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Funds raised by 9/11 medals
NOAA ship rolled out ■
WEST POINT, N.Y. (AP) — The U.S. Mint worker dons surgical gloves as she sprays down the large silver pieces like flowers in a garden. They clank and jingle in the tray as liquid beads up on their mirror-like surfaces and they are sent on their way, to be transformed into medals in memory of the Sept. 11 attacks. The mint next to U.S. Military "I think Academy, they got it specializes in exactly producright." ing bullion coins Joe Daniels made from gold, silver and platinum, but since last year has also been making medals that help raise funds for the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in lower Manhattan. The memorial receives $10 from the sale of every silver medal, which is roughly the size of an old dollar coin and sells for $66.95. The high-security mint rarely opens its doors to visitors, but let reporters in this week to watch blank rounds of silver be struck into medals featuring Lady Liberty holding a flaming lamp before two shafts of light symbolizing the fallen towers. The inscription reads "Always Remember." The back features an eagle with a backdrop of falling water — an echo of cascading water surrounding reflecting pools at the memorial in lower Manhattan, about 55 miles south of West Point. "I think they got it exactly right," said Joe Daniels, president of the memorial and museum. More than 162,000 medals have been sold since last June, raising more than $1.6 million for the memorial. Manhattan's memorial plaza has attracted 2.5 million visitors since it opened on Sept. 12, 2011. There is no opening date for the museum, which became mired in a dispute over who is responsible for paying millions of dollars in infrastructure costs. The task of turning bars of silver stored on site into medals is a complicated process. A vendor melts down the metal and delivers back to the mint what look like shiny blank coins. The blanks are meticulously inspected, washed and burnished before being fed into dyes that strike with the force of 217 tons. The machine hisses as it clucks down three times
EagleHerald staff writer clang@eagleherald. corn
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See MEDALS, A3
State-of-the-art fisheries vessel By CLINTON LANG
MARINETTE — Local shipbuilder Marinette Marine Corp. has been busy building much more than just Navy warships. And while MMC's U.S. Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) program undoubtedly receives the majority of local, regional and national media coverage, other ships, such as the Reuben Lasker — the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's newest fisheries service vessel — kind of fly under the radar. Nevertheless, the 208foot, 200-ton, Rueben Lasker will serve a very important role in its own right. It will become NOAA's most stateof-the-art research vessel constructed to date. The vessel is named after the late Reuben Lasker, a pioneering fisheries biologist who served as the director of the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center's Coastal Fisheries Division and as an adjunct professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego. On Friday afternoon, the vessel, which is approximately 80 percent complete, was rolled out of its hanger and wheeled over to the site from which it will be launched on June 16. "The purpose of this vessel is a fisheries survey vessel," said Scott Wellens, Marinette Marine's Director of Facility and Process Improvement. "So it will go EagleHerald/Rick Gebhard out into the deep ocean — The FSU Reuben Lasker is rolled out of the hangar Friday at Marinette Marine. (Color and like mowing the lawn — reprints:www.ehextra.com)
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severance tax proposed
How it works: Change designed for new mines, like Townships where the mines are located collect and distribute the revenue, the one proposed near Menominee would with 45 percent going to local governTRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — Gov. Rick Snyder's administration is proposing a severance tax for nonferrous mining operations to replace other taxes they would pay under existing law, an official said Friday. Under the plan, a 3 percent tax would be levied on the value of minerals removed from the ground, said Keith Creagh, director of the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. The revenue would be divided between local governments and a new fund that would support economic development projects in rural areas. The tax would not apply to existing iron ore or limestone mines, Creagh told The Associated Press in a phone interview after discussing the plan with community and business leaders in the Upper Peninsula. Instead, it is designed for precious metal operations, such as the Kennecott Eagle Minerals Co. nickel and copper mine under construction in Marquette County.
