A bill proposed in the Alabama Legislature could end up banning most abortions if approved. Republican Rep. Terri Collins of Decatur has proposed legislation to prohibit abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected. Collins says if the end of life is defined by the absence of a heartbeat, it makes sense to her to define the beginning of life with the start of a heartbeat. A spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood says the bill would ban abortions as early as six weeks into pregnancy, before a woman might know she's pregnant. A federal judge last year ruled a similar North Dakota law unconstitutional. Collins says she wants to work on language that the courts might find acceptable.
Moratorium Tabled
An ordinance proposing a moratorium on new construction permits and business licenses for grocery stores was tabled at Tuesday night's Montgomery City Council meeting. All of this has come about because of the announced plan to build a Wal-Mart grocery store off Vaughn Road next to the Festival Plaza Shopping Center. Residents complain that there is no need for another grocery store within close proximity to two others and that already busy traffic will worsen. Mayor Todd Strange and other city officials have called a neighborhood meeting for the week of April 20th to further discuss the issue.
NASA Procurement
The Montgomery Area Chamber of Commerce and Alabama State University's Small Business Development Center hosted the 2015 Alabama-NASA Marshall Space Flight Center Procurement Conference Wednesday. The one day conference was opened to minority, women, veteran and small owned businesses interested in working with NASA centers in the Southeast. The conference was held at the Warehouse in the Alley Station in downtown Montgomery.