News from around the nation.

Aizona has over 150 electric school buses, could more be on the way? Three ex-Memphis officers charged in the killing of Tyre Nichols to stand trial; Florida advocates highlight philanthropy's role in supporting Black maternal health; Indigenous water protectors protest the aging pipeline.

Transcript

The Public News Service Monday afternoon update.

I'm Mike Clifford.

We head first to Arizona with school in full swing, many students taking the bus to school.

Earlier this summer, the EPA awarded $900 million of clean school bus program funding to more than 500 districts across the country, some of which came to Arizona.

Currently, Arizona has received 155 electric school buses according to the ESB initiative.

Hazel Chandler with Moms Clean Air Force says smaller school districts in the state received enough funding to replace half their fleets.

She adds, school districts are now looking to alternative avenues to continue transitioning.

Some of them are using utility money.

A lot of them are using bond money.

So they might've gotten a couple or three or four initially, but then they love them so much and families and the kids love them so much, they just continue to approve them.

I'm Alex Gonzalez reporting.

And the federal trial of three former Memphis police officers charged in the killing of Tyree Nichols begins today.

That for the Guardian, they report ex-officers to Darius Bean, Justin Smith Jr. and Demetrius Haley will stand trial for federal civil rights and conspiracy charges in connection to Nichols' death.

After being pulled from his car, Nichols was brutally beaten by officers, an assault that was caught on video and later released to the public.

Nichols died from his injuries three days after the attack.

Meantime, while the United States has made strides in improving maternal care, disparities in access to quality healthcare persist, particularly for black women.

Studies show black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy related cause than white women.

Jenny Joseph is a midwife and head of the Common Sense Childbirth Institute in Florida.

She says one of the biggest challenges black mothers face in the state is access to care, largely due to economic and structural barriers.

The astronomical cost of the care is prohibitive.

It could be tens of thousands of dollars before you're done trying to pay for maternity care.

And we believe those are the reasons for these physiological outcomes.

Mothers who are unhealthy.

Joseph's organization, supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, centers on community-based maternal care.

I'm Tramell Gomes.

And indigenous water protectors and allies met at Michigan's Straits of Mackinac last week to spotlight the dangers of the 71-year-old Lime 5, deemed North America's riskiest crude oil pipeline.

Headlined by the non-profit Oil and Water Don't Mix, the protest featured a flotilla against Enbridge's Lime 5 oil spill risk.

Dr. Nicole Kiwe-Biber is with Clean Water Action.

She explains that indigenous people have been given stewardship over the waters.

We're also really critical to us having lived relationship to our culture and what our teachings are and our instructions are.

And so much of that is to protect and oversee the water and the wildlife.

Enbridge maintains that Lime 5 safety is exclusively regulated by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

This is public news service.

Next to Iowa, a state that's getting help to eliminate lead water pipes.

The Iowa Department of Natural Resources is working with local water agencies, planning where to prioritize funds.

As part of the bipartisan infrastructure law, cities and towns in Iowa are reducing the number of dangerous lead water lines.

The Iowa Environmental Council's Cody Smith says even homes built as recently as 1988 are connected to the local water utility with lead lines, which leaves people at risk, even in Iowa's big cities like Des Moines and Council Bluffs.

Particularly with the most vulnerable groups, such as unborn babies or young children, they have extreme and outsized risk related to exposure to lead through lead service lines.

That can cause higher levels of lead in the blood and lead to developmental issues for children.

The state's revolving fund, which is the primary source for water infrastructure updates, has received more than $620 million as part of the bipartisan infrastructure law.

The IEC says more than 700 communities have benefited so far.

I'm Mark Moran.

And in Kentucky, Fayette County is looking at approving industrial-scale solar operations on farmland.

Ashley Wilms with the Kentucky Resources Council says her organization has developed a model planning and zoning ordinance local officials can use as a resource.

Our model ordinance offers a menu of options in certain areas to allow local officials, hopefully with the input from county residents, to select the options that best meet the needs and future land use plans of those communities.

Solar projects in the state are increasing.

In Eastern Kentucky, there are plans to turn 7,000 acres of former surface mine land into a large-scale solar operation that crosses several counties.

Nadia Romligon reporting.

Finally, from RTD, the Biden administration issued an executive order in 2022 to strengthen and protect America's forest and old-growth trees.

The Sierra Club and other environmental groups are pushing for more clarity from federal agencies on their strategy for protecting old-growth forests.

Illinois Environmental Council Conservation Director Lindsey Keeney says those agencies manage forests with various goals in mind.

We trust our evidence-based science partners to decide what sort of management practices make sense within each of these forested areas, whether that is removing diseased trees through logging, using prescribed fire as an invasive species treatment, or other conservation practices to manage those forests.

The council acknowledges that forest stewardship practices are so fragmented that invasive species encroach on the trees.

This is Mike Clifford for Public News Service, member and listener supported.

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