Spooky summary

An electrical fire at Arkansas Nuclear One near Russellville forced one of two back up cooling systems for its Unit Two reactor off-line Monday, prompting a precautionary alert for emergency officials in five surrounding counties. The blaze occurred in an auxiliary building with no potential for a radioactive release. The fire began at 12:38 p.m. and was extinguished 10 minutes later without injury.

Appeals Court Judge Wendell Griffen has asked the Judicial Discipline & Disability Commission to end a case accusing him of violating rules restricting judges’ public political speech.

The state could be open to future lawsuits over housing the mentally ill unless it provides treatment in outlying areas to ease overcrowding at the State Hospital, officials told lawmakers Monday. Members of the House and Senate Committees on Public Health, Welfare and Labor discussed the issue in light of a recent lawsuit involving a mentally ill Bella Vista man who died while in the Benton County Jail.

Gov. Mike Huckabee on Monday announced the creation of an exchange program that will allow some Arkansas teachers to spend a year teaching in Taiwan.

Wal-Mart says that it intends to broaden its appeal to all customers by tailoring its advertising to individual stores and communities.

A Virginia-based government services contractor has signed a contract worth up to $164 million with the U.S. State Department and will open a passport-processing facility in Hot Springs that should ultimately create about 150 jobs.

A Little Rock woman who killed a grandmother in a car crash last year was acquitted on mental health grounds Monday after state psychiatrists found that she was incapacitated by schizoaffective disorder at the time of the collision. Carmelita Delores King had been charged with leaving the scene of an accident with death, a felony, and misdemeanor negligent homicide.

Prosecuting Attorney Steve Tabor plans to file charges of attempted capital murder today in Sebastian County Circuit Court against two men arrested Sunday in the shooting of a University of Arkansas at Fort Smith student. One of the suspects is 16 but will be charged as an adult. Terrist Parramore, a freshman guard on the UAFS basketball team, is listed in critical condition Monday at Sparks Regional Medical Center.

Prosecutor Robin Green asked a judge Monday to recuse from hearing two of Benton County’s highest profile cases, which she’s tried unsuccessfully to expedite. Senior Circuit Judge Tom Keith declined to recuse from both a felony drug and theft case against County Coroner Kimberly Scott and a misdemeanor negligent homicide case against former Arkansas State Trooper Larry Norman.

A man was found dead from a gunshot wound on the porch of an east Little Rock home Monday evening. This is the capitol city’s 51st. homicide of the year.

Authorities in south Arkansas are investigating the slaying of an elderly couple whose bodies were found in woods outside of Nashville. The bodies were found Monday night, police said. The victims have not yet been identified.

The third suspect in Friday’s robbery of the Merchants and Planters Bank in McCrory surrendered to Forrest City police Monday, after hiding in a wooded area of St. Francis County and eluding arrest over the weekend, authorities said. Jeremy McEwen of Forrest City walked into the police station shortly after noon and admitted to his role in the robbery

A man has been arrested for trying to use a hundred-dollar bill with no president’s face and only the name of former President Clinton. The man, who has not been identified, was arrested Friday after trying to use the bill to buy cigarettes at a Batesville gas station.

In an unusual twist to a weekend robbery, police had to rescue their K-9 unit dog from the armed robbery suspect the dog was chasing. “The man attacked the dog and attempted to strangle him,” Capt. Cliff Freeman of the Southaven Police Department said Monday. “He had to be pulled off the dog.” Lewis Elliott was charged with armed robbery and taken to the DeSoto County Jail, where he was being held under bonds totaling $79,800.

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Good fences make nervous neighbors

President Bush has signed the bill for a fence between the United States and Mexico into law. It seems odd to me because, when I was a youngster, we were passing laws to build space rockets to explore what lies beyond. Now, we are trying to block others from getting inside, as if a 700-mile obstruction would do any good on a 2,000-mile border.

One little fact that seems to be missing from all the coverage of this momentous signing is the cost of such an extravagant project. If you have ever put up a fence, you know it is not cheap, and this one will have two layers, so that is actually 1,500 miles of fencing.

Let me give you some perspective.

Estimates of the number of undocumented residents is somewhere between 12 and 20 million. The population of Arkansas is about 2.5 million, so the total number of illegals already here would fill up Arkansas six to ten times over. Got it? This is big. I suspect it is beyond control and more creative thinking is in order.

Given the War in Iraq and the so-called wars on such nouns as terror and drugs, the country does not even have the muscle to deal forcibly, if there were the political will. Enter this fence alongside of Iraq and Katrina for Bush administration fiascos.

