RIP
Actor, singer, 'The Gambler': Kenny Rogers dies at 81

By KRISTIN M. HALL, Associated Press

Actor-singer Kenny Rogers, the smooth, Grammy-winning balladeer who spanned jazz, folk, country and pop with such hits as “Lucille,” “Lady” and “Islands in the Stream” and embraced his persona as “The Gambler” on record and on TV died Friday night. He was 81.

© Provided by Associated Press FILE - In this Oct. 24, 2017 file photo, Kenny Rogers poses with his star on the Music City Walk of Fame in Nashville, Tenn. Actor-singer Kenny Rogers, the smooth, Grammy-winning balladeer who spanned jazz, folk, country and pop with such hits as “Lucille,” “Lady” and “Islands in the Stream” and embraced his persona as “The Gambler” on record and on TV died Friday night, March 20, 2020. He was 81. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey, File)

He died at home in Sandy Springs, Georgia, representative Keith Hagan told The Associated Press. He was under hospice care and died of natural causes, Hagan said.

The Houston-born performer with the husky voice and silver beard sold tens of millions of records, won three Grammys and was the star of TV movies based on “The Gambler” and other songs, making him a superstar in the ‘70s and ’80s. Rogers thrived for some 60 years before retired from touring in 2017 at age 79. Despite his crossover success, he always preferred to be thought of as a country singer.

“You either do what everyone else is doing and you do it better, or you do what no one else is doing and you don’t invite comparison,” Rogers told The Associated Press in 2015. “And I chose that way because I could never be better than Johnny Cash or Willie or Waylon at what they did. So I found something that I could do that didn’t invite comparison to them. And I think people thought it was my desire to change country music. But that was never my issue.”

A true rags-to-riches story, Rogers was raised in public housing in Houston Heights with seven siblings. As a 20-year-old, he had a gold single called “That Crazy Feeling,” under the name Kenneth Rogers, but when that early success stalled, he joined a jazz group, the Bobby Doyle Trio, as a standup bass player.

But his breakthrough came when he was asked to join the New Christy Minstrels, a folk group, in 1966. The band reformed as First Edition and scored a pop hit with the psychedelic song, “Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In).” Rogers and First Edition mixed country-rock and folk on songs like “Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love To Town,” a story of a Vietnam veteran begging his girlfriend to stay.

After the group broke up in 1974, Rogers started his solo career and found a big hit with the sad country ballad “Lucille,” in 1977, which crossed over to the pop charts and earned Rogers his first Grammy. Suddenly the star, Rogers added hit after hit for more than a decade.

“The Gambler,” the Grammy-winning story song penned by Don Schlitz, came out in 1978 and became his signature song with a signature refrain: “You gotta know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ’em.” The song spawned a hit TV movie of the same name and several more sequels featuring Rogers as professional gambler Brady Hawkes, and led to a lengthy side career for Rogers as a TV actor and host of several TV specials.

Other hits included “You Decorated My Life,” “Every Time Two Fools Collide” with Dottie West, “Don’t Fall In Love with a Dreamer” with Kim Carnes, and “Coward of the County.” One of his biggest successes was “Lady,” written by Lionel Richie, a chart topper for six weeks straight in 1980. Richie said in a 2017 interview with the AP that he often didn’t finish songs until he had already pitched them, which was the case for “Lady.”

“In the beginning, the song was called, ‘Baby,'” Richie said. “And because when I first sat with him, for the first 30 minutes, all he talked about was he just got married to a real lady. A country guy like him is married to a lady. So, he said, ‘By the way, what’s the name of the song?’” Richie replies: “Lady.”

Over the years, Rogers worked often with female duet partners, most memorably, Dolly Parton. The two were paired at the suggestion of the Bee Gees’ Barry Gibb, who wrote “Islands in the Stream.”

“Barry was producing an album on me and he gave me this song,” Rogers told the AP in 2017. “And I went and learned it and went into the studio and sang it for four days. And I finally looked at him and said, ‘Barry, I don’t even like this song anymore.’ And he said, ‘You know what we need? We need Dolly Parton.’ I thought, ‘Man, that guy is a visionary.’”

Coincidentally, Parton was actually in the same recording studio in Los Angeles when the idea came up.

“From the moment she marched into that room, that song never sounded the same,” Rogers said. “It took on a whole new spirit.”

