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Four players, and one coach, to keep an eye on today:

Receivers coach Steve Spurrier Jr.

The son of the Gamecocks’ head coach maintained a low profile during his first three years in Columbia. But the man the USC staff knows as “Bubba” stepped into the spotlight when he assumed offensive play-calling duties from his father.

Gamecock fans likely will not notice much of a difference with the 36-year-old Spurrier Jr. drawing up plays. Unlike the previous father-son tandem on George Rogers Boulevard, the Spurriers seem to be on the same page philosophically.

Regina Hampton Brown and Harriet McMillan Perkins became the latest members of the Columbia Housing Authority’s Wall of Fame during annual recognition ceremonies Friday as more than 200 people gathered at the Drew Wellness Center gym to pay tribute.

The Wall of Fame honors former residents of public or Section 8 housing who have achieved success in their chosen career fields and have given back to their community.

“It’s an honor,” Brown said after Friday’s induction ceremonies. “I look at all the folks that are on the wall, and I think about all the contributions they have made in the community. Now, I’m a part of that same group that is making those contributions.”

Brown and Perkins join the more than 40 others whose names have been added to the Read Street wall since it was erected in 1988. That list includes educators, political leaders, business professionals, national entertainers, professional athletes, church leaders and civil servants.

Councilman Todd Cullum was charged in February with hit-and-run and impersonating a police officer.

Because the solicitor’s office is largely funded by County Council and prosecutors and staff are county employees, Eleventh Circuit Solicitor Donnie Myers said to try Cullum would “certainly be an appearance of impropriety.”

Myers also wrote in a March 19 letter that three members of council appeared at Cullum’s bond hearing and spoke as character witnesses for him.

Myers asked the attorney general’s office to take the case.

Councilman E.W. Cromartie, one of the four council members who voted to exempt bars from the city’s smoking ban, is having second thoughts about the issue.

“I think we may have to look at that again,” Cromartie said. “It has been some time since the last time we voted.”

Only one council member would have to change his or her vote for the issue to be reconsidered.

The change comes after hearing complaints from restaurant and bar owners.

On Sunday, members plan to gather at Sims Park for a “Bike-In” to encourage members who live nearby to walk or bicycle to church.

“We want to become a greener sanctuary,” said the Rev. Neal Jones, the fellowship’s pastor. He’ll borrow a bike for the event, as his was stolen a few years ago.

“I hope I don’t need training wheels,” he quipped. “It’s been a long time since I’ve ridden a bike.”

When they arrive at the church, at Heyward and Woodrow streets, congregants will dedicate a new bike rack for church use. The rack was donated by Joan and Bill Amundson, who regularly bike to church from their Rosewood home.

The bureau would be one of four recommended in a USC review of how the city is organized.

The move also comes after a separate citizen review of the police department, which cited interference by Austin and other elected officials that hindered how officers responded to calls.

The USC study, which The State obtained this week, recommends the creation of a bureau of public safety that would include the Fire Department, Police Department, 911 Communications, Municipal Court and Homeland Security.

According to the organizational review, this would “help lessen the perception that the City Manager is heavily involved in the operation of the Police Department.”

Instead, the troops, members of the Guard’s 218th Brigade Combat Team, have volunteered to go to Iraq.

“It’s just a job,” shrugged Sgt. Richard Law, who already has served two tours in Iraq with the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division.

Other than the time it takes to fly from Afghanistan to Kuwait to Iraq, the S.C. soldiers won’t get a break. They’ll spend at least 60 days in Iraq, joining the Arkansas National Guard’s 39th Brigade Combat Team. They also will have the option to extend their commitment 30 days at a time.

The soldiers’ yearlong tour in Afghanistan should be over by mid-May. An additional 120 members of the S.C. brigade, including 90 South Carolinians, have volunteered to extend their tours in Afghanistan for up to a year.

Bills were stacking up. He hadn’t worked in about a decade, was in denial over his diagnosis of schizophrenia and continued to have brushes with the law, Richland County probate court records show.

