In Brief: Obama hosts India’s Modi for White House visit

WASHINGTON – Nearly a decade ago, Narendra Modi was banned from entering the United States after he was blamed for failing to stop a series of deadly riots against a minority group in the Indian state of Gujarat.

On Monday, Modi, now the popular prime minister of the world’s largest democracy, arrived in Washington as the guest of the president of the United States.

He attended a private dinner Monday with President Barack Obama in the White House’s Blue Room before retiring to Blair House, the presidential guest house across the street.

Today, after an official arrival ceremony and meeting with Obama in the Oval Office, he will have lunch with Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry. Later, he will head to Capitol Hill to visit House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and other congressional leaders.

Modi has made his agenda clear: He’s looking to convince possible American investors that India is open for business, a goal he dubbed “Made in India” and outlined in an op-ed last week in the Wall Street Journal.

VA settles with three employees

Three employees who complained about the troubled Veterans Affairs hospital in Phoenix have reached full settlements with the scandal-scarred federal agency that runs the health system for veterans, the agency announced Monday.

The employees were among the first to report shortcomings and face retaliation from officials, touching off a national furor that led to multiple investigations and the departure of former VA Secretary Eric Shinseki. Among the allegations was that the hospital covered up lengthy delays in supplying care for veterans.

The full details of the settlement were not announced, but the trio received what the U.S. Office of Special Counsel called “full and fair relief.” The settlements were described as the first result of the VA’s cooperation with the counsel’s office. More than 125 whistleblower complaints from VA facilities around the country still are being investigated.

NYC to end solitary for juvenile inmates

NEW YORK – By the end of the year, city corrections officials will end their long-standing practice of sending 16- and 17-year-old inmates to solitary confinement for breaking rules in the nation’s second-largest jail system.

The policy change, detailed in a memo from Commissioner Joseph Ponte to Mayor Bill de Blasio last week, follows comments made by Ponte at a public meeting before the oversight board earlier this month in which he detailed reforms to the troubled Rikers Island jail complex.

Last month, a scathing Department of Justice review of how 16- to 18-year-old inmates are jailed on Rikers found that among other things, they are too often subjected to solitary, which is called punitive segregation in New York.

About 300 of the 11,500 daily inmates in city jails are 16 and 17 years old, according to the Department of Correction. Of the roughly 530 inmates in solitary on any given day, about 50 of them are teens.

Road salt prices up after frigid winter

DETROIT – The reward for surviving last winter’s frigid temperatures and record snowfall, several states are learning, is drastic price increases for road salt – and that’s if they can even get it.

Replenishing stockpiles is proving challenging, especially for some Midwestern states, after salt supplies were depleted to tame icy roads last winter. And price increases of at least 20 percent have been common in some places, including Boston and Raleigh, North Carolina.

“Everybody is kind of scrambling around right now, contacting anybody they know who may have some salt available,” said Fred Pausch, chief of the County Engineers Association of Ohio.

Flat rooftop rule for skyscrapers ends

LOS ANGELES – Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti heralded a rule change Monday that will allow the construction of skyscrapers with spires or slanted roofs – revising a long-standing regulation that forced builders to make flat-topped structures.

The decades-old rule was meant to ensure fire safety by requiring helicopter landing pads atop tall buildings. No other large city in the country has such a rule, according to city officials.

Now, with new technology and design techniques being used to keep people safe during fires, the prohibition had become outdated, “one more stupid rule in Los Angeles,” Garcetti said in announcing the change.

Architects had bemoaned the old rule, saying it stifled creativity and prevented L.A. builders from crafting a distinctive skyline.