The two singers toured together, including in Australia and New Zealand in 1984 and 1987, and were featured in a HBO concert special. Over the years the two would continue to record together, including their last duet, “You Can’t Make Old Friends,” which was released in 2013. Parton reprised “Islands in the Stream” with Rogers during his all-star retirement concert held in Nashville in October 2017.

Rogers invested his time and money in a lot of other endeavors over his career, including a passion for photography that led to several books, as well as an autobiography, “Making It With Music.” He had a chain of restaurants called “Kenny Rogers Roasters,” and was a partner behind a riverboat in Branson, Missouri. He was also involved in numerous charitable causes, among them the Red Cross and MusiCares, and was part of the all-star “We are the World” recording for famine relief.

By the '90s, his ability to chart hits had waned, although he still remained a popular live entertainer with regular touring. Still he was an inventive businessman and never stopped trying to find his way back onto the charts.

At the age of 61, Rogers had a brief comeback on the country charts in 2000 with a hit song “Buy Me A Rose,” thanks to his other favorite medium, television. Producers of the series “Touched By An Angel” wanted him to appear in an episode, and one of his managers suggested the episode be based on his latest single. That cross-promotional event earned him his first No. 1 country song in 13 years.

Rogers' family is planning a private service “out of concern for the national COVID-19 emergency,” a statement posted early Saturday read. A public memorial will be held at a later date.

Coronavirus and Poverty: A Mother Skips Meals So Her Children Can Eat


Manny Fernandez
19 hrs ago








Summer Mossbarger’s children say grace before eating dinner.

7 SLIDES © Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times


BRENHAM, Texas — With her six hungry children in the car, Summer Mossbarger was one of the first in line for lunch at the drive-through. Not at a fast-food restaurant, but outside Alton Elementary School.

Alton was closed — all the public schools in Brenham, a rural Texas town of 17,000 about 90 miles east of Austin, have shut for the coronavirus — but one vital piece of the school day lived on: free lunch. Ms. Mossbarger rolled down the window of her used, 15-year-old S.U.V. as school employees handed her six Styrofoam containers.

Even as the carnival aroma of mini corn dogs filled the vehicle on the drive back home, and even as the children sat on the porch and ate from their flipped-open containers with the family dogs running around, Ms. Mossbarger ate nothing.

She skipped breakfast and lunch, taking her first bite of food — food-pantry fried chicken — at about 5:30 p.m. All she consumed from the time she awoke that morning until she ate dinner were sips from a cherry Dr Pepper.

Money was tight. Ms. Mossbarger, 33, a disabled Army veteran, does not work. Her husband’s job as a carpenter has slowed in recent days and gotten more unpredictable as people cancel or delay residential construction jobs. She had plenty of worries — paying the $1,000 rent was at the top of the list — but lunch for her children was not one of them.

“If we didn’t have this, I probably would have a mental breakdown with stress,” she said of the free meals at Alton. “I’m not going to let my kids go hungry. If I have to just eat once a day, that’s what I have to do.”

The power of the coronavirus to produce upheaval in people’s lives depends in part on income. Americans with fewer financial resources have fewer options as they navigate the new normal of school closings, shuttered businesses and shelter-in-place orders.

Poverty experts said that in times of natural disasters and large-scale emergencies, low-income families who are already living on tight budgets with overdue bills, unstable housing, poor health care and unsteady employment often bear the brunt of the pain.

“They tend to be the first hit when things go wrong and then also to take the longest time to recover,” said H. Luke Shaefer, a professor of social work and public policy at the University of Michigan and the faculty director of its Poverty Solutions initiative.

Ms. Mossbarger’s self-imposed starvation was one quiet, anonymous moment amid a national crisis, and one sign of the depth of the virus’s impact on the working poor.

The Brenham Independent School District’s free-lunch drive-through was one of many underway this week in Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Oregon and other states attempting to ensure that schoolchildren continue to receive free meals Monday through Friday during weekslong virus-related closures. Educators and school nutritionists said that for some impoverished children, the free breakfast and free lunch at school are the only substantial meals they will eat in a day.

Albuquerque Public Schools, New Mexico’s largest district, where about 69 percent of students receive free or reduced-price meals, began passing out free breakfasts and lunches at dozens of its schools starting Monday. In California, the Elk Grove school system in Sacramento has since last week provided nearly 11,000 students with two daily meals, lunch and tomorrow’s breakfast.