(Broadcast October 27, 2006)

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Down Memory Lane with Nick Wilson

I am doing some research on the criminal activity of former state senate powerhouse Nick Wilson. The Pocahontas flash got himself convicted of federal corruption charges for engineering legislation that would provide legal help for kids in foster care. It seemed like such a laudable objective, but Nick and some of his legislative cohorts intended it for nothing other than to pay themselves.

I was wondering what I was reporting and writing at the time, so I set forth in my own archives. Between the misspellings and pontificating, it is not a pretty picture. I am not finished, but I plan to report when the work is done. I am able to say that, at the time, Wayne Dumond was one of the top stories. He was still in state prison for a rape it seemed unlikely that he committed. Mike Huckabee was twisting arms and even met privately with the state parole board. It was an unseemly mess. That story dominated my news along with a bunch of lesser items that, in retrospect, seem mighty pidly.

I am looking closely to see if I had anything to note on Mike Beebe, but I will say that it appears the reason Wilson got away with it was that nobody was looking.

(Broadcast October 30, 2006)

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Monday summary at sunrise

Rogers Mayor Steve Womack says that he can’t prove earlier claims that “the clear majority” of his city’s drug and gang problems are caused by illegal aliens, but that won’t keep him from seeking laws penalizing those who employ or rent to illegal aliens in Rogers.

Garland County voters are casting early ballots on paper rather than on new touchscreen voting machines because public and private election officials haven’t been able to program the machines properly.

Voters in Dumas, home to the highest local sales tax rate in the state, have a chance come Election Day to lower the levy, provided they agree to extend the deadline for paying off a pair of public-works bond issues.

The new $9 million Bentonville public library opens today.

Sixteen highway projects worth an estimated $94 million won’t be awarded contracts next month because Congress hasn’t passed a bill that would provide federal money for those and other highway projects around the nation.

A judge has dismissed a lawsuit seeking to prevent Russellville from discharging its sewage directly into the Arkansas River just across the waterway from Dardanelle.

The transgressions of a few work-release inmates will cost their fellow prisoners $2 more per day to continue to participate in the program, according to state prison officials.

Shots fired at a Halloween party sent partygoers running scared through the halls of a Fort Smith Ramada Inn and left a University of Arkansas at Fort Smith basketball player critically injured. Police found Terrist Parramore lying on the ballroom floor with multiple gunshots to the head and chest. Two suspects, one a 16 year-old, are in custody.

Philip Verser of Ashdown is being held at the Pope County Detention Center on $200,000 bond after Russellville police alleged he beat an 18-month-old child. Verser told police the child had fallen from a 32-inch dresser onto a wooden floor. A pediatrician told officers the fall would not have been consistent with the child’s injuries.

After being held at the Pope County Detention Center on $200,000 bond for nearly two years awaiting a jury trial, a Russellville man is free after being acquitted of his three felony charges. Wesley Corley was charged in November 2004 with residential burglary, aggravated assault and possessing cocaine after an alleged violent altercation between him and his ex-wife. He was also charged with third-degree battery and violating an order of protection, both misdemeanors, for which he was convicted and sentenced to one year.

A Garland County Circuit Court jury has acquitted a Royal man of first-degree murder, after a two-day trial. Robert Milton Allen was accused of killing his next-door neighbor, William “Rocky” Foster, on Oct. 20, 2005. The defendant initially said he had shot Foster in self-defense, only to testify Thursday that his son, Zack Allen, then 15, was the shooter. The jury deliberated for a little more than an hour Friday morning before returning an innocent verdict. Prosecutors say they have no plans to charge Zack Allen with the crime.

A former Guy-Perkins substitute, Stacy Renee Massey, was arrested on Thursday, Aug. 24 by Clinton and Conway policemen for suspicion of two counts of first-degree sexual assault on a 16-year-old male. The incident, alleged ot have occurred November 5, 2005,occured in a Clinton Super 8 was reported to police on August 11.

Little Rock ranks 23nd on a list of the nation’s most dangerous cities, to be released today, moving up two places from No. 25 a year earlier. Morgan Quitno Press, a research and publishing firm in Lawrence, Kan compiled the rankings, based on statistics from 2005.

A horse is fighting for its life after it was shot in a North Little Rock pasture. In the past nine months, three other horses have been shot in the same pasture, all of them fatally.

New guidelines developed by the state Department of Higher Education will make it easier for college students to transfer course credits from one Arkansas school to another.

Customer growth partly driven by its My Circle calling plan helped Alltel Corp. post an 11 percent increase in its third-quarter earnings

An owner of the former American Greetings facility in McCrory confirms that a California-based company will open an operation at the site The 780,000-square-foot facility, originally a distribution center for American Greetings Corp.’s Osceola plant, closed in 2003, taking away about 300 jobs from the community of about 1,900.

