Good Thursday morning.
For those who have returned to this office – and the morning commute – here’s one for you: It’s the 13th annual National Dump the Pump Day. Sponsored by the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), this public awareness day encourages people to “Dump the Pump” by parking their car and riding a bus or train instead.
According to the June APTA Transit Savings Report , a two-person household can save an average of more than $10,160 a year by downsizing to one car and using public transit instead.
Even better? Try biking to work, or, if you live close enough, walking.
It goes without saying that fewer cars on the road is better for the environment. The pandemic lockdowns provided proof of that – in case you actually needed it. But, sadly, the pollution reduction that the world saw as a result of the lockdowns and closures enacted in an effort to curb COVID-19’s spread has come roaring back.
On this day in 1994, after leading police on a slow-speed chase on Southern California freeways, O.J. Simpson was arrested and charged with murder in the slayings of his ex-wife, Nicole, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.
Simpson was later acquitted in a criminal trial, but held liable in a civil trial.
If you are (ahem) of a certain age, like myself, then you definitely remember the infamous slow speed chase on which Simpson, who was driving a white Ford Bronco, led police on an LA freeway. This was actually one of the most-watched TV events in history.
Also on this day in1972, President Richard Nixon’s eventual downfall began with the arrest of five burglars inside the Democratic headquarters in Washington, D.C.’s Watergate complex.
And it was on this day in 2015 that nine people were shot to death in a historic African-American church in Charleston, South Carolina; suspect Dylann Roof was arrested the following morning. He has since been convicted of federal hate crimes and sentenced to death; he later pleaded guilty to state murder charges and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
A VERY nice day is on tap, with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-70s.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden said he had raised human rights and cyberattacks during a summit with Russia’s Vladimir Putin yesterday that provided an early and critical test of his diplomatic skills in the highest-stakes talks of his long career.
Both men called their meeting positive, but Biden did not claim he got Putin to commit to changing his behavior and the Russian leader accepted no responsibility for cyberattacks on the U.S. or for anything else.
After the summit had concluded, the ornate French style manor home was locked up and the leaders were jetting in opposite directions home, the state of relations between the United States and Russia seemed about the same as before.
On the defensive and appearing on edge after ceding the public relations advantage to Putin at their historic summit, Biden lashed out at the American press at the end of a short, 33-minute briefing.
He later apologized to CNN’s chief White House correspondent, Kaitlan Collins, saying: “I shouldn’t have been such a wise guy with the last answer I gave.”
The talks between the two world leaders included a gift with connection to the Southern Tier. Biden gifted Putin a crystal sculpture of an American Bison by Steuben Glass of New York.
The House passed legislation that would make June 19, or Juneteenth – the date commemorating the day news of the Emancipation Proclamation reached Texas -a federal holiday. The bill has passed the Senate and now heads to Biden’s desk.
Attorney General Merrick Garland reversed Trump-era immigration rulings that had made it all but impossible for people to seek asylum in the U.S. over credible fears of domestic abuse or gang violence.
Federal Reserve officials signaled that they expected to raise interest rates from rock bottom sooner than they had previously forecast and that they were taking baby steps toward reducing their vast bond purchases.
The finances of the two most visible groups with members involved in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol – the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers – are sputtering. Leaders are low on cash, struggling with defections and arguing with members over the future.
Construction of new housing in the past 20 years fell 5.5 million units short of long-term historical levels, according to a new National Association of Realtors report, which is calling for a “once-in-a-generation” policy response.
A coronavirus variant first identified in India is “like Covid on steroids,” Andy Slavitt, former White House senior adviser for Covid-19 response, said.
It’s still unclear whether the Delta variant will go the mostly harmless way of other variants – or pose a serious threat to people who choose to skip COVID-19 shots.
The German company CureVac delivered disappointing preliminary results from a clinical trial of its Covid-19 vaccine, dimming hopes that it could help fill the world’s great need.
Emergent BioSolutions was awarded a $628 million federal contract with no competitive bidding. Top executives received big bonuses while factories mostly sat idle and tens of millions of Covid-19 doses were thrown away.
The first attempt to produce industrial-scale quantities of the experimental vaccine that has played a central role in arresting the coronavirus pandemic in the United States was a total failure.
A sense of dread is growing in some of the very poorest countries in the world as virus cases surge and more contagious variants take hold amid a crippling shortage of vaccine.
Live chickens are being given away by local authorities in rural Indonesia as an incentive for older residents to get vaccinated against Covid-19.
The European Union has advised its member nations to lift COVID travel restrictions to once again allow U.S. visitors.
Former President Donald Trump railed against Covid-19 vaccines for school-aged children, falsely making his point by saying that young people – though he didn’t specify which ages – were “not affected or affected badly” by the coronavirus.
Chris Paul of the Phoenix Suns has entered into the NBA’s COVID-19 health and safety protocols, the team announced. He will be out of action for an unknown period of time with the next update on his status scheduled for Saturday.
A Queens couple says they were both permanently furloughed from their jobs for declining to get the COVID-19 vaccine over pregnancy concerns, according to a new lawsuit.
When Bruce Springsteen walks onstage on June 26 in the first show to return to Broadway, his audience will have had to prove that they’ve been vaccinated with a shot approved by the FDA: Moderna’s, Pfizer-BioNTech’s, or Johnson & Johnson’s.
New York Republicans are calling for an end to the broad powers granted to Gov. Andrew Cuomo under the state of emergency following what amounted to a victory lap heralding the rollback of most — but not all — remaining pandemic restrictions.
