Bowling Green Daily News - 9.4.26

0:00We now turn to the Bowling Green Daily to bring you news from in and around Bowling Green and Warren County. Your reader today is Mark Webster. We are reading from the edition dated today, Thursday September 3, 2026. As a reminder, Radio I is a reading service intended for people who are blind or have other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed materials. As always, we'll begin with page one. A little bit unusual. There are four articles on page one instead of their usual three. We'll read them in this order, pair charged in BG Woman's death back in court. Next, City approves unchanged property tax rate, public safety ordinance, third, business owner pleads guilty in COVID era of fraud case, fourth and last, author Barry left unique Kentucky legacy. Here's the first one. Two people charged in connection with the death of a woman whose

1:03body was found in a burning car returned to court Monday. Salko Hushnovak, 31 and Shelley Boyd, 45, each had pre-trial conferences and Warren Circuit Court, where they are charged with offenses stemming from the death of Jasmina Ajjik. Huchnovak has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, first degree rape, first degree satamy, abuse of a corpse, three counts of second degree criminal abuse, theft by unlawful taking, tampering with physical evidence, first degree criminal mischief and violation of a foreign EPO DVO. Boyd faces charges of complicity to murder, abuse of a corpse, three counts of second degree criminal abuse, theft by unlawful taking, tampering with physical evidence and first degree criminal mischief. According to law enforcement, Ajjik was killed sometime between January 14th to the 19th. Huchnovak had been in

2:07a relationship with Ajjik and the pair had three children in common. In court on Monday, Warren County Columnwell's attorney Cory Beck-Bombernader said that forensic testing continues on evidence collected in the case with one item being forwarded for further DNA analysis. Huchnovak was ordered to return to court November 9th for another pre-trial conference while Boyd, this is continued on page 3. Boyd is due back in court on November 16th. The Warren County Sheriff's Office investigated Ajjik's death after being contacted in the early morning hours of January 19th by someone who had reported seeing a sedan on fire in the 3,300 block of Threlk-Kell Valley Road. Human remains were found in the vehicle which WCSO detectives learned was registered to Ajjik who had a pre who had previously taken out a protective order against Huchnovak in

3:07Missouri. A medical examiner's report established that Ajjik was already dead when the car was set on fire according to prior court testimony. Investigators went to Huchnovak's home on Fortuna Road and obtained a search warrant after Huchnovak came out of hiding and denied knowing Ajjik's whereabouts court record show. Three pillows with apparent blood stains were found in a washing machine in the home and WCSO detectives found a bag of clothing matching clothing bird was seen wearing on surveillance camera footage at a convenience store shortly before the discovery of the burning car. Boyd reportedly told detectives in an interview that she witnessed an incident of domestic violence between Huchnovak and Ajjik with Ajjik's body being left on the kitchen floor for three days while her children were told by Huchnovak that their mother was sleeping according to

4:08prior testimony from WCSO detective Tim Robinson. Huchnovak is alleged to have driven Ajjik's body to Threlk-Kell-Ferry Road with her body inside and then poured gasoline over the vehicle and ignited it with a gasoline soak rag that had been lit on fire Robinson testified. According to law enforcement Huchnovak reportedly claimed that it was Boyd's idea to light the car and body on fire and her idea not to call 911. All right we'll go back to page one for the second article. This is about the property tax rate a 2026 property tax rate of .203 cents per $100 of assessed value was given preliminary approval by Bowling Green City commissioners on Tuesday a rate that remains unchanged from the tax rate implemented last year. Quote we feel this is the right number close

5:09a quote city manager Jeff Meisel told officials quote it does not increase our rate at all close the quote the rate means that an owner would pay $203 in taxes on a piece of property valued at $100,000. Property values are assessed by the Warren County property valuation administrators office not by local government. Officials also okayed a personal property rate of 26 cents per $100 a rate of that's $1.26.0 per $100 a rate that has set that was set 46 years ago and has not changed since. Property tax rates required two votes before becoming final in the city of Bowling Green with a record of reading with a second reading set now for September 15 tax invoices will be sent out this fall with a payment deadline of Thursday December 31 starting January 1 late fees will be applied

6:11to delinquent payments. City commissioners last year opted to lower the real property rate to 0.203 cents per $100 from 0.204 per $100. The reduction was done after around 60% of commercial and residential property in Warren County including Bowling Green saw an increase in assessed value. Broken down city manager Jeff Meisel said then this reflected 33,000 properties out of 54,700 that solve values rise quote when you do 60% in one year that really messes with your calculations unquote he said. Commissioner's also gave early approval to a new ordinance that seeks to improve pedestrian safety along busy roads in town by making it illegal to remain stationary on city-owned rights of way. The

