Things You Need to Know: Wales Man Used Jumper Cables to Steal Power AGAIN!
Here are the things you need to know today......
A man from Wales who had already been arrested for climbing an utility pole to illegally connect his home to CMP lines has been arrested again for the same crime. The Bangor Daily News reports not only is this illegal, it is extremely dangerous.
Hallowell City Councilors pulled their decision to move consolidate fire services with Farmingdale. Centralmaine.com reports that anonymous offer, with some conditions, of a $1M for a fire station at Stevens Commons.
More restaurants in Augusta and centralmaine.com reports a new Italian restaurant is coming to the east side.
SAD 49 is looking at one new elementary school for kids from Albion, Clinton and Fairfield. According to centralmaine.com the school in Benton is not as old and was part of that idea.
From the Associated Press:
Elected officials across Maine have alleged that the state has breached its contract with their municipalities by keeping tax revenues intended to reduce pressure on local property taxes. The state under the 44-year-old program is required to provide percent of sales, income and corporate taxes to municipalities, but that threshold hasn't been met in more than a decade.
Maine's Republican governor says he'll testify before Congress against a national monument in his state. Then-President Barack Obama created the Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument last summer on nearly 90,000 acres of donated forestlands. Gov. Paul LePage opposes the designation. LePage called on President Donald Trump to undo the creation of the monument last month. He said on Thursday that he will testify against the monument before Congress in May.
Maine is dealing with so many drug overdose deaths that the state medical examiner is asking for more money to handle the workload. The epidemic of heroin, fentanyl and other opioids is behind a record number of overdose deaths. The attorney general's office has received $150,000 in supplemental state funding this year for the medical examiner and is seeking an additional $300,000 in the next two-year budget.
A company that makes leather products and a start-up that wants to design a new Lyme disease test are among the recipients of more than $1 million in grants from the Maine Technology Institute. The institute says it has approved 25 awards that will support innovation all around the state. The grants will support sectors such as biotechnology, aquaculture and precision manufacturing.
A mechanical engineer at the University of Maine will receive more than a half million dollars to study human voice production. The National Science Foundation is giving Xudong Zheng the grant, which will help him lead a project to use computer models to look at sound production.
Maine Sen. Susan Collins says President Donald Trump's labor secretary nominee should work to protect the Trade Adjustment Assistance program if he is confirmed. Collins, a Republican, is a member of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. She questioned nominee Alex Acosta about the trade adjustment program during a confirmation hearing on Wednesday.
President Donald Trump is threatening to leave "Obamacare" in place and move on to other issues if a House vote on a Republican replacement health care plan fails on Friday. The outcome of the planned vote is impossible to predict. Even after a long day of talks Thursday, both conservative and moderate lawmakers claimed the bill lacked the votes.
A Maryland high school has been thrust into the national immigration debate after a 14-year-old student said she was raped in a school bathroom by two classmates. One is an 18-year-old from Guatemala who came to the U.S. illegally. The White House has weighed in on the incident, saying the president has made a crackdown on illegal immigration a priority "because of tragedies like this."
A new report says international sanctions on North Korea are taking a serious toll on humanitarian aid. The report issued by the United Nations' senior resident official in Pyongyang says sanctions are inadvertently hindering legitimate operations on the ground and have indirectly contributed to a "radical decline" in donations. The report says more than 10 million people — or about 41 percent of the North Korean population — are undernourished.
A suspect is behind bars after police in Sacramento, California, say four people, including two children, were found dead in a home Thursday. Police say the four victims were discovered after a relative told police that something might be wrong and police broke into the home. It's unclear when the victims were killed and police aren't saying how they died.
Utah's governor has signed legislation giving the predominantly Mormon state the strictest drunken driving threshold in the country. Republican Gov. Gary Herbert says lowering the blood alcohol limit for most drivers to 0.05 percent from 0.08 percent will save lives. The change means a 150-pound man would be over the 0.05 limit after two beers, while a 120-pound woman could exceed it after a single drink.