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No Wyoming Valley levee fee increase — for now

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Fall completion expected for Sidney Street bridge in Miners Mills

<p>Last September, this was a week of friendly banter for Kyle Flood. One in which the Rutgers coach could wink and prepare for his program&#8217;s inaugural Big Ten game against &#8220;The Team From Pennsylvania.&#8221;</p><p>None of that this week. Neither Flood nor anyone at Rutgers is in a playful mood right now.</p><p>Another log was tossed onto the Scarlet Knights&#8217; fire of misery this week when star receiver Leonte Carroo was arrested on a domestic-violence-related simple assault charge.</p><p>Carroo, a senior captain and arguably the Big Ten&#8217;s top wideout, has been suspended indefinitely and is not expected to play Saturday against Penn State.</p><p>According to a complaint obtained by The Record of Bergen, New Jersey, Carroo is accused of injuring a woman he was romantically involved with by &#8220;picking her up and slamming her down on a concrete surface, injuring her left hip, both palms, left elbow and left side of the head.&#8221;</p><p>The alleged incident occurred Saturday night outside of the team&#8217;s facility less than an hour after the Knights&#8217; last-second loss to Washington State.</p><p>&#8220;Not at liberty to comment on the investigation, but there&#8217;s no status change to Leonte right now,&#8221; Flood said Tuesday on the Big Ten coaches teleconference.</p><p>The last few weeks have been nightmarish for Flood and his program.</p><p>&#8226; During training camp, Flood became the subject of a university investigation into alleged improper contact with a professor regarding a grade for would-be starting cornerback Nadir Barnwell.</p><p>Multiple Rutgers officials &#8212; speaking anonymously to The Star-Ledger of Newark, New Jersey &#8212; have criticized Flood for allegedly breaching the firewall between coaches and faculty.</p><p>&#8226; In the week before the opener, five Rutgers players were arrested before a team practice on charges ranging from assault to home invasion. Three of the five were projected starters in the secondary, including Barnwell.</p><p>A sixth player, a walk-on fullback, was charged a few days later. All six have been dismissed from the team.</p><p>&#8226; Two other former players were also arrested in connection to those incidents. The latest was Jamil Pollard, a New Jersey defensive tackle who had originally signed to play at Penn State in 2012. He transferred to Rutgers without penalty that summer after NCAA sanctions released him from his letter of intent.</p><p>&#8226; Carroo and starting quarterback Chris Laviano were both suspended for the first half of the Knights&#8217; opener against Norfolk State for violating curfew during training camp. Laviano was also busted for using a fake ID.</p><p>&#8226; Standout defensive tackle Darius Hamilton, who dominated the Nittany Lions in last year&#8217;s meeting, has yet to play this season because of a lower-body injury. The Knights have already listed him as out for Saturday&#8217;s game at Beaver Stadium.</p><p>&#8226; On the field, the very green secondary allowed 478 passing yards in a 37-34 home loss on Saturday to Washington State, a team that was coming off a loss to FCS Portland State.</p><p>Rutgers led 34-30 with 1:31 remaining before the Cougars went 90 yards in just 78 seconds for the winning touchdown. The Knights were flagged 11 times for 100 yards in the loss.</p><p>Needless to say, Flood has been under heavy fire as questions about his team&#8217;s discipline persist. In total, nine current and former players are facing charges.</p><p>&#8220;The people that know our program, the people that are invested in our program, the people that spend time with our program, they know the high quality of the young men that we have in that locker room,&#8221; Flood said Monday at his weekly press conference.</p><p>&#8220;Now, I&#8217;m not na&#239;ve, either. I understand that people that aren&#8217;t as familiar with our program and all they see are the incidents of the last couple weeks, how they could have that perception. But I think the people that know our program, I don&#8217;t believe they have that perception.&#8221;</p><p>Flood has received written support from athletic director Julie Hermann, who spoke with the team personally at the start of the week.</p><p>New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, while on the presidential campaign trail Monday, downplayed the recent rash of issues.</p><p>&#8220;They&#8217;re dealing with disciplinary problems with teenagers,&#8221; Christie told reporters during a stop in New Hampshire. &#8220;This is not shocking, you know. I&#8217;m a father of four (and) having disciplinary problems with teenagers is the normal course on a college campus.</p><p>&#8220;The breathless media coverage of all of this &#8212; and every time there&#8217;s a problem or some indication of a problem, some deep-seated problem at Rutgers &#8212; man, you (reporters) gotta find something else to do.&#8221;</p><p>Penn State coach James Franklin can empathize with Flood.</p><p>Four of his players from his former job at Vanderbilt were charged in a high-profile rape case that is ongoing. The first two to stand trial were convicted before a mistrial was declared. A new trial is pending.</p><p>Franklin, who gave testimony for that case last October while at Penn State, said Tuesday that managing the behavior of more than 100 players is extremely difficult.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s probably the thing nowadays in our profession that you lose the most sleep over,&#8221; Franklin said. &#8220;We do everything in our power to try to help them understand the significance of decision-making, of perception, of the microscope that&#8217;s on them. Just what it&#8217;s like to grow up as a young man in 2015.</p><p>&#8220;Every single day when we have a team meeting, in my PowerPoint, it&#8217;s examples of professional athletes, college athletes, high school athletes &#8212; programs across the country that people have made mistakes. I&#8217;m hoping by doing that that our guys can learn from it.&#8221;</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Rutgers coach Kyle Flood (center) has come under fire after nine of his current and former players have been arrested in the past three weeks, including star receiver Leonte Carroo. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/web1_Rutgers-Carroo-Footba_Sopr1.jpg</photo0><caption0>Rutgers coach Kyle Flood (center) has come under fire after nine of his current and former players have been arrested in the past three weeks, including star receiver Leonte Carroo. </caption0><photoCredit0>Mel Evans | AP photo </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Derek Levarse</p><p>dlevarse@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Derek Levarse at 570-991-6396 or on Twitter @TLdlevarse</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Problems continue to mount for Flood, Rutgers