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Child Care at a Crossroads: Finding child care is already difficult and expensive — and it’s about to get worse

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

You would think with all the money parents have to pay for child care — it can easily add up to or even surpass the cost of a monthly mortgage payment — that the child care industry would be a lucrative career field for the people who work in it.But it’s not.In fact, at the same time, parents are finding it hard to afford — much less, find — good child care, many of those providers are wondering how long they might be able to make it.It’s especially true of the licensed, in-home providers, which are rapidly declining in number every single year. And with the federal support that helped get child care providers through the pandemic about to end, it could serve another blow to a floundering industry.In the special series, “Child Care at a Crossroads,” WTOP is taking a look at the state of child care now, and what the future holds once billions of dollars in aid that has propped up the child care industry since the pandemic expires. If you thought options were limited and unaffordable ...

Britain approves new North Sea oil drilling in welcome news for the industry but not activists

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

LONDON (AP) — British regulators on Wednesday approved new oil and gas drilling at a site in the North Sea, a move environmentalists say will hurt the country’s attempt to meet its climate goals.The U.K.’s North Sea Transition Authority said it had approved the Rosebank Field Development Plan, “which allows the owners to proceed with their project.”Britain’s Conservative government argues that drilling in the Rosebank field, northwest of the Shetland Islands, will create jobs and bolster the U.K.’s energy security.One of the largest untapped deposits in U.K. waters, Rosebank holds an estimated 350 million barrels of oil.The field is operated by Norway’s Equinor and the U.K. firm Ithaca Energy, which say they plan to invest $3.8 billion in the first phase of the project. The field is expected to start producing in 2026-2027.Green Party lawmaker Caroline Lucas called the decision to approve drilling “morally obscene.”“Energy security and cheaper bills aren’t delivered by allowin...

Mexican mother bravely shields her son as bear leaps on picnic table to devour tacos and enchiladas

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

MEXICO CITY (AP) — A Mexican mother bravely shielded her son after a bear leapt on a picnic table and devoured the tacos and enchiladas meant for the boy’s birthday dinner, inches from his face. Silvia Macías of Mexico City had traveled to the Chipinque Park on the outskirts of the northern city of Monterrey to celebrate the 15th birthday of her son, Santiago, who has Down syndrome.Soon after they sat down to eat the food they had brought, the bear showed up and gulped down french fries, enchiladas, tacos and salsa. A video shot by her friend, Angela Chapa, shows Macías sitting stoically, inches from the bear’s mouth, holding Santiago and shielding his eyes with her hand. She kept her eyes downcast, to avoid anything the bear might consider a challenge.“The worst thing was that Santiago might get scared,” Macías recalled Tuesday in an interview with The Associated Press. “Santiago is very afraid of animals, a cat or a dog, any animal scares him a lot.”“That’s why I...

Man shoots self after shooting store manager at Miami Gardens Big Lots

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

Miami Gardens Police responded to a department store after two people were killed following a shooting, Tuesday night. The incident occurred at approximately 9:45 p.m. when initial reports indicated that a male suspect shot the store manager inside the Big Lots store at 5580 NW 167th St. Police said the assailant first targeted the woman inside the store before stepping outside and turning the weapon on himself. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue pronounced them both dead at the scene, officials said. Javier Rosello, an eyewitness to the events, recounted the chilling scene. “I see him dropping to the floor, but I thought someone had killed him, but it’s not. The result is he killed himself and he killed someone in there,” he said. He added that police arrived around 20 minutes after the shootings, as several employees remained inside the store, grappling with the terrifying ordeal. “All the ladies at the registers, they are with the police, they are terrified … so...

North Korea has decided to ‘expel’ US soldier Travis King, state media reports

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

(CNN) — North Korea has decided “to expel” US Army Private Travis King, who had crossed into the North from South Korea during a tour of the joint security area in July, state media KCNA reported on Wednesday.“The relevant organ of the DPRK decided to expel Travis King, a soldier of the U.S. Army who illegally intruded into the territory of the DPRK, under the law of the Republic,” KCNA said.The report said the investigation into King “has been finished.”North Korea claimed that King has “confessed that he illegally intruded into the territory of the DPRK as he harbored ill feeling against inhuman maltreatment and racial discrimination within the U.S. army and was disillusioned about the unequal U.S. society.”CNN cannot verify whether these are King’s own words. It is unclear from KCNA’s report where, when and how King would be expelled.This is a breaking story, more to follow…