7:12ordinance would apply to city maintain rights of way not intended for pedestrian use it would not apply the sidewalks on property on private property it seeks to and this is on continue on page three. It seeks to improve driving and pedestrian safety on heavily traffic roads like Campbell Lane and Smallhouse Road. The Kentucky General Assembly this year passed House Bill 189 which placed a similar restrictions on state maintain rights of way. Quote our number one job as commissioners is community safety unquote said community Sue Paragen who sponsored the ordinance quote that's the most important thing to me close the quote a permit would be required for anyone looking to gather in right-of-way areas additionally safety equipment including cones or high visibility vest would need to be present to enhance visibility of pedestrians. City Attorney Hillary

8:16High Tire said the ordinance would primarily impact large gatherings of people like an election day when candidates supporters hold signs along roadways. Discussions discussion focused on the potential impacts the ordinance would have on private property owners and organizations advertising different events on the sides of the road. Commissioner Dana Beasley Brown expressed a concern that the ordinance would limit a person's ability to do anything outside their home. Quote I feel like people should be able to stand at their mailbox and talk to their neighbor they should be able to sit in their front yard and quote she said. An amendment made to the ordinance on the floor was approved three to two removing a $20 permit fee from the ordinance. Beasley Brown Commissioner Carlos Bailey and Mayor Todd Alcott voted in favor of the amendment with Paragen and Commissioner Melinda Hill voting against. Another amendment added a provision that

9:17the ordinance would not apply to property owners who live along major roads. This amendment passed five to nothing. The final ordinance as amended passed unanimously. Commissioners will meet again on September 15th. I'd back to page one the third article along the bottom. Business owner pleads guilty and COVID era fraud case. A bowling green business owner pleaded guilty to Zee after being accused of fraudulent obtaining federal loans from a COVID pandemic era program. John Conan the third age 46 entered a guilty plea in US District Court to three counts of wire fraud. Conan was identified in court records as the operator of Metro Mechanics LLC a bowling green entity which did business as rich top mechanical contractors. Federal prosecutors charged Conan last month alleging that he engaged in a scheme from March 2020 to around May 2021 that involved including

10:23false information on applications on behalf of Metro Mechanical for an economic injury disaster loan and a paycheck protection program loan program set up by the US Small Business Administration to help businesses recover from the economic impacts of the pandemic and keep workers employed. According to a copy of the plea agreement, Conan knowingly signed off on loan applications that contain false statements regarding the number of his company's employees gross revenue and a cost of good sold obtaining a total of $92,300 in benefits. The PPP loan application contained false statements concerning the number of employees and Conan's company and the amount of payroll expenses paid. Also a PPP loan for giving this application filled out by Conan featured false statements about the number of employees at his company and how he used the PPP funds advanced to him court record show quote the EIDL advance and PPP

11:30funds were used for the defendant's personal benefit close to quote Conan's plea agreement stated under the terms of the plea agreement Conan would be required to pay $101,450.452 and 93 cents in restitution to the Small Business Administration. The criminal counts carry a maximum possible total punishment for 90 years in prison but assistant US attorney Mark Yurchison indicated in court Tuesday that federal prosecutors would seek a prison term on the low end of federal sentencing guidelines as they apply to Conan. US District Court Judge Greg Stiver's directed Conan to return to court December 7 for sentencing. Alright that's the end of the third article. The fourth article is going to be very interesting. This is about the death of Windelberry. Windelberry the Kentucky-born author who and a grarian who impoms stories novels and

12:33essays celebrated the farming communities of his native site and warned of the excesses and misjudgments of an industrial commercialized society has died. He was 92. His daughter Mary Berry confirmed on Monday that he died in his home in Port Royal Kentucky. Quote there's not enough I could say about him to do him justice. She told the Associated Press. Few authors were more tied to their home than Berry and intellectual and spiritual heir to Henry David Throw and such southern agrarians as Robert Penn Warren and this is continued on page three and John Quo Ransom in prose and poetry that mirrored the uncludtered and deeply felt life he advocated. Berry challenged modern assumptions about prosperity and happiness and renewed the mysteries of birth, love, work, and death. He had learned from his own history. Berry was born and raised in a farming town during

