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    Living at home as long as possible is preferred by a vast majority of adults over 50. But the real estate market and inflation has made doing so less of a choice. Locked into low mortgage rates too good to give up, some baby boomers and older members of Generation X with enough extra case are making upgrades to keep their homes both enjoyable and accessible as they age. The demand for inconspicuous bathtub bars, showers that can accommodate a wheelchair and other amenities has given home improvement chains, contractors, designers and architects a noticeable lift. But it's also exposing an economic divide since lower-income boomers often struggle to age-proof their properties.

      At least one person is dead in Florida as powerful storms continue to pummel the South during a week of severe weather across the U.S. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday issued an executive order declaring a state of emergency for some north Florida counties. The sheriff’s office in Leon County, Florida, says that a falling tree killed a woman inside her family’s home in the Tallahassee area. Some of the strongest storms early Friday rolled through Tallahassee, toppling trees across the state’s capital city. And in Mississippi’s capital of Jackson, authorities were asking residents to conserve and boil water after a power outage at one of its major water treatment plants.

        A statue of the late Rev. Billy Graham set to stand inside the U.S. Capitol to represent North Carolina will be unveiled next week in a ceremony. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association says House Speaker Mike Johnson, other congressional members and the family of the Charlotte-born evangelist are expected to attend Thursday's unveiling in Washington. The North Carolina General Assembly approved legislation in 2015 asking a congressional committee to eventually approve a likeness of Graham for display. Graham died in 2018 at age 99. Each state gets two statues. Graham's statue will replace one of early 20th-century Gov. Charles Aycock.

        A Virginia school board has voted to restore the names of Confederate military leaders to a high school and an elementary school four years after the names were removed. Shenandoah County’s school board voted 5-1 early Friday to rename Mountain View High School as Stonewall Jackson High School and Honey Run Elementary as Ashby Lee Elementary. Friday’s vote reverses a decision by the school board in 2020, a time when  school systems across Virginia and the South were removing Confederate names from schools and other public locations in response to the Black Lives Matter movement. Board members who voted Friday to restore the Confederate names say the previous school board ignored popular sentiment and due process when the names were stripped.

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