Chilly Start, Mild Finish

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

Feeling the chill this morning? Yeh, certainly it is a bit on the cool side with temps reaching the upper 30s for some! Even in Boston, the sub 50 degree reading was the first since early June. With a lot of sunshine, temps bounce back into the mid to upper 60s for this afternoon. The combination of light winds, brighter skies and low humidity, will allow for a great afternoon from the playgrounds to ball fields to golf courses to apple orchards. Enjoy! Tomorrow, we’ll pretty much do it again. Friday afternoon, into Saturday morning… We’ll watch to see how close an area of low pressure with rain gets to our coast. The highest risk for some rain is across Southeast Mass, especially near the south coast. If the storms far enough south, then all of us will stay dry. Sunday, into early next week looks great. 70s in the afternoon, 50s at night. We’ll have a bit of patchy fog in the mornings, but the pattern is a nice one to kick off October. That includes for the ...

Over 100 masked teens ransack Philadelphia stores and arrests are made, police say

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Groups of teenagers swarmed into stores in Philadelphia’s Center City, stuffing plastic bags with merchandise and fleeing, although police made several arrests, authorities and witnesses said.An Apple Store was hit at around 8 p.m. Tuesday and police chased fleeing teenagers, recovering dropped iPhones and a “pile of iPads” at one spot, a police statement said.More than 100 people who appeared to be teenagers stole from a Lululemon store, NBC10 Philadelphia reported, citing a police officer.Video posted on social media showed masked people in hoodies running out of Lululemon and police officers grabbing several and tackling them to the sidewalk, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.No injuries were immediately reported but CBS Philadelphia said a security guard was assaulted at the Foot Locker.The flash mob-style ransacking followed an earlier peaceful protest over a judge’s Tuesday decision to dismiss murder and other charges&n...

Howie Carr: How low can Bob Menendez go?

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

In his unfolding corruption case, Sen. Bob Menendez asks for no special favors.He merely asks to be treated like Hunter Biden.The “embattled” senior senator from New Jersey has already won an earlier photo finish with a jury, in Newark. He was tried by a jury of his Democrat peers, one of whom asked in court, “What is a senator?”The new indictment runs 39 pages. Naturally state-run media is giving it a good leaving alone because… professional courtesy.However, despite what some deplorables are claiming, there are great differences between the Biden and Menendez cases.Of course, Menendez is, or was until last week, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Joe Biden used to be chairman of that same committee, which is apparently a golden goose when it comes to, uh, whatever.But beyond that, there is no connection between the Biden and Menendez scandals.For example, Menendez is accused of shaking down Egypt. The Bidens, on the other hand, are accused of taking payoffs from s...

North Korea says it will expel the US soldier who crossed into the country in July

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea said Wednesday that it will expel a U.S. soldier who crossed into the country through the heavily armed border between the Koreas in July.The North’s official Korean Central News Agency said that authorities have finished their questioning of Pvt. Travis King. It said that he confessed to illegally entering the North because he harbored “ill feeling against inhuman maltreatment and racial discrimination” within the U.S. Army and was “disillusioned about the unequal U.S. society.”Verifying the authenticity of the comments attributed to King is impossible.The agency did not say when authorities plan to expel King or to where.King, who had served in South Korea, sprinted into North Korea while on a civilian tour of a border village on July 18, becoming the first American confirmed to be detained in the North in nearly five years.At the time he joined the civilian tour and crossed the border, he was supposed to be heading to Fort Bliss, Texas, follo...

Giant panda Fan Xing leaves a Dutch zoo for her home country China

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:05:26 GMT

RHENEN, Netherlands (AP) — Giant panda Fan Xing began a long journey home on Wednesday — to a country she has never visited.The 3-year-old was given a ceremonial send off Wednesday from Ouwehands Zoo in the Netherlands, where she was born, for the first leg of her journey to China, where she will join a breeding program that is helping preserve the vulnerable species.Wouter Jurgens, director Asia and Oceania at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said he hoped the panda would be an ambassador for relations between the Netherlands and China.Those links have been strained in recent months by the Dutch decision to limit sales of advanced semiconductor processor chips. The government called the move “country neutral,” but it was seen as part of a U.S. policy aiming at restricting China’s access to materials used to make such chips, which can be used in military technology.Jurgens said Fan Xing represented “a sign of the special relationship between the Netherlands and China in the fi...