This week’s biggest Winners & Losers

In spite of no long-term funding solution, SEPTA’s service cuts seem to be on hold. The Shapiro administration and PennDOT are moving forward with the transit agency’s request to use up to $394 million in capital assistance funds for daily operations. Still, lawmakers need to get on board with a consistent stream of funds if they want to stave off SEPTA’s long-term fiscal woes.

A large-scale drug bust took place last week as Attorney General Dave Sunday and law enforcement partners charged numerous individuals connected to a cocaine/crack cocaine trafficking organization. Sunday’s office announced the charges of 21 individuals, along with seizures of cash, drugs and firearms, for allegedly running the drug ring in North Philadelphia and working throughout the city and Bucks and Montgomery Counties. The bail is set between $1 million and $5 million. 

Vultures are circling in Centre County – literally. Despite multiple attempts to scare away legally protected black vultures from a Centre County government building in Bellefonte, the birds have continued to congregate on the building’s roof, despite some rather innovative efforts from county leaders. According to local reports, the vultures’ persistent pecking has prompted the county to spend hundreds of thousands on a new roof, and thus far, county officials have tried deploying everything from animatronic eagles to effigies of dead vultures – apparently to little effect. 

Well, he did represent the state of Delaware for nearly 40 years – so it makes sense that former President Joe Biden announced he’d build his presidential library in the First State. Still, for Northeast Pennsylvanians accustomed to thinking of the Scranton native as one of their own, being passed over for the honor by “Scranton Joe” has a bit of a sting.

Like the boy who cried wolf, occasionally the folks who cry “election fraud!” have a basis for their claim. This week, it was the U.S. Attorney for Pennsylvania’s Eastern District, charging Matthew Laiss of Bethlehem and Miya Pack of Philadelphia with election fraud and with voting more than once – each allegedly registered and voted in multiple states – during the 2020 and 2024 elections, respectively.

A retired Cumberland County pastor pleaded guilty to human trafficking-related charges this week after paying for sex acts at G-L Massage in Carlisle and visiting the location at least 68 times between April 2023 and September 2024, according to WGAL. Stephen Melton, who worked as a pastor at Big Spring Presbyterian Church in Newville, is now awaiting sentencing, according to the Cumberland County DA.