Valley News Dispatch category, Page 670

There are demons inside all of us. Life is about overcoming that darkness. And Marcus Corson has created a clothing line to help. “My company represents fighting all the inner demons we all have going through in the struggles of life, whether it be PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) from serving...

Allegheny Valley Hospital is looking for volunteers to join the hospital’s lobby escort team. According to the hospital, lobby escorts greet outpatients and visitors and help them find their destination in the hospital. “This position offers significant opportunity to work directly with patients and their families,” the hospital said. Openings...

First Commonwealth Bank will be closing its existing bank in Harrison and opening a new location nearby in September, the bank has told customers in a letter. According to the letter, the bank’s existing location in Heights Plaza will permanently close at 6 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 6. The new...

Contract talks between New Kensington-Arnold School District and its teachers union are scheduled for Monday. The district’s 167 teachers have been working without a contract since Aug. 31, 2017. Superintendent John Pallone said the state Department of Labor and Industry has assigned a mediator, and negotiating sessions must include the...

Ten people at an Indiana Township group home for youths were taken for evaluation and released Thursday night after apparently being affected by fumes. Allegheny County spokeswoman Amie Downs said someone called 911 from the Western Pennsylvania Adult and Teen Challenge campus off of Lefever Hill Road reporting that people...

Investigators are hoping DNA tests could help identify the culprit who pulled off a bank caper in Leechburg last year. Someone tunneled from a vacant storefront at 154 Market St. into the wall of the First Commonwealth Bank next door at 152 Market St. in January 2018. The FBI believes...

An East Deer couple is charged with breaking into a house and stealing more than $3,000 worth of items later sold at a scrap yard. Joseph Samuel Gould, 35, told police he stole copper wire and a generator from the home and sold them for about $72 at PJ Greco...

A Tarentum man is accused of beating his 3-year-old son with a belt because he soiled his diaper. Andre Coral Stanford Jr., 36, of East Street faces a felony charge of endangering the welfare of children and a misdemeanor charge of simple assault. A warrant was issued for his arrest...

Three Highlands teachers have received grants from the Pennsylvania Association of School Retirees. High school Spanish teacher Laura Proano and Kevin Mason, a fifth-grade teacher at the middle school, are sharing a $750 educational support grant from the association. Jody Shumaker, a second-grade teacher at Highlands Elementary School, received a...

The technology that Highlands elementary students use for learning will be on display during an upcoming event. Highlands Elementary School and Remake Learning will host a “Technology Showcase” on the evening of Thursday, May 9. It will run from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. in the cafeteria at the school...

A man was transported to a local hospital with a head injury after crashing his four-door Saturn over a hillside in Bell Township. Township Fire Chief Steve Master said crews were dispatched to the intersection of Route 819 and Route 66 near the Bell and Washington townships border shortly before...

A 46-year-old contractor is accused of home improvement fraud and theft in North Apollo and Apollo last year. Charles Todd Doland of Woodward Avenue, Apollo, is accused of accepting almost $11,000 in upfront money but not doing the work. He allegedly took a $4,700 down payment to install a metal...

Price shouldn’t be the only consideration in choosing a school bus company, but price was why Mark D. Schmitt didn’t make an offer to the Highlands School District. Schmitt owns Monark Student Transportation in Richland and has been in the business his entire life. He considered submitting a proposal to...

The Highlands School District is looking for a new assistant superintendent. The position became vacant when the school board named Monique Mawhinney to replace Michael Bjalobok as superintendent beginning April 1. Mawhinney started as the district’s assistant superintendent in April 2018. The district had not had an assistant superintendent since...

Tarentum police are looking for two men accused of breaking into and stealing items from a borough home on Tuesday. Police Chief Bill Vakulick said the burglary was reported to police shortly before noon Tuesday. It occurred in the 600 block of Second Avenue. Police believe one of the men...

State troopers arrested three people Monday in Parks and charged them with possessing or selling methamphetamine. Troopers said Steven Taylor Green, 43, of Erie was at the residence of Liana Nicole Zaffuto, 32, and Jeffrey Shawn Lookhart, 34. The troopers were at a residence in the North Vandergrift section of...

West Penn Power plans to spend $43 million this year to trim and remove trees that could pose problems for power lines in an effort to minimize outages across its 24-county service area. Six contractors for the Greensburg-based utility company have trimmed more than 600 circuit miles of electric lines...

Part of Pleasantville Road in Harrison will be closed for three months while a bridge is being replaced, PennDOT announced Wednesday. The work to replace the bridge over Little Bull Creek between Burtner Road and Keystone Street is scheduled to start at 7 a.m. on Monday. Pleasantville Road will be...

The Highlands School Board came up one vote short Tuesday in a move to replace the district’s longstanding bus company, W.L. Roenigk, with a competitor, ABC Transit. The board held a special meeting at the high school Tuesday after a vote to award the five-year contract to ABC Transit was...

Westmoreland County elections officials Tuesday approved a redistricting plan for Upper Burrell that is expected to shorten lines at the polls. The proposal calls for moving the line that separates the town’s two voting precincts several blocks in the Seventh Street and Pleasant Valley Road areas, elections bureau director Beth...

Dave Kalatschoff was shocked when lightning struck his Oakmont apartment on a rainy Tuesday afternoon. “I saw this big white flash, and it felt like someone shook you really, really hard,” he said standing outside the three-story building near the intersection of Eighth Street and Washington Avenue. “I didn’t get...

PennDOT officials on Tuesday said numerous maintenance projectshave been scheduled for Westmoreland County this week. Crack or joint sealing will take on Leechburg Road in Lower Burrell, Bushy Run Road in Penn Township and Belle Vernon Monessen Road in Rostraver Township. Shoulder repairs will take place on Baker School Road...

The mood was sober during Allegheny Township police Officer Charity Butz’s presentation Tuesday on the dangers and penalties for driving under the influence for a freshman health class at Kiski Area High School. But the students perked up considerably when they wore goggles that simulate being drunk or under the...