The Commonwealth

Most legislation passed by Kentucky's 2013 General Assembly will take effect June 25, the state attorney general's office said Monday. The attorney general's opinion came from a request by Legislative Research Commission director Robert Sherman about the effective date of legislation passed during this year's law-making session.

Several organizations have partnered with Kosair Charities to participate in a campaign to end child abuse. The announcement expected Tuesday comes in the middle of Child Abuse Prevention Month. Kosair Charities announced the initiative last year. Since then, Kosair president Randy Coe says the coalition has been developing a plan to measure the success of the campaign. The goal is to eradicate child abuse, which Coe acknowledges is ambitious.

Neighbors of Lloyd Gibert described him as a soft spoken man who kept to himself but was warm toward those around him. A U.S. Army veteran and civilian employee with nine years of experience with Human Resources Command, Gibert was the victim in Wednesday’s shooting at Fort Knox. Gibert, 51, was shot Wednesday evening in a parking lot near the HRC building at Fort Knox, according to a statement released Friday by the Fort Knox Public Affairs Office. He was pronounced dead at 6:27 p.m. at Ireland Army Community Hospital.

A soldier in the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division wanted for questioning in the shooting death of a Fort Knox civilian employee was charged with murder Thursday after he was apprehended in a town 5 miles south of the Kentucky-Tennessee border.

A judge’s decision in Campbell County has libraries across the state fearful it might lead to closings and cuts should the ruling stand. The ruling could slice the property tax rate for the Campbell County Library District by more than half – from 7.7 cents per $100 to its 1978 level of 3 cents.

A U.S. Army civilian employee is dead following a shooting Wednesday afternoon in a parking lot near the Human Resources Command headquarters on Fort Knox. Agents from the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command are investigating the shooting, which forced the post to enter a full lockdown just before 6 p.m., according to a news release from the Fort Knox Public Affairs Office.

At this time last year, after a dry start to spring and an abnormal string of 80-plus-degree days, Western Kentucky farmers were off to perhaps the fastest start to planting corn in their lives. This isn’t last year. Kentucky has experienced six consecutive weeks of below-normal temperatures, including freezing conditions last week, which has largely kept farmers out of the field, the Louisville office of the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service noted Monday in its first weekly crop and weather report of the season.

A group of volunteers are bringing the Special Olympics to the Danville area. Lonnie Jones, 34, is developmentally disabled and has lived in Danville for about a decade. He has fond memories of participating in the Special Olympics as a teenager in Ohio. Jones asked his local case workers about bringing the event to Danville. With the help of Tina Scott and Mary Carol Porter from A1 Case Management, and Judy Bayless from A Brighter Choice, Jones’ dream will come true this year.

Although it will be years before vehicles cross it, the cost to pass over a new Ohio River bridge near Louisville is being discussed now.  A consulting firm announced Tuesday toll rates for the Ohio River Bridges Project include a likely one dollar fee for frequent users.  Other assumed rates are two dollars for other two axle vehicles, five dollars for medium trucks and ten dollars per heavy loads.  Official toll rate setting will be the job of a Kentucky-Indiana Joint Tolling Board.

Kentucky transportation officials have a hunch that thousands of people will descend onto Lexington's Rupp Arena for first and second round games of the NCAA Tournament, starting Thursday. And, of course, there's roadwork on state highways to contend with. Here's some advice issued Tuesday morning by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet:

The state is offering a new program to educate and train skilled minority and female workers for careers in construction.  ‘Bridges to Opportunities’ is a training program aimed at filling a need for women and minority workers in the Louisville-Southern Indiana Ohio River Bridges project.  Governor Beshear notes the Ohio River Bridges will be finished in a few years.  He adds ‘those who complete our program will be armed with the skills for a lifetime career.’ 

Their lives are delineated by a great divide: Before the tornado, and after the tornado. Yet survivors of the storms that tore through Eastern and Southern Kentucky on March 2, 2012, causing 25 deaths and millions of dollars in damages, have refused to allow personal tragedies to define their lives. They remember, but they move on. They grieve, but they live. Here are the stories of some survivors, one year after their lives were turned upside down.

Tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of severe weather which took the lives of many Kentuckians and caused millions of dollars in structural damage.  The March second, 2012 tornadoes caused vast devastation with the bulk of the damage in communities like West Liberty, Salyersville, East Bernstadt, and Piner.  Statewide, 25 people were killed and more than 45 hundred homes impacted.  671 of those houses were destroyed.

Kentucky's incarceration rate for youth has decreased in the past several years—but not by as much as the national average, said an Annie E. Casey Foundation report released Wednesday. And Kentucky and two other states are responsible for 60 percent of the nation’s juvenile incarcerations because of court order violations for status offenses—crimes applied to youth such as truancy and alcohol consumption.

Joined by Lt. Gov. Jerry Abramson, the Kentucky Habitat for Humanity foundation celebrated their 20th year of service in the commonwealth with a Capitol rally. Founded in 1993, Kentucky Habitat for Humanity works with affiliations across the state to build homes in much needed areas. They also have helped rebuild West Liberty and other affected areas from the March 2012 tornadoes.