Alabama top stories in brief

• With unemployment at record-low numbers, Alabama farmers are increasingly forced to turn to the federal H2-A visa program. The program allows immigrants and local workers to receive a work visa. Farmers who apply for the program must prove an effort to recruit non-immigrant workers. Farmers must also pay the federal H2-A minimum wage, $13.67, any kind of travel into the state and housing. Because it’s a federal program, Alabama farmers have little say over new changes. One such change is an increased hourly wage if a worker is using specific equipment during their shift. However, that hourly wage applies to the worker’s entire week of work, even if their use of the equipment is only a few hours. Already, the application process is expensive for farmers, averaging $1,000 per worker. Farmers in Alabama, including Alabama Farmer’s Federation members, are concerned how the changes to the federal program may affect their ability to hire necessary workers.

• On Wednesday, Oct. 11, Montgomery Circuit Court Judge James Anderson dismissed a lawsuit filed by Verano Alabama after the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission revoked several licenses. Verano’s lawsuit alleged that the AMCC, after issuing 21 licenses in June of this year, did not have the authority to revoke the licenses. The AMCC revoked and reissued licenses in August after discovering scoring errors with the initial licensing. Anderson agreed to dismiss the case, stating that the authority to revoke licenses is inherent to the AMCC, otherwise, “there could be no legitimate reason for the committee to stay licenses in the first place.” After the dismissal, on Oct. 13, the AMCC released new rules to their application and licensing process. The rules will allow applicants to present their license proposals to the AMCC in a public meeting. Applicants can address pass/fail issues in their applications and scoring errors to the AMCC. Additionally, denied applicants no longer need to pay a $40,000-$50,000 fee to request an investigative hearing.

• The location for a statue of famous disability rights advocate Helen Keller was announced by the Alabama Women’s Statue Tribute Commission last week. The statue will be placed near Union Street in Montgomery facing toward the current Alabama State House. The Keller statue is one of two statues whose creation and placement is being managed by the commission. The other statue will be of civil rights activist Rosa Parks. Combined, the two statues are expected to cost $611,000, and the commission has raised around $700,000. Any excess of funds will go towards maintenance for the statues. 

• Rep. John Rogers pleaded not guilty last week to two counts of obstruction of justice. The charges against Rogers allege that he and his assistant, Varrie Johnson Kindall were involved in the mismanagement of public funds intended to go towards non-profit organizations, one of which was the Piper Davis Youth Baseball League, which was overseen by former Rep. Fred Plump. Plump resigned from his seat in May after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of obstruction of justice. 

• David Cole, a former Alabama representative who pleaded guilty to a voter fraud charge, has been sentenced to serve 60 days at the Madison County jail as part of a plea agreement with prosecutors. The rest of Cole’s three-year sentence was suspended; he will be kept on probation for that time instead. In addition to his 60 days in jail, Circuit Judge D. Alan Mann ordered Cole to pay $52,885 in restitution. Cole was elected in 2022. Claims that he did not live in his district had dogged him since his campaign. He resigned from office and agreed to plead guilty soon after it was revealed that he had paid $5 per month to rent a 5 by 5 foot space in a home so he could claim residency in the district he was elected in. 

Changes to the Alabama Roundup

After a lot of discussion and reflection, we’ve decided to change how we handle the Alabama Roundup. Don’t worry, we’re still going to work just as hard to keep you informed on important events in the state, but we’ve decided to stop doing the longer focus article as part of each Roundup.

While we’ve enjoyed being able to dive a little deeper into a particular issue each Roundup, the goal of The Sunrise News has always been to provide you with a personal news experience that offers a unique service you can’t get anywhere else. 

The reality is, our focus articles take more time than the blurbs and really don’t fulfill our goal of providing a unique service. Our blurbs are useful and unique because they allow you to get a snapshot of current events in our state. While we do work hard to make the focus articles unique as well, they simply aren’t as important. 

Additionally, removing the focus articles from the Roundup gives us more time to work on publishing more news and lifestyles content, separate from the Roundup. 

We know some of you will miss the extra detail provided in the focus article, but we encourage you to click the links that we include with the top stories in brief if you want to read more details than we can provide. 

For our part, we’re excited to be able to take more time to dive into writing more articles for you to read. 

Our articles you might have missed

• We’ve released the second episode of From Dusk to Dawn, “Decisions and deadlines.” In it, we dig into our personal experience with publishing stories, how we decide what to cover and how we handle responses from articles we write. You can check out the transcript on our website or listen to the episode on Spotify. 

• In the latest edition of The Alabama Ramble, travel columnist Wesley Miller returns to Wetumpka Alabama, where he sees more art, peers into Alabama’s past and, of course, samples more of Wetumpka’s unique food options. 

• Last week’s edition of the Roundup focused on the new congressional map for Alabama. We also provided the latest in the ongoing conversation between Gov. Kay Ivey and the Alabama Public Library Service, updated readers on the lawsuit between birthing centers and the Alabama Department of Public Health and informed readers of a recent investigation launched by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Events this week

• Alabama Invitational: An exhibition featuring work created by current and former Alabama artists in the mediums of sculpture, glass, photography, painting and textiles produced by artists originally from or currently based in Alabama. View more details on our event calendar. 

• If you’re interested in having your event advertised on our calendar, you can submit events here. 

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You also can always reach us with questions, concerns or potential news tips via [email protected].

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