One school building would be constructed and another renovated if voters in the Carthage School District approve a bond issue being proposed by the Board of Education. The panel on Monday unanimously voted to submit to district residents in the April 8 election a proposed $18 million bond issue that would finance construction of a new Intermediate Center for fourth- and fifth-grade students on district-owned property near Steadley Elementary School.
The Neosho Board of Education on Monday night approved a resolution placing a $24 million bond issue for a new junior high school on the April 8 ballot. Only board member Lynn Otey voted against the measure. The 100,000- to 115,000-square-foot junior high school would house seventh- and eighth-graders.
Gov. Jay Nixon was still making finishing touches to his State of the State address on Monday — a day before he is set to deliver his sixth annual speech to a joint session of the Missouri General Assembly. During his only public event on Monday, Nixon said the speech was still “a little long,” and that he and aides would spend much of the day refining the language and rehearsing ahead of its delivery tonight.
A political action committee formed to endorse and fund candidates in the Joplin City Council and school board races has collected $11,000, according to its first quarterly report. Directors of the Joplin Progress Committee said last month that it was formed with a set of objectives and values that contributors of $500 or more would use to select candidates to support.
After receiving a confidential request for a health hazard evaluation from some employees at the Mars Petcare plant west of Joplin, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health sent a team to the plant to do a walk-through visit. In their request, the employees cited health concerns that included respiratory illness, gastrointestinal illness and allergy symptoms.
Nancy Good, of Joplin, received the Drum Major for Service Award on Monday in honor of her years of service to organizations that help local residents and causes. The award, presented during ceremonies at the Independent Living Center, is the highest honor offered by the Corporation for National and Community Service, the agency responsible for AmeriCorps, Senior Corps and other service organizations.
It has been 974 days since the May 2011 tornado struck Joplin. But there are still families in need of assistance, according to Jerrod Hogan, co-founder of Rebuild Joplin. And in the spirit of the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service, he called Monday on the Joplin community to find and respond to those needs.
Classes were canceled Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but one Missouri Southern State University group put King’s legacy of service to the test by giving up the morning to volunteer. About 50 student athletes and coaches spent the morning at Children’s Haven, 701 S. Picher Ave., to help the shelter — which temporarily houses children and teens in times of family crisis — move into a new, larger home that has been built next door at 711 S. Picher Ave.
Developers made a discovery last summer as they were in the planning stages for a steel mill near Osceola, in northeastern Arkansas. “The property that the local developers own includes a number of archaeological sites, mostly prehistoric Native American settlements,” said Ann Early, state archaeologist of Arkansas. “A few of those properties appear to have historic integrity.”