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5 stories to follow: Sept. 12

    by Emily Babay
    Published 

Here's your daily look at five stories to know about today:

1. City Council returns: The Philadelphia City Council returns from its summer recess today, with school funding slated to dominate the agenda. Council President Darrell Clarke plans to introduce a bill today to have the city give the school district $50 million for closed school buildings, which could then be sold to earn the money back. Other issues on tap for the fall session include a report on the deadly June building collapse at 22nd and Market streets, legislation to create a land bank for the city's vacant properties and a bill that would force the mayor to get permission from Council before challenging an arbitration award.

2. Sentencing in Autumn Pasquale slaying: Justin Robinson, the 16-year-old who pleaded guilty to killing Autumn Pasquale last October, is scheduled to be sentenced today. The 12-year-old Pasquale disappeared after leaving her Clayton home for a bicycle ride, setting off a massive search for the girl. Robinson faces a 17-year prison sentence.

3. Strip club opens in A.C.: Scores, a $25 million adult-entertainment complex, opens today in Atlantic City. Officials hope the venue inside the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Hotel brings sex appeal and new visitors to the struggling city.

4. Lower Merion marks 1963: Lower Merion will remember its own 1963 moment in a 50th-year observance. Ceremonies marked the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington last month, and today a commemorative marker will be placed at the former Ardmore Avenue Elementary School, a predominately black school that the Main Line NAACP pushed to have closed in 1963, leading to a "moment of integration" for the school district. A group will then march to Lower Merion High School for a speech by retired Army Lt. Gen. Julius Becton Jr.

5. Syria talks: Secretary of State John Kerry and U.S. experts are in Geneva today to meet with their Russian counterparts. The groups hope to outline whether and how Syria's chemical weapons supplies could be inventoried, placed under international control and ultimately destroyed.