Amarillo, Potter County | featured news

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas will stop helping the U.S. government provide aid and services to refugees, state officials said Wednesday, severing ties at a time when President Barack Obama has announced intentions to dramatically increase the number of resettlements in 2017.
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A law enforcement investigation is underway and Dalhart Independent School District has published a letter to parents after a middle school student brought an unloaded handgun to school on Tuesday.
The letter was published on the school district’s Facebook page and said the student brought the gun in a backpack. School officials said the student did not possess any ammunition.
School officials said they became aware that the student brought the gun but did not elaborate.

VEGA, Texas (AP) — Investigators say a pickup truck accident in the Texas Panhandle has led to the seizure of $2.2 million in packaged marijuana found in the bed of the vehicle.
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AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The Texas Department of Public Safety says it will regularly review traffic stop data to ensure minority motorists aren't being stopped and searched at higher rates than white drivers.
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Amarillo’s newest community policing efforts will literally have officers rolling down the streets.
Officers assigned to the new Neighborhood Patrol Unit will be assigned bicycles within the next week to aid them in Amarillo Police Department’s efforts to improve community relationships. The bicycles will help get officers out of their cars and into the streets, Police Chief Ed Drain said.
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Nothing says wedded bliss quite like mustard running down your chin.
Actually, Ted and Tommie Cummings are careful when eating a celebratory corn dog, and carry a napkin just in case. If this is Tri-State Fair week, then count on Ted taking his wife on an anniversary date — a relatively cheap anniversary date.
It was Sept. 26, 2009, when they married after both lost their longtime spouses. It coincided with the fair, and heading to the fairgrounds each year around anniversary time seemed like the thing to do.

A recent Texas attorney general interpretation of a law about cameras in special education classrooms may spell an unexpected half-million-dollar expense for Amarillo Independent School District.
An opinion last week from Attorney General Ken Paxton affirmed a broad interpretation of a law, passed in 2015, that requires districts to install cameras in special education classrooms should a parent, school staff member or trustee request it.
Lawmakers drafted the legislation in response to concerns that children in special education were being mistreated by educators.

Amarillo Economic Development Corp. board of directors approved a 3 percent annual raise and $10,000 performance bonus for Interim President Doug Nelson at its Tuesday meeting.
Board Director Brian Heinrich said the compensation package was based on Nelson’s work during the past year, which included stepping in as acting president following the April departure of former president and CEO Buzz David.
The board unanimously approved the package. Nelson’s annual salary will increase from $155,400 to about $160,000.

Amarillo Police Department will be getting two new Belgian Malinois K-9 dogs in October, Lt. Clay Rolan said today, to bring the city’s K-9 unit back up to its full roster of four dogs plus its one existing bomb-sniffing dog.
The new dogs will replace two vacancies in the unit after one police dog recently retired and another, Bruno, died in a training accident in June when he ran into a tree and broke his neck.
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Construction is underway on an addition to the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Amarillo.
A 20,500-square-foot, $9.75 million Panhandle Clinical Simulation Center is being built at the campus. It will house simulation equipment to train medical professionals.
The facility, slated to open by fall 2017, will feature “high-tech, state-of-the-art mannequins and computer software” as well as observation rooms and a large classroom, according to a news release.