After being shuffled from one adult-care facility to another, the 59-year-old Seeley ended up at Southside Residential Care in Prosperity. He died April 11 at Newberry County Memorial Hospital in what Prosperity police call one of the worst cases of neglect they have seen and in what family friends say was a failure of the system.

Seeley died of pneumonia and septic shock, a potentially fatal reaction to a severe infection. Authorities say he was malnourished and had leg sores and bedbugs.

Southside’s owner, 64-year-old Roy Bowers, is charged with neglect of a vulnerable adult resulting in death.

It is one of only 11 known to exist and made by Rock Hill’s former Anderson Motor Co., the car manufacturing company of the South in its time. The Model C, five-passenger touring car had been lovingly housed and tended in a Michigan family’s garage for about half a century, venturing out only for Sunday afternoon drives.

At least half a dozen members of the Anderson family turned out Tuesday to await its arrival by truck. Of those Anderson cars known to exist, four are owned by the Anderson family, and one is at the State Museum.

This one will be housed at The Cotton Factory until the new Culture and Heritage Museums of York County’s Museum of Life and the Environment is built.

Victoria Spector of Michigan has slowly liquidated her father’s estate since he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease two years ago, but the little blue Anderson, one of 15 cars in his collection, was the most difficult to part with. It was his favorite.

State Law Enforcement Division spokeswoman Bobbi Schlatterer said Friday the investigation into the fire at the former site of the Lockmore Cotton Mill was ongoing.

The fire started around 7 p.m. Thursday. No injuries were reported, and officials have said they do not suspect foul play.

York Fire Chief Domenic Manera said Friday there were no damage estimates, but authorities think the property was destroyed.

The complex was being renovated into apartments for seniors, The (Rock Hill) Herald reports. Manera told the paper those renovations could have caused the building to burn faster.

The Democratic-led U.S. House is expected to unveil a new proposal in about two weeks, said Clyburn, D-Columbia.

He hopes the plan will include $1 billion to fund a summer work program in cities and communities across the country, creating 1 million new jobs and an instant infusion to the stalling U.S. economy.

Clyburn said he also will push to include in the new package a $10 billion to $15 billion appropriation to put Americans to work improving the country’s crumbling infrastructure, primarily deteriorating roads and bridges.

House Majority Whip Clyburn said Democrats pushed for these proposals in the initial stimulus package, a $150 billion economic plan enacted in February, but President Bush opposed them.

During the holiday, they will remember how God, through the prophet Moses, led them out of slavery in Egypt and brought them to the promised land.

Along with family dinners, there will be a number of community events:

Tonight:

• Tree of Life Congregation, 6719 N. Trenholm Road: 6 p.m. Passover Seder. (803) 787-2182

GREENLAWN BAPTIST CHURCH: Children’s handbell lessons, 5-5:30 p.m. Wednesdays, 6612 Garners Ferry Road. (803) 776-4074

EBENEZER LUTHERAN CHURCH: Holy Communion service, 7:15 a.m. Wednesdays, 1301 Richland St. Service lasts 30 minutes. (803) 765-9430

FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH OF LEXINGTON: Strength Team family event, 7 p.m. Wednesday through April 27, 415 Barr Road, Lexington. (803) 957-0686; www.first-baptist.org

EASTMINSTER PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH: Jubilee service, 5:30 p.m. Sundays, Thompson Hall, 3200 Trenholm Road. Child care provided. Harmonica stylist and songwriter Buddy Green to participate Sunday. (803) 256-1654

No one was injured in the 6:19 a.m. blaze, which caused $165,000 damage. The cause is under investigation, Jenkins said.

- Lee Higgins

Kozie Brown, 52, of Cayce, died at the scene, Watts said. He was about 60 to 70 feet off the ground when the 2:30 p.m. incident occurred, Watts said.

