Lynch at Large

The Morning News of Northwest Arkansas Leads with a major article on Springdale quarterback Mitch Mustain’s decision to keep his options open on his college football career.

According to the latest Census date, Arkansas, with an estimated median household income of $33,445 in 2003, ranked 49th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Only Mississippi and West Virginia ranked below the Natural State. The U.S. median income was $43,318.

Cynthia Howell reports in Sunday’s Democrat-Gazette that a task force of national education scholars will conclude a yearlong study of public education in Arkansas with the release Monday of its findings and recommendations. Gov. Mike Huckabee invited the 11-member Koret Task Force from the Hoover Institution at Stanford University to do the assessment of Arkansas’ public education system as a way to inject a national perspective into the debate over reforms to the system.

Tomorrow will mark a statewide election on bond initiatives for interstate highways and higher education. Fairfield Bay has a local issue of smoking in public and Sherwood will decide whether to extend local officials terms to four years. In Crawford County, it’s a jail tax under review.

After hearing from constituents in the medical field that a shortage of flu shots had again hit his region, U.S. Rep. Mike Ross has asked the federal government to create a vaccine center at the Pine Bluff Arsenal.

The Benton County Daily Record has news that a couple charged last week with childsex crimes including incest and possession of child pornography committed suicide at their home Saturday evening. Joe Billy Canoy and Shawna Lee Anne Canoy were found dead of suspected asphyxiation after a neighbor, thinking something was wrong, broke down the door to the Canoy home.