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The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has said that two national marine sanctuaries off the Bay Area coast will be expanded soon, making it more than double in size.

According to NOAA, the change, published in the Federal Register on Thursday, has taken effect after 45 days of nonstop session of Congress.

After the change, Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary west of Point Reyes will expand to 1,286 square miles from 529 square miles and the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary just west of San Francisco Bay will expand to 3,295 square miles from 1,282 square miles.

The expansion will help in the protection of additional marine and coastal habitats and biological resources and ecological features of the region.

It has been found that engineers on Wednesday submitted redevelopment project plans for Adam Meldrum & Anderson Co. (AM&A) department store building to the Buffalo Planning Board for approval. The building located in downtown Buffalo has been vacant since long time.

The enormous redevelopment project, will involve an estimated cost of about $50 million. As per the plan submitted the building will have eight floors of hotel rooms, two restaurants and a lobby.

The plan will bring a new life to the 375,000-square-foot edifice at 377 Main St., which has been empty for more than 16 years since the closing of the last tenant.

If successful, it would rejuvenate a major eyesore in the downtown business district, where many residents and business are eager to see new activity.

On Tuesday, Republican Steven Rhoads, a Bellmore Republican, beat Rita Kestenbaum, a Bellmore Democrat, in a special election in the Nassau County Legislature's 19th District. He will now be filling the 19th Nassau County legislative district seat, which was unfilled since former Legis. David Denenberg (D-Merrick) resigned.

According to unofficial votes tallied by the Nassau County board of elections, Rhoads beat Kestenbaum by a margin of 58 to 41% out of over 5,600 votes cast. Rhoads is an attorney, who had attempted to beat Denenberg. Kestenbaum is a former Hempstead town councilwoman. Both belong to Bellmore.

According to police, the Borough Hall subway station in Brooklyn saw bloody chaos on Tuesday night, when a retired correction officer shot and killed a man. According to police sources and a witness, the man who was killed Gilbert Drogheo, 32, and another person started irritating the retired officer as he got on a Brooklyn-bound 4 train at the Bowling Green station in Manhattan around 6:30 pm.

The witness, 30-year-old Thomas Berry of Crown Heights, who was going back to his home from work and saw the argument, said that they were fighting badly and they seemed to be drunk.

New York City-run homeless shelters are part of a system that costs Department of Homeless Services (DHS) of the city about $360 million every year. According to a city Department of Investigation report, sometimes the agency pays well above neighborhood market rates for those apartments.

The Department of Investigation found that the largely privately-run shelters that house more than 10,000 homeless families are in dangerous conditions. The report stated that DHS didn't work to improve the current condition of shelters. At its worst, the agency has turned blind eye to violations that threaten the lives of people that are living in those shelters, as per the report. The report has also called for stiffer inspections and repairs.

Michelle fans would be disappointed as the hip hop artist's this month's concert's at the Washington Avenue Armory has been cancelled.

The Armory on Thursday announced that it has suspended shows due to foreseeable future, while its owners, the city and state Department of State investigate security procedures in the aftermath of six stabbings and an assault at a concert by Migos, a hip hop group.

It has been found that three Albany residents named Dywuan Blunt, 21, Nyguel Williams, 17, and Da-Min Germon, 17, has been charges with felony first-degree riot after the fight.

Blunt was accused Thursday and was sent to the Albany County jail without bail, according to City Court records. Williams and Germon were released on Sunday under supervision.