News from around the nation.

Senator John Kennedy, the Louisiana Republican, says living public officials cannot have public buildings named after them, New York officials want to repeal the HALT Act despite some benefits, and a new report finds that Black and Latino students in San Francisco face a 'silent suspension.

Transcript

The Public News Service Monday afternoon update.

I'm Mike Clifford.

Living public officials should not have buildings named after them.

So says Senator John Kennedy, the Louisiana Republican, on Sunday he proposed a rule to prohibit such renaming efforts.

Kennedy told CBS Face the Nation that public officials, including Trump, should not spend public money on private ads for themselves.

This comes as President Donald Trump continues to push to rename the Kennedy Center after himself.

The president has also sought to add Trump to other prominent federal buildings in D.C.

Kennedy added, the White House sees it differently, but you can't spend public money to promote yourself.

Meantime, New York lawmakers want to repeal a 2021 law that limits how and when solitary confinement can be used in state prisons.

Republican candidate for governor Bruce Blakeman has made the Halt Act a campaign issue, saying it makes prisons more dangerous.

However, there is no evidence that solitary confinement makes prisoners safer, and the law remains a political point of contention.

Eldon Vail is the former secretary of the Washington State Department of Corrections.

He says solitary confinement reform requires more than legislative change.

You've got to have committed leadership.

You have to have the folks who run the department believe there is harm that comes from overuse of solitary confinement.

That's a critical piece of it.

Assuming that's in place, you've got to be able to train your staff to understand what that means and how that impacts what they do in high security units.

He feels the behavior causing a person's confinement should also be addressed.

I'm Edwin J. Viera.

This story was produced with original reporting by Katie Rose for The American Prospect.

Next, large disparities in discipline for black students persist for the third year in a row in the San Francisco Unified School District.

That's according to a new report.

Researchers from the nonprofit Coleman Advocates found that during the 2023 and 2024 school years, Black students were four times more likely to face suspension or expulsion than their peers.

Brandi Bowen with Coleman Advocates says total suspensions are actually down in recent years, but so-called silent suspensions are up.

There is definitely a trend of the students who are pushed into referral rooms or sent home early without it being tracked.

They're suffering the most academically.

I'm Suzanne Potter.

And a new rule proposed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services aims to fundamentally alter Head Start, a program that serves over a million kids in Colorado and across the nation each year.

Clarissa Hayes with the Food Research and Action Center says those changes would undermine the program's role in promoting child nutrition and healthy eating.

Head Start provides comprehensive services to young children and their families with a particular focus on children from households with low income, and this has really been a trusted source of care and meals for over 60 years.

The administration says cutting the program's more than 100 pages of regulations down to 10 will allow more kids to participate.

This is Public News Service.

Conservation groups are now pushing back against efforts by the Trump administration to rescind protections for undeveloped land from further development.

Arzimon Perez lets us know they say such efforts threaten crucial habitat and species.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture filed a proposed change that would end the 2001 roadless rule, which protects vast swaths of public lands from further development.

If approved, the change would open up more than 45 million acres of public lands for road construction, logging, mining, and even potential privatization.

Such a move could imperil the Bald Mountain roadless area, one of the largest intact forest tracks in the eastern United States.

Olivia Porter, with the National Parks Conservation Association, says ridless areas serve many important functions for the health of the environment and communities.

Ridless areas are incredibly important for clean air, for long-range view sheds, for clean water for many communities here in North Carolina.

That's our mountain communities.

They also provide resilience measures during extreme weather.

The Trump administration argues rescinding the rule would give greater flexibility to forest management to local and state governments, while promoting domestic timber production.

I'm Zamone Perez.

An analysis by the National Parks Conservation Association finds 30% of roadless areas are within 30 miles of a national park.

Next, scientists are calling on the Congress to continue funding for USDA climate hubs, which help New England farmers adapt to increasingly volatile weather.

The Trump administration has vowed to eliminate the network of regional centers, which have operated for more than a decade. and House Republicans have cut all funding from the most recent Agriculture Appropriations Bill.

Julian Reyes is a former national coordinator for USDA Climate Hubs and now works with the Union of Concerned Scientists.

He says farmers could lose access to research used to better protect crops from rising temperatures and drought.

It's just really sad to see that the administration is choosing to dismantle such a great USDA organization that works at farmers and ranchers and really thinks about their needs and concerns on the ground.

I'm Katherine Carley.

Finally, September is National Atrial Fibrillation Awareness Month.

For one Oregon stroke survivor, Tam Driscoll, the message is simple.

An irregular heartbeat can become a medical emergency.

Driscoll is an American Heart Association Go Red for Women ambassador.

She was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation, or AFib, after episodes in which her heart raced erratically.

That danger became real two years ago when in her mid-30s, she had a stroke.

Driscoll says knowing the signs of a stroke and taking immediate action may have saved her life.

Luckily for me, I knew the signs of a stroke and I got immediate care.

As a result, I was able to walk out of ICU two days later because I identified it and I got the care that I needed.

More information is available at heart.org slash afibfacts.

I'm Mark Richardson.

This is Mike Clifford.

Thank you for starting a week with Public News Service.

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