Viral News

Salt Lake City will loan another $1.15 million to a Chicago developer in hopes of keeping afloat the long-delayed affordable housing project at 255 S. State Street. Different developers have struggled to build on the key downtown plot for more than eight years now for a variety of reasons, from soil problems and contractor disputes to financial issues and now a pandemic. The additional cash for Brinshore Development — on top of $13.4 million in lending and other guarantees the city has already chipped in — got approved Tuesday after the firm said its costs had leapt by 16% in one year, partly due to COVID-19. The new loan makes 255 S. State one of the largest recipients of financial backing from city’s Redevelopment Agency in its history, city officials noted. The total price tag for the Brinshore project is now estimated at $88.5 million. “It’s not cheap to put affordable housing in your downtown core,” RDA Chief Operating Officer Danny Walz said Tuesday. “We recognized going in ...

Years of investments in emission reductions and cleaner fuels have improved Utah’s air quality to a point that federal authorities on Tuesday declared the Wasatch Front’s air quality “in attainment” for particulate matter, the gritty pollution that often fills the valleys during wintertime inversions. While state officials crowed about Utah’s progress, clean air advocates say the Salt Lake Valley’s airshed still has an unacceptable pollution load, with more industrial emission sources and population growth on the way. After concluding Wasatch Front air quality now meets standards for fine particulate, or PM2.5, and coarse particulate, or PM10, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing to lift its oversight of Utah’s efforts to reduce this type of air pollution. “That bureaucratic change is likely to hamper, or even reverse efforts and public policies needed to further reduce our air pollution,” said Jonny Vasic, executive director of Utah Physicians for a Healthy E...

It certainly looked like Democrats had picked up at least three seats in the Utah House on Election Day, but those races have tightened as more results have rolled in. And in another race a Democratic challenger for other Salt Lake County seat remains tantalizingly close to the Republican incumbent. New results were added Tuesday and more votes are expected to be tallied in the days to come. The closest race right now is in House District 39 between Republican Rep. Jim Dunnigan, R-Taylorsville, and Democrat Lynette Wendel. On election night, Wendel led by about 300 votes, but Dunnigan erased his deficit and pulled ahead on Tuesday by just 22 votes in this district that covers Taylorsville and Kearns. Rep. Steve Eliason, R-Sandy, has stormed back after falling behind Democrat Wendy Davis on election night by more than 700 votes. Davis’ lead is now just 181 votes after the latest update in this district which covers parts of Midvale, Cottonwood Heights, Sandy and South Jordan. Eliason...

The Salt Lake Valley Coalition to End Homelessness is closing in on two overflow sites to house unsheltered people experiencing homelessness this winter — but at least one of the spots is coming under fire. Midvale Mayor Robert Hale said Tuesday that he’s opposed to the proposal to use a hotel on 7200 South to move people off the streets this winter, arguing the location has not been "well thought out.” “It’s within a half mile that we try to protect [because of] our homeless shelter,” he told The Salt Lake Tribune in an interview Tuesday, referencing the city’s Midvale Family Shelter. “It’s also in a high crime area. We’ve got extra officers working 7200 South, [near] the freeway. We’ve got other motels in the area that accept cash for payment, which brings its own crime element. And we’ve got a brand new multi-hundred-unit apartment building going up right across the back fence.” Jean Hill, co-chair of the Salt Lake Valley Coalition to End Homelessness, said Tuesday that the...

President Trump meanwhile tweeted he would ultimately win the race that he has been projected to lose. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/3kcQlDq

About 160 million Americans voted - here's a sampling of some that swayed the election. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/2U6T5rf

A look at how Donald Trump's direct approach has changed US relations around the world. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/3mFyaI1

Just ahead of the election, the US is seeing what could be the largest outbreak of the pandemic so far. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/3kQx63C

For some Americans, civil unrest after police shootings is driving their support for Donald Trump. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/2TJaHte

Chenren and Cathy Shao haven't let political differences get in the way of their eight-year marriage. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/2HVJXmN

As he described coming upon a Nazi street rally in 1930′s Germany, my college sociology professor captured every ear in the classroom. Reed Bradford, an LDS missionary at the time, recognized Adolf Hitler at the center of the scene. Having read his book, “Mein Kampf ,” he knew he was hearing in real time the “big lie,” the notorious Nazi propaganda technique of creating confusion by stating a falsehood as if it were obviously true, then repeating it again and again over time until it is no longer even questioned, but accepted as truth. President Trump has elevated the “big lie” to an unprecedented level; as of Aug. 27, innumerable news organizations have tracked 22,247 documented lies. A few of the most memorable: I’m going to “Drain the swamp!” I have drained the swamp. (Seven of his advisers have been criminally charged, just the tip of the iceberg.) We’ve got a great health care plan that’ll be out next week (month), any day now. (Trump has been making this claim since his 20...