13:37the Great Depression and watched it seemingly immortal ties unraveled by his teens. Quote increasingly over the last maybe 40 years the thought has come to me that the old world in which our people lived by the work of their hands close to weather and earth plants and animals was the true world. He wrote in quote Andy Catlett early travels in quote a novel published in 2006 quote and that the new world of cheap energy and ever cheaper money honored greed and dreams of liberation from every restraint is mostly theater. Quote the world I knew as a boy was flawed surely but it was substantial in authentic the households of my grandparents seemed to breathe forth a sense of the real cost and worth of things. Whatever came came by somebody's work close the quote. Berry was a prolific writer who published more than 40 books including the novels Nathan Culture and a place on earth and the anthology a Timbered choir the Sabbath

14:43poems 1979 to 1997. His legacy extended well beyond Kentucky Michael Poland author of such best sellers as the Omnivars dilemma was say his life was changed by Barry declaration that quote eating is an agricultural act. The chief and food activist Alice Waters cited him as a favorite author and wrote an introduction to Barry's 1989 essay The Pleasures of Eating. He was among the most prominent authors never to receive a Pulitzer Prize or National Book Award although his honors included a national humanities medal and membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2016 he was presented a lifetime achievement award from the National Book Critics Circle. The Tall Slender Berry imagined Chronicle and lived out those tall Slender Berry imagined Chronicle and lived out his vision of a self-sustaining community in

15:48which no one had to ask where the food came from or the names of their neighbors. In the classic farming manifesto quote the unsettling of America unquote published in 1977 he attacked the consolidation and mechanization of agriculture as a violation of the natural order whether of the land or the spirit quote the modern urban industrial society is based on a series of radical disconnections between body and soul husband and wife marriage and community community and the earth unquote he wrote at each of these points of disconnection the collaboration of corporation government and experts sets up a profit making enterprise that results in the further dismemberment and impoverishment of the creation close the quote his disdain for modernity touched upon virtually every aspect of life from dancing to weather forecast to birth control opinions he well knew were not universally shared. Reviewing a

16:51library of America anthology of his nonfiction the New York Times Dwight Garner wrote that Barry quote bangs the same theme so relentlessly the perils of industrial agriculture the decimation of rural life America's blind faith in technology that one's eyes begin to cross close the quote most of this fiction closely based on his childhood was set in rural Port William and populated with such characters as drunken uncle peach the drowned chicken little the wise and patient farm and Dick Watson and Andy Catlett Barry's alter ego a boy quote inclined to be dreamy unquote and quote slide right out of the present world close the quote his worldview was shaped by an ancient sense of continuity and connection like in the story quote watch with me unquote when a troubled man known as quote nightlife unquote picks up an old shotgun disappears into the woods a local posse follows led by the farmer Todd

17:53Proudfoot who worries nightlife might kill himself or harm others the pursuit as long and exhausting quote I reckon it would be better not to have gotten involved unquote tall admits to himself but he knows that he will continue quote until whatever happened that would allow him tall deceased to go along had happened unquote quote I reckon I am involved unquote tall discovers Barry yearn for the past was painfully divided by his awareness that quote my people established themselves here by killing or driving out original possessors unquote and that quote people were once bought and sold here by my people unquote he saw the US has plagued by quote disorderly violence and quote and inflamed by the rootlessness of the early settlers and the corporations that follow quote we still have not in any meaningful way arrived in America unquote he lamented history led to some controversial opinions Barry would

18:56regard the Confederate General Robert E. Lee as a more as more quote a tragic figure unquote than an uphold or slavery and a clash among Barry the University of Kentucky and some of its students period Barry's wife Tanya was the niece of the artist and rice or Hanlon who's great depression aero fresco about Lexington history has long been controversial for its alleged sanitizing of slavery window and Tanya Barry filed a lawsuit in 2020 that objected to its removal from the school three years later he had defended it the fresco as a painful but realistic portrait that's the end of that article we'll go now into the paper we'll move to page two page two has a three-day weather forecast the weather today Thursday will be high 96 low 73 Friday high 96 low 75 you get the picture Saturday high 95 low 75 but with showers our next chance at

20:02relief from the heat comes Saturday with some rain chances high stay in the upper 90s now there are three articles on this page that we never read but I always read the headlines the first is dear Abby by Jean Phillips widows new bow does not pull his weight then the horoscope your mind is working overtime Gemini and then Billy Graham's column Satan is the great discourager now along the left-end column is a column that I like today in history today is the 246 day of 2026 there are 119 days left in the year on this date in 1783 representatives of United States and Britain signed the Treaty of Paris which officially ended the revolutionary war and recognized US sovereignty in 1861 during the Civil War Confederate forces invaded the border state of Kentucky which declared its neutrality in the conflict in 19 in 1894 the United States

