Governor Robert Bentley says the state faces a “real crisis” with its budget.
The governor continued his tour of speaking engagements to rally support for his proposed $541 million tax proposal. He spoke at Guntersville State Park today.
The Department of Conservation is working on a contingency plan to close 15 of 22 state parks because of anticipated budget cuts. He says it will be lawmakers who close state parks and axe other state services if they fail to approve new revenue for the budget.
In addition to state parks, Bentley said mental health treatment, services for children, state troopers and "everything that is funded by the General Fund" will face cuts.
Today marks the fifth anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
An explosion on an offshore oil rig killed eleven workers, and the gushing well spilled more than two hundred million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico before finally being capped in September 2010.
Filmmaker Margaret Brown recently released a documentary, The Great Invisible, covering the spill and its aftermath. She says that in the four year process of making the film, its focus changed.
“I was really interested in making a film that was sort of following the spill in the three to four years after it happened. But as the film evolved, it evolved into this web of how we're all connected to that factory and to the Gulf of Mexico.”
The Great Invisible is available on Netflix and iTunes, and makes its television debut tonight on PBS.
You can also head to apr.org for an interview with Margaret Brown and a look back at our award-winning coverage of the Deepwater Horizon spill.?
Driving around the Gulf Shores area might be a little easier starting today. City leaders and the Alabama Department of Transportation are cutting the ribbon on the new bridge over Little Lagoon.
The ceremony was supposed to be last Friday, but some finishing touches were needed on the road approaching the bridge.
Vincent Calametti is a Regional Engineer for the Alabama Department of Transportation. He says construction of the bridge was a typical replacement project.
“This bridge has been open since the early seventies, and it’s on state route 182, which is adjacent to the Gulf of Mexico. So, it’s weathered quite a few storms. It was deemed ‘need to be replaced.’”
Construction had been underway for about a year, and a temporary detour bridge was put in place so cars could get by. The ribbon cutting ceremony is set for today at 10:30.