Democrat Biden's lead over the US president is narrower in must-win states, with Florida a key prize. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/2HM9uyS

Walmart has removed gun and ammunition displays from its stores citing concerns of "civil unrest". from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/3oHxxiX

Miles Taylor, a senior official at the Department of Homeland Security, wrote the excoriating op-ed in 2018. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/35P1HIK

One of the most lethal leadership failures in modern times unfolded in South Africa in the early 2000s as AIDS spread there under President Thabo Mbeki. Mbeki scorned science, embraced conspiracy theories, dithered as the disease spread and rejected lifesaving treatments. His denialism cost about 330,000 lives, a Harvard study found. None of us who wrote scathingly about that debacle ever dreamed that something similar might unfold in the United States. But today, health experts regularly cite President Donald Trump as an American Mbeki. “We’re unfortunately in the same place,” said Anne Rimoin, an epidemiologist at UCLA. “Mbeki surrounded himself with sycophants and cost his country hundreds of thousands of lives by ignoring science, and we’re suffering the same fate.” One role of journalism is to establish accountability, and that’s particularly important before an election. Trump says he deserves an A-plus for his “phenomenal job” handling the coronavirus, but the judgment of hi...

Window Rock, Ariz. • Navajo Nation health officials reported 64 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 but no additional deaths for the fifth consecutive day. The latest figures released Saturday night bring the total number of cases to 11,217 with the known death toll remaining at 574. Tribal health officials said 121,274 people on the vast reservation that covers parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah have been tested for COVID-19 since the pandemic started and 7,466 have recovered. A shelter-in-place order, mask mandate, daily curfews and weekend lockdowns remain in effect on the Navajo Nation. Most people experience mild or moderate symptoms with the coronavirus, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. But for some — especially older adults and people with existing health problems — it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia and death. from The Salt Lake Tribune https://ift.tt/3otx4Rl

On Tuesday, Judge Amy Coney Barrett took a few minutes during her confirmation hearing to discuss her judicial philosophy, best known as originalism. It means, she explained, “that I interpret the Constitution as a law, I understand it to have the meaning that it had at the time people ratified it. That meaning doesn’t change over time, and it is not up to me to update it or infuse my policy views into it.” Now, originalism is subject to a good deal of criticism and critique as a method for decoding the Constitution. Zeroing in on its narrow preoccupation with language, Jonathan Gienapp, a historian of the early American republic at Stanford, charges originalists with building a framework “such that no amount of historical empiricism can ever challenge it,” in which neither “the Framers' thoughts or agendas or the broader political, social, or intellectual contexts of the late eighteenth century” have any bearing on the so-called original public meaning of the Constitution. Likew...

How do we help the homeless population in the Salt Lake Valley now that it is becoming increasingly colder? Living in Salt Lake City, it seems as though there are individuals experiencing homelessness at every corner, every park, and every TRAX stop, and I ask myself, “What is my community doing to end homelessness?” I have had the amazing opportunity to work at the Men’s Resource Center for The Road Home and have loved getting to know the men and their stories. I have seen firsthand the strengths and weaknesses of my community and our response to homelessness. The new building in South Salt Lake that offers a bed, meals and services to 300 men a night is life-changing for them, but what about the 17 men I had to turn away one night alone because we didn’t have any beds left and they couldn’t sleep in the lobby due to it being a fire hazard? It is heartbreaking to look into a person’s eyes as they ask me, “Well, what am I supposed to do?” St. Vincent De Paul’s emergency winter shelte...

Lisa Montgomery is due to become the first woman to face federal execution in the US in 67 years. from BBC News - US & Canada https://ift.tt/355U9kp

Utah’s leaders on Tuesday rolled out a new strategy for curbing the spread of COVID-19 across the state, announcing that county-level restrictions going forward will be tied to local data on how the virus is being transmitted. The system is replacing the color-coded guidelines that state officials have previously used as they’ve imposed economic restrictions across Utah. Under this new framework, most of the state will fall under a mask mandate as a “jump start” for at least the next two weeks, while a swath of detailed industry guidelines will disappear. And state officials made clear that their plan won’t work unless individuals and business owners take personal responsibility for stopping the spread of the disease. “Our announcement of this new system without your involvement is practically nothing,” Richard Saunders, interim director of the Utah Department of Health, said during a news conference. How are officials categorizing counties? The new system will separate counties ...