In Brenham, where 60 percent of the 5,000 public-school students qualify for free or low-cost meals, the school district handed out more than 1,000 lunches and more than 800 breakfasts to children over the program’s first three days this week.

Brenham is a working-class town, known in Texas as the home of Blue Bell ice cream. Cattle and horses graze in the pastures that line the roads and highways, and the cowboys don’t bother to take off their hats when they climb into their trucks. The town is the uncredited backdrop of countless postcards, posters and Instagram accounts — the bluebonnets are bright and ubiquitous, and even color the grassy medians. But beneath its rustic beauty and ice-cream-company charm lies financial hardship. Brenham has a median household income of roughly $44,000, and a poverty rate of 18.6 percent.

On Tuesday, the long, tranquil driveway outside Alton Elementary was the coronavirus equivalent of an old-fashioned soup line, roughly 10 cars deep. District employees who volunteered to pass out meals recognized some of the drivers — they worked for the district, too, and had brought their children to get a free lunch.

The nation’s free or reduced-price lunch program has long been used as an indicator of a community’s poverty level, but there was no sign of embarrassment, resentment or shame in the drive-through line. Some drivers hollered a loud thank you to the volunteers as they pulled away, and most didn’t even bother to ask what was inside the lunch containers: mini corn dogs, baked beans, baby carrots, an orange. People seemed more concerned with social distancing than any social stigma. One woman kept her driver-side window rolled up as she interacted with the volunteers, to avoid having them get too close to her.

They pulled up in beat-up cars with rattling engines, newly washed trucks, sleek Cadillacs, old minivans. They were white, black, Hispanic. Mothers were behind the wheel of most of the vehicles, but there were a few fathers, too, and high-school students with their younger siblings inside. The only requirement was that children under 18 had to be inside the vehicle to receive the meal, but no one was asked to prove the children attended a district school.

For many of the families, the free meals were not the difference between their children eating or not eating. Instead, they said they viewed it as a way to stretch their budgets a little longer, so that the money they would have spent on that day’s lunch could instead go to tomorrow’s dinner or next week’s bill. Word had spread while families idled in line that the Texas governor was activating the National Guard, that some of the shelves at a local grocery store were still barren. The drive-through at Alton was one small bright spot at an anxious time, even though their county had no confirmed cases of coronavirus.

Gabbie Salazar, 28, made two trips to the drive-through, each time with different sets of nieces, nephews and cousins in her car. She knows Alton well: She manages the school cafeteria. She is a single mother who works two jobs, at the school and at a day care, and makes a total of about $2,000 a month, with a rent of about $800 monthly.

“Save a little money, you know?” Ms. Salazar said of the free meals. “I’m a single mom. I only have to do one meal at night, so that helps a lot.”

Before Ms. Mossbarger pulled up in the drive-through line on Tuesday, she took her six children to the HEB grocery store. She went to the aisle for paper towels and toilet paper, but there was nothing left — the shelves were empty, and customers were crowding around to grab whatever they could. She gathered the children, left the cart in the middle of the aisle and walked out, frustrated that she had wasted gas in her Chevrolet Suburban.

“I couldn’t deal with it,” she said of the grocery store. “It stresses me out. Because me as a mother, it makes me feel like I’m not going to be able to provide for my kids.”

Her husband, Jordan Spahn, 47, said they do not have the luxury of stockpiling. When he found out he didn’t have any carpentry jobs on Tuesday — usually, he makes about $180 daily — he worked on a friend’s patio-furniture set to make a few extra dollars.

“We live check to check,” Mr. Spahn said. “We’ve seen those that have more than others be the first ones to get everything they could get their hands on. It shows a little bit of the state of society these days. What if it gets 20 times worse next week, and now we don’t have nothing to get?”

The family moved into a rental home a few weeks ago. Empty fields sprinkled with bluebonnets gave the children space to run around, ride their bicycles and swing from the tire hooked to a tree branch and from the hammock on the porch. Ms. Mossbarger thinks of her military training when she thinks about mealtime for her four boys and two girls — Tristan Spahn, 5; Layla Ray, 6; Stasy Spahn, 7; Hayden Brown, 9; Gavin Brown, 9; and Joseph Brown, 10. “I was a cook in the military, so I’m used to feeding the masses,” she said.

