Green Bay News

ALLOUEZ – With March Madness more than 60 million Americans are expected to fill out their brackets, many participating in at least one pool for the men’s basketball tournament.

But how does the tournament affect those who participate at work?

Office pools could mean big losses for some companies.

A firm called Challenger, Gray, and Christmas says those unproductive workers could cost companies almost $2 billion.

While many people fill out their brackets online, some businesses can block specific websites.

However, some say, March Madness can also boost the overall morale in the workplace.

“Companies do deal with a lot of perceived disruption during March Madness and my perspective is it’s going to be there no matter what the companies do,” said Denise Knutson, a senior consultant at The H.S. Group. “There are also studies that show that the growth in productivity and teamwork by me talking to you, who I may never see in day to day work activities, is a benefit.”

If you’re wondering, the odds of filling out the perfect NCAA bracket is pretty much impossible.

It’s somewhere around 1 in 9 quintillion.

If you’d like to check out the brackets, click here.

WAUPACA COUNTY – Work is already underway to help shape the upcoming deer hunting season.

Right now, hunters are giving their opinions.

County Deer Advisory Councils are starting to come together, eight months before opening day, including Monday in Waupaca County.

“This is a pair of shed antlers I picked up Friday,” said Arlyn Splitt, Waupaca County Deer Advisory Council Chairman.

Splitt says there are plenty of deer in Waupaca County.

He is the chairman of the county’s deer advisory council, formed out of the Deer Trustee Report a few years ago.

Members include hunters, and those with interests in forestry, transportation, and tourism.

Councils decided in December what to do with the herd in their particular county.

They voted to increase, decrease, or maintain the deer population.

“We do have a high deer number. People like that number. They’re very tolerant of it. So, that went into consideration when we voted to maintain,” said Splitt.

Now, the councils are meeting statewide to recommend antlerless quotas for the upcoming deer season.

Councils forward those recommendations to the Department of Natural Resources.

“This process is the way that the community can come in and share and have that discussion. And say yeah, we may get it that county ‘x’ has a lot of deer, but not necessarily in my corner, and I would like you to know that,” said Jeff Pritzl, D.N.R. District Wildlife Supervisor.

Pritzl says the rules could change county, by county.

“The more you’re going to treat different areas differently, the more complex the rule process ends up being, or the result ends up being,” said Pritzl.

Splitt says, he doesn’t expect drastic changes in Waupaca County.

“We’ll probably take the history of what the department has always proposed, and what the harvest has been in the past, and relate those two together and go from there,” he said.

The councils’ recommendations are for two years.

GREEN BAY – The Green Bay area school district says 4,581 parents opted out of having some of their children’s information shared.

A pro-voucher group, School Choice Wisconsin, requested students’ information, including phone numbers as part of a marketing campaign.

As a compromise, the district said it would only release student addresses.

Green Bay was among 30 districts statewide to be asked for the information.

MARINETTE – A mom charged with child neglect in connection with injuries suffered by her child waived a preliminary hearing and pleaded not guilty Monday.

Katrina Blasing returns to court May 8 for a status conference, according to online court records.

Also Monday, the other person charged in the case – Ryan Lenz – waived his preliminary hearing, too. He also returns to court May 8.

According to the criminal complaint, the baby’s mother, Katrina Blasing, left the child with a friend in the town of Stephenson. Blasing went to Milwaukee with the friend and the friend’s grandmother. Another man at the house – Lenz – was watching the baby. The complaint says he noticed the baby was injured and called Blasing, who told him to wait until she returned. Prosecutors say Lenz cared for the baby and called Blasing several times to ask if the baby should be taken to the hospital. Each time, Blasing said to wait until she returned.

Finally, several hours after Lenz first noticed the injuries, Blasing called 911 for medical help.

Blasing, 33, and Lenz, 29, are charged with child neglect resulting in great bodily harm. No one is charged with abusing the baby.

Sheriff’s investigators are still looking for more information in the case. They ask that anyone who knows anything call them at (715) 732-7626.

