MIAMI (AP) — Western Mexico was being lashed Monday by a hurricane bringing heavy rain, strong winds and rough surf to coastal areas and the Baja California peninsula.

A tropical storm watch was issued for Baja California Sur from Cabo San Lucas to Santa Fe, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said in an advisory. A watch was also in effect for Punta San Telmo to Punta Mita, Mexico.

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Hurricane Priscilla was spinning just off the coast of Mexico, about 205 miles southwest of Cabo Corrientes with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph.

Parts of southwestern Mexico could get up to 6 inches of rain from Priscilla’s outer bands through Wednesday, bringing a flash flooding risk to Michoacán and Colima states, forecasters said.

Swells from Priscilla were reaching the coast of Mexico. Life threatening surf and rip currents were likely, the weather service said.

The hurricane was expected to intensify to a Category 2 and approach major hurricane status over the next several days.

Nearby, Tropical Storm Octave was weakening about 885 miles west-southwest of the southern tip of Baja California. Its maximum sustained winds Monday morning were 65 mph.

There were no watches or warnings in effect with Octave, and no hazards affecting land. Forecasters expect the storm will continuing weakening and dissipate in a few days.

By MIKE STOBBE, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention adopted recommendations by a new group of vaccine advisers, and stopped recommending COVID-19 shots for anyone — leaving the choice up to patients.

The government health agency on Monday announced it had adopted recommendations made last month by advisers picked by U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Before this year, U.S. health officials — following recommendations by infectious disease experts — recommended annual COVID-19 boosters for all Americans ages 6 months and older. The idea was to update protection against the coronavirus as it continues to evolve.

As the COVID-19 pandemic waned, experts increasingly discussed the possibility of focusing vaccination efforts on people 65 and older — who are among those most at risk for death and hospitalization.

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But Kennedy, who has questioned the safety of COVID-19 vaccines, abruptly announced in May that COVID-19 vaccines were no longer recommended for healthy children and pregnant women. He also dismissed the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and replaced them with a handpicked group.

The new group voted last month to say all Americans should make their own decisions. But the CDC also says vaccine decisions, especially for seniors, should involve checking with a doctor, nurse or pharmacist.

The recommendation was endorsed by Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services Jim O’Neill, who is serving as the CDC’s acting director. O’Neill signed off on it last week, but HHS officials announced it Monday.

The panel also urged the CDC to adopt stronger language around claims of vaccine risks, despite pushback from outside medical groups who said the shots had a proven safety record from the billions of doses administered worldwide.

In a statement Monday, O’Neill celebrated the change, saying past guidance “deterred health care providers from talking about the risks and benefits of vaccination.”

Major medical societies continue to recommend shots for younger children, pregnant women and others at higher risk of severe illness. They say the Trump administration’s discussion of risk overemphasizes rare side effects and doesn’t account for the dangers of coronavirus infection itself.

O’Neill also signed off on a panel recommendation that children under 4 get their first vaccine dose for varicella — also known as chickenpox — as a standalone shot rather than in combination shot with measles, mumps and rubella.

There is a single shot that contains all four, but it carries a higher risk of fevers and fever-related seizures. Since 2009, the CDC had said it prefers separate shots for initial doses of those vaccines and 85% of toddlers already get the chickenpox vaccine separately.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

St. Paul police responded to reports of flyers with racist messaging and language in the Union Park area late last week and are encouraging residents to report if they see any more.

Officers met with a resident on the morning of Oct. 2 who found flyers with “racially motivated biases” in the street of the 1600 block of Sherburne Ave, according to Nikki Muehlhausen, a St. Paul Police Department public information officer. Officers also recovered laminated flyers with hate speech from the 400 block of Fry Street the same afternoon, Muehlhausen said in an email to the Pioneer Press.

Police also responded to other areas to collect flyers including Cleveland Avenue between Roblyn Avenue and Carroll Avenue, Feronia Avenue between Prior Avenue and Lynhurst Avenue and the 2000 block of St. Anthony Avenue/St. Anthony Avenue between Dewey Street and Prior Avenue.

