It’s closing time: With 70 years in the furniture business, 87-year-old Gerard Ruth says he is not ready to leave, but all the furniture has to go as he prepares to close down Gerard’s Furniture on Florida Boulevard, WBRZ-TV reports. Ruth and his family decided to close the shop that he opened 66 years ago because of his health. He says it should take two or three months to liquidate all items. Read the full story.
New school: The Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine will build its newest campus at the University of Louisiana Monroe, The News Star reports. The private college has other campuses in Virginia, South Carolina and Alabama and was founded by John G. Rocovich Jr., who started the medical school to bring medical care to low-income, rural areas in the southeastern U.S. Gov. John Bel Edwards says the public-private partnership medical school, once fully accredited, will help raise the quality of life and have an economic impact of somewhere between $60 million and $77 million a year. Read the full story.
Test case: After a high-profile campaign to oppose the Dakota Access Pipeline in 2016, a number of states moved to make it harder to protest oil and gas projects. In Louisiana, NPR reports the first felony arrests of protesters at the Bayou Bridge Pipeline site in the Atchafalaya swamp could be a test case of these tougher laws as opponents vow a legal challenge. The controversy here is over the Bayou Bridge Pipeline, the last leg of the Dakota Access Pipeline which takes oil through Louisiana to be exported abroad. Read the full story.