The four-and-a-half-month-old boy was taken to a Marinette hospital on Feb. 2. He was eventually airlifted to Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin in Wauwatosa. According to a criminal complaint, doctors there found that the child had severe injuries including fractures to his skull and other parts of his body, brain injuries and bite marks. Doctors said some of the injuries were fresh, but some were old. Doctors went on to say the injuries were unlikely to be caused by normal household accidents; they more likely resulted from the baby being slammed, shaken or thrown.

Democratic members of the state Legislature and its Joint Finance Committee have scheduled their own listening sessions on the 2015-17 state budget.

The Democrats plan to hold nine sessions around the state, including two in Northeast Wisconsin. These sessions are in addition to the four sessions planned by the full committee.

The Democrats’ public session schedule is:

Thursday, March 19, 2015 – Wisconsin Rapids
Common Council Chambers
444 Grand Ave.
5-8 p.m.

Saturday, March 21, 2015 – Wausau
UW-Marathon County, Room 100, The Terrace Room
518 S. 7th Ave.
12-4 p.m.

Saturday, March 21, 2015 – Rhinelander
Nicolet Technical College, Room 207
5364 College Dr.
10 a.m.-2 p.m.

Tuesday, March 24, 2015 – Green Bay
West High School, The Thune Center
966 Shawano Ave.
4-7 p.m.

Saturday, March 28, 2015 – Menomonie
Menomonie Public Library, Meeting Room
600 Wolske Bay Rd.
10 a.m.-2 p.m.

Saturday, March 28, 2015 – Platteville
Common Council Chambers
75 N. Bonson St.
12-4 p.m.

Monday, March 30, 2015 – Oshkosh
UW-Oshkosh, Reeve Union, Room 213
800 Algoma Blvd.
4-7 p.m.

Tuesday, March 31, 2015 – Dodgeville
Common Council Chambers
100 E. Fountain St.
5-8 p.m.

Saturday, April 11, 2015 – Eau Claire
UW-Eau Claire, Centennial Hall 1614
1698 Park Ave.
10 a.m.-3 p.m.

The Joint Finance Committee is the committee that works out many of the changes to the two-year budget originally proposed by the governor. Gov. Scott Walker made his proposed budget public in February. The full Senate and Assembly must approve the final budget; that typically happens in summer.

There are four Democrats and twelve Republicans on the committee.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – An analysis by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau finds that Gov. Scott Walker’s budget would raise taxes and fees by $48 million.

The report released Monday also determines that Walker proposals to bolster tax collection would bring in nearly $125 million in additional revenue over the next two years.

The bulk of the tax increase, $22 million, is Walker’s proposal to delay implementation of a law that expanded when retailers could claim certain sales tax reductions for bad debt.

That law is set to begin in July 2015 but Walker is calling for it not to take effect until 2017.

Walker’s budget would also increase annual state park vehicle admission fees by $3 and nightly camping fees by $2, raising $1.9 million annually.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A man accused of wounding two police officers monitoring Ferguson protests last week has made his first court appearance.

KTVI of St. Louis reports 20-year-old Jeffrey Williams didn’t make any statements during Monday’s brief hearing on St. Louis County charges of felony assault and armed criminal action.

The television station says a judge read the charges to Williams, gave him a list of possible private attorneys and set the next court appearance for March 31.

Williams is accused of shooting two police officers early last Thursday outside Ferguson’s police station. That’s been the common scene of protests since last summer’s police shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown.

The county prosecutor says Williams has acknowledged he was the gunman, but that he told investigators he wasn’t targeting the officers.

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — German Olympic officials selected Hamburg over Berlin on Monday to bid for the 2024 Olympics, adding a third international contender to what is shaping up as a high-profile field.

The 10-member board of Germany’s national Olympic committee announced its recommendation after a day of deliberations.

The decision is expected to be ratified Saturday at the committee’s general assembly. It also has to pass a referendum expected to be held later this year in Hamburg, a port city in northern Germany.

A recent poll commissioned by the committee had 64 percent of Hamburg residents backing an Olympic bid, while only 55 percent of citizens of the capital supported a candidacy.

Opponents of the Hamburg bid already have announced plans to campaign against the Olympics.