Ms. Mossbarger was raised in Brenham. Years ago, her father was one of her husband’s high school teachers. They laugh about it now and said that’s just how things work in a small town. She wears her devotion to her children on her skin. The tattoo of the Teddy bear on her arm was for 10-year-old Joseph, the initials on her chest for six-year-old Layla, who is named for the Eric Clapton song.

The spread of the virus, for Ms. Mossbarger and Mr. Spahn, was one struggle in a lifetime of them. Ms. Mossbarger said that years ago, there was a time when she was homeless. Two of Mr. Spahn’s older sons — Matthew, 21, and Jonah, 24 — were both struck by vehicles in separate accidents and killed in the past year and a half. Their pictures and track jerseys cover the walls of the living room.

“We’ve been through some hard times in these past 16, 17 months,” Mr. Spahn said. “We’ve had heartache, heartbreak and now with this coming on, it’s kind of like, all right, bring it.”

Dinner, like lunch, was served on Styrofoam.

The entire meal was provided by Ms. Mossbarger’s sister-in-law and by a food-distribution nonprofit, Bread Partners of Washington County. The children ate leftover spaghetti, canned vegetables, microwave biscuits and Goldfish crackers. Ms. Mossbarger and her husband ate fried chicken with rice and the canned vegetables. The children said grace before their parents even sat down.

Ms. Mossbarger hardly mentioned it, but she was starving. “I honestly wasn’t going to eat, but Jordan was like, ‘You got to eat something,’” she said.

The next morning, she again skipped breakfast and was sipping a Monster Energy drink. She was tired and her head hurt.

“I feel it,” she said.

Her husband’s job was called off yet again, heightening her financial concerns about the coming days and weeks. “I’m constantly thinking what’s the next move going to be,” Ms. Mossbarger said. “Basically, if he’s not working, I’m going to eat as little as possible because I know that’s less food in my kids’ mouths.”

Soon, it was almost 11 a.m. She packed the children into the Suburban. She was headed again to the drive-through at Alton.

Simon Romero contributed reporting from Albuquerque, N.M.

Don't abandon your pets! Heartbreaking coronavirus appeal to animal owners
PET OWNERS have been urged not to abandon their furry friends as there is "no evidence" the coronavirus can be transmitted from domestic pets to humans, the Head of the Italian Civil Protection has said.

By LUKE HAWKER Fri, Mar 20, 2020

Angelo Borrelli has delivered a heartbreaking plea to pet owners not to give up on their animals and reassured the public the virus present in dogs cannot passed onto humans. In a daily briefing, Mr Borreli said: "The abandonment of pets, especially dogs, is absolutely regrettable. “The virus is also present in dogs, but nothing proves the contagion from animals to humans, so they should not be abandoned for this.”

He added: “There are reports of abandonment of domestic pets, in particular dogs, when there is no proof of the possibility of contagion between animals and humans.

“Don’t do it, there is no scientific evidence that proves they can transmit the virus”.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has already stated domestic pets such as cats and dogs cannot be infected with the current type of coronavirus which is killing thousands of people around the world.

In a statement, the WHO said: “At present, there is no evidence that companion animals such as dogs or cats can be infected with the new coronavirus.

Coronavirus: Authorities have urged pet owners not to abandon their animals (Image: GETTY)


 

Coronavirus: The World Health Organisation said there is no evidence pets can transmit the disease (Image: GETTY)

“However, it is always a good idea to wash your hands with soap and water after contact with pets.

“This protects you against various common bacteria such as E.coli and salmonella that can pass between pets and humans.”

Dr Grace Roberts, a virologist at Queen’s University Belfast, explained animals are unlikely to transfer viruses to humans because they have a different cell structure.

Dr Roberts said: ”If the virus meets a cell that doesn’t have the structure it needs to get in, it won’t.

“Some animals have closer related structures, but if people are thinking about whether dogs or cats could transmit the virus, I think it is very highly unlikely.

“A lot of illnesses that dogs get, humans have never had, despite living with dogs for a very, very long time.

“The kind of illnesses they get just don’t spread to humans because the kind of relationship they express within their cells and what we express in ours are just too far apart.

