Northampton County News

Nazareth Area School Board approved a bid for a nearly $500,000 parking lot for Shafer Elementary School to accommodate growth and ease on-street parking.

School directors voted 5-3 for a $140.7 million spending plan that includes a 4% tax hike, which would raise $3.2 million in additional revenue for the district.

School directors voted 5-3 to continue funding the Northampton Area Public Library at its current level.

The Catasauqua School Board voted to continue the football team's annual Thanksgiving Day game against Northampton. The rivalry on the gridiron is 101 years old.

Parker Flamisch, a 2023 district graduate, will fill a vacancy created by the resignation of former school Director Kim Bretzik. He will finish out Bretzik's term, which ends in December.

The school district wants the Lower Nazareth Township Board of Supervisors to rezone a piece of land at the corner of Hecktown and Country Club roads for school use.

Northampton Area Public Library was slated to get $270,000 from Northampton Area School District for the upcoming fiscal year. But some school directors want to keep the money in NASD.

Follow the journey of an adolescent boy living with PANDAS, a rare condition that causes sudden, severe psychiatric symptoms after a strep infection. He and his family navigate the challenges of this condition and find hope through treatment in the Lehigh Valley.

Catasauqua Area School District is recommending the 101-year-old tradition be canceled because of safety concerns. Northampton Area's football players are stronger than the Rough Riders, Catasauqua Area's football coach said.

The projects were among 81 community projects across Pennsylvania for which Gov. Josh Shapiro announced grants through the Main Street Matters program.

“I know a lot of people are dealing with inflation still, yet forever, it seems like,” Lower Saucon councilwoman Sandra Yerger said. “It seems like it might help them out a little bit.”

It might seem counterintuitive, but harvesting holiday trees year after year is better for the environment than using an artificial one, experts said, especially amid the proliferation of plastic piling up in landfills.

Officials on Wednesday reviewed several preliminary transportation policy strategies for the Valley's priority climate action plan. The plan’s focus is to reduce carbon emissions from transportation, a significant driver of greenhouse gas emissions across the region.

More than three dozen projects in the Valley were awarded grants, receiving about 7% of the total funding awarded. Statewide, $335 million in grants were announced Wednesday.

All but one township zoning amendment application were reviewed without issue by the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission Comprehensive Planning Committee on Tuesday afternoon.

If ultimately completed, the combined health care system would operate 30 hospitals and more than 700 outpatient sites, with more than 62,000 employees, according to LVHN and Jefferson Health.

Driven by $8.1 billion in manufacturing, the Lehigh Valley's Gross Domestic Product grew to a record $50.2 billion in 2022. The region's economy now ranks above Vermont and Wyoming.

Verizon is bringing more choice for high-speed internet to the area as it expands Fios to previously unserved pockets of the Lehigh Valley.

State Sen. Lisa Boscola said it's a fallacy if the U.S. Postal Service thinks it can save up to $7 million by shipping outgoing mail from the Lehigh Valley to Harrisburg for processing without cutting jobs. On Monday, she called on USPS to do further analysis of its plans.

Bradbury-Sullivan LGBT Community Center, which has been a central organization for LGBTQ community in the region since opening in 2016, in recent months has laid off five employees and temporarily reduced hourly employees' time.

The Lehigh Valley Planning Commission at 11 a.m. on Wednesday is holding a meeting at its Allentown office to brainstorm and prioritize ways to decarbonize transportation across the region. Decarbonization is the process of reducing or eliminating carbon dioxide emissions.

A new study from the Lehigh Valley Justice Institute of the area's local courts found a link between time spent in jail awaiting trial and harsher prison sentences.