Questions, answers about college union ruling

A regional director of the National Labor Relations Board ruled Tuesday that Northwestern football players could unionize. Does that mean some players will be able to organize and get better health care and academic support? Or does it spell the end of college sports as we know it? The AP takes a look at all sides of the issue.

Question: Who came up with the idea of unionizing football players at Northwestern and why?

Answer: Outgoing senior quarterback Kain Colter began the process by helping form the College Athletes Players Association, which is also affiliated with the National College Players Association, an advocacy group in California. Colter, who wanted to go into medicine but couldn't because of the time he spent playing football, said the main thing he wanted was to make sure player medical needs were met, even after graduation.

"If we are making sacrifices like we are, we should have these basic protections taken care of," Colter told ESPN. "With the sacrifices we make athletically, medically and with our bodies, we need to be taken care of."

The football players are backed by the United Steelworkers, which provided lawyers and other help in seeking the NLRB ruling.

Q: What does winning this decision mean? Will Northwestern players soon be walking a picket line?

A: No, and there's a chance they may not end up unionized at all in the end. The decision by the regional NLRB director is an important one for the athletes to have a chance to move forward, but Northwestern says it will appeal to the full NLRB in Washington, D.C., and there is no timeline on how long a decision from the board would take to come down.

"This is not a final board decision," said NLRB spokesman Gregory King. It's a regional director's decision."

FILE - In this Jan. 28, 2014, file photo, Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter, right, speaks while  …

Q: Who does this affect?

A: Northwestern, for now, though there surely will be copycat efforts at other private schools should the full NLRB uphold the ruling that the players can organize as a union. The NLRB does not govern labor matters at public institutions, but it's hard to imagine there wouldn't be wholesale changes at those schools, too, should the union be successful in bargaining for working conditions at Northwestern.

Q: Does this mean college players will be paid?

A: No, though there are other developments in various lawsuits that might in the near future lead to increased stipends for college athletes. Former UCLA basketball star Ed O'Bannon's antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA is due to go to trial on June 9 in California, and a win could change the way college athletics are governed. An effort by NCAA president Mark Emmert to add $2,000 stipends to the scholarships of athletes failed a few years ago because of opposition by smaller schools, but experts say they believe players in the major conferences will in the near future be paid beyond room and board.

Q: If they're not getting paid, what do the players want?

A: A seat at the table when it comes to decisions that might affect their health and future. Players say they want more research into concussions and other traumatic injuries, and reasonable limits on hits taken in practice. They also want insurance to cover medical costs, and guarantees that they will be covered for medical issues that might arise later from their days playing football.

"The key issue at Northwestern is negotiating better protections against concussions and improving medical coverage following graduation," said United Steelworkers president Leo W. Gerard.

Q: What does this mean for the future of the NCAA?

A: Nothing at the moment, though anything that interferes with the organization's model for so-called amateurism in college sports may eventually force some major changes in the way big time college sports are operated. Already there is talk in the major conferences on restructuring the NCAA and giving athletes a larger voice in their affairs. Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany said last month that a victory by the players would mean the NCAA would likely seek "guidance from Congress" on how college athletics should be governed.

Combined with the antitrust lawsuits, there seems to be a gathering momentum for change that could alter the college sports landscape.

"This is a colossal victory for student athletes coming on the heels of their recent victories," said Marc Edelman, an associate professor of law at City University of New York who specializes in sports and antitrust law. "It seems not only the tide of public sentiment but also the tide of legal rulings has finally turned in the direction of college athletes and against the NCAA."

Q: How much money are we talking about?

A: Tons. Big-time college programs take in more than $100 million a year from basketball and football, and the big conferences are awash in cash from both television contracts and their own networks. The NCAA has a 14-year, $10.8 billion contract for the basketball tournament, while ESPN and the major conferences signed a 12-year deal for a new college football playoff package that is reportedly worth $7.2 billion. Northwestern's football team generated $30.1 million in revenue last year, with $21.7 million in expenses, and those numbers pale in comparison in its own conference with powerhouses like Michigan and Ohio State.