Both cities presented their case over the weekend and the Olympic committee consulted on Monday with representatives from sports, politics, industry and other groups.

“Both cities presented excellent concepts,” committee president Alfons Hoermann said in announcing the decision. “Hamburg has a fascinating and compact concept that fits excellently into the IOC reform process.”

Only seven members of the board took part in the vote and Hoermann indicated the decision was not unanimous, without giving the breakdown. Hoermann said he abstained from voting.

Of the 33 German sports federation, 18 favored Hamburg, while 11 supported Berlin, with four having no preference, Hoermann said.

Hamburg will need to build more facilities than the capital, which hosted the 1936 Olympics.

Boston and Rome have already announced bids for the 2024 Games. Paris is also expected to join the field soon. Other possible contenders include Baku, Azerbaijan; Budapest, Hungary; and Istanbul, Turkey.

The deadline for submission of bids to the International Olympic Committee is Sept. 15. The host city will be selected in 2017.

Germany has not staged an Olympics since the 1972 Summer Games in Munich. Munich failed in a bid for the 2018 Winter Olympics and dropped a planned bid for the 2022 Winter Games after it was rejected in a referendum.

German soccer officials also want to bid for the 2024 European Championship. It is unlikely Germany would be awarded both the Olympics and the soccer tournament.

Hamburg’s Olympic plans call for the games to be located centrally in the harbor of the city, which has a population of about 1.7 million.

Most of the events would he held within a 10-kilometer (six-mile) radius.

Hamburg, the biggest city in northern Germany, is famous for its harbor on the River Elbe and its raucous nightlife in the Reeperbahn district. A former Hanseatic League city, it is northern Germany’s commercial and cultural center.

It is also home to the Hamburger SV club in the Bundesliga and the popular St. Pauli second-division team.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Blues Brothers have found a new mission.

Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi’s widow, Judy Belushi, have launched Blues Brothers Records.

The new record label is dedicated to the development of blues artists. The label’s music will be distributed by Capitol Music Group’s Blue Note Records.

Aykroyd and John Belushi originally performed as the sunglass-clad siblings on “Saturday Night Live” and later in the 1980 film “The Blues Brothers.”

Aykroyd said in a statement Monday that he’s excited for the label to find the next generation of blues performers.

Aykroyd previously co-founded the House of Blues, which will be partnering with the record label for promotional events at House of Blues venues.

NEW YORK (AP) – McDonald’s workers in 19 cities have filed complaints over burns from popping grease, a lack of protective equipment and other workplace hazards, according to labor organizers.

The complaints are the latest move in an ongoing campaign to win pay of $15 an hour and unionization for fast-food workers by publicly pressuring McDonald’s to come to the bargaining table. The push is being spearheaded by the Service Employees International Union and began more than two years ago. Already, it has included protests around the country and lawsuits alleging workers weren’t given their rightful pay.

The burns and other hazards were detailed in complaints announced Monday and filed with U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration in recent weeks. Workers cite a persistent lack of gloves for handling hot equipment and say they’ve been burned while cleaning grills that have to be kept on. One worker says he was told by a manager to, “put mayonnaise on it, you’ll be good.”

The complaints also detail a lack of training for handling hot fryers and slipping on wet floors.

A representative for the Labor Department, Laura McGinnis, confirmed the complaints were received by OSHA but said the agency does not discuss ongoing investigations.

In a statement, McDonald’s Corp. said the company and its independent franchisees are committed to providing safe working conditions for employees, and will review the allegations. “It is important to note that these complaints are part of a larger strategy orchestrated by activists targeting our brand and designed to generate media coverage,” Heidi Barker Sa Shekhem, a McDonald’s spokeswoman, said in the statement.

The complaints extend a central theme of the “Fight for $15″ campaign, which has been to hold McDonald’s accountable for working conditions at its franchised locations. That would ease the way for worker negotiations and unionization across the company’s more than 14,000 U.S. restaurants, the vast majority of which are run by franchisees. McDonald’s and other fast-food chains, including Burger King and Wendy’s, have said they’re not responsible for employment decisions at franchised restaurants.

