Shaq to film anti-binge drinking PSA with UA students
Al.com – March 29
Former NBA superstar Shaquille O’Neal will visit the University of Alabama next week to film a public service announcement video with students, the university announced today. LessThanUThink, a student-based anti-binge drinking initiative formed at UA in 2010 with help from the Century Council, launched a social media campaign to ask O’Neal, a Century Council partner, to come to the campus. Last year, O’Neal began a partnership with the Century Council to work with college students in producing videos that address binge drinking. After a Twitter campaign using the hashtag #GetShaq2UA reached him, O’Neal tweeted in November that he would come to Tuscaloosa this year. O’Neal, who recently completed classes at the New York Film Academy, will work with advertising and public relations and telecommunication and film students on April 6 to film a student-created PSA on the issue of binge drinking at college.
The Tuscaloosa News – March 30
Fox 6 (Birmingham) – March 29
UA comes together to help the homeless
ABC 33/40 (Birmingham) – March 29
Students at the University of Alabama wanted to learn just what it felt like to be homeless. To learn that lesson, they spent a night…They do this every year as a way to promote awareness of homelessness issues that exist in our state and across the nation. Representatives from Habitat for Humanity, the VA Hospital, Jesus Way shelter and the Tracy Dent Foundation were all there.
Trayvon Martin case: Alabama has ‘stand your ground’ law
Birmingham News – March 30
Alabama has a “stand your ground” law similar to the Florida law that has been at the center of a national debate ever since a neighborhood watchman killed an unarmed teenager…”It essentially is broadening the self-defense doctrine. It allows you to use any kind of physical force against another person even if you could retreat. Previously there was an obligation to retreat,” said University of Alabama School of Law professor Pam Pierson…A key aspect of the law is the notion that a person must have a “reasonable” belief that their life is in danger, Pierson said. “There has to be a reasonable belief. It doesn’t have to be correct belief,” Pierson said.
“In the situation like the one in Florida, if it’s dark and it’s scary and it happened real quick and it’s confusing, all of those circumstances are going to go into an assessment of — no matter how incorrect it was — if it was reasonable,” Pierson said
Letter: Why is the Badger suddenly under attack?
The Muskegon Chronicle – March 29
This is the excerpt for an article by Andrew Morriss titled, “How to Sink a Car Ferry: Government Subsidies Lead to Regulatory Nightmares,” in the January 2000 edition of the magazine The Freeman, ideas on liberty. Morriss, the D. Paul Jones Jr. & Charlene A. Jones Chairholder in Law and professor of business at the University of Alabama, wrote: “Getting Milwaukee the ferry service politicians think it should have apparently takes quite a bit of government help: for starters, $80 million in loan guarantees from the U.S. Maritime Administration to build high-speed hovercraft and a $650,000 loan from the state of Michigan to the town of Muskegon for a dock.
Will Mississippi choose the higher road or follow down a misguided path?
Dailykos.com – March 29
It appears some of Mississippi’s lawmakers are showing neighborly love in the worst way possible–by attempting to push through a copy of Alabama’s HB 56 in their own legislature. Like its widely reviled predecessor, Mississippi’s HB 488 is designed to make living conditions so unbearable for immigrants that they have no choice but to uproot their families and leave the state. And in the process of doing so, the law would trample on the civil rights of citizens, lead to enormous economic losses to the state, and encourage racial profiling and discrimination against all communities of color … a study published by the Center for Business & Economic Research at the University of Alabama shows that HB 56 could shrink Alabama’s economy by $2.3 billion annually and will cost the state no less than 70,000 jobs.
Jackie Hurt is new chief professional officer and president of United Way of West Alabama
The Birmingham Times – March 29
Jackie Wuska Hurt began her duties as the Chief Professional Officer and President of United Way of West Alabama two weeks ago. UWWA is a regional nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing the common good by focusing on education, income, and health stability services in Bibb, Fayette, Greene, Hale, Lamar, Marengo, Pickens, Sumter, and Tuscaloosa counties. Before joining UWWA, Jackie Hurt was Development Director for The University of Alabama Honors College. Prior to her tenure in the Honors College, she was Executive Director and President of the Literacy Council of Central Alabama, a non-profit agency that serves as a clearinghouse for all literacy organizations in Blount, Jefferson, Shelby, St. Claire and Walker counties.