“Viruses would have to make so many mutations to make that jump. It just becomes so unlikely that would happen.”

The Department for Health has confirmed 177 patients have now died after testing positive for COVID-19 in the UK.

 

2 dogs test positive, quarantined for coronavirus in Hong Kong
By
Danielle Haynes
()


Health officials said there's no evidence that dogs with the virus can infect humans. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

March 20 (UPI) -- Two dogs have tested positive for the coronavirus in Hong Kong, prompting officials there to warn residents Friday to avoid kissing their pets.

The Hong Kong Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department said a German shepherd tested positive for the virus in Pok Fu Lam, a residential area on the west coast of Hong Kong Island. It's the second dog in Hong Kong to test positive for a presence of the virus.

Officials sent both the German shepherd and another dog from the same residence to a quarantine facility at the Hong Kong Port of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge.

The department said neither dog showed any signs of disease, and added that it's not believed dogs with the virus can infect humans.

"There is currently no evidence that pet animals can be a source of COVID-19 for humans or that this virus can cause the disease in dogs," a department spokesman said.

"To ensure public and animal health, the department strongly advises that mammalian pet animals including dogs and cats from households with persons confirmed as infected with COVID-19, or close contacts of COVID-19 infected persons, should be put under quarantine."

Hong Kong officials advised pet owners to wash their hands before and after handling animals, their food or supplies. They also said pet owners should avoid kissing their pets and maintain good hygiene in their homes.

Owners who notice a change in their pets' health condition are encouraged to contact a veterinarian.

Broadway workers get pay, health insurance help in coronavirus deal

By BILL SANDERSON
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
MAR 20, 2020

W. 45th Street in the Theater District.(ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images)

Broadway theaters agreed with their unions Friday to cover pay and health insurance during the coronavirus crisis.

The package includes supplemental wages to workers and continued contributions to health insurance.

The Broadway League — which represents theater owners — agreed to talk with the union coalition starting the week of April 6 about possibly extending health benefits further.

“We are grateful to be able to tell our members that the industry came together to provide some compensation during this terrible time,” the Coalition of Broadway Unions and Guilds said in a statement.

The coalition includes an array of Broadway unions that represent actors, artists, dancers, singers, musicians, playwrights, directors and choreographers, as well as stagehands and other backstage crew, ushers, ticket takers and box office personnel, as well as other professions.

Madison Square Garden still hasn’t committed to paying its workers for duration of coronavirus crisis

March 21, 2020: Pay 'Em! -- Food vendors and cleaning staff are growing frustrated and scared as James Dolan's Madison Square Garden hasn't come up with compensation plan. (New York Daily News) 

https://www.nydailynews.com/sports/ny-new-york-daily-news-back-pages-2020-20200107-pfryepf2vrgktclslha3txzsdu-photogallery.html 

Madison Square Garden still hasn’t committed to paying its workers for duration of coronavirus crisis


By STEFAN BONDY
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
MAR 20, 2020

With the coronavirus crisis creating pervasive anxiety in the workforce, Madison Square Garden still hasn’t committed to pay concession workers for the remainder of the shutdown, the Daily News has learned.

The union had been negotiating with MSG as recently as Friday but MSG has only pledged to continue making healthcare contributions to workers who are eligible for the company’s plan, a source said. MSG has also vowed to pay workers until March 29, and only certain workers until April 5.

After that, there’s no commitment from MSG for at least the concessions and cleaning staff, according to multiple sources. The Knicks are the NBA’s most valuable team with an estimated worth of $4.6 billion, according to Forbes.

The Knicks’ final home game was scheduled for April 14 and the Rangers’ was April 4, although they had a chance of making the NHL playoffs.

Joseph Gambino, son of top Mafia boss Carlo and one-time Garment District powerbroker, dead at age 84

By LARRY MCSHANE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
MAR 19, 2020

Joseph Gambino in 1992.(Tom Monaster / New York Daily News)


Philanthropic mobster Joseph Gambino, the son of mighty “Boss of All Bosses” Carlo Gambino and one-time partner in a multimillion-dollar Mafia monopoly in the Garment District, reportedly died at the age of 84, according to the website GanglandNews.com.

Joseph Gambino famously teamed with his older brother Thomas to oversee a corrupt system where mob-controlled trucking businesses were assigned for decades to specific zones in the busy Manhattan business district. Without any competitive bidding, the mob truckers pocketed tens of millions of dollars by simply imposing a 7% mob tax on all Gambino-trucked items.

