Stories from Sunday, February 9, 2014

SUBMITTED photo Giving to Locks of Love Ashlynn Hudgens-Sills, 10, of Bloomfield, recently donated her hair to the Locks of Love organization. Locks of Love is a public non-profit organization that provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children suffering from long-term medical hair loss due to any diagnosis. Hudgens-Sills is the daughter of Dean and Nikki Sills, and the late Dale Hudgens, Jr. She had her hair cut at Hairworks in Dexter by Dawn Dowdy...

A workshop through the University of Missouri Extension in cooperation with the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) and Missouri Department of Agriculture is planned for Thursday, Feb. 20. at the NRCS office in Dexter. Producers who would like help starting a safety plan or who want more information on Good Agriculture Practices (GAP) are encouraged to attend the workshop, "Understanding Good Ag Practices."...

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NEDRA PICKLER Associated Press EAST LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- President Barack Obama on Friday signed into law an agriculture spending bill that will spread benefits to farmers in every region of the country, while trimming the food stamp program that inspired a two-year battle over the legislation...

ST. LOUIS (AP) -- New filings in a class action lawsuit challenging Missouri's treatment of convicted sex offenders seek the release from custody of more than 200 men in the program. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that the legal challenge to the Missouri Department of Mental Health claims its Sex Offender Rehabilitation and Treatment Services program is mismanaged, overcrowded and essentially a prison disguised as a mental hospital...

By Michelle Rasberry, Steve Patton SEMO News Service Over three decades of service to the citizens of Southeast Missouri will come to a close Friday as Lieutenant Steve Niederkorn retires from the Missouri State Highway Patrol. Niederkorn's entire career has been spent in Troop E and has become a living legend on the highways of the area...

By NOREEN HYSLOP Managing Editor Posted in a well-tended flower garden at the entrance to a home in rural Dexter is a green rectangular street sign -- the type seen posted on some city streets -- that simply says, "Happy, Happy, Happy Place." Indicative of the sign is the couple residing there. The newlyweds can't seem to stop smiling. At the age of 69 and after more than 50 years apart, Don and Patti Gard are beginning a new life together...