News

As part of his efforts to increase citizen involvement in government, Auditor Adam Edelen's office will soon release a smart phone app to let residents make anonymous requests for investigations. 

Tips have always been taken in person or over the phone, but now, the office is on the verge of allowing tips to come in via smartphone or tablet.

Edelen says moving to smartphone applications will give taxpayers another tool to fight fraud and abuse.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Louisville says former McMahan Fire Chief Paul Barth failed to disclose two real estate transactions that would have affected his ability to pay back some $200,000 he embezzled from the Crusade for Children charity and the fire district.

At his sentencing hearing Monday , Barth said he was unable to make restitution until he sold his Louisville home. He was given until the close of business Wednesday to pay the money or sign an agreement under which the government would collect on the sale of the property.

Want to know how the three upcoming holidays are going to wreak havoc with your garbage and recycling pick-up? Check out the handy schedule below from Metro Government.

Thanksgiving Day 2012

Angry over what they say are unfair labor practices, protesters are planning to demonstrate at a Louisville area Walmart on Friday -- traditionally the busiest shopping day of the year.

But organizers won't announce which Walmart will be the site of the demonstration until Friday morning, said Harold Embry, organizing director for the United Food & Commercial Workers Local 227, based in Louisville.

As many as 50 people are expected to participate, Embry said. 

Indiana Supreme Court justices want to know whether the nation's largest school voucher program primarily benefits students and their parents or religious institutions.

The five justices prodded lawyers for both sides on that point today during a hearing on a constitutional challenge to the 2011 law under which more than 9,000 students have switched from public to private schools with help from state funds.

The Louisville Water Company has approved an operating budget for next year which includes an average monthly customer bill increase of 77 cents.

Although the amount of water used in Louisville has decreased, spokeswoman Kelley Dearing Smith says the rate increase is necessary.

“We still have to raise the rates in a very small manner to make sure we still maintain that high quality that customers expect," she says.

Indiana taxpayers will receive a $111 credit on their state income tax returns next year as the state distributes part of its budget surplus.

Gov. Mitch Daniels announced the credit today.

It will be $222 for couples filing joint returns. The credit represents the automatic taxpayer refund plan that Daniels pushed through the state legislature last year.

Kentucky’s 17-member Child Fatality and Near Fatality Review Panel will meet next week to begin work and a starting point could be the 55 death or near death cases recorded this past fiscal year.

The independent panel was created to provide oversight to the Cabinet for Health and Family Services and to make recommendations for how the cabinet can improve. This follows long-term criticism in the way the CHFS handles its child abuse cases.

While flirting with a 2016 presidential bid, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., also outlined how the GOP can expand its base by getting behind defense cuts, as well as marijuana and immigration reform.

Since President Obama's re-election, the political narrative has centered on the Republican Party redefining itself in the wake of a poor showing amongst key demographics. The conversation has been described as coming to terms with the party being "too white, too old" and "too male."

In September, Paul told WFPL he foresaw problems with Mitt Romney's electoral map for this reason. And a recent interview shows the Senator wants the GOP to reach out to Hispanic and younger voters.

From ABC News:

We're getting an ever dwindling percent of the Hispanic vote," Paul says. "We have to let people know, Hispanics in particular, we're not putting you on a bus and shipping you home."

(SNIP)

Paul himself does not favor legalizing marijuana, but he says individual states -- such as Washington and Colorado, which both voted to legalize in November -- should be allowed to make marijuana legal.

The University of Kentucky recently spent $25 million in energy savings projects, and that work is already showing results.

The Herald-Leader reports that costs have been cut by $2.4 million a year. $2.2 million of those savings will go toward the $25 million bond, while the remaining $200,000 will be set aside for future energy projects. And the projects have also reduced UK's carbon dioxide emissions by 23,291 tons a year.