Carrie Lane, 100 block: Police were called to a mobile home park at 7 a.m. Wednesday after a woman said another woman was harassing her and vandalizing her trailer. The alleged victim told deputies she and her husband were separated and the woman harassing her was the husband’s new girlfriend. She said the girlfriend had broken out one of her windows and has been spray-painting obscene and threatening messages on the wife’s trailer in red paint. The messages say things like, “He’s mine” and “back off,” and they use derogatory names for the wife, the wife said. She had photos of the messages that she gave to the deputies.

Jamil Road, 200 block: A man called police at 10 a.m. Wednesday after he discovered someone had broken into his storage space and stolen almost $2,000 worth of saltwater fishing equipment. The man told deputies his wife had gone to the storage space Monday and found the lock missing. The lock was replaced, but Wednesday when the man went to check out the space, he found all of his rods and reels were gone, including one antique fly-fishing outfit.

RICHLAND COUNTY SHERIFF

Fore Avenue, 700 block: A woman called police at 8 a.m. Friday and said her son was forging her checks. The 64-year-old woman told deputies her 41-year-old son had a drug problem and in March he had stolen a book of her checks from her home. She said since that time he had been forging the checks at numerous local businesses, and she’s afraid there might be more out there that the son will try to cash.

School board members Thursday approved splitting employee’s monthly earnings into two pay periods as long as it does not impact the Cayce-West Columbia system’s budget.

District officials told board members during the meeting that payroll office employees need time to prepare and a 2009 start date would give employees the opportunity to notify banks and change their automatic draft arrangements.

The fox attacked the man, whose name has not been released, Wednesday while he was doing yardwork in West Columbia.

Department of Natural Resources staffers were able to catch the fox and test it for rabies. The victim is receiving preventive vaccinations.

This is the third confirmed rabid animal in Lexington County in 2008. Last year, there were eight.

The blaze broke out about 6:33 p.m. inside a truck in a work area. The cause is under investigation, but the fire does not appear to be suspicious, Jenkins said.

Ronald Edward Riley, of Saluda, was arrested at his high school this week on assault and unlawful conduct charges and was being held Friday at a Clarendon County jail on $30,000 bail.

Riley was a volunteer counselor at a Clarendon County camp for children of deployed soldiers or those preparing to go overseas. Riley put his hands around a boy’s neck and choked him unconscious twice, authorities said. A second boy also told authorities Riley choked him until he passed out.

The Centers for Disease Control said earlier this year that 82 children had died from the “choking game,” a growing fad among youths for the euphoric, dreamlike feeling people get as blood rushes back to the brain.

But, at Bookman Road Elementary School, volunteers, staff and students are making strides to keep that outside environment around with a nature trail.

Located in the woods behind the school, the Lighthouse Lookout Trail is a learning experience and a reprieve from inside classrooms. It is also open to the public in the evening and on weekends.

“Kids spend way too much time surfing the Net and staying inside,” said Becky Groth, a member of the school’s improvement group. “This is a way we make sure that the children get outside.

“I think it makes it more real and more fun.”

Every second-grader at the Richland 1 school appeared in “Weather or Not!,” an opera-like show they helped write, choreograph and outfit with homemade costumes.

They drew inspiration from lessons about climate, but with an emphasis on the effects of smog, acid rain and fouled drinking water, to name a few.

The 120 7- and 8-year-olds had help from adults, including a guest maestro and Satchel Ford’s energetic arts faculty.

The timing of its premier — a week before “Earth Day” — was coincidental, but not inconsequential.

I had three goals:

• To share stories that would make parents say, “Hey, that’s how it is for us too!”

• To offer real and usable advice from experts in the community while making it clear that I wasn’t one of them.

• To remind moms and dads that parenting is often funny — and fun.

Switch to compact fluorescent bulbs — even just for the few bulbs you use the most.

In the winter, set your thermostat at 68 degrees in the daytime, 55 at night. In the summer, keep it at 78 degrees.

Turn off lights and unplug electrical appliances when not in use.

Weatherize your home or apartment by sealing and caulking around windows and doors and making sure you have adequate insulation.