The matter has reached the general counsel of the National Labor Relations Board, which said late last year that McDonald’s could be named as a joint employer in complaints by workers. Those complaints have yet to be heard, but whichever side loses is expected to appeal the decision.

Kendall Fells, organizing director for Fight for $15, said the injuries at franchised and company-owned restaurants mostly came about because understaffing and employees being told to work too quickly – both of which he said were the result of a computer system that tracks sales and staffing metrics.

The computer system was also cited in lawsuits last year that allege “wage theft” by McDonald’s and its franchisees for the denial of breaks and overtime pay. That system has been key in the argument by labor groups that McDonald’s exerts enough control over franchised restaurants to be considered a joint employer.

Fells noted that workers are looking at every way they can hold McDonald’s accountable, and that workplace injuries are just the latest issue they’re bringing to light.

Although the OSHA complaint system doesn’t let workers name joint employers, Randy Rabinowitz, a health and safety legal expert who was hired by the Fight for $15 campaign, said there have been other cases where multiple employers are issued citations for the same violations. She said she’s not aware of any such cases involving fast-food restaurants, however.

She said the first onsite OSHA visits triggered by the complaints took place in the past week or so, and that the agency has six months to issue citations.

Mary Vogel, executive director of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health, said in a conference call organized by labor groups that the burns and other hazards detailed in the complaints are “pretty universal” in the fast-food industry.

McDonald’s, which saw customer visits at established U.S. locations decline in each of the past two years, has been trying to reinvigorate its image. Earlier this month, the company’s chief administrative officer, Pete Bensen, said a big part of the U.S. turnaround will be what the company is doing around “the employment image and our employee-employer relationships.”

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – An official at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Library says a “simple misunderstanding” left the wrong impression that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker personally sought to hold the family Bible the late president used when taking the oath of office.

Walker told the story of having his picture taken with the Bible at a 2013 Reagan Day dinner in Milwaukee. He described in his speech how he was surprised to see the Bible had been taken out of its exhibit case so that he could pose with it for a photo.

In a series of emails with the liberal magazine The Progressive, a library official said it was Walker who had asked to see the Bible. A spokeswoman for the Reagan Foundation now says Walker’s retelling of the moment is correct.

Warmer weather means construction projects will be resuming soon and a reminder about the need for drivers to be alert.

National Work Zone Awareness week will start next week but you could certainly be extra alert starting this week.

Highway workers and police say drivers should stay off the phone, stay farther behind the vehicle in front of you, and pay attention to the warning signs.

In the most recent year reported, 2013, 10 people died in work zone crashes in Wisconsin.

Ernie Winters of the Winnebago county Highway Department, says, “Somebody’s always doing something out there in the middle of the roadway even in the middle of winter. There are accidents that fire, police, highway, plow trucks are out working for instance on 41 and those are work zones. They don’t last very long but people are still out working. A lot of times there hasn’t been time to put up the sign and the warning devices and the barricades so people needs to be extra alert.”

This is the 16th year for the campaign.

The investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of private emails is picking up steam with more calls for her to testify before Congress.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is expected to announce a new investigation into the matter this week.

Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) said, “We don’t get to grade our own papers in life and she had a very unique arrangement with herself as it relates to public records.”

That statement followed calls by Gowdy last week for Clinton to testify before Congress as it relates to her email account and to answer more questions about the deadly terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya in 2012.

In the GOP Address on Saturday, Rep. Susan Brooks (R-Indiana) expressed her concerns.

“It is simply unacceptable for so many questions to remain unanswered.  And it is unjust and simply wrong for anyone to withhold evidence that may lead to the answers,” Brooks said.

They’re answers that may or may not be found in future congressional testimony, said Lara Brown with George Washington University.

“The result is they’re largely ineffective now,” said Brown of congressional hearings. “Part of the problem in today’s world of congressional testimony is that each member of the committee tries to make news or make a sound bite,” Brown added.

She said in the past, members of committees regardless of party often worked together; instead of trying to score political points or get material for campaign commercials.

Former Secretary Clinton has denied any wrongdoing.

“While the President and the executive branch essentially run things in the bureaucracy, Congress constitutionally funds it and checks up on it,” Brown said.

