AUGUSTA — Parents who question the safety of vaccines are battling with Maine’s medical establishment about two bills that could have the effect of lowering vaccination rates.

WINTHROP — Property taxes could rise sharply under the initial 2011-2012 municipal budget proposal as presented to the Town Council on Monday.

WINTHROP — Buildings, building wings, and just about everything else is on the table as the Winthrop Board of Education continues to work to trim some $1 million from the budget proposed for the upcoming year.

TOKYO — Fishermen who lost their homes and boats in Japan’s tsunami now fear radioactive water that had been gushing into the Pacific Ocean from a crippled nuclear plant could cost them their livelihoods.

WISCASSET — It’s been 15 years since Maine Yankee produced nuclear power on Bailey Point, but the spent nuclear fuel stored in 64 dry cask storage containers still has the potential to release “19 times more radioactivity than Chernobyl” in the event of a natural or manmade disaster, according a senior scholar at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.

AUGUSTA — Allegedly collecting $3,000 in unemployment checks while serving a jail sentence has landed a Portland man in more legal trouble.

AUGUSTA — State lawmakers must find $120,000 to maintain funding for three scientists who inspect shellfish beds, which are critical to Maine’s $20 million-a-year shellfish industry, Sen. Lois Snowe-Mello, R-Poland, said Tuesday.

WASHINGTON — Quick: What do these things have in common? Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. The Japanese earthquake and tsunami. Wall Street volatility. A cranky, even angry American populace.

AUGUSTA — The state archivist will brief the City Council on Thursday about an upcoming event commemorating Maine’s entry into the Civil War 150 years ago.