pass his top legislative priority, a constitutional amendment to allow expanded ...
- Business People
LEGAL SERVICES Napier Gault PLC announced that Nicholas K. Haynes has joined the law firm as an associate.
- Legislators bill state $1.3 million for travel
FRANKFORT, Ky. -- State Sen. Tom Buford was one of at least seven legislators who got word recently of the state's $456 million revenue shortfall while attending a convention of lawmakers in Duck Key, Fla., at ...
- Schoolsa contingency fund to help soften blow of revenue shortfall, superintendent says
As the state revenues continue to shrink, state officials say local school budgets may not escape reductions as they did when state expenditures were cut earlier this year.
Burkesville is a city in Cumberland County, Kentucky, United States. Nestled among the rolling foothills of Appalachia and bordered by the Cumberland River to the south and east, it is the county seat of Cumberland County. The population was 1,756 at the 2000 census.
Burkesville began as a small riverside settlement even before the Iroquois Indians officially sold the land in 1768 to establish Cumberland County. The settlement was originally called Cumberland Crossings. In 1846 it was incorporated as a city and named Burkesville after Samuel Burk, a prominent citizen leader at that time.
Just as Kentucky was a border state in the American Civil War, so was Burkesville a border town. Burkesville stood on the Cumberland River, a major natural barrier between opposing forces, so Union and Confederate troops as well as guerillas lead by Champ Ferguson sparred across the countryside. Confederate General John Hunt Morgan tore through the area while conducting Morgan's Raid, and General Hylan B. Lyon's raids in December 1864 burned seven courthouses, ending with the one in Burkesville on January 3.
Burkesville was a fairly busy river port whose heyday came during the latter part of the
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