That could include a subpoena by the House Committee on Government Reform and a new chapter of the investigation, which Speaker Boehner said may begin this week.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) – Robert Durst, a troubled millionaire from one of America’s richest families, agreed Monday to face trial for murder in the Los Angeles shooting 15 years ago of a woman who some believe knew too much about the disappearance of his wife in 1982.

Monday’s extradition hearing came only hours after Sunday’s finale of a six-part HBO documentary detailing Durst’s life of privilege and links to three deaths: his friend in Los Angeles, Susan Berman; his wife in New York, Kathleen Durst; and Morris Black, an elderly neighbor in Texas.

Durst is heard muttering that he “killed them all, of course,” at the end of “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst.”

His trip to California trip may be delayed by new charges in Louisiana, one of his lawyers said. A police report said the heir to a New York real estate fortune was carrying a revolver when FBI agents arrested him without incident at a New Orleans hotel before the final episode. It wasn’t immediately clear if Durst had the required gun permit. Christopher Bowman, a spokesman for the Orleans Parish district attorney’s office, declined to comment.

Durst shuffled into a courtroom with his hands shackled at his waist, wearing sandals and an orange jumpsuit, and appeared to fall asleep before Magistrate Harry Cantrell struck his gavel down. Then he answered “yes” to questions about waiving extradition. The judge also agreed that Durst could get pain medication meanwhile; defense attorney Dick DeGuerin said Durst had undergone “neurosurgery.”

Durst had been laying low at the Marriott hotel to avoid the growing attention from the documentary, his longtime lawyer, Chip Lewis, told The Associated Press.

This is not the first time in handcuffs for Durst, who has been estranged from family members who are together worth an estimated $4 billion. The Durst Organization manages a New York real estate empire including One World Trade Center.

Just last year, Durst was fined for urinating on the candy racks at a CVS pharmacy in Houston, where he keeps a townhouse. Lewis called that an “unfortunate medical mishap” and said Durst has Asperger’s syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder that can involve behavioral problems.

Former prosecutor Jeanine Pirro believes it was her reopening of the cold case into Kathleen Durst’s disappearance that provoked the murder of Berman, who had been Durst’s confidante. And she said Durst’s own words can now be used against him.

In the documentary, filmmaker Andrew Jarecki and Durst discuss an anonymous letter that alerted Beverly Hills police to a “cadaver” at Berman’s address. Durst says whoever sent it was “taking a big risk. You’re sending a letter to police that only the killer could have written.”

Then, in a second interview seen in the final episode, Jarecki shows him another letter that Durst had sent to Berman, which one of the slain woman’s relatives had recovered and given to the filmmakers. It has similar handwriting, and the address is misspelled as “Beverley Hills.”

“I wrote this one but I did not write the cadaver one,” Durst says, burping oddly when confronted with this potential evidence.

Then they wrap up the interview, and Durst says he’s going to the bathroom.

Still wearing his microphone, he is recorded as he seems to think out loud, pausing between each whispered thought. The documentary plays the sound and shows his words in subtitles over the now-empty interview room: “There it is. You’re caught! … You’re right, of course, but you can’t imagine … Arrest him! … I don’t know what’s in the house … Oh, I want this … What a disaster … He was right. I was wrong … And the burping! I’m having difficulty with the question … What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.”

And then the documentary fades to black, silently leaving law enforcement to pick up the story.

By Monday, the filmmakers were declining to comment, worried that they may be called as witnesses in the future. But Jarecki and his cinematographer Marc Smerling answered some of the many questions raised by their finale in a New York Times interview published Monday.

They said they had no idea they had the bathroom audio until editors found it last June, and that they never confronted Durst about it because they didn’t believe he would speak with them. But they did share evidence with authorities last year, they said.

Lewis smells a setup. He called Jarecki “duplicitous” for not making it clear to Durst that he would be sharing what he said with police. He also suggested that the timing of the arrest, just before the show’s finale, was chosen for maximum impact.

“It’s all about Hollywood now,” Lewis said.

Los Angeles Deputy Police Chief Kirk Albanese scoffed at that, saying police were “definitely” concerned that Durst might try to flee the country.

