Yo, Philly in the News

• How about a little local celebrity gossip? WPVI's Monica Malpass is being sued by her former fiance (auto-parts entrepreneur Stephen Thorne) because she won't give him back the engagement ring, even though she supposedly agreed to do so, and he has requested her to numerous times.
• The casinos are apparently sending attorneys and private investigators to harrass people who signed those anti-casino petitions. Smooth, guys. Smooth. Meanwhile, a Bucks County judge has been appointed to decide whether those groups successfully collected the 20,000 signatures they need to get the casino question on the May 15 ballot.
• The Inquirer discusses the City Council elections in the light of the mayor's race, and suggests that this year might be not quite as good as usual for incumbents. Meanwhile, some of the City Council candidates are hoping everybody will go easy on challenging each other's nominating petitions. Good luck with that, guys. As for the mayoral candidates, they were busy touting their environmental plans and green thumbs at the Flower Show mayoral forum on Monday.
• Bad news: gas prices are going up in the area, and are likely to get worse before they get better.
• After all the uproar about teachers getting attacked, School District CEO Paul Vallas has found it necessary to announce "a crackdown on student violence against teachers," including the establishment of a teacher safety hotline and more stringent penalties for offenders. The hotline is 215-400-STOP.
• A plane heading to Philly from LA was diverted to Las Vegas yesterday when it was discovered that it was carrying the bag of a man who had been detained for questioning in LA, and who had been carrying a "suspicious item" that was seized. It's not clear whether anything equally suspicious was found on board the plane after it was searched, but apparently there were no closures, cancellations, or delays as a result of the event (except for the diverted flight, of course).

Image Credit: Flickr user monoglot