Sports & RecreationAmerican Footballcollege sportsNational Labor Relations BoardNCAAKain Colter

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Senators concerned by Secret Service allegations

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Democratic chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee and a senior Republican senator expressed concern Wednesday over an alleged incident involving a drunken Secret Service agent in connection with President Barack Obama's overseas trip to the Netherlands.

On Sunday, the agency called three agents home from the Netherlands just before Obama's arrival for talks with foreign leaders in The Hague. One agent had been found inebriated inside a hotel, according to reports.

Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., the Homeland Security Committee chairman, said Wednesday he is "troubled by the reports regarding the behavior of a few Secret Service agents serving on the president's detail in the Netherlands," according to a statement. His office said he's asked the Secret Service for more information about the episode.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a statement that the incident "shows that the agency has to deal with some in its ranks who fail to respect the important job the agency is tasked with." While he said that he appreciated "swift action" by Secret Service Director Julia Pierson, the senator added that "it looks like she's still got work to do to regain the trust of the American people."

The latest embarrassing incident involving a drunken Secret Service agent comes a year into the term of a new agency director who already has been confronted with a handful of incidents since the Colombia prostitution scandal nearly two years ago. In that episode, 13 agents and officers were accused of partying with female foreign citizens at a hotel in the seaside resort of Cartagena, where they were staying before Obama's arrival.

Agents can consume alcohol only "in moderate amounts while off duty" or on temporary assignment, according to an updated Secret Service professional conduct manual obtained by The Associated Press. They also can't drink within 10 hours of reporting for duty.

A Secret Service spokesman on Wednesday declined to comment on the incident, except to say that three agents were sent home for "disciplinary reasons." White House spokesman Jay Carney, speaking to reporters traveling with the president, said Obama had been briefed on the incident and supports Pierson's zero-tolerance approach.

"The president believes, as he has said in the past, that everybody representing the United States of America overseas needs to hold himself or herself to the highest standards," Carney said.

Obama named Pierson as the agency's first female director last March in a sign he wanted to change the agency's culture and restore public confidence in its operations. Since then, Pierson has had to face some alleged misbehavior on the elite service, which is charged with protecting the president and investigating financial fraud.

In November, two Secret Service agents were removed from Obama's detail after one was allegedly discovered trying to re-enter a woman's hotel room because he left a bullet from his weapon behind. In a subsequent probe, investigators came across sexually suggestive emails that the agent and another supervisor had sent to a female subordinate, The Washington Post reported.

More recently, two counter-sniper officers suspected of drinking were involved in a March 7 car accident during a presidential visit to Miami, the Post reported Wednesday, citing several people with knowledge of the incident. The driver passed a field sobriety test and was not arrested, the newspaper reported.

The agency disputes that recent reports of misbehavior is indicative of a widespread trend. And an inspector general's report made public in December concluded there was no evidence of widespread misconduct, in line with the service's longstanding assertion that it has no tolerance for inappropriate behavior.

Pierson said in a letter to former Acting Inspector General Charles Edwards that, while the agency agreed with the report's 14 recommendations, she was concerned about how the survey was conducted and its results.

___

Associated Press writers Alicia A. Caldwell and Josh Lederman contributed to this report.

Politics & GovernmentGovernmentBarack Obama

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Some of 90 missing in mudslide may not be found

DARRINGTON, Wash. (AP) — Becky Bach watches and waits, hoping that search crews find her brother and three other relatives who are missing in Washington state's deadly mudslide.

Doug Massingale waits too, for word about his 4-month-old granddaughter. Searchers were able to identify carpet from the infant's bedroom, but a log jam stood in the way of a more thorough effort to find little Sanoah Huestis, known as "Snowy."

With little hope to cling to, family members of the missing are beginning to confront a grim reality: Their loved ones might never be found, remaining entombed forever inside a mountain of mud that is believed to have claimed more than 20 lives.

"It just generates so many questions if they don't find them," Bach said. "I've never known anybody to die in a natural disaster. Do they issue death certificates?"