“The HBO series had nothing to do with his arrest. We do police work based on the facts and evidence, not based on the HBO series. I know there’s lots of speculation about that. It had nothing to do with the show,” Albanese told The AP on Monday.

Durst was already acquitted of one murder but suspected in two others when he willingly talked with Jarecki on camera. They met after the filmmaker told a fictionalized account of Durst’s story in “All Good Things,” a 2010 film starring Ryan Gosling. Jarecki told the Times that Durst signed a release form agreeing “that we could use any recording of him in any way we deemed appropriate,” and was well aware he was being recorded.

Berman was the daughter of an associate of Las Vegas mobsters Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky who spoke out on Durst’s behalf after his wife disappeared in New York.

After she was shot in the back of the head at her home near Beverly Hills in 2000, Durst went undercover, leaving as a mute woman in a Texas boarding house.

Then, in 2001, dismembered parts of his elderly neighbor’s body were found floating in Galveston Bay. Durst was arrested, fled, then caught shoplifting a chicken sandwich in Pennsylvania, with $37,000 and a pair of guns in his rental car.

Lewis told that jury that Durst shot Black in self-defense, and he was acquitted of murder, despite admitting that he used a paring knife, two saws and an ax to dismember the body. With time served, Durst walked free after one more year for bond jumping and evidence tampering.

Pirro, the former Westchester County District Attorney and current Fox-TV personality who had hoped Berman would provide evidence against Durst, said the audiotape can clearly be used against him in court.

“It was a spontaneous statement, a classical exception to the hearsay rule,” Pirro told Fox-TV’s “Good Day New York.” ”I don’t hear it as a muttering. I hear it as a clear, unequivocal ‘I killed them.’ That means he killed his wife, he killed Susan Berman and he killed Morris Black.”

Lucian Chalfen, a spokesman for the current Westchester DA, said Kathleen Durst’s disappearance “remains an open homicide investigation and as such any new information that’s developed is investigated, both by the state police and by us if we’re involved.”

Robert Durst has been estranged from his family since their father chose his brother Douglas to run the family business. In recent years, they took out restraining orders against him, but he was acquitted of trespassing outside their homes.

“We hope he will finally be held accountable for all he has done,” Douglas Durst said in a statement.

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Melley and Tami Abdollah reported from Los Angeles. Contributors include Associated Press Writers David Bauder, Jim Fitzgerald and Verena Dobnik in New York and Emily Schmall in Fort Worth, Texas.

Follow college basketball teams with brackets for the NCAA men, NCAA women and men’s NIT brackets:

• Men’s NCAA Tournament
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• Men’s NIT
• FOX 11 March Mania Basketball Bracket Challenge

NEW YORK (AP) – Facebook is trying to clarify what posts, images and other content it allows on its site and why.

In an update to its Community Standards Page, the world’s largest online social network gave users more guidance on why, for example, it might take down a post that featured sexual violence and exploitation, hate speech, criminal activity or bullying.

It also explained why it not only bans terrorist and organized crime groups, but it also removes content supporting them.

The Menlo Park, California-based company said it isn’t changing how it regulates the content of posts, and that while some of the guidance for users is new, “it is consistent with how we’ve applied our standards in the past.”

In a blog post Monday, Facebook said it is a challenge to maintain one set of standards that meet the needs of its entire community. More than 80 percent of Facebook users are outside the U.S. and Canada.

“People from different backgrounds may have different ideas about what’s appropriate to share – a video posted as a joke by one person might be upsetting to someone else, but it may not violate our standard,” wrote Monika Bickert, head of global policy management, and Chris Sonderby, deputy general counsel, in the post.

Facebook users who believe that a particular page or content violates the site’s standards can click a “report” link to notify Facebook. The company then considers whether to take it down.

Some content is only removed in some countries. Facebook restricts content in countries where it violates local laws, even if that content does not violate its community standards.

Separately, Facebook also released its latest report on requests it gets from governments worldwide, covering the second half of 2014. The report shows that requests from governments for data and to restrict information are both increasing.

To read the government report, click here.