The state Department of Environmental Quality approved plans last month for a copper and silver mine near Ironwood in the far western Upper Peninsula. Another company is expected to seek permits this year for a zinc and gold project near Menominee, and other locations in the peninsula are being explored. Companies that pay the severance tax would be exempt from levies on real and personal property, sales and use and corporate income, he said. Severance taxes on minerals are common in many states, Creagh said. They spare companies from paying large tax bills before their operations begin making money and when production is scaled back because of economic downturns or price declines. When times are good, local governments would reap extra benefits. Some local officials in Marquette are concerned that a severance tax might shortchange them of revenue
"It has silencing technology on-board, so you don't scare the fish and get better surveys." Chuck Goddard Marinette Marine CEO it will literally go back and forth with sonar to determine fish populations, size of fish, and help set quotas for fishing regulations." The vessel will operate out of a home port near San Diego, however, researchers will utilize the ship all the way up and down the West Coast, as well as in the Caribbean, to provide scientists with the most accurate data available from which to base decisions regarding ocean fisheries regulations. "It has silencing technology on-board, so you don't scare the fish and get better surveys," said Marinette Marine Corp. President and CEO Chuck Goddard. "She has all kinds of scientific equipment she carries for sampling," including fish egg sampling equipment, Goddard explained. Aside from the Reuben Lasker, according to both Goddard and Wellens, Marinette Marine's $73.5 million capital improvement program and the shipyard's hiring uptick are well under way. Wellens said the shipyard's expansion projects are currently more than 50 percent complete. Goddard added that the shipyard currently employs See SHIP, A3
Walker still eyes iron mine
MILWAUKEE (AP) — Gov. Scott Walker said Friments. The other 55 percent would be day he still holds out hope designated for the new rural development fund, which Creagh said would be mod- for an iron mine in northern eled after the Michigan Natural Wisconsin. Walker says he's asked Resources Trust Fund. former Bucyrus International needed for schools and other basic CEO Tim Sullivan to bring services. Creagh said the administra- mining experts and conservation's plan is designed for them to get tion leaders together to see if at least as much money as they would there's a way to get the mine near Ashland approved. He under the existing tax structure. Townships where the mines are predicts modified legislation located would collect and distribute could be considered by the the revenue, with 45 percent going to end of the year. Legislation to streamline local governments. The other 55 permine permitting and clear cent would be designated for the new the way for a $1.5 billion rural development fund, which Gogebic Taconite mine failed Creagh said would be modeled after in the Senate in March. After the Michigan Natural Resources Trust that, a frustrated Gogebic Fund. It uses royalties from state- president Bill Williams said leased oil and gas development rights the company was leaving to buy and improve public lands. Wisconsin. The rural fund would provide The mine could bring as grants to support infrastructure pro- many as 700 jobs to an area jects, such as broadband internet con- that strongly needs employnections and railroad upgrades. ment.
Conditions good on eve of new space era. CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — NASA hasn't seen this much launch jitters since the space shuttle program ended last summer. Today, a private company was set to make history by launching a capsule loaded with supplies to the International Space Station. The rocket maker known as SpaceX — Space Exploration Technologies Corp. — hopes to join a short list of governments in flying to the Good morning,
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Rhonda Anderson!
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were awe-struck over what The SpaceX Falcon 9 they were about to under- rocket was scheduled to SpaceX: take. blast off from Cape http://www.spacex.com "There's no question this Canaveral at 4:55 a.m. NASA: is a historic flight," SpaceX Forecasters put the odds of http://www.nasa.gov/offices/ President Gwynne Shotwell good weather at 70 percent. c3po/home/ said at a news conference The Dragon capsule atop Friday. the rocket contains a halforbiting lab. Only Europe, Russia, ton of space station supOn the eve of this new Japan and the U.S. have plies. The capsule will percommercial era, NASA offi- sent a spacecraft to the form practice maneuvers cials described it as "a semi- space station, she noted. around the space station on nal moment" and extremely "So yeah, we really respect Monday before NASA gives a important mission, while having the opportunity to "go" for docking on Tuesday. SpaceX leaders said they attempt this," she said. The California-based
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INSIDE Menominee: Everything old becomes new again. A7 Sports: The Marinette baseball
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Details on A5
team humbles state-ranked Wausaukee. B1
SpaceX — formed by PayPal co-founder Elon Musk — is the first of several competing companies to actually get this close to launching a vessel to the space station. For now, it's supplies. Within three or four years, the goal is to have astronauts on board so Americans no longer have to hitch expensive rides on Russian rockets. See SPACE, A3
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In this June 4, 2010, photo, a halo forms around the top of the SpaceX Falcon 9 test rocket.
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