State & Regional News

It’s a special year for cicadas, insects known for their high-pitched mating songs. Two adjacent broods are expected to co-emerge for the first time in 221 years. Here's the next time they emerge in the Valley.

Stanley cups have skyrocketed in popularity, following other trends in reusable drinkware. But, fads like these can encourage overconsumption, experts said.

The state agency that promotes hunting in Pennsylvania has hired a lobbying firm run by a former top lawmaker using tens of thousands of dollars in public funds.

Gov. Josh Shapiro wants to invest more money in Pennsylvania's transit authorities. The money could plug a funding gap at LANTA as COVID relief dollars run dry, said Executive Director Owen O'Neil.

Gov. Josh Shapiro proposed increasing basic education funding by $1.1 billion, laying the groundwork to slash tuition costs at state-owned schools and taking out a $500 million bond to spur economic development.

Gov. Shapiro will deliver his budget address on Tuesday, Feb. 6. The deadline to deliver a completed spending plan is June 30.

During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, state parks across Pennsylvania were inundated with visitors.

State officials late last month announced the theme for this year’s annual tick-themed art contest, “Protect. Check. Remove.” Last year, there were no winners in the Lehigh Valley.

Take a look at stories that ran throughout the week of which we are most proud, had a profound impact on readers or that you might want to look at again.

Republican congressional candidates Maria Montero and Ryan Mackenzie criticized U.S. Rep. Susan Wild after she said Carbon County "drank the Trump Kool-Aid" on a conference call with prominent Pennsylvania Democrats.

Sharon Serra was a federal law enforcement official working in Manhattan when the first plane hit the World Trade Center. At the time, the Northampton County resident was just about three years into her now decades-long career in law enforcement.

This weekend marks the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. President Joe Biden is expected to visit Shanksville, Somerset County, on Saturday, the site of the Flight 93 crash.

PALMER TWP, Pa. - Patrick Cartier of Palmer Township said two decades later, he still feels the trauma of 9/11. “I look at it like it’s a part of me,”…

Tuesday was the start for Pennsylvania’s K through 12 masking mandate. The order was issued last week by Acting Secretary of Health Alison Beam, not Gov. Wolf. Sarah Anne Hughes, deputy editor for SpotlightPA, a nonpartisan investigative newsroom which has been covering these issues, recently joined us by phone to discuss the move by the Wolf administration.

The office of state Sen. Pat Browne announced Thursday the senator was injured in a motorcycle crash on Aug. 31.

Newly released FBI data show hate crimes in the U.S. hit a 12-year high in 2020.

HARRISBURG, Pa. - With a ban on abortions after six weeks of pregnancy now in effect in Texas, and rampant speculation that a conservative U.S. Supreme…

Pennsylvania’s Republican-controlled House of Representatives is mulling a legislative challenge to the Wolf administration’s latest mask mandate for schools. A group of state senators, meanwhile, is readying a bill to change the state’s constitution to prevent those mandates.

A Pennsylvania State Police Officer recalls when United Flight 93 crashed into a Somerset County field on September 11th, 2001.

HARRISBURG, Pa. - A state Senate panel will soon hold its first hearing on investigating the last two elections even though both contests have already…

HARRISBURG, Pa. - Marian Jarlenski, associate professor of health policy and management at the University of Pittsburgh, said the project will evaluate…

Breakthrough coronavirus cases occur when a fully vaccinated person contracts COVID-19. Though these cases are rare, health experts say some are to be expected.