Special Session Adjourns & Nightly News Roundup

By KERA News & Wire Services

Dallas, Tx –

The Texas Legislature has adjourned a two-day special session.

Two of the issues assigned to them by Gov. Rick Perry were adopted before Thursday's adjournment. The third, a measure that would allow the state to continue contracting for privately built toll roads, never made it out of committee.

They passed a bill to keep five important state agencies operating for the next two years and a measure authorizing the state to spend $2 billion in bonds to build new roads. The road bonds were already approved by voters statewide in 2007, but the Legislature still needed to authorize the spending.

Newspaper Closures

A group of weekly community newspapers covering southern Dallas suburbs is printing its final editions. The publisher said Today Newspapers is shutting down Friday because of a loss of advertising revenue.

Today Newspapers published two editions. One served the communities of Cedar Hill, Duncanville, Desoto, and Lancaster, which are south of Dallas. The other covered Grand Prairie, which is west of Dallas.

Publisher Kim Petty told The Dallas Morning News that most of the advertisers were mom-and-pop stores that couldn't continue buying ads in a bad economy. Petty said "there is just not a lot of hope for small-town newspapers."

Corruption Trial On Hold

The trial of former Dallas City Hall officials accused of taking bribes is on hiatus after a juror's parent fell ill.

U.S. District Judge Barbara Lynn announced Friday the trial would not resume until after next week. She decided not to dismiss the juror and install one of the four alternates on the panel. The court was already scheduled to stay out of session next week because one of the jurors has a vacation that was scheduled before being selected to serve on the jury.

Former Mayor Pro Tem Don Hill and other ex-officials are accused of extorting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes from developers seeking to build apartment complexes in Dallas. Hill has maintained his innocence.

Six people already have pleaded guilty in the case.

Church Group Ejected

A Texas church youth choir has diverted a planned mission trip after being told they're not welcome to perform and work in a Kentucky Baptist mission program.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports that the Broadway Baptist Church Chapel Choir, made up of high-schoolers, was informed Monday that it was "uninvited" to participate in the University of the Cumberlands' Mountain Outreach program. Officials at the school in Williamsburg declined to comment Thursday.

The Southern Baptist Convention voted last week to sever ties with Broadway Baptist Church of Fort Worth because it said the church did not adhere to the language in the denomination's constitution calling for churches not to "approve or endorse homosexual behavior." The choir will instead travel to Tennessee to First Baptist Church of Nashville.

Twitter In Space

NASA is taking Twitter to space - in Spanish and English. Astronaut Jose Hernandez grew up in a migrant farming family and didn't learn English until he was 12. He is scheduled to fly aboard the space shuttle Discovery in August and tweet bilingually from orbit.