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Billions added to Texas teacher's retirement system

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

AUSTIN (Nexstar) — Texans voted to approve Proposition 9 which will add billions to the Texas retired teacher's pension, according to Associated Press projections. ELECTION DAY BLOG: Texans vote on 14 state constitutional amendments, local propositions Proposition 9, stemming from H.J.R 2 from the 88th regular session, would make an "appropriation of $3.45 billion to the Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS)" to provide cost-of-living adjustments to eligible annuitants within TRS.With 40% of the vote reported, 84% voted in favor of Prop 9.BackgroundJoe Ramirez, a former high school teacher of the year from the Austin Independent School District, has been retired for 11 years, and his pension check of $2,000 hasn't increased since.“People are basically living from month-to-month. And they need to have a little bit more security to make sure that their futures in their golden years are better off,” Ramirez said. Election Results Over a quarter of the system’s beneficiaries rece...

Bertram man sentenced in child pornography case

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) — A Central Texas man was sentenced Monday for advertising child sexual abuse material online, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.According to the DOJ, 35-year-old Neal Staton Grubert, of Bertram, received 15 years in prison, as well five years of supervised release.The DOJ said on July 12, Grubert pleaded guilty to one count of advertising child pornography.An undercover investigation found images and a video uploaded and published by Grubert on a dark website, according to the DOJ.“This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse,” the DOJ said.

Election results: 2023 St. Paul-area races

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Check here for live election results. And remember, there’s an asterisk on all of Tuesday night’s results: Not all absentee ballots have been counted yet. That means some contests won’t be definitively called Tuesday night.App users: Try our mobile site if the chart below is not visible. MINNESOTA GENERAL ELECTION LIVE RESULTSRelated ArticlesElections | Local voters cast ballots in election featuring city council, school board races, ballot questions Elections | Kentucky Gov. Beshear wins reelection. Ohio passes amendment on abortion rights. Follow live updates Elections | What you need to know for Election Day Elections | Voters in the St. Anthony-New Brighton School District will decide on two questions on Tuesday’s ballot Elections | Stillwater School District: Voters will elect board member and decide on $175M bond referendum

City of Albany hosts job fair ahead of ShopRite closure

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) -- The city of Albany is working to help ShopRite employees find jobs before the store closes in December. The city hosted a job fair at the ShopRite location on Central Avenue on Tuesday.It gave ShopRite employees a chance to learn about employment opportunities with the city and then connect them with employment training programs. The goal is to help as many people as possible. Get the latest news, weather, sports and entertainment delivered right to your inbox! "We can't hire everyone, obviously. We do have a limited number of vacancies, but we can help people get jobs," City of Albany Dir. of Human Resources Tatiana Diaz said. "So we felt that it was very important for us to not only be able to help some people with jobs but hold their hand through their job search process."More than 500 current ShopRite employees will lose their jobs. The company said they have not brought in enough revenue to keep those stores open.

Suburban voters select new mayors in Lakewood and Arvada, decide on police and fire funding

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Voters on Tuesday were set to elect new mayors for two of Colorado’s largest cities, bringing to an end eight-year runs at the top of Lakewood’s and Arvada’s municipal power structures.Councilwoman Wendi Strom held a sizable lead over challengers Cathy Kentner and Don Burkhart in Lakewood, the state’s fifth-largest city, with 46.7% of the vote, according to preliminary results released shortly after polls closed at 7 p.m. In Arvada, the state’s seventh-largest city, John Marriott had a slender 50.3% to 49.7% lead over Lauren Simpson.Both Marriott and Simpson currently serve on the City Council.Suburban voters had a host of candidates and ballot issues to decide on in this election, including a myriad of local tax measures and three separate ballot questions in Commerce City about whether residents can keep backyard ducks, chickens and bees. In early results, chickens and bees were in the winning column while ducks were not so welcome.The winner in Lakew...

