If you were hoping to cash in that Borders gift card for the latest Dan Brown novel — or at least hoping to get some cash for it — you're too late.

A Manhattan federal judge on Wednesday ruled that the bankrupt and defunct book chain owes nothing to the roughly 17.7 million people who hold $210.5 million in unredeemed gift cards.

U.S. District Judge Andrew Carter says it would be unfair to Borders Group's other creditors to let gift-card holders pursue recoveries, Reuters reports:

The devastation near Oklahoma City this week is the latest reminder of the tremendous damage tornadoes and other cataclysmic storms can inflict. The reminders are frequent. Last year, in our own region, we had the late-winter tornado in Henryville, which wiped out the town and united the region in relief efforts. Later in the year, Hurricane Sandy ravaged the East Coast. 

Update 4:55 p.m. Thursday: The boil water advisory has been lifted.

So a Louisville Water Company contractor was working on a water main replacement and the main was cut, causing residents of the Windsor Forest neighborhood to lose water service.

With that, a boil water advisory has been issued Wednesday afternoon for the southwestern Louisville neighborhood "until water quality tests confirm the water is safe to drink." (See map for details on that area.) 

A Louisville Metro Police officer is facing misconduct charges after he allegedly asked a woman to expose herself and later touched her improperly.

Officer Joe Burden is accused of asking the women to partially strip her clothes in October, after detaining her during a call to service and falsely telling her she had a warrant—and that other officers wanted her arrested, according to a criminal complaint summons. She complied.

Soon after, the woman filed a complaint with LMPD’s Public Integrity Unit.

A technology firm hired by the state says the planned expansion of Kentucky’s Medicaid program and the push to help the uninsured get health coverage will likely worsen the state’s shortage of physicians.

Gov. Steve Beshear announced earlier this month that he will expand the state’s Medicaid program to cover an additional 300,000 people, most of them working poor who don’t have insurance coverage.   He’s also ordered the creation of the health benefits exchange to help more than 300,000 others get coverage.

For the second straight year,  Ford Motor Company will reduce the number of days it shuts down its Louisville Truck Plant this summer for maintenance.

Every year Ford and other North American car manufacturing companies shut down for a couple of weeks to repair, maintain or change their factory lines. Officials say increased sales and higher demand are pushing the American car production, which has been strong.

A quarterly report shows that the number of jobs in Kentucky’s coal industry has dropped to the lowest level in at least 63 years.

The kerfuffle Tuesday and today on Twitter about the "news" that the creator of the GIF gets annoyed if he hears someone use a hard "G" when pronouncing the name of his file format triggered our aging memory banks.

Hadn't we heard a while back that GIF creator Steve Wilhite and many other tech types insist it's supposed to be pronounced with a soft "J," like Jif peanut butter?

The chairman of an ethics watchdog group is questioning whether Louisville Metro Councilman Dan Johnson, D-21, should serve as a juror on fellow council member Barbara Shanklin’s removal trial.

The 20-member council court convened earlier this week to schedule a hearing after the Ethics Commission ruled Shanklin violated five provisions of the city’s code of ethics.

City lawmakers will sit as a jury to decide whether to oust Shanklin in a trial beginning July 23.

Last September, however, Shanklin’s attorney Aubrey Williams entered an affidavit alleging Johnson told him the commission was prejudiced against his client, and mishandled the proceedings.

"Johnson called ... and informed me that his wife’s sister’s husband was a friend of a certain Commission   member, who had told the friend that the commissioners were out to get Barbara Shanklin," Williams wrote. "That is to say that they had made up their minds to rule against her. He stated that he did not think they were going to be fair to her when the hearing got underway."

Common Cause of Kentucky Chairman Richard Beliles filed the initial ethics complaint against Shanklin. He  says Johnson’s prior interference in the case raises concerns if the south Louisville Democrat can adequately serve on the jury.

"It’s really important that the public has confidence in whatever jury. So from that standpoint, reading about and hearing about the questions about Metro Councilman Dan Johnson, it would seem to me that perhaps he should consider recusing himself from that jury," he says.

Louisville’s Valley High School will replace Principal Gary Hurt next school year following a state audit that concluded he doesn’t have the ability to turn around the school.

Last month, a Kentucky Department of Education team was at Valley High conducting interviews and observing classes.