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — Celebrating her 100th birthday with a parachute jump is not enough for South African Georgina Harwood. She plans to make her centenary even more exciting by doing a shark cage dive on Monday.

Her birthday skydive was a tandem jump in which she was in harness with another person. The jump took place Saturday near the Melkbosstrand area north of Cape Town.

Wearing a red jumpsuit, Harwood was joined in the air by 15 family members and friends who participated in groups of three. Harwood said it was wonderful seeing all the others around her.

Harwood said this was her third skydive. She did her first when she was 92 years old in 2007.

In a shark cage dive the participant goes underwater in a cage in an area where sharks are fed chum, bits of cut up fish meat, by tour operators.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Pointing to increased high school graduation rates, President Barack Obama said Monday he’s prepared to fight with Republicans for school funding and his education priorities rather than risk going backward.

The president said he hopes that Republican lawmakers focus on educating every child and not shifting money away from needy districts. He’s also calling for a focus on low-performing schools, annual assessments and investments in special education and English-language learners.

Obama said if the Republican budget doesn’t reflect those priorities, they will have “a major debate.”

“We are making too much progress now in terms of graduation rates, improved reading scores, improved math scores, increasing standards, increasing access to the resources the kids need, for us to be going backwards now. And this is something worth fighting for,” Obama said at a White House meeting with urban school leaders.

The Education Department said Monday that high school graduation rates for all racial groups have increased, according to data from the 2012-2013 school year. But black, Hispanic, and American Indian students still significantly lag behind their white and Asian/Pacific Islander counterparts.

Previously, the department said the graduation rate had reached a high of 81.4 percent. That means 1 in 5 students overall leaves high school without a diploma.

Among black students, the rate reported was 70.7 percent — up from 69 percent a year earlier.

Hispanic students had a rate of 75.2 percent, which was up from 73 percent a year earlier.

American Indian students had a rate of 69.7 percent — up from 67 percent.

Asian/Pacific Islander students had a rate of 88.7 percent, which was up from 88 percent.

White students had a rate of 86.6 percent, which was up from 86 percent.

The No Child Left Behind law, signed in 2002, has been credited with shining a light on the performance of poor, minority, disabled and non-English speaking students, but also has led to complaints from both Republicans and Democrats that the requirements were unworkable.

Lawmakers are working on a bipartisan effort to update the No Child Left Behind Act. Congress for years has been stymied on the best way to renew the much maligned law, and last month House Republican leaders abruptly canceled a vote on a GOP reform bill after conservative opposition made passage uncertain.

Lawmakers have grappled with such issues as whether federal law should continue to require annual reading and math testing in grades three to eight and again in high school. Much of the conflict focuses on how much of a federal role there should be in identifying and fixing failing schools.

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AP Education Writer Kimberly Hefling contributed to this report.

(CNN) – 127 million Americans say they’ll celebrate St. Patrick’s Day this year. That’s according to an annual survey by the National Retail Federation.

Total spending is expected around $4.6 billion, slightly lower than last year’s estimated total of almost $4.8 billion.

Last year’s spending got a boost when about one in three Americans said they’d go out for the holiday and celebrate at a restaurant or bar.

This year that number is slightly lower, and about half of Americans say they’ll mark the holiday at a private home, either by attending a party or by enjoying a special dinner from their own kitchen.

Some of that could be because of the weather in many parts of the country, but retailers also haven’t seen lower gas prices translating into more spending elsewhere.

And big St. Patrick’s Day celebrations are usually a tough sell when the holiday falls on a weekday, as it does this year.

Nonetheless, leading the way among St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, consumers ages 25 to 34, who will spend almost $42 on the holiday.

CLEVELAND — After eight seasons in Green Bay, Tramon Williams has a new home. Today the free agent cornerback signed with the Cleveland Browns according to a release from his new team. Multiple reports including the NFL Network say the deal is for 3 years for $21 million.

Williams, undrafted out of Louisiana Tech, thrived in Green Bay, racking up 28 interceptions in the regular season. He was a Pro Bowler in 2010 and helped the Packers win Super Bowl XLV.

Williams turned 32 years old on Monday.