Leavenworth County will cut back on its janitorial expenses next year, although it will mean some county employees will have to add cleaning and vacuuming to their list of duties.

The Leavenworth County Commission on Thursday voted 3-0 to authorize the public works department to negotiate with Leavenworth Cleaning for next year's county janitorial contract for no more than $180,000, pending a legal review regarding liability insurance.

This year's janitorial contract, also with Leavenworth Cleaning, paid the company about $236,000, said county buildings and grounds director John Forslund.

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Does your dog get mad at the sight of a vacuum cleaner? Well, you can now take a breather, as plans for a dog-shaped vacuum cleaner designed to make pooches more comfortable around the household cleaning device have emerged.

Although a patent application was submitted in the UK in 1973, the unusual device was never produced, reports the Daily Mail.

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Russia has announced they are planning on spending $2 billion on a craft to clean up around 600 pieces of the space junk.

Space Daily reported that Russia's NASA equivalent Energia plans to build a pod that will float through orbit for 15 years, collecting the old satellites and then head back to Earth. The pod will be nuclear-powered and should be completed by 2020 and set to be fully-operational by 2023 if it all goes to plan.

 

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The rapid growth of the chemical industry after World War II changed housekeeping forever and not necessarily for the better. Chemists whose previous employment was manufacturing weapons realized that similar concoctions could be used to fight agricultural pests and improve consumer products.

Since the fifties, some 75,000 chemicals have been introduced into our world. Three hundred of those can now be found within our bodies, even in the bodies of newborn babies who inherit synthetic chemicals from their mothers.

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CALEDONIA - Trevor Morgan, a disabled veteran, noticed about two months ago that his Vicodin prescription did not appear to be working.

He was violently ill, vomiting and feeling weak - as if he had quit the narcotic painkiller cold turkey after nine years.

"I had just thought I was getting sicker and sicker," said Morgan, 30, of Caledonia.

It wasn't until he returned from a weekend trip in late October that he noticed the remaining pills from his trip looked different than the pills he had at home, he said.

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SAN DIEGO -- Opening statements are scheduled Wednesday in the trial of a sex offender accused of sexually assaulting two South Bay women he allegedly enticed with promises of house cleaning jobs.

George Moreland, 46, picked up the women on the street in Chula Vista, took them to a residence in Rancho San Diego where they were sexually assaulted, gave them money and dropped them off back in the South Bay, according to the Chula Vista Police Department.

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Approximately 1,500 people attended a general meeting hosted by the Union des employés et employées de serviceundefinedthe trade union that represents Concordia’s janitorial staffundefinedand held at the Palais des Congrès de Montréal. Nearly 79 per cent of those in attendance who voted, did so in support of the new collective bargaining agreement between the UES and their employers.

“Generally, those on hand today were excited the proposal passed,” said Alain Brisson, vice president to the administration at UES. 

 

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SCOTTS VALLEY - The Scotts Valley High School gymnasium was packed with about 800 people Monday paying tribute to Daniel Garcia, the popular custodian who died from injuries he suffered in a motorcycle accident near his Watsonville home.

The crash happened Nov. 1, and he died Nov. 11 at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center at age 51.

Students, teachers, parents, school district officials and many former students, athletes and school leaders who have left the district attended the ceremony that honored Garcia's life with songs, a slide show and several funny anecdotes from his 14 years with the Scotts Valley Unified School District.

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DALLAS - A Texas exterminator thinks he mnight have an explanation for recent bedbug infestations.

Alex Contaboni with Safe Pro Pest Control investigates hundreds of homes every year.

"I will go to million dollar homes that have cleaning people or nannies, and they're immaculate."

The exterminator, coming over to take care of an unwanted infestation.

"They're like, 'I'm not dirty, I'm not dirty, I swear'."

People who do not have pets find themselves with fleas.

"And a big problem nowadays is bedbugs as well."

Yes, even bedbugs in homes where no one has recently taken a vacation or gone on a business trip.

"They bring vacuums from customer to customer."

Now, Contaboni believes has has solved the mystery.

"As the maid is cleaning the rest of the house, maybe something jumped on there and you didn't notice it, and she puts it in the bucket and takes it to the next house."

He believes cleaning services are cross-contaminating homes, from vacuuming up roach, flea, and bedbug eggs in one home and unknowingly bringing them into another.

"And as they're vacuuming, they're vacuuming up the eggs of the fleas. Well, fleas spread through the eggs."

B&B Maid Service makes sure it changes out its rags, brooms and mops before entering a home, if the clients don't want him to use their own cleaning gear and supplies.

"We provide new and clean rags for every cleaning."

Contaboni recommends anyone entering your house use protective shoe covers as well.

"Bed bugs aren't gonna attach to the booty, but they love the cracks of the shoe."

Cleaning services unaware their gear could actually be bug taxis, spreading unwanted pests from one home to another

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Indianapolis -- Simon Property Group has sued UGL Unicco of Auburndale, Mass., in a contract dispute over janitorial services it provides at 11 Simon malls, including one in Bloomington. The Indianapolis mall developer's suit, filed locally in U.S. District Court, says UGL Unicco failed to comply with contracts and overbilled Simon. UGL said in a statement it disagrees with Simon's allegations and plans to countersue.

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