State & Regional News

More than 1,300 Pennsylvania officials, including lawmakers and Gov. Josh Shapiro, will get bigger salary increases in 2025 than the average Pennsylvanian under a state law that guarantees them automatic pay raises.

Hurricane Helene may be out of the headlines, but the residents of North Carolina still need help with everyday items. Nazareth nonprofit Every Ribbon Counts is rallying the valley to help these victims.

Lehigh Township volunteer firefighters shared the obstacles they faced fighting a 600-acre fire that erupted on Blue Mountain. Almost a month later, it's still not technically out.

The Lehigh Valley is in a 9-inch rain shortfall. The prolonged dry spell has raised concerns about the longevity of fresh-cut Christmas trees this year. And, it's thinning out the trees planted this year to grow for future holiday seasons.

The township's Shade Tree Commission was awarded 15 trees from a statewide nonprofit dedicated to improving the tree canopy in urban areas.

Listings will include risks for flood, wildfire, wind, heat and air quality, as well as interactive maps and insurance requirements.

Highs in the 30s and lows mainly in the 20s are forecast for the weekend and well into next week, which could be jarring on the heels of one our warmest Novembers on record.

More shoppers are using ‘buy now, pay later’ plans heading into Black Friday and the holiday season, as the ability to spread out payments looks attractive at a time when Americans still feel the lingering effect of inflation and already have record-high credit card debt. Experts say the short-term loans can lead consumers to overextend themselves and warn that those who use credit cards for the service face higher interest expenses.

With no quick cure for the fast-moving, but slow-to-kill disease, experts said American beech trees could be functionally extinct throughout the state within 10 to 15 years.

Democrats in Pennsylvania lost its 19 presidential electoral votes, a U.S. Senate seat, three other statewide races, and two congressional seats.

The recommended change would mean that patients would begin treatment before they get extremely sick. In Africa, where millions of people are infected with HIV, a move to earlier treatment would be challenging for the public health system.

Budget cuts and layoffs are hitting teachers in Philadelphia. But the city and a local developer are hoping to offer some relief: a housing project designed for them. At a similar project in Baltimore, having fellow teachers as neighbors brings support and camaraderie after a tough day at work.

It's not just homesteaders, hipsters and foodies getting into the hands-on pursuit. The butter-churning craze is part of a larger, do-it-yourself food movement that includes everything from canning, to making homemade bitters, a food writer says.

For 20 years, Linda Smith was a successful ER doctor. But she started to regret doing painful procedures on patients without having the time to sit down and talk with them. So she became a palliative care doctor, one of a growing number helping people deal with life-threatening illnesses.

An experimental "gut check" test can tell us more about the bacteria that live inside us. By studying the way the microbial populations change over time, researchers think they may have a new tool for monitoring health.

Audie Cornish speaks with Michele Dunne, director of the Atlantic Council's Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East for analysis of the latest events in Egypt.

The Statue of Liberty reopens July 4, for the first time since Hurricane Sandy damaged the statue's pedestal and flooded park service offices. We look at what it took to reopen the iconic statue — and why nearby Ellis Island remains closed indefinitely.

After years of food shortages and drought, in a country that was once the breadbasket of southern Africa, Zimbabwe's crippled economy is recovering — after adopting the U.S. dollar as its currency. But memories of the violent elections in 2008 are fueling fears about security. The disputed vote ended in a power-sharing deal between President Robert Mugabe and his main opposition rival. The Zimbabwean leader has now proclaimed July 31 as election day. New York-based Human Rights Watch warns there's potential for more violence — unless key security and other reforms are brought in before the vote.

When it comes to selling Texas Latinos on the Republican Party, Republican Sen. Ted Cruz would seem like a natural. But even though he is the son of a Cuban refugee, Cruz is much closer to his Tea Party supporters' hard line on immigration than he is to the Republicans who are urging a more accommodating position for the sake of the party's future.

One day after Egypt's military deposed the nation's first democratically elected president, it began a crackdown on Mohammed Morsi's Islamist Muslim Brotherhood.

Homemade sodas are hot these days: Americans bought more than 1.2 million home carbonators last year. For the Fourth of July, we asked mixologist Gina Chersevani to help us tap into the trend with a soda float inspired by Independence Day.

A young college grad asks an economist for advice.