Thomas Gambino was the head of the scam, while Joseph served as his principal operating officer, authorities said. Both took a 1992 plea bargain deal where they agreed to quit their lucrative jobs in the trucking industry and pay a $12 million fine — with both avoiding jail time as part of the agreement.

Authorities estimated the brothers grossed roughly $70 million and pocketed $22 million in profits.

The deal also required the siblings to sell off a large portion of their trucks, effectively ending the crime family’s control of the Garment District since the 1950s. Asked how he was feeling after entering his plea, Joseph Gambino replied, ''I’m a lot happier.''

It wasn’t his only profitable venture in the clothes business. Back in 1991, it was revealed that celebrity fashion designer Bob Mackie, to help pay off a loan provided by the Gambino brothers four years earlier, provided Joseph Gambino’s wife Arlene with a new wardrobe and created dresses for a number of relatives before a family wedding.

The siblings were the sons of Carlo Gambino, the powerful head of the crime family that still bears his name despite decades of internal difficulties. Carlo Gambino, who died of natural causes at age 74 in 1976, rose to the boss’ seat after the infamous 1957 assassination of Albert Anastasia in a barber’s chair at the Park Sheraton Hotel.

The elder Gambino turned the reins over to his brother-in-law Paul Castellano, who was infamously gunned down just before Christmas 1985 in a hit orchestrated by new family boss John “Dapper Don” Gotti.



(Charles Hoff/New York Daily News)
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True 'Goodfellas': A look back at the long history of the Mafia and NYC

Both Joseph and Thomas kept a much lower profile after their guilty pleas as the Gambino crime family fell on hard times during the 1990s and into the new millennium.

But brothers Thomas and Joseph shared a softer side: In 1991, the pair donated more than $1 million toward the creation of a state-of-the-art children’s cancer center on Long Island. The brothers also gave generously to another cancer foundation, according to their lawyers.

Try universal basic income now, NYC: Andrew Yang says coronavirus makes the city an ideal testing ground for a bold idea

By ANDREW YANG
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
MAR 20, 2020 | 7:15 AM

Money for the masses.(Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

The novel coronavirus that’s reached pandemic proportions has already seen more than 13,000 U.S. cases, close to 4,000 of them here in New York. Neighboring New Jersey is seeing one of the highest death tolls, with one family hit particularly hard. And in an attempt to curb the spread of the disease despite a late start, social distancing has become the catchphrase most Americans are living by.

All of us staying at home is particularly problematic to those of our neighbors who work in the service industry. In previous times of crisis, New Yorkers have banded together to keep a sense of community together and to help small businesses.

After Hurricane Sandy, communities helped small businesses rebuild. In the wake of 9/11, New Yorkers, refusing to give in to the fear that the terrorists tried to spread, made it a point to go out and live their lives. With everyone trying to avoid spreading the coronavirus, local businesses will be hit a lot harder than they’ve ever been hit before.

On the average waiter’s or hotel employee’s salary, it’s impossible to have a two to three-month safety net saved up, so many workers are out of a job and quickly running out of money.

I’m glad to see the federal and state governments taking steps to ensure that there is some assistance. However, too much of the focus has been on helping businesses, with no-interest loans or interest rates being lowered to help corporations’ bottom lines.

Instead, we’ve got to focus on doing the one thing that we know will help people hit the hardest economically by this crisis: Send them a check of at least $1,000 each month so that they can continue to live. So they can keep their families healthy and safe. So they can make sure their kids’ lives and learning are disrupted as little as possible.

I’m glad this idea has risen to the top of the list in Washington, with even the Trump administration agreeing to the wisdom of direct cash payments. This idea isn’t partisan. The list of supporters includes Sen. Tom Cotton (R), Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D), Sen. Mitt Romney (R), and New York’s own Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D).

Such an infusion would inject nearly $13 billion per month into the state of New York. Not by moving money into the accounts of banks, but by moving it into the accounts of our friends, our neighbors and ourselves

This isn’t a time for fighting, and it isn’t a time for half-measures. It isn’t a time to focus on bailing out the banks, or the airlines, or hedge funds. It’s time we bail out the American people. Too many of them are wondering where their next rent payment is coming from. Or whether they’ll have money to feed their kids.

