Blue Bell Creameries announced Thursday it will be closing all its facilities including a plant in Sylacauga, Alabama for cleaning and retraining in response to a listeria outbreak linked to Blue Bell ice cream.
The company says the program comes after a thorough review of all its internal operations and discussions with expert microbiologists.
The Sylacauga plant as well as facilities in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma and Brenham, Texas will be closed all next week and likely into the following week as well. Ice cream produced at those facilities in the last few days will be used for testing and will not be sold to the public.
On Monday, Blue Bell announced a complete recall of its entire product line after its ice cream was linked to ten listeria illnesses in four states, including three deaths. Several Blue Bell products were found to contain listeria. None of the listeria illnesses have been linked to products manufactured at the Sylacauga plant.
Alabama’s Senate Judiciary Committee recently passed a comprehensive bill to legalize medical marijuana in the state.
But Jabo Waggoner, chairman of the Senate Rules Committee and ultimately the person who sets the calendar for debate in the state Senate, says the bill is dead. Waggoner says he will refuse to put the bill up for debate on the Senate floor, calling the measure "bad legislation" and saying Alabama just isn’t ready for it.
Robert Capecchi is the Deputy Director of State Policies for the Marijuana Policy Project. He says even still, attitudes are shifting in favor of medical marijuana policy.
“Across the country, there’s a realization that these medical marijuana laws in the states that have them are working, and they’re not resulting in mass chaos on the street, and they’re not resulting in increased marijuana use. They’re actually having good, positive effects in a lot of these states.”
Bill sponsor Bobby Singleton is considering making a few changes to the bill to make it more palatable to the GOP. He’s also considering converting the bill into a constitutional amendment, which would put it up to a public vote.
The roar of cannons and the crack of gunfire will be heard near Selma today.
Civil War reenactors are observing the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Selma. The actual battle took place in 1865 between Union General James Wilson and Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Wilson was just 28 years old when he won the battle of Selma.
Edward Longacre is General Wilson’s biographer. He describes Wilson as one of the Civil War’s boy generals.
“He was actually a more distinguished boy general than the one we think of as the preeminent boy general, George Armstrong Custer. In fact, Wilson and Custer served together and for a short period of time, Custer served under Wilson’s command. So Wilson was the more senior officer.”
The reenactment of the Civil War Battle of Selma will continue through Sunday.