Search crews using dogs, bulldozers and their bare hands kept slogging through the mess of broken wood and mud again Wednesday, looking for more bodies or anyone who might still be alive nearly five days after a wall of fast-moving earth destroyed a small rural community. But authorities have acknowledged they might have to leave some victims buried in the debris some 55 miles northeast of Seattle.

Crews found another body late Wednesday, said Brian McMahan, a landslide incident spokesman. Authorities have now discovered at least 25 bodies, though not all have been recovered.

Christina Jefferds, 45, became the first mudslide victim to be identified by the Snohomish County Sheriff's Office late Wednesday. The medical examiner determined the Arlington, Wash., resident's cause of death was accidental blunt impact.

The number of people missing also was reduced to 90. That number had been fluctuating — at one point reaching as high as 220 — but authorities were able to verify that dozens of people once reported missing had been located, Snohomish County Emergency Management Director John Pennington said.

Besides the 90 confirmed missing, authorities are looking into a list of 35 people who may or may not have been in the area at the time of the slide, Pennington said.

Trying to recover every corpse would be impractical and dangerous with the debris field about a square mile and 30 to 40 feet deep in places. The moon-like surface that includes quicksand-like muck, rain-slickened mud and ice. The terrain is difficult to navigate on foot and makes it treacherous or impossible to bring in heavy equipment.

To make matters worse, the pile is laced with other hazards that include fallen trees, propane and septic tanks, twisted vehicles and countless shards of shattered homes.

Searchers walk into the scene of a deadly mudslide that covers the road, Wednesday, March 26, 2014,  …

"We have to get on with our lives at some point," said Bach, who has spent the past several days in the area in hopes that searchers would find her brother, his wife, her 20-year-old great niece and the young girl's fiance.

The knowledge that some victims could be abandoned to the earth is difficult to accept.

"Realistically ... I honestly don't think they're going to find them alive," Bach said, crying. "But as a family, we're trying to figure out what to do if they find no bodies."

Bach spoke via phone about a wedding the family had planned for summer at the rural home that was destroyed. And how, she wondered, do you plan a funeral without a body? "We'll probably just have a memorial, and if they find the bodies eventually, then we'll deal with that then."

A death certificate, issued by the state, is legal proof that someone has died. Families often need them to settle their affairs. The authority to issue them starts with a county medical examiner or coroner, said Donn Moyer, spokesman for the Washington State Department of Health. If and when it appears there is no chance of finding someone, people can ask the county to start that process.

This combination of images provided by NASA shows the Oso, Wash. area on Jan. 18, 2014, top, and the …

In previous mudslides, many victims were left where they perished. Mudslides killed thousands in Venezuela in 1999, and about 1,500 bodies were found. But the death toll was estimated at 5,000 to 30,000, so the government declared entire neighborhoods "memorial grounds."

Two Washington National Guard Blackhawk helicopters arrived at the site Wednesday to relieve sheriff's helicopter crews that had been working since Saturday.

The Blackhawks' sole mission is body removal, said Bill Quistorf, chief pilot for the Snohomish County Sheriff's Office.

Other survivors began to grow impatient Wednesday that they weren't allowed to return to the sites of their homes to search for their valuables and keepsakes.

"This isn't right. All of us who are still alive need to have access and find what we can of our lives," said Robin Youngblood, who said her son-in-law was turned away from the slide site.

This March 24, 2014 aerial photo released by the U.S. Geological Survey shows the extent and impacts …

As families grieved, officials were pressed again Wednesday about multiple reports from years ago that showed the potential for catastrophic landslides in the area.

Pennington said authorities took steps to mitigate risks and warn people of potential dangers, especially after a 2006 landslide in the area. But the sheer size of this disaster was overwhelming.

"It haunts me," a sometimes-emotional Pennington told reporters. "I think we did what we could do. Sometimes large slides happen."

Massingale said he's grateful that his daughter, Natasha Huestis, survived the slide. She had gone to Arlington that morning and left her baby with her mother, Christina Jefferds. Her husband Seth, a volunteer firefighter, was also away at the time.