This year’s seating chart at Little Rock’s Farmers Market – one that separated the vendors of homegrown-only produce from those who import food – was deemed a success and will remain in place next year.

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College bond issue

Remember the big fight over highway bonds last year? Arkansas voters rejected a proposal that would give the Highway Commission perpetual permission to raise money by way of revenue bonds. I supported it because we know that highways need repairs frequently and are subject to heavy damage from truckers.

It turns out that higher ed has had a similar authority since the 1990’s and the college bond issue seeks to continue that on to eternity. This started to bubble up during my conversation with Glen Hooks from the Sierra Club and David Carruth, President of the Arkansas Wildlife Federation. You can hear that interview on lyncho.com. It has a load of good information on political and environmental subjects.

Carruth sent out a letter last night on state finances and he has given me permission to share it with you.

To all:

As most of you are aware one of the problems that is arising with the Grand Prairie, Bayou Meto and Beouf-Tensas irrigation projects is the amount of state money needed and the Ark. Natural Resources Commission’s authority to issue general obligation bonds to pay for them. As we have been finding out, in 1998 the voters passed a measure allow the ARNC to issue up to $300 million of general obligation bonds to pay for various water projects in the state including irrigation projects. No more than $60 million can be issued in a biennium without legislative approval. It was sold as a measure to provide money for drinking water and sewer projects for Arkansas’ cities and town. However, the vast majority of this authorization has been used on these three irrigation projects with Grand Prairie soaking up some $32 million alone. Much of this $32 million has been paid over to the Grand Prairie project as grants meaning the Arkansas taxpayer will have to pay that money back in full. The remaining $17.2 million is in the form of a loan–a loan the irrigation district has no ability to pay back– with no payments due until 2043. In the interim, the Arkansas taxpayer will foot the bill for interest to the bondholders.

The Higher Education bond question that is on the upcomming ballot is exactly like the ARNC bond. Actually, in some respects it is worse because the only cap is a $250 million one along with a restriction that bonds cannot be issued if the total payments in one year reach $24 million including principal and interest. The legislature has no say in whether the bonds are issued, only the governor. In my opinion we would be turning control of our tax dollars over to the bureaucrats who we don’t elect and who don’t have to answer to the voters, only the governor.

The track record of the ANRC with Grand Prairie is an excellant arguement why this power should not be given to the bureaucrats.

I understand the bonds would be used for infrastructure improvments to our colleges and universities. That is not my objection. My objection is that we, the people would not be able to hold the bond issuers, i.e. ADFA accountable. Said another way, I frequently see Senator Jim Luker and Rep. David Dunn in my town asking the voters how they think they (the elected officials) are doing. I have yet to have a state agency, board, commission or bureaucrat do that. The Game and Fish Commission as well as ADEQ have come close but only seek public input or comment to proposed action.

As laudable as its purposes may be, I am voting against the Higher Ed issue for these reasons. With more accountability it would be acceptable. I think the Democrat Gazette has endorsed the measure but I don’t think they understand how it can abused.

David Carruth

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There are new things happening in Eureka Springs concerning the local proposal to lessen the priority of marijuana enforcement. Ryan Denham is on at 10 Monday morning.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Asa Hutchinson returns to the Pat Lynch Show Tuesday (Halloween!) at 9.

Democratic Party Chairman Jason Willett will be around Thursday at 9.

The Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor, Bill Halter, is all set for Friday at 10.

You can call and interview the guests, or email the show. Pat Classic is on the Super Talk Arkansas Network and we expect to welcome a new affiliate next week.

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There are new things happening in Eureka Springs concerning the local proposal to lessen the priority of marijuana enforcement. Ryan Denham is on at 10 Monday morning.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Asa Hutchinson returns to the Pat Lynch Show Tuesday (Halloween!) at 9.

Democratic Party Chairman Jason Willett will be around Thursday at 9.

The Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor, Bill Halter, is all set for Friday at 10.

You can call and interview the guests, or email the show. Pat Classic is on the Super Talk Arkansas Network and we expect to welcome a new affiliate next week.

Filed under: Uncategorized

There are new things happening in Eureka Springs concerning the local proposal to lessen the priority of marijuana enforcement. Ryan Denham is on at 10 Monday morning.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Asa Hutchinson returns to the Pat Lynch Show Tuesday (Halloween!) at 9.

Democratic Party Chairman Jason Willett will be around Thursday at 9.

The Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor, Bill Halter, is all set for Friday at 10.

You can call and interview the guests, or email the show. Pat Classic is on the Super Talk Arkansas Network and we expect to welcome a new affiliate next week.

Filed under: Uncategorized