Incumbent Mike Coffman leading Juan Marcano in Aurora mayor’s race

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Incumbent Mike Coffman had a significant lead in the race for Aurora mayor in the first round of election results posted at 7 p.m. Tuesday.City Council member Juan Marcano is challenging Coffman for the seat, and in the early results, Coffman, who is running for a second term, had 56.61% of the vote to Marcano’s 36.35%, leading by more than 8,100 votes.The third candidate in the race, Jeff Sanford, who ran a limited campaign for the seat, had received 7.04% of the vote.Although the citywide races are nonpartisan, the candidates for mayor and City Council could take Aurora in vastly different directions, depending on who voters ultimately elect.Coffman, a Republican and former U.S. congressman, was elected to his first term leading the left-leaning city in 2019. In 2021, the City Council majority also flipped to conservative leadership. While Coffman and others running for local seats hope to see that trend continue, Marcano, a Democrat, and other progressive candidates are pus...

Proposition HH results: Colorado are rejecting complex property tax relief measure

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Colorado’s wide-ranging Proposition HH, a property tax relief and education-funding measure pressed by the state’s Democratic leaders, was failing by a wide margin Tuesday night, with early results showing it down by more than 20 percentage points. As of 7:45 p.m., nearly 62% of voters had rejected Proposition HH while just under 39% supported it out of 966,000 votes tabulated so far.While 56% of Denver voters were supporting HH, suburban voters were handily rejecting it — “no” votes had a 57% share in Arapahoe County, a 60% share in Jefferson County and a 66% share in Douglas County.The measure, backed by Gov. Jared Polis, became a partisan battleground in an election year without any state races on the ballot. Its complexity reflected the careful aims of supporters, while rallying opposition groups against a measure that, beyond tamping down on coming property tax increases, also proposed to tinker with state tax refunds and significantly boost educat...

Denver Referred Question 2P: Voters supporting extension of preschool tax

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Denver voters are supporting Referred Question 2P, which would permanently extend the existing city sales tax that provides preschool tuition for Denver kids, early results on Tuesday night show.Initial results posted shortly after 7 p.m. by the Denver Elections Division, 75.9% of voters supported the measure while 24.1% opposed it. The measure held a 46,491 vote lead with just under 90,000 ballots counted in that initial posting.If that lead holds, the city’s 0.15% sales tax — or 15 cents on every $100 purchase — that raises money for preschool tuition for Denver kids would become a permanent fixture of the city’s tax hierarchy.As currently written, the tax sunsets in 2026.Denverites first voted to establish a dedicated sales tax stream to provide educational opportunities for 4-year-olds in 2006. That measure established a 0.12%  — or 12 cents on every purchase of $100 dollars — sale tax to fund the city’s preschool program through 2016.In...

John Youngquist holds commanding lead in Denver school board’s at-large race; incumbents trailing

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Candidates supported by education reform groups were leading in the Denver school board election in the first returns Tuesday night, with the two incumbents in the race — Scott Baldermann and Charmaine Lindsay — trailing their challengers. The three candidates — John Youngquist, Kimberlee Sia and Marlene De La Rosa —  backed by Denver Families Action, a deep-pocketed political group with charter-school ties, were ahead as initial election results were posted.Younguist, a former East High principal, held a commanding lead in the at-large race, with 50,579 votes, or 62.84% of the total. Kwame Spearman, the former mayoral candidate and ex-CEO of the Tattered Cover bookstore chain, had 20,371 — or 25.31% — votes. And Brittni Johnson, a community organizer and DPS parent, had 9,536 — or 11.85% — votes. “Thank you to the families, educators, and community leaders that have supported my campaign and gotten us to the finish line,” Youngq...

Proposition II results: Colorado voters favor measure allowing state to keep excess tobacco taxes

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 15:45:52 GMT

Colorado’s tobacco and nicotine taxes will likely remain unchanged and the state will reap an extra $23.65 million in preschool program funding as voters were widely favoring ballot measure Proposition II in early results Tuesday night.In the first batch of results released just after 7 p.m., about 67% of voters were supporting Proposition II and 33% were rejecting it.Prop. II is a tax-retention measure that asked voters to allow the state to keep excess tax collections under the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. It’s a sequel to 2020’s Proposition EE, which raised taxes on cigarettes and other tobacco products and created a new tax on certain nicotine products, such as e-cigarettes and vapes. Voters approved that tax increase by a 2-to-1 margin.Prop. EE added $1.10 to the price of a pack of cigarettes on top of an existing 84-cent tax; the EE portion of the tax is set to increase to $1.40 in July and then to $1.80 in July 2027. Tax increases on other items included...