Government

The Trump administration has approved Michigan’s plan to require able-bodied adults in the Medicaid expansion program to meet work or job-related requirements. The waiver was authorized Friday. The federal government has now approved work requirements in seven states, with others pending. Starting in 2020, adults age 18 to 62 in Michigan will have to show workforce engagement averaging 80 hours …

St. Joseph County’s board of commissioners is expected to approve a budget of nearly $18 million for its 2019 fiscal year. The preliminary budget was at the center of a public hearing during Tuesday’s final county commission meeting of the year. Officially $17,949,839, the proposed 2019 budget represents a 5 percent decrease from the county’s 2018 amended budget of nearly …

E-911 Central Dispatch will soon have a new communications tower toward the south end of the county. St. Joseph County commissioners this week approved a request from agency director Dennis Brandenburg to enter into a land-lease agreement with the St. Joseph County Conservation and Sportsman’s Club. Brandenburg said central dispatch would like to erect the tower and access drive on …

Reappointments to three different panels were made Tuesday by the St. Joseph County Board of Commissioners. Sturgis-area resident Tracey Parker will serve three more years as an at-large representative on the Animal Control Advisory Board, along with Cathi Abbs of Sturgis. Abbs also will serve in the capacity of at-large member. The nine-member board still has one vacancy to fill. …

A toddler has become the third person to die from a weekend hit-and-run crash in South Bend. Authorities say 17-month-old Isabelle Jasper died Thursday. She was a passenger in one of three cars involved in a crash near South Bend International Airport on Sunday. Police say a Dodge Avenger rear-ended another northbound car, sending that vehicle into southbound traffic. Joel …

An unprecedented run ended Tuesday, as St. Joseph County commissioner John Dobberteen attended his last meeting as an elected member of the board. His 20-year tenure on the county board is believed to be the longest in the county’s history. It will officially end Dec. 31, but Tuesday was the board’s final meeting of 2018. A 59-year-old Sturgis resident, Dobberteen …

Sheriff’s deputies are investigating the circumstances behind a fire believed to have been deliberately set last weekend in White Pigeon Township. Fire officials were called at 5:15 a.m. Saturday to an unoccupied residence in the 16000 block of Fawn River Road. It was determined that the fire was started intentionally. The fire was limited to a front porch, as crews …

Michigan marked the beginning of legal, recreational marijuana last week and is the first state in the Midwest to allow marijuana for more than medical purposes. Retail shops are still months away and must involve state regulators, but the St. Joseph County prosecutor’s office has announced it is ready to dismiss possession cases. Residents 21 years of age and older …

A Cass County teenager was injured after she was involved in a one-vehicle accident earlier this week in Violinia Township. Sheriff Richard Behnke said deputies responded shortly before 12:30 p.m. to an area in the vicinity of Church Street and Goff Lake, where the 16-year-old girl drove off the roadway. She was traveling west on Church Street when the incident …

A northern Indiana couple has been sentenced in a hit-and-run crash that killed two children and a man. An Elkhart County judge sentenced 43-year-old Leonard Grosswiler on Wednesday to 15 years, with 10 years to be served in prison and the rest in community corrections and probation. The Elkhart man had pleaded guilty in October to leaving the scene of …