21:05celebrated its first federal labor holiday in 1935 Sir Malcolm Campbell became the first person to drive an automobile more than 300 miles per hour that's 480 kilometers per hour speeding across the boom across the Bonnieville salt flats in Utah in 1939 Britain France Australia and New Zealand declared war in Germany two days after the Nazi invasion of Poland in a radio address Britain's King George the Six said quote with God's help we shall prevail unquote in 1943 Allied forces invaded the mainland of Italy during World War II the same day Italian officials signed a secret armistice with the Allies in 1976 America's Viking 2 lander touched down on Mars to take the first close-up color photographs of the red planet surface today's birthday singer musician Al Jardin the

22:05Beach Boys is 84 filmmaker Jean Pierre Junet is 73 rock guitarist sex Jones Steve Jones of the sex pistols is 71 actor Steve Sharipa of the sopranos on TV is 68 author Malcolm Gladwell is 63 actor Charlie Sheen is 61 filmmaker Noah Bombak is 57 actor Garrett headlin is 42 Olympic gold medal snowboarder Sean White is 40 model actor Kaiya Gerber is 25 and Jack Dylan Grazer is 23 I will go to the next page there is just one article in this page we haven't read yet TJ regional health graves Gilbert explorer partnership graves Gilbert clinic announced 2G in a press release that with the overwhelming support of its physician members owners in a selected TJ regional health as its preferred

23:06partner to explore a long-term affiliation quote the two organizations will now begin a period of due diligence to shape a partnership design to ensure that the people of South Central Kentucky can count on exceptional health care close to home for generations to come close to quote according to the release together the two organizations would unite more than 300 providers across a full range of primary care and specialties creating new opportunities to coordinate care expand access and keep medical decisions local according to the release quote this is an exciting opportunity for both organizations and most importantly for the patients and communities we serve close to quote said Neil Thornberry CEO of TJ regional health quote graves Gilbert clinic has built a respected legacy of clinical excellence and we believe bringing our organizations together will

24:07allow us to build on that legacy while creating an even stronger health care system for the future at the center of everything we do is a shared commitment to delivering exceptional care close to home close to quote graves Gilbert clinic patients should continue seeking care as they normally would existing appointments and clinic operations will continue without interruption according to the release quote on behalf of GGC's Board of Directors physicians and providers and all our employees we are excited by this partnership with TJ regional health close to quote said David Samarro Kalakash chairman of the graves Gilbert clinic board of directors quote the shared values and cultures of our two organizations are natural fit the alliance with TJ will allow GGC to continue providing high quality health care to our patients in Bowling Green and all of South Central Kentucky close the quote and that's the end of that article

25:09we'll move to page four that's the opinion page there are always two opinion articles we never read them but we will take a look at the headlines the first one is taken from the Philadelphia in choir the headline is the Iran war is straining the US military then below that the DSA communist are killing the Democratic Party there's a cartoon I'll try to describe there's a farmer holding a cup of coffee that Donald Trump is trying to get the farmer says you're war with Iran and tariffs are really hurting us farmers is there anything you can do and then Trump says yes I'll rename your coffee Trumpkin spice all right moving to page five we run into our first obituaries and death notices in Bowling Green Michael Wayne Martin 70 died on August 29th 2026 in Bowling Green

26:11baby a silver died August 28th 2026 on the same day baby B silver died in Bowling Green Truman knew 77 died in Bowling Green on August 30th 2026 and then C. Lanny shoulders 74 of Smith Grove died in Glasgow the longer obituaries John and Cheryl Downing McGee it's a notice of a celebration of two lives that's going to be this Sunday September 6th from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Carroll Nicely Conference Center room 208 then two more obituaries William Harold Watts 91 of Oakland passed away on August 27th and then for a Juanita Wiltshire Tungate 95 a Bowling Green died at the spring senior living on August 29th I believe I've got all the death notices and obituaries there are a couple of short articles

27:14here one dollar coin with Trump's face and gold finished to go on sell the one dollar coin designed to celebrate America 250th birthday and seemingly president Donald Trump whose face gazes from one side of the gold finish will go on sell Wednesday according to the US Mint then beside that there's a a lengthy or article postal work to comply with Trump's executive order is rushed sloppy whistleblower contends the US Postal Office is poised to launch a hastily built error-ridden computer system that could jeopardize the process of mill voting relied upon by one-third of all voters according to a whistleblower statement released Tuesday by Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal I'd like to read more but this concludes excerpts from today's edition of the Bowling Green daily your reader has been Mark Webster on behalf of everyone here at Radio I thank you for listening keep on listening have a good Thursday a good weekend and

28:16a good week