State
Arkabutla ag land available for lease
DeSoto Times-Tribune
Some agricultural land at Arkabutla Lake is being made available for lease to the public, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported Tuesday.
PARTS OF TENN-TOM WATERWAY REMAIN CLOSED
WCBI
The Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway has been officially shut down for around a month.
Sandbars on the canal have made it impossible for barges to get through.
Greenwood City Wide Cleanup Day Scheduled for April 22nd
DeltaNewsTV
The plan for Monday April 22nd, is to clean up some high litter zones in Greenwood.
In honor of Earth Day, Greenwood residents plan to hold a City wide cleanup.
Keep Itawamba Beautiful returns April 15-27
Itawamba County Times
Itawamba County will be getting its much-needed annual spring cleaning next month.
A two-week span, April 15-27, has been set aside for this year’s Keep Itawamba Beautiful cleanup event, the local spin on the national Great American Cleanup.
More than 100 volunteers help clean up
New Albany Gazette
Volunteers Saturday cleaned up some of the city’s most visible areas as part of The Great American Cleanup.
Homeowners take Costco gas station ruling to highest court
MBJ
Six Ridgeland homeowners have filed notice of appeal with the state Supreme Court over a ruling in favor of the city’s approval of a site for a gas station for a proposed Costco Wholesale store.
State Government
MORE COUNTY BRIDGES ACROSS MISSISSIPPI DEEMED UNSAFE
MPB
More county bridges across Mississippi have been deemed unsafe. And state transportation officials have been ordered to immediately start closing them.
Top Mississippi lawmakers agree on $1,500 teacher raise
AP
Leaders in the Mississippi Legislature answered the biggest question of their election-year session Wednesday night, agreeing to give public school teachers a $1,500-a-year raise beginning July 1.
Oil Spill
Anticipation grows as final acrylic panels are installed at Mississippi Aquarium
WLOX
Lifting a 25-foot long, 12-foot diameter tube is obviously no easy task.
Construction workers started early Wednesday morning to carefully lift it off the truck. A few hours later, two cranes hoisted it into an upright position with extreme care.
Project Funding Awarded to Improve Carpenter Creek
WUWF
Funding is on the way for 23 water quality projects in the Pensacola area, from Natural Resource Damage Assessment. That includes $2.1 million for Carpenter Creek’s restoration.
Regional
Federal utility eyes removal of coal ash from Memphis plant
AP
A federal utility is eying options to unearth and move toxin-laden coal ash from a Memphis power plant to an off-site landfill.
USGS deploys sensors after recent earthquakes
WEAR
Twitter May Be Used To Track Lingering Health Problems In The Gulf Of Mexico
WUSF
A group of scientists from states bordering the Gulf of Mexico met in St. Petersburg Wednesday to figure out ways to deal with health problems coming from red tide and oil spills in the Gulf.
National
EPA: No toxic releases at Superfund sites in flooded Midwest
AP
Flooding in the Midwest temporarily cut off a Superfund site in Nebraska that stores radioactive waste and explosives, inundated another one storing toxic chemical waste in Missouri, and limited access to others, federal regulators said Wednesday.
New Jersey Sues Chemical Companies Over Contamination
WSJ
New Jersey officials sued chemicals makers DuPont , Chemours Co. and 3M Co. to pay to clean up years of industrial contamination.
Man awarded $80M in lawsuit claiming Monsanto's Roundup causes cancer
USA Today
Opinion
It’s the season for spring garden projects
Picayune Item
By Patricia R. Drackett, Director and Assistant Extension Professor of Landscape Architecture
The Crosby Arboretum, Mississippi State University Extension Service
This past weekend at the home show at the Biloxi Coliseum I had a chance to share information with homeowners about the MSU Extension Smart Landscapes program, focused on creating attractive, low-maintenance, and sustainable ways to design and maintain home landscapes, and gardening for specific purposes such as attracting birds, butterflies, bees, and other pollinators and wildlife to the garden.
...The Environmental and Education Outreach Mobile Classroom, the 2018 Gulf Guardian Award Winner for Youth Education, presented by the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality and Bayou Town Productions, a theatrical presentation about water quality and watersheds. Pre-registration is required. Entry fee is $2 per child, but teachers, parents and chaperones are free.
Press releases
Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant Testifies Before Senate Commerce Committee
WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Roger Wicker, R-Miss., chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, today chaired a hearing to discuss the “Blue Economy,” which is the sustainable use of our nation’s ocean resources for economic development and growth. Wicker invited Governor Phil Bryant to share Mississippi’s recent successes in the Blue Economy with the committee.
Fishing for Energy Marks 10 Years, 4 Million Pounds of Marine Debris Converted to Energy
NFWF
WASHINGTON, D.C. (March 27, 2019) — More than 4 million pounds of derelict fishing gear that would otherwise have become marine debris has been collected, recycled and converted into energy, thanks to Fishing for Energy, a partnership between the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF), the NOAA Marine Debris Program, Covanta and Schnitzer Steel Industries.
