Jul 17, 2024

If you're into music, make sure you check out the podcast. Music writer Matt Wake joins us to talk about his list of Alabama's 20 greatest singers.

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Ike Morgan

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When Aldi announced the acquisition of a pair of grocery-store chains from Southeastern Grocers last year, it said it would be converting some of Alabama's Winn-Dixie locations into Aldis.

That acquisition was finalized in March.

AL.com's William Thornton reports that three stores are planned to make the change. Winn-Dixies on McFarland Blvd. in Northport, Morgan Road in Bessemer and Center Point Road in Pinson will become Aldis.

The chain said workers at those stores will have the "first opportunity" to apply at the rebranded Aldis or transfer to another Winn-Dixie.

The other brand acquired by Aldi in last year's deal was Harveys Supermarkets.

Yesterday a primary runoff was held to determine the replacement for longtime state Rep. John Rogers of Birmingham, who earlier this year resigned his seat and pled guilty to federal corruption charges.

The seat will remain with the Democratic party after the only Republican candidate dropped out of the race. In the Democratic primary, the city's director of community development, Kelvin Datcher, defeated pastor Frank Woodson by carrying 55 percent of the vote.

If you didn't vote in the runoff, you're not alone. Only 1,506 voters turned out. The district, which includes parts of Birmingham, Fairfield and Homewood, has 34,245 registered voters.

That 10-point difference between the candidates amounted to just 156 votes.

Alabama currently has four veterans homes -- in Alexander City, Huntsville, Bay Minette and Pell City. All four have waiting lists for residents, spanning from four months to more than a year.

The homes provide a nursing-home level of care.

A fifth veterans home is scheduled to open Sept. 13 in Enterprise, reports AL.com's Mike Cason.

It'll be the Bennie G. Adkins State Veterans Home near Fort Novosel, and it'll have an estimated 174 residents and 200 employees.

The project has been six years in the making and has cost around $115 million in state and federal funds. The Bennie G. Adkins State Veterans Home will begin accepting residency applications after it names a director.

Bennie Adkins was an Army veteran and was deployed to Vietnam three times during the war. One of those times made him a recipient of the Medal of Honor. After retiring from the Army he earned degrees from Troy University and settled in Opelika, where he passed away in 2020 with complications from COVID-19.

His medal of Honor proclamation said that during 48 hours of combat in 1966, he used mortars, firearms and hand grenades to reportedly kill between 135 and 175 enemy soldiers and was wounded 18 times. His body is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

“This feels and looks like a military weapon for me.”

Randall Woodfin, holding an AR-15 (which at one point he swung around and made the council nervous), during a press conference in which he complained that the state won't let him regulate guns in the city.

$393,000

That was the average sale price of a home in Limestone County in June, according to new Valley MLS data. The number surpassed that of Madison County as the Athens area led the Tennessee Valley in home prices for the first time ever according to the site.

In 1914, character actress Lucille Benson of Scottsboro.

In 1952, sci-fi author Robert R. McCammon of Birmingham.

Music writer Matt Wake joins us to talk about his list of Alabama's 20 greatest singers.

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