DREAM RIDERS OF LEXINGTON is accepting sponsorships, program advertising and donations for its May 24 benefit horse show. Amounts range from $5-$400; sponsorship forms must be postmarked by Friday, April 25, to be included in the brochure. Dream Riders is a therapeutic equestrian program for the handicapped. For more information, go to www.dreamriders.org; e-mail dreamr2@mindspring.com or call (803) 957-7906.

CELL PHONES FOR SOLDIERS, a cell phone recycling program and Smith Turf & Irrigation have teamed up to distribute prepaid calling cards to soldiers serving overseas. About half of the phones are reconditioned and resold, the rest are dismantled and recycled to reclaim gold, silver, platinum, copper wiring from chargers, nickel, iron, cadmium and lead from battery packs and plastic from cases and accessories. You may drop off your old cell phone at STI, 550 Corley Mill Road, Lexington. Cash donations are also accepted. (803) 957-6662; www.cellphonesforsoldiers.com

HOME WORKS is seeking donations of multivitamins for children and adults to be delivered to Zorritos, Peru, Aug. 5-17. (803) 206-6974 or e-mail homewrksc@aol.com

PALMETTO’S THRIFT STORE is accepting donations of clothing, housewares, furniture, toys, books, linens, jewelry, purses, shoes and accessories at 7539 St. Andrews Road, Irmo (behind Lizard’s Thicket). Items may be dropped off 9 a.m.-6 p.m. weekdays, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturdays or call (803) 781-1335 to arrange for pick-up service. The store donates 50 percent of all profits to Children’s Chance, a nonprofit organization assisting families and children affected by pediatric cancer.

Basketball action

Come watch the Harlem Wizards, a traveling basketball exhibition, at 7 p.m. Friday at Lower Richland High. The event is presented by the Mill Creek Elementary PTA. The Harlem Wizards will play the Lower Richland All-Stars. There will be a free autograph session. Cost for the event is $8 for students in advance or $10 at the gate. For adults, $10 in advance, $12 at the gate. Senior citizens are entitled to the student rate. Children under the age of four get in free.

For more information, call 783-5553 between the hours of 7 a.m. and 4 p.m.

In celebration of Earth Day on Tuesday, Seven Oaks Elementary first-graders are decorating paper bags for Kroger grocery store.

The colorful bags — with earth-friendly messages and pictures — will be given out to customers shopping at the St. Andrews Road store on Earth Day.

Catherine Kilbourne, a Seven Oaks teacher, said she was looking for project ideas on the Internet when she found earthdaybags.org.

“I thought it would be a really great idea,” she said.

• 7 p.m. Monday at Lugoff-Elgin High, 1284 Highway 1, South, Lugoff

• 7 p.m. Tuesday at North Central High, 3000 Lockhart Road, Kershaw

• 7 p.m. Thursday, April 24, at Camden High, 1022 Ehrenclou Drive

Decisions by the school board could cause a roughly $80 tax increase on property valued at $100,000. Or, in an effort not to increase taxes, initiatives such as a new special education program, a new literacy program, class size caps and arts programs could be eliminated or scaled back.

All of it in just 10 days as part of the new schoolwide recycling program.

The project is one of the everyday lessons their teacher Joey Hendrix started last fall, and it’s one he uses to show the effect they have on the Earth.

“I’m teaching them they can do their part on a small scale and make a big difference,” he said.

High school students are the most wasteful people when they throw away cans and bottles, said senior Hope Snipes. But if they recycle, they don’t waste as much.

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS

TUESDAY TEA TALK: Noon-2 p.m. and 6-8 -p.m. the fourth Tuesday monthly at Reisling Garden Room, 1061-B Sparkleberry Lane. Networking, relaxation and conversation over a cup of tea. $5; at the door, $8. Call (803) 754-5620 or e-mail vii@viiservices.com for reservations (space is limited).

