The U.S. ambassador to Russia says any meeting between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin “would be a ways off.”

Jon Huntsman suggested Sunday on “Fox & Friends” that if a summit were to occur, “the president, at the right time, will say what needs to be said.”

Huntsman’s statement comes after a report that White House officials were working toward setting up a meeting.

Trump has said he was open to having a summit with Putin, who U.S. intelligence officials have said directed Russian meddling in the 2016 election to help Trump win.

The president has repeatedly said he wants to improve relationships with Moscow.

Huntsman says Trump would not sit down with Putin unless he had issues to discuss “that were aligned with our national interests.”

 
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National Guard troops, police and firefighters ushered the last group of evacuees from homes on the eastern tip of Hawaii’s Big Island early Saturday, hours before creeping lava from the Kilauea volcano severed road access to the area, officials said.

A stream of lava as wide as three football fields flowed over a highway near a key junction on the outskirts of Kapoho, a seaside community of private homes and vacation rentals rebuilt after a destructive eruption of Kilauea in 1960.

The lava flow left Kapoho and the adjacent development of Vacationland,encompassing about 500 homes combined, cut off from the rest of the island by road, according to the Hawaii County Civil Defense agency.

Authorities since Wednesday had been urging residents of the area to pack up and leave before lava spewing from a volcanic fissure at the eastern foot of Kilauea reached the area.

Latest evacuations Saturday

The final phase of the evacuation was carried out late Friday and early Saturday by fire and police department personnel, with help from the Hawaii National Guard and public works teams, county civil defense spokeswoman Janet Snyder told Reuters by email.

An estimated 500 people live in the greater Kapoho area, but Snyder said it was not immediately clear how many residents, if any, chose to stay behind.

Another 2,000 people have been evacuated from the Leilani Estates subdivision, an area further west, where dozens of homes have been devoured or cut off by rivers of red-hot molten rock streaming over the landscape since May 3.

For those whose homes have been unscathed, the prolonged strain of uncertainty has grown increasingly difficult.

Living on edge

“We’re waiting for Pele to make the decision,” said Steve Kirkpatrick, a retired mailman and 14-year resident of Leilani Estates, referring to the volcano goddess of Hawaiian myth. His home was still intact but in harm’s way.

“You go for three weeks and you think everything is fine, and then you can still lose your house,” Kirkpatrick told Reuters as he and his wife, Kathy, ventured back to their community to help friends move out.

“As the lava expands, so has the anxiety,” she said, the low, jetlike sound of lava spouting from the ground audible in the distance.

Lava, toxic gas and ‘Pele’s hair’

Lava was not the only challenge posed by the eruption.

Toxic sulfur dioxide gas emissions have created an additional hazard. So too have airborne volcanic glass fibers, called “Pele’s hair,” wispy strands produced by lava fountains and carried aloft by the wind.

One resident, Nancy Avery, said the glass strands hurt like paper cuts, slicing into her fingers and feet, toes exposed because she wore only sandals. She tried to pick up a strand but, “It just kind of melted into my skin and cut me. It’s so sharp, it feels like the glass is still in there.”

The lava itself, extruded from about two dozen fissures that opened on the slope of Kilauea’s “eastern rift zone” earlier this month, has also knocked out telephone and power lines and forced the shutdown of a geothermal energy plant.

Lava burned two buildings at the plant, a substation and a warehouse that stored a drilling rig on the property, officials said.

Eruption cycle began in 1983

The latest upheaval of Kilauea, one of the world’s most active volcanoes, comes on the heels of an eruption cycle that began in 1983 and continued almost nonstop for 35 years, destroying more than 200 dwellings and other structures.

The current activity has been accompanied for weeks by daily periodic explosions of gas and volcanic rock from Kilauea’s summit crater as well as earthquakes.

But the summit has quieted down over the past few days, as tons of rubble shaken loose from the interior walls of the crater have fallen into the void and plugged the bottom of the vent.

Scientists are unsure whether the blockage will eventually bring an end to further eruptions at the summit or lead to a buildup of pressure that could cause a much bigger explosion.
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The president of a leading Baptist seminary in Texas was dismissed because of his response to two rape allegations made years apart by students, according to officials at the Fort Worth-based school.

Kevin Ueckert, board chairman for Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, in a statement Friday criticized the actions of former President Paige Patterson.

Ueckert said Patterson sent an email to the head of campus security in 2015 to say he wanted to meet alone with a student who told him she had been raped, to “break her down.”

The attitude expressed by Patterson in the email was “antithetical to the core values of our faith,” Ueckert said.

Patterson also was criticized by the board for his response to a student’s allegation of rape in 2003 when Patterson was president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina.

