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New arts program will connect student artists to PA Turnpike New partnership, Art Sparks, will develop public art created by local students HUMMELSTOWN, PA. (March 30, 2017) — Today, the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) and Pennsylvania Council for the Arts (PCA) announced a new partnership that connects student artists with art being developed for stops along the PA Turnpike. The new program, called Art Sparks, will utilize the PCA’s Arts in Education residency program to develop student-created, original pieces of art for Turnpike service plazas across the 550-mile system. These public art pieces will be on display in service plazas...

Pennsylvania's 2018 race for U.S. Senate is getting underway. Rick Saccone, a fiery Republican state lawmaker from suburban Pittsburgh, formally declared his candidacy Tuesday to challenge Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey. Saccone held the event in the Pennsylvania Capitol, where he was joined by conservative supporters. The 59-year-old Saccone is one of the state Legislature's staunchest conservatives and is a strong backer of President Donald Trump.

A 20-year-old Harrisburg man pleaded guilty Monday to trying to help the Islamic State group and to tweeting out a list that identified and targeted people serving in the U.S. military. Jalil Ibn Ameer Aziz faces the potential of up to 25 years and a $500,000 fine after admitting to a charge of conspiring to provide material support to the Islamic State group and to transmitting a communication containing a threat, both felonies. Aziz, a natural born American arrested in Harrisburg in December 2015, used about 70 different Twitter accounts and an encrypted mobile messaging application to spread messages from...

Did you notice the labor that went into painting each and every block of the new sound barrier? On the Pennsylvania Turnpike between Route 83 and the Interstate 283/Harrisburg East exits, recently I have observed contractors on lifts individually spray-painting each and every block on the sound barrier/retaining wall. I was hoping what I was seeing was not what I thought, so wasteful. But the main question is why was this level and type of expense happening at all? Is natural concrete not acceptable for cars on the turnpike traveling 70 miles per hour to see? The concrete barriers in...

Msgr. Vincent Topper, the oldest and longest-serving priest in the country, died Oct. 7. He was 104 years old and celebrated the 80th anniversary of his Ordination to Priesthood on May 24 of this year. According to research done by Zenit News he may have been the longest ordained diocesan priest in the world. “His life was a shining example of fidelity and cooperation with God’s grace in a selfless and dedicated manner,” Bishop Ronald Gainer said of Msgr. Topper, who was a priest of the Diocese of Harrisburg for 80 years. “He has seen and personally experienced so much...

HARRISBURG — Motorists blow past Pennsylvania Turnpike toll booths every year, resulting in millions of dollars of losses. The agency that manages more than 500 miles of highway is supporting legislation to punish those scofflaws. A bill pending in the state Senate would “give us the hammer we need to go after habitual toll cheats,” Turnpike Commission Chairman Sean Logan said. “This measure would ensure that everyone pays their fair share. There are no free rides.” The bill by Senate Transportation Chairman John Rafferty, R-Montgomery County, and Senate Minority Leader Jay Costa, D-Forest Hills, would allow PennDOT to suspend the...

Pennsylvania city of Harrisburg is STILL plowing snow from January blizzard despite it being 70 degrees A Pennsylvania city is still clearing snow left from a record-breaking blizzard that occurred two months ago despite it being 70 degrees. An estimated 15,000 tons of snow from the city of Harrisburg and surrounding municipalities was piled high on City Island following a 30-inch snowfall in January. And for the last three weeks, city employees have been using gas-powered burners to help melt the remaining piles of snow before its baseball team's opening day in April, according to Pennlive.

HARRISBURG - Dozens of protesters took a stand against the National Civil War Museum Wednesday, saying that an exhibit currently on display and sponsored by the NRA sends the wrong message to young people. “This public institution is highlighting guns when we in fact are trying to get them off the streets and limit their use,” Homer Floyd, a demonstrator, said. Much of the anger is directed at the display of a pistol used by William Quantrill, a Confederate fighter who captured runaway slaves in Kansas and Missouri. In one such raid during the Civil War, Quantrill and his group...

The mayor of Harrisburg, Penn., ordered his police department on Friday not to provide security for an upcoming NRA-sponsored gun show after the association refused to meet a demand to pay a 60-percent increase in fees for the service. Harrisburg police have provided security for the annual Great American Outdoors Show, scheduled this year for February 6-14, in the past. Mayor Eric Papenfuse said that the decision not to offer the department’s services this year was motivated in part by the NRA’s opposition to the city’s gun control policies. “We have an epidemic of gun violence,” Papenfuse told WHTM. “It’s...

HARRISBURG — The midtown home sat quietly Thursday night with two single sheets of white paper posted to the door with a clear message: No Comment No News! No Trespassing. Hours earlier, FBI agents stormed and raided the home in the 1700 block of Fulton Street, where the U.S. District Attorney's Office said 19-year-old Jalil Ibn Ameer Aziz lived. Aziz, now held in federal custody, has been charged in supporting the ISIS terrorist organization through various means. Agents said they found a tactical backpack, high-capacity gun magazines, ammunition and a "modified kitchen knife" among his belongings in the home, according...