GEN. WADE HAMPTON CAMP — SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS: 6 tonight at Seawell’s, 1125 Rosewood Drive. (803) 781-1836

DUTCH FORK CHAPTER GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY: 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday at Mount Horeb Lutheran Church, Columbia Avenue and East Boundary Street, Chapin. Brent Holcomb will speak in the morning, his topic will be “South Carolina’s Vital Records and Substitutes for Them.” Afternoon speaker will be Michael Bedenbaugh, “Introduction to the Palmetto Trust for Historic Preservation.” Registration, $16; includes lunch by Shealy’s Barbecue. Mail checks to Dutch Fork Chapter, SCGS, Inc., P.O. Box 481, Chapin, SC 29036-0481. (803) 345-5815, (803) 345-9843

There’s a 5K walk/run and 10K run, starting at 7:30 a.m. at the Community Medical Clinic, 110 C. DeKalb St.

Advance registration is $25 for the 5K, $30 for the 10K. Fees increase slightly for registration on Saturday. Proceeds will benefit the clinic, which provides free medical care to the county’s uninsured.

To register, log on at www.strictlyrunning.com or www.cmcofkc.org, or call the clinic at (803) 713-0806.

• How to reach us

No tax hike would be needed to pay off the debt under the plan proposed to Town Council on Monday.

Increased revenue expected from current taxes and fees would pay for most of the project, Mayor James Wiszowaty said.

The plan calls for offices of nearly 16,000 square feet — more than double the current amount — at the site on which Town Hall sits.

It’s a $3.4 million project that would bring police headquarters into a new Town Hall, which would be located on a different part of its one-acre site at West Columbia Avenue and Sulton Court. The public safety complex is a mile west of Town Hall.

THE HISTORIC COLUMBIA FOUNDATION is seeking nominations through May 1 for the 30 Most Significant African-Americans from Columbia and Richland County as part of the 30th annual Jubilee: Festival of Heritage. The festival, slated for Aug. 23 on the grounds of the Mann-Simons Cottage at 1403 Richland St., will feature historic tours, hands-on craft activities for children, music, demonstrations, artists and vendors. Recipients will be announced at a tribute gala on Thursday, Aug. 21. Nomination forms available at www.historiccolumbia.org or by calling (803) 252-7742, ext. 27.

THE CITY OF CAYCE FINANCE DEPARTMENT has received a certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting from the Government Finance Officers Association for its comprehensive annual financial report. City Manager John Sharpe commended department head Garry Huddle and his team for their hard work and attention to detail in preparing Cayce’s financial documents and reports.

CORPORATE

SOUTHEASTERN FREIGHT LINES of West Columbia recently donated a heavy truck engine, transmission and differential assembly to the Applied Technology Education Campus in Camden. The heavy vehicle components will be utilized by students in the truck diesel program at the school.

PROPERTY TRANSFERS

105 Crickets Chirp Lane, Batesburg, from Southern Comfort Homes Inc. to Rocky M. Oswald, $202,900

ZIP CODE 29016

PROPERTY TRANSFERS

Batesburg-Leesville educators and local conservationists are hoping to create that opportunity — and a learning experience for students — through a new butterfly garden at the elementary school.

“I think today’s students need more hands-on activities,” said Darlene Stephens, Batesburg-Leesville Elementary principal. “They want to be up and moving.”

Batesburg-Leesville Elementary teachers Myra Davenport and Julie Ruff are coordinating the effort.

They were awarded a $500 grant from the Lexington Water and Soil Conservation District toward transforming a 5,400-square-foot courtyard into an outdoor classroom for students.

Performances are at 8 p.m. today through Saturday and Friday and Saturday, April 25-26; and at 3 p.m. Sunday, April 27.

The show, being performed by the Camden Community Theatre, is a 25th anniversary production of the first show produced at the Fine Arts Center’s Bassett Building.

Tickets are $20 for adults, $15 for students and seniors.

For details, contact the Fine Arts Center at (803) 425-7676.

While the raid on the West Texas sect earlier this month has focused attention on polygamists who live in communal fashion and dress like 19th-century pioneers, many polygamists are very much part of the modern world, and live right next door in cities, suburbs and small towns across the West.

At least 37,000 men, women and children live in polygamous families from Canada to Mexico, most of them in Utah, according to Wilde, now an activist for plural marriage.

