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The Daystarter: How they caught the Austin serial bomber; baker shortage at La Segunda; local stars in Sweet 16; Tampa council seeks to tackle barking dogs

 
Nick Richards #4 of the Kentucky Wildcats drives to the basket against the Buffalo Bulls in the second round of the 2018 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament at Taco Bell Arena on March 17, 2018 in Boise, Idaho. Two local stars, Gibbs High's Barry Brown Jr. and Tampa Catholic's Kevin Knox II, will face off tonight when Kentucy plays Kansas State.  (Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)
Nick Richards #4 of the Kentucky Wildcats drives to the basket against the Buffalo Bulls in the second round of the 2018 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament at Taco Bell Arena on March 17, 2018 in Boise, Idaho. Two local stars, Gibbs High's Barry Brown Jr. and Tampa Catholic's Kevin Knox II, will face off tonight when Kentucy plays Kansas State. (Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)
Published March 22, 2018

Catching you up on overnight happenings, and what to know today

• Another mild day, with high temperatures in the mid 60s, according to 10Weather WTSP. Today will be slightly less windy than yesterday.

• As you head out for your morning commute, check out our live blog for the latest traffic updates and road conditions across Tampa Bay.

• La Segunda Bakery is expanding, but not just anyone can bake the time-tested Cuban bread. That makes their planned expansion difficult, Paul Guzzo writes.

• The suspected Austin bomber is dead after terrorizing Texas' capital city for three weeks. And in the end the manhunt wasn't cracked by hundreds of phoned-in tips, the big pot of reward money or police pleading to the bomber through TV. One of the largest bombing investigations in the U.S. since the Boston Marathon attacks in 2013 came to an intense close early Wednesday when authorities say they moved in on Mark Anthony Conditt at an interstate hotel. Here's how they caught the bomber.

• Former state Sen. Arthenia Joyner, a Tampa Democratic icon, is considering a 2020 run for her former District 19 Senate seat now held by Sen. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg. "I'm giving it serious thought," said Joyner, 75. She was Tampa's first black female lawyer and a prominent civil rights activist, then served in the state House and Senate from 2000 until her 2016 Senate term limit.

• Legislators — like House Speaker Richard Corcoran — can claim they've made students safer by allowing guns on campus while paying to train random school employees, columnist John Romano writes. And if local districts don't want the school nurse packing a 9mm pistol, well then they'll just have to figure out how to pay for the extra cops they're going to need. You may not like it, but he offers one way to provide school safety.

• Orchestra musicians respected and feared Irwin Hoffman, the founding conductor of what is now the Florida Orchestra. They describe him as old- school, unsparing in criticism, even dictatorial. The same musicians credit Mr. Hoffman with establishing the high standards that kept the orchestra afloat during its first 20 years. Mr. Hoffman, who turned two merged civic orchestras into a regional player, with aspirations to become a major symphony orchestra, died Monday in Costa Rica. He was 93.

• March Madness continues tonight with four Sweet 16 games. For local hoops fans, all eyes will be on the Kansas State-Kentucky matchup (9:37 p.m., CBS). The game features a pair of locals in Gibbs High's Barry Brown Jr. and Tampa Catholic's Kevin Knox II. And speaking of Knox, sounds like we'll know soon if he'll be one-and-done, declaring for the NBA draft after this season.

• Will longtime Tampa political gadfly Tony Daniel test new rules designed to limit vulgar, threatening speech at a Tampa City Council workshop? The meeting starts at 9 a.m. Follow @CharlieFrago, who will be tweeting any fireworks. The council will also take up a proposed nuisance animal ordinance to tackle barking dogs.

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