The Sunrise News

A new report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities shows 81,800 Alabamians have lost Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program since last year. The report shows that SNAP enrollment in the state decreased by 11% from July 2025 to April 2026. The decline in enrollment affects 23,324 children’s access to SNAP benefits. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that nationwide SNAP enrollment has decreased by 11% in that same timeframe. SNAP enrollment decreased following new SNAP work requirements and cost-sharing requirements included in last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Under OBBA, the upper age limit of the work requirements to receive SNAP benefits was raised from 54 to 65. Additionally, the bill also requires caretakers of children older than 14 to work for a minimum of 20 hours per week in order to receive benefits. Read the full story on our website and check out the rest of this week's Alabama Roundup. https://lnkd.in/gGinPcGh #Alabamaroundup #alabamanews #thesunrisenews

Alabama officials are seeking federal permission to fill in a stretch of wetlands and streams in the Cahaba and Black Warrior River sheds as the state aims to move forward with a decades-long highway project to construct the Birmingham Northern Beltline. The Alabama Department of Transportation is requesting a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to fill 1.36 acres of wetlands and more than 10,000 linear feet of streams to build a 9.5-mile section of the beltline. The Birmingham Northern Beltline has been in the works for decades. The project intends to create a northern bypass of the city, called Interstate 422, running from Bessemer at its southern terminus to Argo at its northern terminus — a total of 52 miles. If completed, the project would help to entirely encircle Birmingham with interstate highways — the city has four interstates that run through its metro area and a southern bypass, Interstate 459. Read more about this story on our website and check out the other stories featured in this week's Alabama Roundup! https://lnkd.in/eqsEj-C6 #Alabamaroundup #localnews #birminghambeltline #independentnews #alabamanews #thesunrisenews

A recent federal court ruling upheld a nearly decade-old lower court ruling finding that the Alabama Department of Corrections fails to provide adequate mental health care to incarcerated individuals. However, that same ruling walked back several requirements imposed by the lower court to address mental healthcare in the state’s prisons. A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a 2017 district court finding that conditions within the state’s prisons as it relates to mental healthcare violate the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment, reaffirming the lower court’s finding that ADOC’s mental healthcare is “horrendously inadequate.” In their opinion, the judges called suicide rates in Alabama prisons “staggering” blaming “the Department of Corrections’ deliberate indifference to the serious mental healthcare needs of its inmates.” Read more on our website and make sure to subscribe to the Alabama Roundup to get weekly updates on news in our state! https://lnkd.in/epG_AjcS

After a two-month break, Alabama’s grocery tax will be back in effect starting July 1, meaning that Alabamians can expect to pay more for groceries in July. Lawmakers passed a bill in April creating a two-month grocery sales tax holiday lasting from May 1 through June 30. During this period, the 2% state grocery sales tax was not levied on grocery purchases in the state. Read more on our website and make sure to subscribe to get weekly updates on news in Alabama. https://lnkd.in/g5mur9gk

Community members are questioning the conditions inside Birmingham City Jail after two inmates died within three days at the facility. The first inmate, Kalena “Peaches” Croskey — a 32-year-old transgender woman — died on June 11. Croskey was found unresponsive in her single-person cell. She had been booked in the jail on April 21 on charges of disorderly conduct, public intoxication, criminal mischief and two counts of third-degree assault. The second death came on June 14, when 35-year-old Center Point man Kadeem Sweazer was also found unresponsive in his cell. Sewazer had been booked into the jail on June 13 on a charge of disorderly conduct. Birmingham Deputy Chief of Public Safety Carlton Peeples has said that both deaths stemmed from self-harm incidents. Read more on this story on our website and check out the full Alabama Roundup. https://lnkd.in/ePjhrUWD

Check out the winners of yesterday's primary run-off elections. #alabamanews #thesunrisenews #alabamaprimary #runoffelections

Auburn University’s Board of Trustees has voted to eliminate shared governance of the university between itself and the school’s faculty senate, while also giving itself complete control of course offerings, curriculum and degree requirements. Under the new model, the faculty senate will be replaced by the Presidential Academic Advisory Council. The board claims this new body will “strengthen Auburn University’s model for meaningful academic consultation by creating a direct, structured and professionally responsible channel for faculty perspective to the president, provost and senior academic leadership.” Read more on our website and check out the full Roundup! https://lnkd.in/eN4xcSUJ

The ruling came after Alabama officials requested an emergency ruling following a lower court decision at the end of May that blocked the state from implementing a congressional map drawn by state lawmakers in 2023 that featured only one majority-Black district. That map was struck down by the same federal court in 2023 for violating the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by diminishing Black voting power in the state, and a congressional map that featured two majority-Black districts was put in place by the court until 2030.   Read more on our website and check out the full Roundup for more news across the state. https://lnkd.in/ejN7NqNF

Last week, federal judges blocked Alabama's congressional redistricting plans. The three-judge panel issued a preliminary injunction to stop the state from going forward with redistricting, saying that the new map “intentionally discriminated based on race” because it only included one majority-Black congressional district out of its seven districts. Black people make up about 27% of the state’s population. While the state lost one court case, they did have a favorable ruling a lower court redistricting case. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the state by lifting a district court injunction that blocked state Senate redistricting in two districts in the Montgomery area. Read more on our website, and subscribe to our newsletter to have weekly updates delivered directly to your inbox! https://lnkd.in/e9w74yE7

A three-judge panel has blocked Alabama's new congressional map. Here is what that ruling means for the state.