HARRISBURG - State Attorney General Kathleen G. Kane, who has castigated prosecutors, judges, and others for exchanging offensive emails, failed to disclose that her twin sister - a top prosecutor on her staff - sent and received emails that mocked African Americans and Asians, joked about domestic abuse, and included photos of scantily clad men and women. Kane made public her sister's emails late Wednesday after coming under pressure from a Philadelphia prosecutor, who asserted that Kane's sister had sent or received 58 troubling emails - and Kane herself had received 11. The 49-year-old Democrat and her sister, Ellen Granahan,...

Is the Obama Administration Trafficking in Illegals or Refugees through UPS Flights & then Moved on Buses? Is the Obama Administration Trafficking in Illegals or Refugees through UPS Flights & then Moved on Buses? In a video that appeared earlier this month, a man is claiming that he videoed several buses that are carrying people who were brought in from a United Parcel Service flight. He discusses what he saw prior to filming which he described as people who came in on a UPS flight into Harrisburg International Airport. He also claims that it was supposed to be a parcel...

Former Harrisburg Mayor Stephen R. Reed was charged Tuesday with a battery of theft, fraud and bribery charges that, if proven, would stamp corruption in indelible ink on the Reed Era. They would also likely put Reed, who has been out of office since January 2010 and has indicated his intent to fight for vindication, in jail. The 65-year-old Reed was arraigned before Magisterial District Judge William Wenner Tuesday on charges that go right to the heart of his longtime role as benevolent dictator of Pennsylvania's Capital City.

About 10 or 15 minutes after the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its 5-4 decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, which made gay marriage legal across the country, including the 13 states that up until now had banned it, a colleague of mine walked into the PennLive newsroom. A smile lit up her face and there were tears in her eyes. Up until about 10 a.m. on Friday, my gay colleague sat on pins and needles, waiting to see if nine lawyers were about to throw the life and her and her partner into absolute upheaval. We embraced and I offered...

A court ruling striking down a Pennsylvania law that made it easier for gun-rights advocates like the National Rifle Association to challenge local gun ordinances is drawing strong reaction from both sides of the issue. A spokesman for Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter says Thursday’s Commonwealth Court ruling that the law is unconstitutional will allow municipalities to pursue common-sense gun safety requirements. Sen. Daylin Leach is one of five Democrats who joined in the challenge of the law. He says municipalities that repealed their gun ordinances because of the law can now restore them. An attorney for four pro-gun groups dismisses...

A shocking chart released this week shows that nine of the top ten cities have more retirees collecting pensions than current employees contributing to the fund. It’s happening in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Scranton, and Harrisburg. “It’s a major problem,” said Representative Seth Grove (R-York). “We have local governments that are on the verge of bankruptcy.” Auditor General Eugene DePasquale has been raising alarms across the state about the fiscal frailty of municipal pensions. “One-quarter of all the municipal pensions in the United States are in Pennsylvania,” DePasquale said. That’s a lot of little communities managing pension plans and DePasquale says nearly half...

Mayor Nutter will ask City Council on Thursday to approve a 9.3 percent increase in property taxes to fund the beleaguered School District. In his final budget address as mayor, Nutter will ask Council - in an election year - to approve a $3.95 billion spending plan that would raise property owners' taxes by hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year. Currently, the tax bill for a home assessed at the median of $113,000 is $1,112. If Nutter's proposal was approved, it would go up to $1,216. Details of the budget were disclosed to Council members Wednesday morning in...

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf's budget proposal unveiled Tuesday drastically changes education funding and represents a windfall for Harrisburg residents, said Harrisburg Mayor Eric Papenfuse. The new governor's proposal completely wipes out school property taxes for Harrisburg homeowners. School taxes currently represent the bulk of homeowners' property taxes. "This is news everyone in Harrisburg needs to hear," said Papenfuse, who could hardly contain his enthusiasm. Harrisburg was among several distressed cities whose residents would get to zero out their school property taxes. Specifically, Harrisburg is in line for a 155-percent property tax reduction. That means the state would provide relief representing...

HARRISBURG – A tractor-trailer driver faces charges after police say he forced a driver into the median in a road rage incident on Friday. State Police at Harrisburg charged Stepan Brezden, 42, of Willowbrook, Illinois, with one count of reckless driving and one count of driving on roadways laned for traffic after a road rage incident on Interstate 81 south near Lemoyne. Police said Brezden was driving his tractor-trailer erratically while “engrossed in a bout of road rage” with another driver. During the incident, police said Brezden forced the driver, a 22-year-old Mechanicsburg woman, into the center median of the...

Pennsylvania's capital is facing a lawsuit believed to be the first filed under a new state law designed to give gun owners and gun rights groups a better chance at dismantling illegal municipal firearms ordinances. Houston-based U.S. Law Shield and two members of its Pennsylvania chapter filed the lawsuit, asking the court to stop Harrisburg from enforcing various firearms ordinances. They include ordinances that ban possession of firearms in parks, allow the mayor to prohibit public possession of weapons in a declared state of emergency and require gun owners to report lost or stolen firearms to police. The 48-page complaint...