Today's News-Tuesday, June 3rd

Pottsville police are looking for vandals who damaged tombstones at a city cemetery. Between Sunday night and Monday morning, unknown vandals knocked over more than 40 tombstones at Charles Baber Cemetery on West Market Street. The cemetery is operated by Trinity Episcopal Church, and is closed from dusk till 9am. Anyone found on the property at that time can be considered trespassing. Anyone with information should call Pottsville City Hall at 622-1234.

Leaders in the Ukranian Church have announced the closing of two churches in our area. Monsignor Peter Waslo, Philadelphia, announced the closings during weekend services. According to the Republican and Herald, St. Nicholas Ukranian Catholic Church, Mahanoy City, and Holy Trinity Ukranian Catholic Church in St. Clair will close, citing declining membership. These announcements come as the Diocese of Allentown decided to restructure several dozen churches in the county over the weekend. St. Nicholas will close on June 21st and Holy Trinity on June 28th.

Its a cross the Catholic people of Schuylkill County are being asked to bear, as Kerry Dowd reports:


DOWD click to listen


Major Chip Hall, Schuylkill Haven, and Sgt. Anthony Liptok, Pottsville....stationed at Camp Ripper, Iraq.

Hometown values are prominent for two Schuylkill County natives serving with the Marines in Iraq. The odds of two people from the same county working side by side in a foreign country are odds many people wouldn't bet on. However, Sgt. Anthony Liptok and Maj. Chip Hall, both from Schuylkill County, are currently deployed together with Regimental Combat Team 5. Hall and Liptok didn't find out they were from the same area until someone asked how to spell one of their hometowns and they both quickly answered. "We didn't find out that we were from the same hometown till just recently," said Liptok, who is the training non-commissioned officer in charge, RCT-5. "He is the second or third person I have come across in the military that knows where the towns are," said Hall, who is from Schuylkill Haven. Although deployed for a year, they still reminisce about the things that unite both their communities. The volunteer firefighters have block parties all summer long, which brings our communities together," said Hall, 37, who is the future operations and plans officer, RCT-5. "And Yuengling beer, can't forget that." Coming from such a small area, their communities share many of the same likenesses and are high school basketball rivals. The pride in their hometowns is apparent in both Marines. You can view a picture of Liptok and Hall on our news website.

The first annual Kielbasi Festival in Shenandoah on Saturday was a rousing success. Now, the winners have been announced. The competition was tight, and Kathy Reese of Ringtown had the best recipe for fresh kielbasi, and Mike Frendak, Lansford, the top prize in the smoked kielbasi category. Downtown Shenandoah Incorporated sponsored the event on North Main Street Saturday, drawing large crowds. The entries were judged by kielbasi pros Mark Kowalonek, Dave Lukashunis and Mike Stanakis, owners of Shenandoah area kielbasi shops. The winners received the Kielbasi Loving Cup trophy.

A Barry Township garage was the site of a burglary earlier this week. Unknown thieves jimmied a door at Kimmel's Service Center on Deep Creek Road bettwen Sunday and Monday. Inspection stickers were taken, and several hundred dollars damage done to the businesses door. Schuylkill Haven state police are investigating.

A rally was held in Harrisburg Monday, calling for the elimination of property taxes in Pennsylvania. Chuck Nichols has more:

NICHOLS click to listen

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - Gov. Ed Rendell and state legislative leaders have begun a busy June with a frank exchange on spending proposals and major policy priorities. Rendell and top legislators met for two hours at the governor's official residence in Harrisburg as they worked toward approving a budget by the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - One Pennsylvania liberal-arts college is trying to encourage more families to save for college in the hopes that its counterparts will follow suit. Dickinson College in Carlisle is promising a higher rate of return on the Independent 529 plan, a tax-free college savings plan sponsored by more than 270 private colleges. The plan allows families to prepay tuition at a slight discount from today's prices.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Nearly two dozen motorists in the Philadelphia region called AAA over the weekend because they had run out of gas. With gas prices hovering at $4 a gallon, AAA says motorists are gambling by putting less fuel in their tanks. The auto club reported last week that calls from out-of-gas AAA members in Philadelphia doubled between May 2007 and May 2008. They were even higher last month.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A Philadelphia pizza shop owner is dead and the man suspected of shooting him is in the hospital after being captured by members of the shop owner's family. Police were called to the Carnival Pizza shop just after 11 p.m. Monday. They say they found the owner of the pizzeria, a man in his 40s from Saudi Arabia, shot five times during an attempted robbery.

ROSEMONT, Pa. (AP) - Rosemont College in suburban Philadelphia will begin accepting men for the first time in the fall of 2009. The Catholic school's board approved the move after committees at the financially struggling school studied the issue for more than a year. Board president Ron Remnick says the school, founded in 1921, determined it could no longer continue to be viable as a single-sex undergraduate school.

UNDATED (AP) - As voters make their choices in the primary season-ending contests in South Dakota and Montana today, Hillary Clinton's giving no hints of dropping out of the race with Barack Obama. But Bill Clinton told her backers in South Dakota yesterday that it "may be the last day" he's ever involved in such a campaign.

DURHAM, N.C. (AP) - Doctors treating Senator Ted Kennedy are closely watching him for bleeding and blood clots after operating on his cancerous brain tumor yesterday. Kennedy remains hospitalized in North Carolina. He's facing chemotherapy and radiation.

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - An Ohio man accused of traveling to Pakistan and Afghanistan and plotting terrorist bombings against Americans overseas could have faced life in prison. Instead, a plea agreement offered to Christopher Paul calls for a 20-year sentence. He's expected to plead guilty today.

BEIJING (AP) - It was 19 years ago that China launched the military assault on pro-democracy groups in China's Tiananmen Square. A human rights group based in the U.S. says about 130 people are still being held for their role in the demonstrations that were crushed, and it's urging China to free them all now to
improve its image ahead of the Beijing Olympics.

CANTON, Ohio (AP) - Mow the lawn or risk being locked up. The city council in Canton, Ohio, has passed a law that makes a second high-grass violation punishable by a fine of up to 250 dollars and as many as 30 days in jail. The mayor says he wants to clean up neighborhoods.