Runoff’s coming, ex-Methodists vs. Methodists: Down in Alabama
It’s tax day, folks. No judgement here, but don’t wait until after the Braves game to file.
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Alabama’s ‘new’ district
Before you complain about some of the current crop of Republican politicians not playing nice, at least note they don’t play nice with each other, either.
Barry Moore just last month beat Jerry Carl in a really contentious Alabama 1 Republican primary after both candidates locked up in a tried-and-true GOP campaign strategy of sparring over conservative bona fides.
Now we have the newfangled Alabama 2 primary runoff Tuesday. District 2 was redrawn to give Democrats an advantage somewhere other than District 7. Alabama 1 is a horizontal district that runs across the bottom of the state. Alabama 2 claims part of Mobile and then a horizontal swath above District 1 and includes Montgomery County.
The Republican primary in District 2 has also leaned into the negative. Caroleene Dobson is a Montgomery attorney running against Former State Sen. Dick Brewbaker for the GOP nomination.
Dobson calls Brewbaker a career politician who isn’t supportive enough of Donald Trump. Brewbaker’s a 63-year-old who spent eight years in the state senate and boasts a hefty collection of endorsements from pro-Trump groups. He said Dobson’s been lying about his record.
The winner will have the challenge of trying to keep the district red. On the Democrats’ side Tuesday, Shomari Figures of Mobile and Anthony Daniels of Hunstville square off. Figures worked for the Obama administration and the Justice Department. Daniels is the current minority leader in the Alabama House of Representatives.
Ex-Methodists vs. Methodists
As more than half the state’s Methodist churches formally split from the United Methodist Church denomination over the past few years, the individual congregations were paying settlements to acquire their churches and infrastructure.
Some have paid as high as $4 million.
AL.com’s Greg Garrison reports that Harvest Church of Dothan has been arguing in court that it already owns its own property.
There’s a good bit at stake here: Harvest Church, now independent, is a large church that sits on 10 acres and has a worship center than seats 1,200.
Founding pastor Ralph Sigler has said the church has never had UMC on its sign and that some members weren’t even aware of the affiliation. And when it bought its current property and built its current worship center, there was no “trust clause” to make the the Alabama-West Florida Conference of the UMC an owner of the property.
Harvest’s efforts remained alive on Friday when the Alabama Supreme Court denied a UMC request to dismiss the lawsuit. A Houston County court denied the same earlier.
So now the case goes back to a lower court for a hearing.
More bodycams in Tuscaloosa
The Tuscaloosa Police Department is updating its standard operating procedure to require non-uniformed officers to wear bodycams during many situations, reports AL.com’s Hannah Denham.
Although the changes come after last year’s shooting of Tristan Clark by an undercover officer, the requirement doesn’t extend to officers when they’re undercover. Otherwise, investigative officers are expected to wear bodycams. That includes narcotics teams and the SWAT team.
During the Dec. 20 shooting that’s behind all this, two undercover officers pulled over Clark. Police say Clark pulled out a gun after being told not to. A lawyer for Clark’s mother said two people in the car with Clark dispute that account. There was no video of the incident.
A grand jury did not charge the officer.
Strike One
You can say Jacksonville State’s first year of women’s bowling went pretty well: On Saturday the Gamecocks became the NCAA Division I women’s bowling champions.
It was a first-year program, but the roster included seven transfers with college experience. The Gamecocks beat Arkansas State in a best-of-7 match in the finals.
That’s the first national championship for Jacksonville State athletics since it won NCAA Division II football title in 1992.
Quoting
“Once again, Alabama is going to pull down its political pants and moon the nation.”
“I found out if I did my chores, then I could go play golf, so I get up early so I can get my chores done.”
Nick Saban, on an ESPN broadcast from Augusta National during The Masters.
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