"She didn't suffer," Massingale said after he was told about Christina's death.

Massingale said he would miss his first grandchild, a sweet, pretty and smiley child.

"It's stressful to think about," he said. "A little baby that hasn't gotten a start yet in life. It's too much."

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Baumann reported from Seattle. Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Phuong Le and Matt Volz in Seattle; P. Solomon Banda in Darrington, Wash.; photographer Elaine Thompson in Oso, Wash.; and researcher Rhonda Shafner.

Society & CultureFamily & RelationshipsSeattle

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Storms threaten MH370 search after new debris sighting

Perth (Australia) (AFP) - Thunderstorms and gale-force winds threatened to impede a frantic international search Thursday for wreckage from Flight MH370 after satellite images of more than 100 floating objects sparked fresh hopes of a breakthrough.

Malaysia said the imagery taken in recent days by a French satellite showed "122 potential objects" in the remote southern Indian Ocean, although nothing has yet been pulled from the treacherous seas despite a multinational recovery operation.

Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein has cautioned that it was impossible to determine whether the objects were related to the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 which crashed on March 8 with 239 people aboard after mysteriously disappearing.

But the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA), which is coordinating the search some 2,500 kilometres (1,550 miles) southwest of Perth, said they were in an area authorities have pinpointed as a potential crash zone.

"Positions in the satellite information released by Malaysia Remote Sensing Agency were within Wednesday's search area," it said as a fleet of planes were set to leave for the area before the weather worsens.

Six military planes from Australia, China, Japan and the United States will fly sorties throughout the day, along with five civil aircraft, scouring two areas covering a cumulative 78,000 square kilometres in an increasingly frantic hunt for clues to exactly what happened.

MH370 deviated inexplicably off its intended course between Kuala Lumpur and Beijing, flying thousands of kilometres in the wrong direction before plunging into the sea. Malaysia believes the plane was deliberately diverted by someone on board.

Five ships are also in the search zone, including Australia's HMAS Success and Chinese vessels Xue Long, Kunlunshan, Haikou and Qiandaohu.

Map and details of the equipment used in the search for Flight MH370 (AFP Photo/)

But they are operating in a wild expanse of ocean described by Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott as "about as close to nowhere as it's possible to be" where gale-force winds and towering waves are routinely whipped up.

AMSA and Australia's Bureau of Meteorology warned the weather was expected to deteriorate later Thursday.

"Potentially thunderstorms down there as well as winds picking up, and they could get to gale force conditions," said bureau spokesman Neil Bennett.

- Lawyers fire first salvo -

The new images, provided by European aerospace giant Airbus and depicting some objects as long as 23 metres (75 feet), came as US lawyers fired the first salvo in an expected barrage of lawsuits on behalf of grieving families.

Seeking closure, anguished families of those aboard are desperately awaiting hard evidence, which the aviation industry hopes can also provide clues to what caused one of aviation's greatest mysteries.

But as the search continued, US law firm Ribbeck Law Chartered International said it was getting the ball rolling on potentially "multi-million dollar" lawsuits against Malaysia Airlines and Boeing.

Malaysian Minister of Defence and Acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein shows pictures of p …

"We are going to be filing the lawsuits for millions of dollars per each passenger based on prior cases that we have done involving crashes like this one," the firm's head of aviation litigation, Monica Kelly, told reporters in Kuala Lumpur on Wednesday.

A separate statement by the firm, which filed an initial court petition in the US state of Illinois on Tuesday, said the two companies "are responsible for the disaster of Flight MH370".

The airline declined detailed comment.

Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak said Monday that satellite data indicated the plane plunged into the sea in a region off western Australia, possibly after running out of fuel.

- Relatives seek closure -

MH370 relatives have endured more than a fortnight of agonising uncertainty.

Two-thirds of the passengers were from China, and relatives there have criticised Malaysia in acid terms, accusing the government and airline of a cover-up and botching the response.

The sister of New Zealand victim Paul Weeks also lashed out Thursday.

"The whole situation has been handled appallingly, incredibly insensitively," Sara Weeks told Radio Live in New Zealand.

