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Chikungunya Virus Confirmed in Texas, Health Officials Warn to Avoid Mosquito Bites

submitted by Albert Gomez

wjla.com - ABC - July 7, 2014

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America’s Largest Reservoir Drains to Record Low As Western Drought Deepens

      

Hoover Dam holds back Lake Mead, America’s largest reservoir. The mineral-stained canyon walls are a growth chart in reverse, showing where the lake surface has been. Photo - J. Carl Ganter / Circle of Blue

ecowatch.com - by Brett Walton - July 7, 2014

Lake Mead—America’s largest reservoir, Las Vegas’ main water source and an important indicator for water supplies in the Southwest—will fall this week to its lowest level since 1937 when the manmade lake was first being filled, according to forecasts from the federal Bureau of Reclamation. . .

. . . the steadily draining lake does signal an era of new risks and urgency for an iconic and ebbing watershed that provides up to 40 million people in the U.S. and Mexico with a portion of their drinking water. The rules governing the river are complex, but the risk equation is straightforward: less supply due to a changing climate, plus increasing demands from new development, leads to greater odds of shortages.

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Russia Attacks U.S. Oil and Gas Companies in Massive Hack

      

Russian hacker spies are attacking energy companies. It's the latest sign the Cold War has gone cyber.

money.cnn.com - by Jose Pagliery - July 2, 2014

The Cold War didn't end in the 1990's. It simply moved online.

That much is clear after a security firm reported this week that Russian hackers have launched unprecedented, highly-sophisticated attacks on Western oil and gas companies.

The cyber operation nicknamed Energetic Bear is the latest example of an ongoing battle between all-seeing American and British cyber spies on one side -- and intellectual-property-stealing hackers in China and Russia on the other.

The report by Symantec (SYMC, Tech30) described how hackers have sneaked malware into computers at power plants, energy grid operators, gas pipeline companies and industrial equipment makers.

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Red Cross: How We Spent Sandy Money Is a Trade Secret

      

(Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images)

The charity is fighting our public records request for information on how it raised and spent money after the superstorm.

propublica.org - by Justin Elliott - June 26, 2014

Just how badly does the American Red Cross want to keep secret how it raised and spent over $300 million after Hurricane Sandy?

The charity has hired a fancy law firm to fight a public request we filed with New York state, arguing that information about its Sandy activities is a "trade secret."

The Red Cross' "trade secret" argument has persuaded the state to redact some material, though it's not clear yet how much since the documents haven't yet been released.

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Crackdown on Florida Clinics Leads to Decline in Deaths, Report Finds

    

Deaths due to overdoses of prescription painkillers like OxyContin dropped sharply in Florida, the first such decline in a decade, according to a new report published by the CDC. (Lawrence K. Ho/Los Angeles Times)

latimes.com - by Lisa Girion - July 1, 2014

Public health officials have identified a sharp decline in overdose deaths involving prescription painkillers for the first time in a decade.

Deaths involving OxyContin, Vicodin and other narcotic painkillers dropped by 26% over two years in Florida after a crackdown on pain clinics that dispensed high volumes of the medications, according to a government study released Tuesday.

Lawmakers there barred doctors in these "pill mills" from selling the drugs they prescribed.

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STUDY - Decline in Drug Overdose Deaths After State Policy Changes — Florida, 2010–2012

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Tropical Weather

CLICK ON THE NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER WIDGET (ABOVE)

ALSO CLICK HERE - THE WEATHER CHANNEL - HURRICANE CENTRAL - UPDATES

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Number of People Living in Poverty Areas Up, Census Bureau Reports

      

census.gov - June 30, 2014 - (CLICK ON INFOGRAPHIC ABOVE FOR 1 PAGE .PDF IMAGE FILE)

One in four U.S. residents live in "poverty areas," according to American Community Survey data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau from 2008 to 2012, up from less than one in five in 2000. These areas of concentrated poverty refer to any census tract with a poverty rate of 20 percent of more. The number of people living in poverty areas increased from 49.5 million (18.0 percent) in 2000 to 77.4 million (25.7 percent) in 2008-2012.

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Obama Administration Announces New Hazard Resiliency Grant Competition

submitted by John Patten  

      

blogs.planning.org - June 25, 2014

At a commencement speech at the University of California at Irvine, President Obama announced a new $1 billion investment into disaster resiliency for state, local, and tribal communities. The investment, known as The National Disaster Resilience Competition, is part of Obama’s action plan to combat climate change and extreme weather events.

Built largely on the Rebuild by Design program from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the National Disaster Resilience Competition will exclusively assist areas previously hit by a natural disaster by providing grants for recovery and resilience projects.

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NSA Releases First Statistics on Surveillance Sweep

The logo of the National Security Agency hangs at the Threat Operations Center in Fort Meade, Maryland on January 25, 2006 (AFP Photo/Paul J. Richards)

news.yahoo.com - AFP - June 27, 2014

Washington (AFP) - The US National Security Agency released its first "transparency report" Friday, as part of an effort to quell the firestorm over reports of its massive data collection efforts.

The NSA report said that in 2013, it obtained fewer than 2,000 orders from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

That included 1,767 orders based on "probable cause" for an investigation, and 131 orders allowing the agency to collect data using a so-called "pen register" or "trap and trace."

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IC on the Record - Statistical Transparency Report Regarding Use of National Security Authorities
Annual Statistics for Calendar Year 2013

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Texas Clean-Energy Projects Created 6,400 Jobs Last Year

submitted by Margery Schab  

      

Texas is among the leaders nationally in the creation of clean-energy jobs.  OCI Solar

bizjournals.com - by Sanford Nowlin - March 14, 2014

Clean-energy production and energy-efficient transportation projects created nearly 6,400 jobs in Texas last year, according to a new report by nonpartisan business group Environmental Entrepreneurs, or E2. 

The Lone Star State ranked No. 2 behind California, which generated around 15,400 clean-energy jobs in 2013.

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REPORT - E2 - Clean Energy Jobs: 2013 Year in Review and Q4 Report (12 page .PDF report)

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