A minor league baseball prospect with the Cincinnati Reds hit an inside the park home run this week and rounded the bases in 13.8 seconds. The shortstop playing for the AA Pensacola Blue Wahoos is known for his speed. He stole 104 bases in 82 games in the first half of the season with a different minor league affiliate of the Reds.
http://youtu.be/wJfmIt6u8h8
Category: Local News
SJPD Officer Recognized For DWI Enforcement
Officer Brendon McGinnis of the St Joseph Police Department is being honored by his peers.
McGinnis was honored by the Law Enforcement Traffic Safety Advisory Council as its Officer of the Year.
McGinnis is a seven-year veteran of law enforcement, and has been with the St Joseph Police Department for more than five years.
Among his accomplishments on the overnight shift were 1,043 traffic citations, including 208 DWI arrests.
At an awards banquet last week, officials said McGinnis “often goes above and beyond his regular assigned duties and strives to assist others when he possibly can.”
He also serves as a DRE instructor (Drug Recognition Expert), a Taser instructor, and a crash reconstruction expert.
The organization had high praise for McGinnis.
“Officer McGinnis sets a standard for all officers to follow, his exceptional dedication to locating and apprehending impaired drivers is impeccable.”
He has also been praised by Mothers Against Drunk Driving for his agressive enforcement stance when it comes to the impaired driver.
20 Years For Murder During Home-Invasion Robbery
A Kansas City man was sentenced to 20-years in prison Wednesday for his role in the fatal home-invasion robbery that claimed the life of Brian Ulmer last year.
Xavier Johnson was one of five people charged in the case.
Prosecutors say he has agreed to testify against his co-defendants.
Officials say Johnson, Kasey Hall and Elijah Picket entered Ulmer’s home to rob the occupants last August. Witnesses say when the gunman threatened one of Ulmer’s children, he tried to intervene and was fatally shot. Two other men were charged with leading the trio to Ulmer’s home near 16th and Jules.
Johnson pleaded guilty to second-degree murder May 15. Sentencing is scheduled July 31 for Hall, who also pleaded guilty. Pickett is scheduled for trial in January.
The other two defendants, Camareo Goodwin and Felix Turner, were charged with murder and attempted robbery. Their cases are pending in Buchanan County Court.
Six Injured In Holt County Accident; Two Children Serious
Six people were hurt, including two young children with serious injuries, after a traffic accident on I-29 north of Craig, Missouri Tuesday afternoon.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol crash report indicates that 36-year-old Kyi Htoo of Kansas City, Kansas lost control of his Ford Escape. The vehicle left the highway, overturned, and then careened through a fence into a corn field.
Two children, ages six and three, were flown to Children’s Mercy Hospital for treatment. Four others were treated at Community Hospital in Fairfax.
NASA Image Shows Current Drought Impact to Midwest, Missouri.
An image from NASA shows the impact of the drought across the United States.
The extent of damage to crops is shown in this vegetation anomaly map based on data from the NASA Terra satellite. The map contrasts plant health in the central United States between June 25 and July 10, 2012, against the average conditions between 2002 and 2012. Brown areas show where plant growth was less vigorous than normal; cream colors depict normal levels of growth; and green indicates abnormally lush vegetation. Data was not available in the gray areas due to snow or cloud cover. The image is based on the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), a measure of how much plant leaves absorb visible light and reflect infrared light. Drought-stressed vegetation reflects more visible light and less infrared than healthy vegetation.
The most severe damage to crops appears to be centered on Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas, Nebraska, and South Dakota. Crops in much of the upper Midwest—southern Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, southern Illinois, western Kentucky, and western Tennessee—also show signs of strain. The drought has been less severe in Iowa, a key corn-growing state.
Barnard Man Recovering after Tractor, Semi Collide Tuesday
A Barnard man was flown to Heartland after an accident involving a semi and a farm tractor south of Maryville Tuesday.
A tractor-trailer unit came over a hill in the southbound lane of US 71 Highway and crashed into the back of a John Deere tractor pulling farm equipment.
The Missouri Highway Patrol reports it happened just after 11:00 am at the intersection of Highway 71 and State route M. Driver of the tractor, 59-year-old Ed Lager of Barnard, suffered serious injuries including multiple broken bones and was flown to Heartland for treatment.
49-year-old driver of the semi, David Snow of Joplin, was taken to Maryville for treatment of what’s described as moderate injuries.
Another accident on Highway 71 earlier in the morning sent three to the hospital in Maryville.