While some men in rural Utah build large barracks-style houses with separate entrances to accommodate multiple wives, many of the state’s polygamists are unattached to any particular sect or clan and live almost invisibly, under conventional-looking circumstances.

Each wife gets her own house. The men shuttle between them, often without a home to call their own. Mothers tell school officials they are single parents if they have to explain. But that’s seldom a problem in a state where many residents trace polygamy in their family trees and law-enforcement authorities rarely prosecute.

Eye-opening new research finds the happiest Americans are the oldest, and older adults are more socially active than the stereotype of the lonely senior suggests. The two go hand in hand. Being social can help keep away the blues.

“The good news is that with age comes happiness,” said study author Yang Yang, a University of Chicago sociologist. “Life gets better in one’s perception as one ages.”

A certain amount of distress in old age is inevitable, including aches and pains and the deaths of loved ones and friends. But older people generally have learned to be more content with what they have, Yang said.

This is partly because older people have learned to lower their expectations and accept their achievements, said Duke University aging expert Linda George. An older person may realize, “It’s fine that I was a schoolteacher and not a Nobel Prize winner.”

In a major speech during his six-day U.S. trip, Benedict also said respect for human rights, not violence, was the key to solving many of the world’s problems.

While he did not specify which countries have a stranglehold on global power, the German pope — only the third pontiff to address the U.N. General Assembly — addressed long-standing Vatican concerns about the struggle to achieve world peace and the development of the poorest regions.

While collective action is needed to solve global problems, he said, “we experience the obvious paradox of a multilateral consensus that continues to be in crisis because it is still subordinated to the decisions of a few.”

The pope made no mention of the United States in his speech. However, the Vatican did not support the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, which occurred despite the Bush administration’s failure to gain Security Council approval for it. At other moments on his trip, Benedict has been overtly critical of the U.S., noting how opportunity and hope have not always been available to minorities.

State District Judge Barbara Walther heard 21 hours of testimony over two days before ruling. Individual hearings will be set for the children over the next several weeks.

She ordered that all children and parents be given genetic testing. Child welfare officials have said they have had difficulty determining how the children and parents are related because of evasive or changing answers.

Experts for the state testified at a custody hearing for the youngsters Friday that girls in the west Texas polygamous sect enter underage marriages without resistance because they are ruthlessly indoctrinated from birth to believe disobedience will lead to damnation.

The renegade Mormon sect’s belief system “is abusive. The culture is very authoritarian,” said Dr. Bruce Perry, a psychiatrist and an authority on children in cults.

Benedict’s third day in the United States began with a packed open-air Mass celebrated in 10 languages at a baseball stadium, and included a speech to Roman Catholic college and university presidents.

But one of the most dramatic moments was a private one, in the chapel of the papal embassy between events.

The Rev. Federico Lombardi, a papal spokesman, said Benedict and Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley met with five or six clergy sex abuse victims for about 25 minutes, offering them encouragement and hope.

“They prayed together. Also, each of them had their own individual time with the Holy Father,” Lombardi said. “Some were in tears.”

The chemicals could point to an increase in cancer and hyperthyroidism in cats and dogs, according to The Environmental Working Group, which released the study at a press conference in Berkeley on Thursday.

The group tested blood and urine from 20 dogs and 37 cats in a Virginia veterinary clinic. It found 48 industrial chemicals in the animals.

The pets probably ingested the chemicals because they live close to floors and lick the ground and their paws, the group said.

Infants and toddlers also are close to the ground and put things in their mouths, which puts them at the same kind of risk as cats and dogs, the group said.

“It brought me directly to heaven today.”

Bishop Berald M. Barbarito of the diocese of Palm Beach:

“His warmth came across to all the people. ... People were just trying to touch him. You could see the joy their faces as well as on his face as they grasped his hand and he grasped their hands back.”

A youth group from North Dakota spent two years raising $15,000 for the trip. Before the Mass started, they lined up for $3 bumper stickers that read “I (heart) Pope Benedict XVI” and $20 T-shirts bearing the pope’s image.