Bosses are gearing up for an almighty standoff with staff who do not want to return to the office after a year of working from home, with workforces in major cities like New York and San Francisco making a sluggishly slow return to in-person business.
Republican state Sen. Ed Rath introduced legislation attempting to encourage New Yorkers to rejoin the workforce. After four weeks of employment, a person would receive a bonus of $1,200 for returning to work.
Tax revenue for New York state over the last two months were $4 billion higher than initially projected by budget officials, a report released Tuesday by Comptroller Tom DiNapoli found.
After 472 days, drive-thru COVID-19 testing sites will be closing. The site at the University of Albany will close Friday, June 25.
New York City’s crowded field of Democratic mayoral candidates made their final pitch to voters on last night during a debate that lacked substance and was repeatedly derailed by petty squabbles.
Clashing over public safety, education and crises of mental health and street homelessness, the candidates for mayor promoted radically different post-pandemic visions for the city as they made their closing arguments before the June 22 primary.
The candidates were encouraged to sling a little mud when moderators asked them to name the worst idea they’d heard from one of their competitors. They fought over, among other things, defunding the police.
Violent crime, which has been on the rise for a year now, remained a front-and-center issue, and the race’s frontrunner, Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, a former NYPD captain, continued to hammer away at it.
When asked about street homelessness, Andrew Yang said he believed there should be more psychiatric-ward beds. City Comptroller Scott Stringer ridiculed Yang for not having any sense of the cost of such a plan.
Slumping in the polls, Yang biked to a polling station on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and cast his ballot, as the tally of major Democratic mayoral candidates who have voted climbed to four.
Manhattan district attorney candidate Tali Farhadian Weinstein and her husband, a hedge fund manager, paid no federal income taxes in four recent years because they reported negative income from investment losses or used deductions to reduce their bill.
City public schools can now squeeze as many people as they want in outdoor graduation ceremonies — as long as they keep up with masks and social distance.
City schools are gearing up to reopen for full-time in-person classes, but some after-school and extracurricular programs are struggling to reopen their doors – unable to afford costly permits to use city public school buildings.
New York City plans to move about 8,000 homeless people out of hotel rooms and back to barrackslike dorm shelters by the end of July so that the hotels can reopen to the general public, Mayor Bill de Blasio said.
Business leaders are warning the mayor that an influx of federal stimulus aid could be squandered on short-term programs that won’t help the unemployed.
With most COVID restrictions now over, local restaurants that scraped by throughout the pandemic with capacity limits and moving tables for social distancing can finally get back to normal.
The New York City Council is set to approve legislation that provides relief for small businesses, including easing code enforcement and slashing the cost of thousands of fines that mom-and-pop shops and restaurateurs were issued in the past eight years.
Hundreds of locals packed the basement of a Greenwich Village church last night for an emergency meeting to address the recent chaos at Washington Square Park — as police officials promised to “address” their growing concerns.
State Assemblywoman Mary Beth Walsh posted and then deleted a satiric Tweet that said Tuesday night’s fireworks display over the Empire State Plaza would “muffle” the sound of gunfire in Albany.
Sealed bids are now in for downtown Albany’s largest eyesore, but the current owner of the Central Warehouse is saying not so fast, filing for bankruptcy protection to halt the bidding process.
A Schoharie judge has resigned amid a judicial investigation into his “abhorrent and inimical” Facebook posts that revealed his bias against the LGBTQ community and Muslims and pro-police views, the state Commission on Judicial Conduct said.
High school sports, already playing pandemic-contorted seasons, are facing an increasing shortage of people to officiate their games. And it’s being felt locally.
Two young social justice activists who live in the City of Schenectady recently resolved a case against them that earlier this year led to fencing being put up around the main entrance of the police department and city court.
The first changes to plans to replace up to 85 percent of the Troy Atrium were revealed as the new building will be five stories tall instead of six and the CVS store will remain on Third Street instead of moving to the corner of Fulton and Fourth streets.
The New York Racing Association will have three new hospitality areas at Saratoga Race Course set to debut during the upcoming 2021 summer meet.
Saratoga County’s human resources director, who played a large role in the pandemic pay debacle, has been replaced.
The Rensselaer Common Council unanimously passed a resolution that charged the Dunn Landfill and gravel mine as a public nuisance and demanded the state shut it down.
Familiar celebrity faces made an appearance at landmark Albany locations yesterday for the HBO production of the five-part Watergate series, “The White House Plumbers.”
Hydro-Quebec, the large provincially owned power company is partnering with a Mohawk group in co-ownership of a portion of the transmission line they hope will eventually carry electricity from Quebec to New York City.
Not only are there more ticks this year, but a greater share of them carries microbes that make humans sick, especially the bacterium that causes Lyme disease.
The state auctioned off the former SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry presidential residence in DeWitt for $360,000.
Former Pennsylvania Gov. and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge was rushed to the hospital by ambulance after suffering a stroke, his family said.
The embattled Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been voted the “most respected” couple by the young people of Britain, after the Queen.
Gianelli Sausage, the legendary State Fair vendor which also serves Dinosaur Bar-B-Que, will not return to the New York State Fair in 2021, the company confirms.
Three years after workplace misconduct allegations cost veteran TV and radio talk-show host Tavis Smiley his job and a national forum, he’s ending his silence.
The first Asian giant hornet, also known as a “murder hornet,” of 2021 was found by scientists outside Seattle.
