By Tim Lambert | Editor-in-chief
“When people think about home care, they often think about older adults, but home and community-based care serves people across every stage of life. Without that support, many families reach a breaking point, and institutional care often becomes the only option — a far more costly and less preferred option.” — Mia Haney, the CEO of the Pennsylvania Homecare Association.
Happy Friday and good morning. We are rolling our way to the weekend.
I’ve been on a kick this summer of listening to the likes of Johnny Blue Skies, Ryan Bingham and Jason Isbell. So, I’m wrestling with hitting the Tyler Childers show at Hersheypark Stadium tonight. But, it’s been a bit of a week, so we’ll see how things shake out in my head when I close up the laptop at the end of the day.
Now that my inner monologue is out of the way, let’s get you to our top stories.
Thanks for starting your day with us. As always, we deeply appreciate you reading, sharing and supporting our work. -- Tim
Scarlotte Sells plays with a toy in her Hanover home while Michele Werner, a regional director with Angels of Care, watches on July 31, 2026. The six-year-old has an extremely rare genetic disorder and requires round-the-clock care, but home health nurses are scarce in rural York County. (Photo by Whitney Downard/Pennsylvania Capital-Star)
By Whitney Downard
Like many other 6-year-old girls, Scarlotte Sell’s excited to start first grade and laughs easily. She loves digging outside for worms and bugs to feed her pet turtle, Carlos, and running in the yard with her dog, Rocky.
Scarlotte also has an extremely rare genetic disorder — one of three children in the world with her gene mutation — and requires round-the-clock care to check her gastrostomy tube and catheter. But getting medically trained caretakers when her dad, Brandon Sell, is away from their Adams County home hasn’t always been easy.
“Hanover is just not a saturated area,” when it comes to skilled nursing, said Sell. “So it’s really hard to get (someone) … Nursing in this area is far and few between.”
Demand in this sector is only increasing.
A statue of the Penn State Nittany Lion at Penn State’s New Kensington campus on Jan. 16, 2026. (Photo by John Beale for the Pennsylvania Capital-Star)
By Piper Hutchinson of the Louisiana Illuminator
A decline in international students at American universities could cost the U.S. more than $3 billion, including $164.2 million in Pennsylvania.
The Association of International Educators based its economic impact calculations on data colleges provided in response to an Institute of International Education survey. It estimates there are 111,000 fewer international students heading into this academic year than in 2024-25, before President Donald Trump began his second term in office.
The analysis projects the count of international students for the 2026-27 could drop as low as 1.05 million, down from nearly 1.18 million enrolled in 2024-25.
More than 50,500 international students are in Pennsylvania. The Economy League of Philadelphia said it’s the sixth-highest total of any state.
Veronica and Ryan Harper moved into their home in Mount Eyre Manor eight years ago and did not know that the development was situated on top of a petroleum pipeline. (Photo by Tracie Van Auken/Inside Climate News)
By Marianne Lavelle of Inside Climate News
As their children ran in circles at the street corner on a clear morning, parents of Mount Eyre Manor kept watch, especially mindful of the white pickup trucks that begin to roll into the neighborhood before the school bus.
Only after their 6-year-old daughter boarded the bus did Ryan Harper and Veronica Casina-Harper talk about the nightmare of the past year and a half.
From their front yard, they pointed to work crews finishing four new holes in their street, the latest of 44 wells drilled in Mount Eyre Manor. The driller is one of the nation’s largest and most politically connected oil and gas companies, Energy Transfer.
The company is using the wells to determine how far and how deep an unknown quantity of petroleum fuel has spread into drinking water supplies from a rupture in its 68-year-old pipeline beneath this neighborhood just north of Philadelphia, a mile uphill from the Delaware River.
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Norfolk Southern says 12 railcars derailed at the Horseshoe Curve in Altoona on Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2026. (Photo by Zach Rudisill/Rudy’s Rail Adventures)
By Sydney Roach of WPSU
Federal investigators are looking into the cause of a train derailment Tuesday at the Horseshoe Curve in Altoona, which marks the third time a derailment happened this year at or near the national historic landmark.
The moment of the derailment was captured on a “Virtual Railfan” livestream, where you can see 12 railcars go off the track.
Crews worked overnight to get the railcars back on track. A Norfolk Southern spokesperson said no hazardous materials were released.
TODAY IN THE CAPITAL-STAR
DOJ targets 3 more states in effort to axe in-state tuition for immigrants: The U.S. Department of Justice has sued New York, Connecticut and Vermont over laws that allow immigrants in the country without permanent legal status to pay in-state college tuition in the states where they live.
Democrats push state bills opposing federal immigration efforts: In a new report tallying 2026 action, State Futures, a nonprofit coordinating hundreds of Democratic lawmakers across the states, tracked 242 pieces of such legislation introduced across 32 states. About a fifth of them passed.
More GOP party platforms include anti-IVF language. Is surrogacy next? In the past two years, Republicans in Idaho and four other states have added specific anti-IVF language to their state party platforms, and some anti-abortion groups have become increasingly outspoken in their opposition to both IVF and surrogacy.
ICYMI
The Pa. Green Party tries to kick a Green Party candidate off the ballot: In one of the most competitive congressional districts in the country, a strange fight is brewing between the Pennsylvania Green Party and a candidate who is petitioning to appear on the ballot under their label.
Natural gas dominates PJM’s first reformed grid queue: Natural gas surged to the top in the first round of power projects accepted into PJM Interconnection’s reformed interconnection process, making up nearly half of the more than 200 gigawatts of capacity qualified for study.
Pa. poised to lead in quantum computing field, state lawmakers hear: Pennsylvania is well positioned to be a leader in the development of the next major breakthrough in computing, state lawmakers heard Tuesday in an informational hearing on quantum technology.
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