Residents who see additional flyers are encouraged to report them to St. Paul police. The more reports the department receives, the more it is able to take action, such as additional patrols in the area, said Sgt. Toy Vixayvong, a St. Paul Police Department public information officer on Monday.

Investigators are working to see who is responsible for the flyers, Vixayvong said.

St. Paul Ward 4 City Council Member Molly Coleman said Friday that her office received reports of the flyers around the Merriam Park area. The flyers are “horrific” and “shockingly racist,” Coleman said.

Vixayvong said residents should follow the motto of “see something, say something.”

Residents who find additional flyers are encouraged to file an online police report at stpaul.gov/departments/police/file-police-report.

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The city of Saint Paul is spending money from lower-income neighborhoods on things like splash pads for recreation centers, while what matters most to many families is covering the basics — paying rent and buying groceries.

Families look at their budgets at the kitchen table asking: Where can we cut back to cover the basics? City Hall needs to take the same approach.

One area where St. Paul should cut spending is in our parks and recreation budget.

This isn’t about caring less. It’s about making sure we’re solving the problems people are actually facing — and being honest about whether our spending is helping the people who need it most.

Since 2018, the city’s budget has grown from $625 million to a proposed $887 million for 2026 — a 42% increase, while inflation rose about 29% — a steep jump that outpaces the cost of living.

The parks and recreation department’s annual budget is now up to $88 million — a 44% increase since 2018. On top of that, voters approved a $246 million sales tax for park and other projects over the next 20 years — a regressive tax that hits lower-income families hardest.

City Hall calls this an investment — but an investment needs a return.

Where are the transformational results?

With this level of spending, the return should be progress on our biggest challenges. Yet one in four St. Paul kids still don’t graduate high school, and nearly 20% of the city still lives in poverty. City Hall is busy building around poverty instead of building a way out of it.

That’s the opportunity cost.

Meanwhile, with commercial revenue down and barely any population growth, more of the city’s property tax burden is landing on homeowners — especially in lower-income neighborhoods where home values are rising the fastest.

When we look at the needs of the neighborhoods giving the most they have to give, all this spending feels deeply unfair.

On the East Side, families have been clear about what they need — and it’s not more recreation centers.

The Saint Paul & Minnesota Foundation’s East Metro Pulse survey, which regularly polls thousands of local residents, shows just how thin the margin is: Nearly eight in ten worry about affording food, half say housing costs are tough, child care strains seven in 10  families, and most renters doubt they’ll ever be able to retire.

We have good parks and rec facilities. With all the funding, broken doors have been fixed, grass has been planted, kids are playing sports. Over 96% of residents rate our parks and outdoor spaces favorably.

But here’s the tension: Families are struggling to cover the basics — while the city’s outsized parks and recreation spending drives up rent and grocery costs.

So, we should cut 7.5% — about $6.6 million — from the parks and recreation budget.

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If we go back to the family at the kitchen table, they’re focused on the essentials. City Hall should be too.

Here are priorities we’re not funding. Let’s change that.

St. Paul faces a retirement boom that could cost the city 100 police officers in the next few years. Parking enforcement officers — who handle critical services and provide one of the best pipelines into the force — number only 10 citywide, 20 fewer than needed, while Parks and Recreation employs 634 full-time staff.

Struggling areas in St. Paul — like the CVS on Snelling and University, the old Sears site, and the downtown riverfront — have become monuments to inaction, reminders that city priorities need to shift to today’s realities.

Even in Parks and Recreation, with all the funding, the basics are falling behind. After losing tens of thousands of trees to the emerald ash borer, the city still loses thousands more each year, but despite a promise to replace them this work isn’t fully funded — leaving neighbors waiting at least five years for a tree.

Or — instead of more funding for rec centers and programs — City Hall could just give the money back to the people who really need it.

Dillon Donnelly lives with his family in St. Paul.