That allegation was never reported to law enforcement, and Ueckert said Patterson gave contradictory information to the board when asked about it.

A working phone number for Patterson could not be found Saturday to answer the allegations.

Documents returned

Also contributing to the downfall of one of the leading figures of the Southern Baptist Convention were documents requested by the North Carolina school.

Southeastern Baptist had requested the return of any school records Patterson took with him when he departed to become president of Southwestern Baptist in 2003. Through an attorney, Patterson initially claimed last month not to have any such records, Ueckert said. But then the attorney later provided records clearly indicating they belonged to Southeastern Baptist, the board chairman said.

Shortly after the records were turned over, the wife of Patterson’s chief of staff posted them online as part of a blog entry, Ueckert said. The records included the names of students and other information not authorized for release by officials at either school, he said.

“I believe this was inappropriate and unethical,” Ueckert said.

President emeritus briefly

The Fort Worth seminary initially named the 75-year-old Patterson as president emeritus May 23 after pushing him out of his position as president. The board at the time said that he and his wife could continue to live on campus as theologians-in-residence. But trustees later cut all ties after confirming the new allegations against him, officials previously said.

Patterson had drawn scrutiny in recent months based on accusations that he made remarks about a teenage girl’s body, said female seminarians should work hard to look attractive and argued that abused women should almost always stay with their husbands.

The comments led to a letter from a group of “concerned Southern Baptist women” dated May 6 to the board, asking trustees “to exercise the authority you have been given by the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention and to take a strong stand against unbiblical teaching regarding womanhood, sexuality and domestic violence.”

Patterson issued an apology days later: “I wish to apologize to every woman who has been wounded by anything I have said that was inappropriate or that lacked clarity,” his statement said. “Please forgive the failure to be as thoughtful and careful in my extemporaneous expression as I should have been.”
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Trucks can be used for so much more than transporting goods from one place to another. They can be transformed into restaurants, mobile health clinics … even a concert hall.

That’s what two young pianists have done with their truck as they work to make classical music more accessible to a wider range of audiences.

The Concert Truck

Nick Luby came up with the idea for the Concert Truck, says his partner, Susan Zhang. “He went sailing with his grandfather,” she says. “When they would dock, they would go to certain churches where he could practice (piano). While he was practicing, people would gather because they were curious about what he was playing.”

Though people can listen to music anywhere, on radio, TV or on their earphones with MP3 players, Luby says nothing is like listening to live music.

“When you listen to live music there is energy they just can’t get from recordings.” He adds, “It brings people together. For me it makes life worth living.”

But for Zhang, the idea of using a truck to bring live music to different locations was a bit unsettling at first.

“When he came to me with the idea, I thought he was crazy,” she recalls. “Then, I watched this movie, ‘Chef,’ about a chef who has a food truck and he travels across the country and I thought that kind of life would be so cool, so I decided to go in on this with him.”

The next step was to get funding.

“We started by winning a Creativity in Music Award from our university in South Carolina,” Luby says. “That was matched by the Performing Art Consortium. They provide some financing for artists to perform or to apply for schools and competitions. And the piano is a generous loan from Jordan Kitts Music, which is a piano store in Rockville, Maryland.”

That was two years ago, and they’ve been performing ever since.

A different experience

Zhang admits that performing from a truck, in the middle of street traffic and noise, can be challenging.

“Usually when you perform in a concert hall, everything is very controlled, everybody is quiet, the lighting,” she says. “In a place like this, anything could happen. When I start performing, I really don’t notice a lot of the things that happen. I think there is definitely a kind of endurance you gain from performing on a truck.”

And the artists don’t take it personally when people pass by and don’t stay to listen.

“When people walk by and listen for a second and keep going you definitely notice, but the fact that someone stops even for a second or a minute is really a nice thing to be able to share that moment with people,” Luby says.

On a recent day, the performance is in front of a farmers market in Baltimore, where Luby and Zhang are both high school music teachers. With their rented piano tightly stored aboard the truck, the duo head downtown. The 5-meter-long Concert Truck is equipped with speakers and lights, and takes only a few minutes to transform into a stage.

The music draws a lunchtime crowd, including Reba Cornman, who was buying some herbs from the farmers market.

“All of a sudden, I heard (Sergei) Prokofiev’s ‘Cinderella’ played on piano,” Cornman says. “I love Prokofiev! I came right over and sit down. It was extraordinary. I know they’re trying to reach all kinds of audiences and being on a truck is such a remarkable way to do that.”

Baltimore Farmers Market manager Jill Ciotta worked with Luby and Zhang to bring their Concert Truck to the market. She considers the performing experience part of the healthy focus the market, which is run by the University of Maryland’s Medical Center, tries to promote in downtown.