"The Malaysian government, the airline, it's just all been incredibly poor."

Scores of Chinese relatives protested outside Malaysia's embassy in Beijing on Tuesday and China kept up the pressure, with Premier Li Keqiang urging Malaysia Wednesday to involve "more Chinese experts" in the investigation, according to a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman.

While Malaysia believes the plane was deliberately diverted, other scenarios include a hijacking, pilot sabotage or a crisis that incapacitated the crew and left the plane to fly on auto-pilot until it ran out of fuel.

Focus has also been on the pilot, Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah, with the FBI Wednesday saying it was close to completing an analysis of data from a flight simulator taken from his home, at the request of the Malaysians who wanted help to recover files deleted from the hard drive.

Commercial VehiclesMalaysia AirlinesMalaysiasatellite images

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Rescuer reunited with woman he saved from U.S. mudslide with her painting

By Bryan Cohen

ARLINGTON, Washington (Reuters) - In the terrifying moments after she somehow emerged alive from the wall of mud and debris that swallowed her house, the only possession that Robin Youngblood managed to salvage was a painted portrait that once hung in her now-flattened home.

Youngblood, 63, was herself rescued by helicopter an hour after her home was reduced to "match sticks" by the powerful torrent of thick, gray muck that cascaded into her neighborhood when a rain-drenched hillside across the river gave way without warning on Saturday.

On Wednesday, four days later, Youngblood came face to face once more with the man who whisked her and a precious family heirloom to safety from the rubble of her home northeast of Seattle.

She and crew chief Randy Fay of the Snohomish County helicopter rescue team embraced in a tearful reunion during an afternoon news conference in the town of Arlington, site of a command post for search teams looking for scores more people still missing in the slide that engulfed dozens of homes near the river valley hamlet of Oso.

Speaking to reporters, Fay recounted that Youngblood, who he found covered in mud when he was lowered to her by winch from his hovering chopper, handed him the painting and asked him to save it for her. He said he returned the artwork, a portrait of an individual in traditional Native American dress, to Youngblood once she was safely loaded into the helicopter.

"It's poignant because their whole house is around them," he said. "That's kind of all she's got left ... I'm really glad we could do that."

Recounting her ordeal in a separate CNN interview, Youngblood recalled hearing a loud roar before looking out a window to glimpse a torrent of mud racing toward her house.

She said the slide struck with such force that her house was knocked from its foundation and carried a quarter mile as it instantly filled with mud and water, imersing her in the muck. Fortunately, the roof also was ripped open, allowing her to clamor out of the mud to escape, she said.

The whole episode lasted just 30 seconds, she estimated.

Miraculously, Youngblood emerged mostly unscathed, suffering a minor finger injury, "lots of bruises" and a sore back. Her jewelry and eyeglasses even stayed on somehow, she said.

Youngblood, a member of a Pacific Northwest tribe known as the Okanagan who describes herself as a "shamanic practitioner,"

had not seen Fay since that painful day and came to the news conference to publicly thank him for rescuing her.

"That was really special," Youngblood said afterward. "I didn't know if I'd ever see him again."

(Editing by Steve Gorman and Lisa Shumaker)

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Ukraine predicts 'yes' vote in UN on unity

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Ukraine is predicting that the U.N. General Assembly will adopt a resolution Thursday reaffirming the country's territorial integrity and calling the referendum that led to Crimea's annexation by Russia illegal.

Ukraine's U.N. Ambassador Yuriy Sergeyev said in an interview Wednesday with the Associated Press that the resolution has "several dozen" co-sponsors and support from democratic countries — but he wouldn't predict the size of the "yes" vote.

Russia has mounted a campaign against the resolution, claiming the dispute is an east-west issue. Sergeyev said he has been explaining to regional groups that Russia violated the U.N. Charter and Ukraine is not a member of any bloc.

Unlike Security Council resolutions, resolutions in the 193-member General Assembly cannot be vetoed and are not legally binding, though they do reflect world opinion.

Politics & GovernmentUkraineU.N. General Assembly

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