News

Eight students are in area hospitals with minor injuries after two school buses from Batesville collided Tuesday in North Little Rock.

They were on their way to a field trip at the State Capitol when one bus slowed for traffic and the bus behind it failed to stop.

The Arkansas State Police are handling the incident.  Batesville Superintendent Randy Willison has kept families informed.

Prosecutors have filed two additional theft charges against a former parks director in De Queen accused of stealing money from a regional softball program.  

Karen Atkins already faced felony theft charges after prosecutors accused her last year of taking money that was intended for the American Red Cross.

Prosecutors say Atkins taught CPR and lifeguard classes and did not pay the required fees to the American Red Cross.  

Prosecutor Bryan Chesshir announced the new charges Monday. 

One of the major riverfront hotels in downtown Little Rock is changing its name and will undergo a major renovation.

A ceremony is set for Wednesday to formally convert the Peabody hotel to a Marriott, which will be run by an Atlanta-based hotel group that has promised a $16 million renovation to the 18-story structure.  

The hotel's history includes a number of name changes. It was the Camelot and then the Excelsior before taking on the Peabody name in 2002.

The Arkansas Higher Education Department has notified 10,000 high school students that they have been awarded Academic Challenge Scholarships. The deadline for students to apply for the award is June 1.

Students qualifying for the scholarships this year will notice that the awards are lower than in past years. For the past two years, university students got $4,500 per year and community college students got $2,250.

Windstream Corp. says its long-distance and toll-free customers have experienced a service outage.

The Little Rock-based phone and data company says the outage began at about 10:30 a.m. Customers had trouble reporting they were having problems because the outage affected Windstream's inbound call center.

Arkansas Business reports a company spokesman didn't have an estimate of how many customers were affected. Windstream offers service in 48 states.

Business and residential customers were affected by the outage.

ExxonMobil as well as federal, state and local officials are still working to clean up from the oil spill in Mayflower that happened one month ago.

The Pegasus Pipeline ruptured spilling about 5,000 barrels of oil into the Northwoods subdivision. Residents from the neighborhood still have not returned to their homes.

The director of the Arkansas lottery says he hopes recent changes are helping the state-run gambling  operation overcome a sales slump that plagued the agency for several months.  

Lottery director Bishop Woosley says March numbers were strong, even though they don't match up to sales figures from March 2012, when a huge Mega Millions jackpot drew people in droves to lottery ticket sellers.  

Officials say it will be weeks before some Mayflower residents who had to leave their homes because of a leak from an ExxonMobil oil pipeline can return.  

More than 20 homes were evacuated after the March 29 leak from the pipeline flooded a neighborhood with crude oil.  

The Unified Command responsible for cleanup says ExxonMobil and environmental regulators will conduct air monitoring and sampling in the homes. The state Health Department will make final recommendations on when residents can return.

Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel has rejected the wording of a proposed constitutional  amendment that would create stricter term limits for lawmakers and expand the "cooling off" period before they could become lobbyists.  

McDaniel on Monday rejected the wording of the amendment proposed for next year's ballot by Tim Jacob of Little Rock.

The wording of the measure must be certified by McDaniel's office before supporters can begin gathering signatures.  

After nearly twenty years of vacancy the port at Helena is getting its first tenant, Enviro Tech Chemical Solutions. Improvements over the last decade, including rail lines, pipelines, and a crane have kept the port working in the absence of a permanent business. State Representative John Edwards attributes the port’s recent success to government involvement and personal leadership.