“We’re always open on bringing in things that make it better and bigger and really draw people outside, get moving, walking, and get healthy food. I’d love to see more performances here, I’d love to see them attracting more people, employees, students and neighbors, and getting them to enjoy the outdoors,” Ciotta said.

Performing on the road

The Concert Truck has performed in schools, children’s homes and homeless shelters, in addition to public squares in several cities in South Carolina, Ohio, Maryland and Minnesota. These trips, Luby says, bring him closer to his dream, “to create a platform that allows musicians, not just us but many musicians, to share their craft and their art broadly.”

That dream is what keeps Luby and Zhang energized, and on the road, bringing the Concert Truck and classical music to new audiences.
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A lawyer tapped to lead a task force at the Environmental Protection Agency overseeing cleanups at the nation’s most polluted places worked until recently for a top chemical and plastics manufacturer with a troubled legacy of creating some of those toxic sites.

Steven D. Cook has been named as the new chair of the Superfund Task Force, which EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt created last year to revamp how the agency oversees cleanups at the more than 1,300 toxic sites.

Before beginning work in February as deputy assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Land and Emergency Management, Cook served more than 20 years as in-house corporate counsel for LyondellBasell Industries — one of the world’s largest plastics, chemicals and refining companies.

EPA records show that LyondellBasell and its subsidiaries are listed as being potentially responsible for at least three dozen Superfund polluted sites.

Half of appointees have industry ties

​An analysis by The Associated Press shows that nearly half the political appointees hired at EPA under President Donald Trump have industry ties. Of more than 60 EPA hires tracked by the AP over the last year, about one-third worked as registered lobbyists or lawyers for chemical manufacturers, fossil fuel producers or other EPA-regulated companies.

Trump promised as a presidential candidate to drain the swamp in Washington. An executive order signed two weeks after his inauguration bars former lobbyists and corporate lawyers from participating in any matter they worked on for private clients within two years of going to work for the government.

Following a request by AP, EPA provided a copy of an April 20 memo Cook signed recusing himself from participating in regulatory matters involving LyondellBasell. However, as stated in the letter, Cook can participate in matters affecting his former employer as long as his actions would also impact at least five similarly situated companies.

“All EPA employees receive ethics briefings when they start and continually work with our ethics office regarding any potential conflicts they may encounter while employed here,” said Lincoln Ferguson, an EPA spokesman. “Steven Cook is no different.”

It was not immediately clear whether Cook would be allowed to participate in decisions involving LyondellBasell, anyway. AP reported in March that White House counsel Don McGahn has issued at least 37 ethics waivers to key administration officials, including three working at EPA, that allow them to help regulate the very industries from which they previously collected paychecks even after signing recusals. It was not clear whether Cook was granted a waiver, and Ferguson did not respond to AP’s inquiries on the subject.

LyondellBasell claims

Lyondell Chemical Co., a Houston-based subsidiary of LyondellBasell, agreed to pay $250 million in 2010 to settle environmental claims and provide cleanup funds for 15 properties across the country as part of bankruptcy proceedings.

Another subsidiary of the Dutch chemicals conglomerate, Equistar Chemicals, agreed in 2007 to spend more than $125 million on pollution controls and cleanup costs to address a myriad of air, water and hazardous waste violations at seven petrochemical plants in Texas, Illinois, Iowa and Louisiana. Court filings made as part of the company’s legal settlement with the Justice Department, and EPA listed Cook as the primary contact for Equistar.

LyondellBasell subsidiaries are identified as a responsible party on dozens of Superfund sites. The companies set aside funds for cleanups before emerging from bankruptcy.

“LyondellBasell resolved its Superfund obligations nearly a decade ago,” said Pattie Shieh-Lance, a corporate spokeswoman in Houston. “The company does not currently have any such obligations.”

Replacing Pruitt friend

Cook is taking over as chair of the Superfund Task Force following the resignation of Albert “Kell” Kelly, a longtime friend and business associate of Pruitt’s. AP reported in August that federal banking regulators had banned Kelly, who previously the chairman of Oklahoma-based SpiritBank, from banking for life. Members of Congress had been pressing for details about what led to the banking sanctions against Kelly when he quit his EPA job.

Cook’s appointment to lead the task force was first reported by Bloomberg.

He is currently the top political appointee at EPA’s Land and Emergency Management office, which oversees the agency’s response to chemical spills and oversees management of the Superfund program.

Trump has nominated Peter C. Wright to serve as assistant administrator for Land and Emergency Management, but he has not yet been confirmed to the post by the U.S. Senate. Wright has worked as a corporate lawyer at Dow Chemical Co. since 1999. 
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