Six minutes of news from around the nation.

Kirk suspect 'not co-operating' with authorities, governor says; WV families with disabilities face staggering medical costs; Report: Florida locks up hundreds of youth for non-criminal violations; TX students have chance to apply for college at no cost.

TRANSCRIPT

The Public News Service Daily Newscast, September the 15th, 2025.

I'm Mike Clifford.

Charlie Kirk's alleged killer is not cooperating with authorities and has not confessed to carrying out the shooting, Utah's Governor Spencer Cox has told U.S. media.

That's the take for the BBC.

They report the suspect, Tyler Robinson, age 22, was taken into custody some 33 hours after Kirk, a 31-year-old right-wing activist, Cox was shot dead on Wednesday.

Speaking to ABC News, Cox, a Republican, said the people around Tyler Robinson had been cooperating with the investigation.

The BBC notes that Cox appeared on various news outlets Sunday morning, where he also reiterated concerns regarding social media in the aftermath of Kirk's death.

Next up, West Virginia parents of children living with disabilities often struggle to pay high medical bills.

More than one quarter of U.S. children have special health care needs.

That's according to the health policy research nonprofit KFF.

Cabell County resident and parent of a toddler with Down syndrome, Ashley Farrell, says her daughter Lucy was also born with a heart defect and required surgery at just nine weeks old, despite having health insurance.

Farrell says the family still owed tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills.

She says parents in similar situations often aren't aware of community resources.

If it weren't for other people in our life to kind of guide us along the way, we would be very deep in a hole of medical debt that we would have no idea how to get out of.

More than 13 percent of West Virginians, or about 180,000 people, have medical debt.

This is Nadia Ramligon for West Virginia News Service.

The UnitedHealthcare Children's Foundation is one source that offers grants to pay for children's medical expenses not covered or fully covered by commercial health insurance.

And while many states have dramatically reduced youth incarceration, a new report finds Florida bucks that positive trend.

The state confines over 1,700 young people on any given day, one of the highest populations in the country.

The report finds a third of those youth are held for nonviolent offenses and nearly 300 locked up for technical non-criminal violations of probation.

Wanda Bertram with the Prison Policy Initiative calls it a startling and thoughtless use of confinement.

These are kids who are on community supervision probation in lieu of having been sent to confinement.

Breaking any of these rules is a technical violation of supervision and Florida has seen fit to actually lock up kids for breaking these rules, which is a horrible waste of resources and a really thoughtless use of confinement for some really vulnerable people.

I'm Tramel Gomes.

This is Public News Service.

Undergraduate students in Texas will have the opportunity next month to apply to public colleges and universities for free.

Free college application Week will be held from October 13th through the 19th.

Glenna Bruhn with the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board says undergraduate and transfer students can apply without application fees to an unlimited number of schools at mytexasfuture.org.

It will show them all of the information about Free Application Week.

It also talks about My Texas Future, which is a program that we have that can help students decide what they want to do when they graduate, what colleges they're looking at, scholarship programs. 37 universities and 50 community colleges are participating.

Students will need information about extracurricular or volunteer activities, test scores and other previous college credits to apply.

I'm Freda Ross reporting.

Next to Michigan where lawmakers are considering eliminating the state's sales tax on gasoline and replacing it with a higher gas tax.

EV advocates say the proposed formula would leave them paying more than their fair share.

Supporters of the bill say it would keep prices at the pump steady and create more reliable funding for Michigan's roads.

But because electric vehicle owners don't buy gas, their annual registration fee is tied to the gas tax, meaning it could rise by $100.

Right now, EV drivers pay a $160 annual registration fee in lieu of gas taxes.

Jay McCurry of Clean Fuels Michigan says she supports road funding too, but wants the formula changed so EV drivers aren't paying more than drivers of gas-powered vehicles.

And there's a formula written into statute that electric vehicle tax increases $5 for every cent that the gas tax goes up.

Michigan has about 8 million registered vehicles, but only around 1 percent are fully electric.

Crystal Blair reporting.

Finally it's not yet a buzzword but adaptive grazing is gaining traction in New Mexico for its ability to improve soil health.

Done right, adaptive grazing, frequently moving livestock from one pasture to another, can mimic historical patterns of bison herds.

It improves land health by preventing overgrazing, distributing manure evenly, and allowing plants to recover.

New Mexico rancher Sandy Wilkie says whether it's raising cattle or growing ag crops that require fertilizer and pesticides, new management practices have rewards.

Going from our traditional systems that we've done for hundreds of years and then switching over to more sustainable healthier practices, in the long run a producer is going to save money, you're gonna be more productive because your healthier soils don't require all that stuff.

I'm Roz Brown.

This is Mike Clifford, thank you for starting your week with Public News Service

Member and listener supported. 

ind our trust indicators at publicnewsservice.org.