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First Read: Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Al Letson, Big Beer, and Marissa Alexander are all in the headlines today.

Welcome to WJCT First Read, your daily weekday morning round-up of stories from the First Coast, around Florida, and across the country. We'll also preview some of WJCT's upcoming news programming.

Today's Weather
In Jacksonville skies will be sunny, with a high temperature near 53 degrees. Tonight should be mostly clear, with a low temperature around 38 degrees. 

At the Beaches will be sunny, with a high near 52 degrees. Tonight, there will likely be increasing clouds, with a low around 44 degrees. (National Weather Service)

WJCT hosts conversation about race relations in Jacksonville. Sparked by the non indictment of the police officers that killed Eric Garner and Michael Brown, State of the Re:Union host Al Letson lead a town hall meeting last night at WJCT studios discussing issues of race and how those cases have impacted the way African Americans feel toward the police here in Jacksonville. (The Florida Times-Union)

Big beer drops lawsuit to stop craft brewery tap rooms. The Florida Retail Federation has withdrawn its lawsuit challenging the way that the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation issues licenses to craft breweries which define tap rooms as tourist attractions. (The Florida Times-Union) 

Marissa Alexander left jail yesterday to go into house arrest. The Jacksonville woman that fired a warning shot at her husband will serve two years under community control. Protesters at the courthouse say that Alexander should be released, not just transferred to house arrest. (WJCT)

Hutson, Stevenson and Renner win the Republican primaries for the state Legislature. Travis Hutson (R-Elkton) will go on to the general election for the District 6 seat in the Senate. Cyndi Stevenson and Paul Renner won the Republican primaries for the District 17 and District 24 seats in the Florida House of Representatives respectively. (WJCT) 

Flights from Jacksonville to the North begin taking off again after blizzard. As the Northeast starts digging out from the heavy snowfall it received from this week's blizzard, so are the airplanes that have been stranded leaving its airports. Only 600 flights nationwide were canceled this morning compared to almost 5,000 yesterday. At Jacksonville International Airport, only flights from Boston were still canceled. (News4Jax)

Today on First Coast Connect, FSCJ President Dr. Cynthia Bioteau joins Melissa Ross to discuss the school's 50th anniversary and President Obama's call for free community college. 

You can get all the latest headlines online at WJCTNews.org, on our Facebook page and on Twitter @WJCTJax. You can follow Ray Hollister on Twitter @RayHollister.

Ray Hollister can be reached at rhollister@wjct.org, 904-358-6341 or on Twitter at @rayhollister.