A ford truck driven by 77-year-old Mary Williams of Clarinda was turning left from the right southbound lane, and into the path of a Ford Taurus driven by a 13-year-old Kristin Misner of Iowa. Williams was taken to the hospital with minor injuries.
Two teenage passengers in the Taurus, ages 15 and 16, were taken to the hospital with minor injuries as well.
Missouri Salutes Conservation Pioneer
The Missouri Department of Conservation is honoring conservation pioneer Aldo Leopold, author of the landmark Sand County Almanac. The department will host a free event Saturday at the Anita Gorman Discovery Center in Kansas City, screening the movie Green Fire, Aldo Leopold and a Land Ethic For Our Time. The center will also host activities and hands-on workshops aimed at applying conservation in our daily lives. It starts at 10 Saturday morning at the Gorman Discovery Center, 4750 Troost Avenue.
Retail Food Prices Down Slightly in Second Quarter
There was a slight decline in retail food prices at the supermarket during the second quarter of 2012 according to the American Farm Bureau Federation Marketbasket Survey. This informal survey shows a drop of about three-percent for the total cost of the 16 food items surveyed compared to the first quarter of 2012. The cost for the overall basket of goods – at $50.91 – is down about one-half of one-percent compared to a year ago.
Most of the decrease was due to lower retail prices for sliced meats and dairy products. Farm Bureau Senior Economist John Anderson says the decline in retail meat prices is not unexpected. He says wholesale meat prices trended lower at the end of the first quarter of the year and consumers are now benefitting as retail prices have followed suit.
Prices for shredded cheddar, sliced deli ham, orange juice, bacon, large eggs, toasted oat cereal, bagged salad, apples, sirloin tip roast and flour all decreased in the second quarter – reversing increases of the prior quarter. Whole milk and boneless chicken breasts also decreased in price – continuing the trend from the first quarter. Farm Bureau’s survey showed modest retail price increases for ground chuck, Russet potatoes, white bread and vegetable oil.
Seventy-four shoppers in 28 states participated in Farm Bureau’s Marketbasket Survey for the second quarter. It was conducted in May.
NCBA Commends EPA Decision to Withdraw Proposed Livestock Reporting Rule
The Environmental Protection Agency withdrew its proposed Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation Reporting Rule late Friday afternoon. National Cattlemen’s Beef Association President J.D. Alexander says the move is a victory for cattlemen and women. He notes NCBA called on the EPA to pull the rule early on. The fact that the EPA listened – he says – showcases the importance of cattle producers getting engaged in the regulatory process and making their concerns heard. Alexander says NCBA is encouraging EPA to redirect its focus to working with states and other partners to attain already publicly available information that would allow them to work toward their goal of water quality. He says it can be done in a way that doesn’t put the U.S. food system at increased risk – which was the primary concern of NCBA.
Cattle operations meeting the regulatory definition of a CAFO would have been required to report information about their operations to EPA under the proposed rule. The agency was going to place the information – including latitude and longitude or street address of the production area – on its website in an easily searchable database. NCBA feared extremists could access the information with the intent to do harm to cattle operations or the nation’s food system.
Cattle Producers Making Tough Decision to Sell
Lack of rain was definitely a big problem for some parts of the country last year. The effects had a big impact on a larger portion of the nation and were expected to be felt for years to come. Now – a drought is stretching across a record-breaking one-thousand-sixteen counties in the U.S. As was the case for cattle producers in Texas and Oklahoma in 2011 – ranchers are finding it difficult to feed their cattle. As a result – they are reducing their herds and selling their cattle to avoid the mounting losses caused by this widespread drought. The New York Times reports that the town of Torrington, Wyoming is an example of just how bad the situation has become. Normally – the Torrington Livestock Markets would be quiet on a Wednesday in the summer months. But they are doing four times as much early-season business as usual. In fact – they auctioned off more than 17-thousand head of cattle last month – compared with around 33-hundred in June of 2011.
Ranchers are losing money – in some cases hundreds of dollars for each animal they sell early – because they are younger and lighter than those fed all summer on prairie grass. For some that will mean the difference between profit and loss. One producer at Torrington said it would take two to three years to recover. He says people are cutting down – but if the drought continues for another year – it could put a lot of people out of business.
The impact could be felt at the supermarket as well. Experts note the sale of cows and calves that otherwise would have produced more cows and calves could ultimately reduce beef production and drive prices higher. USDA most recently projected American beef production to fall by about one-billion pounds this year as compared to 2011. A USDA cattle analyst says U.S. cattle inventories are the lowest they’ve been in several decades. Any plans producers had to expand their herds went out the window with the resurrected drought.