“Our message is to be careful when using these medicines,” said U.S. Navy neurologist Dr. Jack Tsao, who led the study that was released Thursday. “It may be better to use diapers and be able to think clearly than the other way around.”

Urinary incontinence sometimes can be resolved with non-drug treatments, he added, so patients should ask about alternatives such as exercises and biofeedback.

Bladder control trouble affects about one in 10 people age 65 and older, according to the National Institute on Aging, which helped fund the study. Women are more likely to be affected than men. Causes include nerve damage, loss of muscle tone or, in men, enlarged prostate.

Nearly 80 percent of the study participants took one or more of a class of drugs called anticholinergics, including drugs for high blood pressure, asthma, Parkinson’s disease and incontinence drugs such as Detrol and Ditropan.

All told, seven of the court’s nine justices agreed that the specific lethal injection procedures employed by Kentucky and most other states don’t violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on “cruel and unusual” punishment.

“Capital punishment is constitutional,” Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. said Wednesday, “so there must be a means of implementing it.”

Only punishments that present a “substantial” or “objectively intolerable” risk of serious additional harm violate the Eighth Amendment, Roberts added. States cannot be forced into adopting alternative methods of execution unless they’re “feasible” and can “significantly” reduce the risk of severe pain.

In the short run, the decision permits Kentucky to deploy a three-drug combination intended for the execution of convicted multiple murderers Ralph Baze and Thomas C. Bowling. Thirty of the 36 states that permit the death penalty specify using the same drugs. Five other states permit lethal injection without specifying the three-drug blend.

“Many of you have spoken to me of the enormous pain that your communities have suffered when clerics have betrayed their priestly obligations and duties by such gravely immoral behavior,” the pope said in an address to the nation’s bishops at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.

“It is your God-given responsibility as pastors to bind up the wounds caused by every breach of trust, to foster healing, to promote reconciliation and to reach out with loving concern to those so seriously wronged,” he said.

Saying that many of them had adopted “more focused remedial and disciplinary measures” to protect young people, he offered few specifics about how to ensure that “the vulnerable always be shielded from those who would cause harm.”

The remarks were some of his most extensive public comments on the scandal, which slowly unraveled, parish by parish, to eventually reveal 5,000 priests accused of abusing 12,000 children and teenagers in the United States.

While the Dutch quickly cast doubt on the Taliban claim, the death underscores the danger high-profile soldiers can face and illustrates a grim reality for families, famous and not, who choose the military life.

Lt. Dennis van Uhm, 23, was one of two Dutch soldiers killed in the explosion seven miles northwest of Camp Holland, the Dutch military base in the restive southern province of Uruzgan. Two more soldiers were injured, one critically.

Van Uhm’s father, Gen. Peter van Uhm, was installed only Thursday as the Netherlands’ defense chief.

The prime minister called Van Uhm’s death “an unprecedented tragedy,” and the weekly meeting of the Dutch Cabinet was briefly stopped so ministers could reflect privately.

The delay, caused by “unexpected problems in the airline industry,” could last for days, military officials said.

It also could affect the remainder of the 1,400 S.C. National Guard members scheduled to leave Afghanistan as the 218th Brigade Combat Team completes its yearlong tour of duty here. Plans called for all but a handful of the 218th’s troops to be home around the middle of May.

“The South Carolina National Guard is ... doing everything within our power to get these soldiers home as soon as possible,” said Col. Pete Brooks of the S.C. National Guard. “We want to get them home from Kuwait as badly as they want to get home.”

Over the weekend, the S.C. troops flew on a U.S. Air Force plane from Kabul to Kuwait. From there, they were to take a charter flight to Fort Bragg, N.C.

Board chairwoman Wendy Brawley characterized the closed-door sessions as productive, but said more time is needed to evaluate the list of candidates a consultant screened. She declined to say how many candidates have been brought in for preliminary interviews.

Richland 1’s board meets Tuesday night, but Brawley said no discussions about the superintendent search will take place. That will come later in the week at a separate meeting, she said.