Latest news with #NationalInstituteofFoodandAgriculture
Chicago Tribune
22-05-2025
- Business
- Chicago Tribune
Gary council to vote on city fund creations
The Gary Common Council will look at creating funds for parking meters in the city and for green urbanism. The council's Ways and Means committee will look at the two ordinances at its 5 p.m. meeting on May 29. Both ordinances were introduced at the council's Tuesday meeting. Before both funds can be created, the Gary Common Council must first approve the respective ordinances. The parking meter fund is sponsored by Gary Mayor Eddie Melton and will make changes to the municipal code, according to the ordinance. Metered parking is 'in the best interest of health, safety and welfare of the citizens,' according to the ordinance. The Gary Board of Public Works will be in charge of the parking meter fund, if passed by the council. If the council passes the ordinance, funds will be collected to create metered parking throughout the city. Indiana Code allows municipalities to enact metered parking, and the city will create regulations and fees. Gary police will be in charge of issuing citations and imposing fines. If the ordinance is passed, metered parking areas will be designated by the Gary Board of Public Works, according to council documents. Parking meters can be on any land owned, leased and controlled by the city, its board of park commissioners, redevelopment commission and sanitary district. Parking meter fees will be established by a separate ordinance, which the city is required to periodically adjust. Charging stations for electric vehicles might also be located near parking meters if the ordinance is passed. The council will also look at accepting a grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture to create a green urbanism fund. The $317,840 grant comes with a $79,460 cash match. '(The) grant project aims to establish a comprehensive residential waste management program in Gary, Indiana, with a focus on promoting sustainable household waste practices, reducing landfill waste, and fostering community engagement…' the ordinance said. If passed, the ordinance will create the Sustainable Homes: Food Waste Composting Training and Demonstration Project, which will have a team made up of representatives from the city's environmental affairs team, Farmers 202 Collaborative, Gary Food Council and Baby Greens Family Farm. The green urbanism project aims to actively participate in waste reduction efforts, increase recycling rates, reduce landfill waste, improve soil health through composting and create a heightened sense of environmental responsibility, according to the ordinance. The Ways and Means committee will first look at the ordinances before they are moved back to the council as a whole. The next Gary council meeting will take place at 5 p.m. June 3.
Yahoo
03-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
In Muscatine, kids learn to avoid fire, animal, chemical dangers on farms
Sixth graders in Muscatine got an opportunity to learn about agricultural safety on Wednesday. Kids split into groups and went through several stations where they learned about chemical safety, fire safety, hand safety, electrical safety, animal safety, and more. This was the 11th annual Ag Safety Day at the Muscatine Ag Learning Center and around 400 kids attended. According to the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, agriculture is one of the most dangerous professions in the United States. Proper safety training can help farmers to avoid serious or fatal accidents and use chemical pesticides and fertilizers safely for themselves and others. Between 2021 and 2022 there were 21,020 injuries in agricultural production requiring those injured to take days away from work. Fatal injury rates of agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting industry were 18.6 deaths per 100,000 full time workers according to the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC.) The leading cause of death for the farmers was transportation incidents. Others leading causes of fatalities were violence by a person or animal and contact with objects and equipment. Students learned about safe practices when handling different animals such as cows, horses, goats, and sheep. Many of the stations went beyond the farm and taught kids about handling situations that may come up in everyday life. The fire safety lessons are something that kids will be able to take with them wherever they go. Students got to practice using a fire extinguisher on a real fire so that they have experience in case of an emergency. They also ran a fire safety drill in a mobile simulator so that they can be prepared to escape through a window in case of fire. Vehicle safety was also highlighted with a car crash simulation. Students also practiced pulling a rope out of a grain bin. Roger Gibson, the Muscatine site manager at Bayer, which helped to put on the event, told Our Quad Cities News that learning early can help prevent a lot of accidents. 'Learn about safety young because it's easy on a farm to be taking shortcuts and if you don't have that message of safety then it's easy to go down the wrong path and get hurt,' he said. 'Safety can easily be overlooked. I grew up on a farm and knew a lot of farmers who got injured over the years, and a lot of our other employees grew up on farms. So emphasizing the importance of safety is something we can do for the farming community.' The Muscatine Ag Learning Center is a facility that allows kids to participate in farm related activities. The facility helps Muscatine's FFA chapter to thrive. Muscatine Future Farmers of America (FFA) Chapter President Elsie Lewis says the safety lessons go beyond the farm. 'Safety is very important. Even just being in the house you don't have to be operating large equipment,' she said. 'Students will learn that certain gases can be dangerous to their house and can catch on fire. Our fire house is very important in case of emergency for a fire, you never know when one may spark up, so students learn how to exit a window safely and properly.' About Bayer and its products Bayer is a German pharmaceutical and biomedical company that produces agricultural chemicals and seeds. It produces fungicides, herbicides, and insecticides to help with the growth of crops. Among these is Roundup, for which the company is currently under scrutiny in Iowa after legislation was introduced that some say could shield the company from lawsuits related to the cancer risk of the product. To learn about agriculture safety from the CDC, click here. NIFA, click here. To learn about the Muscatine Ag Learning Center, click here. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Tennessee State University to lose $14M federal grant as massive Trump cuts continue
Tennessee State University expects to lose at least $14.4 million in federal grant funding as massive cuts continue under the administration of President Donald Trump. The news comes as the historically Black, public university faces a financial shortfall this spring. Last month, interim TSU President Dwayne Tucker proposed repurposing state funds and instituting further staff and budget cuts to sustain the school. Tucker took over leadership of the troubled school in December after a year of major upheaval, layoffs and budget cuts. He recently told lawmakers the university would run out of money by May if nothing changes. The $14.4 million in federal money now in limbo is the remainder of an $18 million grant to TSU from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture. While the school has not yet received an official letter of termination for the grant, TSU acting CFO Jim Grady said they are working to prepare for it. "This is going to impact our people," Grady said during a regularly scheduled TSU finance committee meeting on Wednesday evening. More: Tennessee State University leaders propose more layoffs, repurposing state funds It's not clear how many faculty or staff positions will be affected by the cut, or if it will affect student scholarships and assistantships. At the very least, Grady said, nothing will change until at least 90 days after receiving the official letter. It was not clear when grant-funded staff would be notified if their positions are affected. Grady said he and other university leaders have been meeting nightly to compare notes on the flurry of changes under Trump. "We'll continue to evaluate the volatility ... and the potential impact to employees, students and university operations," Grady said. Grady told the committee that 70 federal grants totaling $45 million to the university were abruptly suspended in February. All those grants are under the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which includes the National Institute of Food and Agriculture. In response, TSU paused spending those grants while leaders assessed the situation and worked closely with federal officials to determine when it was safe to resume spending. By early March, $23 million of those funds had been restored. Outside the USDA funds, Grady said, TSU has $115 million in other federal grants that may be subject to future suspensions or freezes. Federal grants fully fund 62 employees at TSU and partially fund another 112. In 2023, under the Biden administration, the USDA and U.S. Department of Education sent a letter to Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee calculating the state had underfunded TSU by $2.1 billion over the course of several decades. Advocates have pressed for that underfunding to be restored. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee State to lose $14M grant as Trump cuts continue