I’ve been in touch with those who are calling for a universal basic income in this time of crisis, and I’ve been trying to convince them that it shouldn’t stop once we’re clear. I’m going to continue to reach out to them and anyone who will listen. I’m going to fight so that the leaders of each city, each state, and even the federal government propose basic incomes to help all Americans navigate this new world we’re living in. And I’m going to continue to publicly call on all of our leaders — from Mayor de Blasio all the way to President Trump — to come together and deliver money, no strings attached, directly to the people.

In the meantime, my organization, Humanity Forward, is proud to team up with the Collective Action Fund, Neighborhood Trust Financial Partners and One Fair Wage to today announce the delivery of over $1 million dollars (in $1,000 increments) to working families in New York and across the country in the coming weeks.

Once America sees what money in our hands can do, I can’t imagine we’ll turn back.

Yang, a businessman, is founder of Humanity Forward and a former Democratic candidate for president.

Andrew Yang's non-profit to spend $1 million to help jobless families

Businessman Andrew Yang, shown at a Des Moines, Iowa, forum in January, said his non-profit will spend $1 million to help families affected by the spread of the coronavirus. File Photo by Mike Theiler/UPI | License Photo

March 20 (UPI) -- Andrew Yang, through his new non-profit, will spend $1million to assist working families impacted by the coronavirus pandemic, the former Democratic presidential candidate said Friday.

Humanity Forward, an organization the wealthy tech entrepreneur formed after dropping out of the presidential race, is teaming with the Collective Education Fund and Neighborhood Trust Financial Partners, to locate families in need as businesses around the country close up shop because of the virus.

The move is an offshoot of his universal basic income theory which Yang campaigned on. He plans to start giving about 500 families in the Bronx $1,000 per month starting this month. The non-profit will also raise money for the project through its Humanity Forward Coronavirus Relief Fund.

"It seemed much more important to put money into people's hands because people are struggling and wondering how they are going to be able to pay their bills," Yang said. "So rather than doing basic income trial, we deiced to get money into people's hands immediately and it seemed like the most effective way to do it."

In a New York Daily News op-ed Friday, Yang said current bailout talk has centered around businesses and industries and not workers.
https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2020/03/try-universal-basic-income-now-nyc.html

"I'm glad to see the federal and state governments taking steps to ensure that there is some assistance," Yang said. "However, too much of the focus has been on helping businesses, with no-interest loans or interest rates being lowered to help corporations' bottom lines.

"Instead, we've got to focus on doing the one thing that we know will help people hit the hardest economically by this crisis," he said.

Authorities investigate worker's death in a Kentucky grain bin

A COMPLETELY PREVENTABLE INCIDENT IF OSHA APPLIED ON THE FARM

Adolfo Garcia, 44, died in a grain bin accident in Kentucky on Tuesday. Photo courtesy of Pixabay

EVANSVILLE, Ind., March 20 (UPI) -- Authorities are investigating the circumstances surrounding the death of a farmworker in a Kentucky grain bin this week.

Adolfo Garcia, 44, died in a grain bin accident at United Livestock Commodities Inc. on Tuesday. He is at least the seventh person to die in a grain bin accident in the United States this year.

Garcia had entered the bin "in an attempt to dislodge a portion of grain that was stuck," according to the Graves County Sheriff's Office, which responded to the call. "A witness and co-worker reported that as that portion of grain dislodged, a large amount of grain collapsed on the victim."

The bin, which was large enough to hold about 80,000 bushels, was partially filled with corn.

Several local fire departments and rescue groups -- along with neighboring farmers in tractors and semi-trucks -- worked for nearly four hours to free Garcia from the bin. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

An autopsy was conducted Tuesday, but the results have not been released, Graves County Coroner Brad Jones said.

Garcia is survived by a wife and five children. His community has set up a benefit account at a local bank to help his family, according to the sheriff's office.

His family planned a private service, according to his obituary.

Dozens of farmers and farmworkers die in grain bins every year. Accidents happen most often on farms with few employees that are not required to follow Occupational Safety and Health Administration safety regulations.

It is unclear if OSHA will investigate the accident.

IT IS NOT AN ACCIDENT IN OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

IT IS CALLED A PREVENTABLE INCIDENT
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