METRO DIGEST || VP Pence to speak at Grove City commencement

VP Pence to speak at commencement

GROVE CITY, PA.

Vice President Mike Pence will deliver the keynote address at Grove City College’s 137th Commencement at 10 a.m. May 20, on the Quad between Harbison Chapel and Crawford Hall on campus. He is the first sitting vice president to speak at GCC and the highest-ranking government official to ever visit campus. Pence also will receive an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the college.

Admission is by ticket only for graduates and their families, employees and friends of the college.

3 escape Howland fire

HOWLAND

Howland Township firefighters are investigating the cause of a blaze that destroyed a home at 3051 Hilda St. S.E. just before noon Thursday. Three occupants of the home escaped the fire, preliminarily believed to have started in the garage, without injury.

According to firefighters, when crews arrived they encountered heavy fire and smoke consuming nearly half of the house and a large amount of flames in the garage area. After confirming that the occupants were out of the house, firefighters worked to protect abutting structures.

It took Howland firefighters, helped by personnel from Cortland city and Weathersfield Township fire departments, about 20 minutes to extinguish the fire and several more hours to ensure there were no areas that could reignite.

Warren Relay For Life

WARREN

The four streets that form Courthouse Square will be closed starting at 6 p.m. today for the Relay for Life. One-block sections of these roads will be closed to automobile traffic: North Park Avenue, High Street, Mahoning Avenue and West Market Street. Normal traffic will resume Monday.

Woman in car robbed

WARREN

A woman was struck in the face and robbed of her wallet by a gunman who walked up to her car while she was stopped at a traffic light on Elm Road at 2 a.m. Wednesday.

The woman, 31, of Warren, said she was smoking with her window rolled down when the man approached her at the Woodland Avenue intersection. She went to ValleyCare Trumbull Memorial Hospital to be treated for a severe cut and other injuries, according to a Warren police report.

A nurse told police that 30 stitches would be needed to close the cuts on the left side of her face. The woman’s van had blood covering the driver’s area around the steering wheel, a police report said.

Route 154 landslide

LISBON

Recent heavy rains have reactivated a landslide along state Route 154 just north of Elkton in Columbiana County. The landslide was repaired last fall. It is now slipping beyond the limits of that wall, however, said a news release from the Ohio Department of Transportation.

Route 154 has again been reduced to one 11-foot lane with temporary traffic signals.

ODOT’s contractor for the original project, Ohio-West Virginia Excavating Co., from Shadyside, will return to fix the slide by extending the retaining wall. A completion date has not been determined.

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