News from around the nation.

An Alabama man who spent more than 40 years behind bars speaks out, Florida natural habitats are disappearing, and spring allergies hit hard in Connecticut. 

Transcript

The Public News Service Friday afternoon update.

I'm Joe Ulery.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said today the US will drop efforts to end the war in Ukraine within days if talks show no progress.

The New York Times reports speaking after meeting with the French president in Paris, Rubio said the Trump administration will soon decide if a deal is possible.

His comments increased pressure on both sides and signaled growing urgency for Ukraine's president to consider compromise.

A man who spent more than four decades behind bars in Alabama is speaking out about the need for second chances.

Our Shantia Hudson has the story.

Convicted of robbery as a young man, James Jones was sentenced to life without parole under Alabama's Habitual Felony Offender Act.

He says no one was hurt during the incident, but the cost of his mistake was lifelong incarceration. there must be some type of legislation to fix the problem because I was in prison now 40 plus years and the crime has proliferated 2000 percent since I have been in there so definitely.

Jones was released in December.

He says he's deeply aware of the pain his actions caused and emphasizes that his support for second chances doesn't ignore the victims.

According to a report by Alabama Appleseed, the state has the fourth highest rate of what's known as extreme sentencing in the country. teams of researchers and volunteers fanned out at dawn today with their smartphones and binoculars on the Florida Gulf Coast University campus.

The annual event comes as new research shows Florida's natural habitats are disappearing at unprecedented rates with Southwest Florida among the regions most affected.

This fifth annual event builds on last year's discovery of 144 species including the rare two-striped forktail dragonfly and confirmed river otter activity on campus wetlands.

Senior biology student Mercedes Raceler hopes to focus her camera to capture another circling osprey, one of FGCU's most visible raptors.

Yeah we see a lot of ospreys, a lot of red-shouldered hawks.

Those are kind of our cool raptors.

In terms of other species we've got northern mockingbirds, we've got grackles, blue jays, lots of iconic species but then also some species that people may not know right away.

I'm Tramiel Gomes.

Spring allergy season is hitting hard in Connecticut.

The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America ranked three cities among the nation's top allergy capitals.

One in four US adults suffers from seasonal allergies and climate change is making symptoms worse.

UConn health nurse Pamela Sherman says switching medications can help.

All of a sudden they'll say my Claritin's not working anymore, my Zyrtec's not working anymore. because your body can get used to that over a long period of time.

Doctors say testing can lead to more effective long-term treatments.

This is Public News Service.

Communities in Southern and Eastern Montana were connected to passenger rail lines running from Chicago to Seattle until 1979.

An effort to fund the revival of those routes passed the House, but failed the Montana Senate this week by a few votes.

Our Kathleen Shannon has the story.

The Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority has garnered support from county commissioners, city council members, and Montanans across party lines since its creation in 2020, especially in communities that could again become rail towns.

Authority Vice Chair Jason Stewart calls rural rail a critical lifeline.

Folks need access to critical healthcare services and other services, and the only way they can reach them is by car.

Passenger trains would just be such a blessing for all these communities up and down throughout Southern Montana and Southern North Dakota.

Opponents, largely with the freight industry, argued they shouldn't be expected to subsidize passenger rail.

I'm Kathleen Shannon.

Drone footage provided evidence in a case by animal advocacy group Animal Outlook and helped expose misleading free roaming egg claims by a poultry farm in Pennsylvania.

Our Danielle Smith with the story.

The video showed hens in poor living conditions contradicting the farm's marketing.

Animal Outlook's Ben Williamson says for years, the industry has raised animals in confinement with high walls.

Undercover investigations get beyond them.

He says drone footage from public airspace now offers a new way to see what's happening inside.

I hope it serves as an example for other animal protection organizations around the world that they can use cutting edge photography to investigate other claims.

Mulderfur has agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit for over $287,000 and pledged to remove the free roaming claim from its products.

The company eggs are sold in stores in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states.

Beef production has risen steadily over the past 50 years, but so has its environmental impact.

In Washington, over 750,000 acres of state land are leased for grazing, which can threaten habitats for other species.

Deforestation from cattle grazing disrupts what are known as food webs, interconnected predator-prey systems that maintain ecosystem balance.

Jennifer Molidor of the Center for Biological Diversity says while the most notable damage is to the Amazon rainforest, cattle ranching has also devastated old-growth forests in the Northwest for decades.

More than one-third of U.S. land is used for pasture, making grazing the single largest user of land in the contiguous 48 states.

Mollador adds the conversion of forests, grassland and other ecosystems to livestock pasture and feed cropland is a leading driver of biodiversity loss.

I'm Isabel Charlay.

This is Joe Ulari for Public News Service, member and listener supported.

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