NPR 2009-04-04

Authorities in Binghamton, New York say 14 people are dead, four others are listed in serious condition after an armed man walked into an immigration services center and opened fire today. Joseph Zikuski is chief of the Binghamton Police Department. He says it's believed the gunman is dead. "Among the dead, there is a male victim that has a satchel 1 around his neck or arms, and there is ammunition 2 in there. Our original information is that the shooter was using handguns and we did recover two handguns at the scene. So at this point, not 100%, but we have very good reason to believe that the shooter is among the dead." Officials say the gunman barricaded 3 a back door to the center with his car. New York's governor called it a tragic 4 day, while President Barack Obama issued a statement saying he and first lady Michelle Obama were "shocked and saddened by the shooting". Police were still investigating a motive 5.

President Obama held a town hall meeting in Strasbourg, France today where he called for renewing US-European partnership 6. NPR's Don Gonyea was there and has audience’s reaction.

The president and first lady were greeted with thunderous applause. Mr. Obama was cheered again when he explained why he decided 7 to close the Guantanamo prison camp. But he also said Europe needs to do its part in Afghanistan and in fighting terrorism. He said the US can't shoulder the burden alone. This 16-year-old Strasbourg student's reaction was typical. "He said what we wanted to hear about the ecology, no torture, less nuclear weapon. He had a very European point of view." One student asked if the White House has a new dog yet, the president responded "Soon." Don Gonyea, NPR News, Strasbourg.

With millions of Americans facing foreclosure, a federal regulator issued a new report today on efforts to keep people in their homes by reworking their loans. NPR's Chris Arnold reports.

The report found that when lenders lower homeowners' payments, that's very likely to keep the person in their home. But it also found that during 2008, in most cases lenders were not willing to do that. John Dugan is the US Comptroller of the Currency. "We found some interesting findings, um, some a little surprising." Dugan says that when the industry intervened to modify a mortgage, the lender in most cases did not lower the payments and the borrower was likely to defaults again. "About a third of the modifications 8 involved payments that increased not decreased." Still, in the latter part of the year, the industry was more likely to cut deals with homeowners. And in cases where lenders did reduce the borrowers' payments by more than 10%, about 75% of people were able to recover and were not seriously delinquent 9 after six months. Chris Arnold, NPR News.

On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 39 points ending the week at 8,017. The NASDAQ was up 19 points today.

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Heavy equipment maker 10 Caterpillar 11 announced today it is speeding up some planned layoffs 13 at the company by several weeks in effort to cut cost. The Peoria-based company says that it’s letting a thousand of its workers go two weeks early with pay rather than keeping them through April 13th that it had initially 14 been planned. The company says it decides to accelerate the layoff 12 to meet the continued slowdown in demand for its mining trucks and large earth moving equipment. Layoffs, which are occurring at the company's Decatur, Illinois facility, are part of more than 24,000 job cuts taking place at Caterpillar.

South Carolina's governor today became the last in the nation to accept funds from the federal stimulus 15 package. Republican Governor Mark Sanford had been a vocal 16 critic of the stimulus but he agreed to formally request the money to keep the state's options open. NPR's Adam Hochberg reports.

Governor Sanford previously 17 staked himself out against accepting about 700 million dollars in stimulus money earmarked for education, about 25% of South Carolina's total stimulus funds. As a federal deadline approached to request the funds, Sanford had threatened to inform the White House that South Carolina was turning down the money. Sanford's position created a fire storm of opposition 18 with even many of his fellow Republicans criticizing him for leaving money on the table at a time when his state faces a huge budget shortfall. Now Sanford says he’ll start the process of applying for stimulus funds, but he stresses he still could turn down the education portion later. He wants state legislators to commit to using the money to pay down long-term state debt rather than spending it on immediate 19 budget needs. Adam Hochberg, NPR News.

The Institute for Supply Management in an important purchasing managers group says its service sector 20 index fell to 40.8 last month. Any reading below 50 denotes contraction 21 in the service sector while a reading above that level indicates expansion.