An incident where vandalism was discovered on the campus building that houses the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Resource Center will also be investigated as a hate crime.
The eventual more than doubling of Davis residents water and sewer rates will begin with a rather modest 5% increase in the water rate and 6% increase in the sewer rate. For the average ratepayer, the city staff argues this will be tantamount to a little over four dollars a month or less than fifty dollars per year in a rate increase.
The actual rate approval will not occur until May 4. However, this is just the first step among many that will see most people’s water and sewer rates at least double in order to pay for what might be a half billion dollars combined in a water supply project and a wastewater treatment project. The city has already taken the step of forming a joint powers authority with Woodland, making the water supply project a done deal without ever having final approval.
In light of the fallout that occurred at the end of January during a Davis City Council Meeting that has attracted a lot of attention, Mayor Pro Tem Don Saylor and Councilmember Stephen Souza have submitted an item that would add language to “Council Meeting Ground Rules” and the “Procedures Manual for Council Members” to address circumstances when Ground Rules and Procedures are not adhered to and the range of possible sanctions that may be applied in the event of violation.
The Council will consider this item on Tuesday night.
Here is the brochure broken into panels below. Click on them to expand them to full size.
Federal Court Judge Morris England denied Defendants’ Motion for Partial Summary Judgment in the portion of the Buzayan family’s lawsuit that aims at the conduct of Davis Police Officers Pheng Ly and Ben Hartz.
The lawsuit stems from an incident that occurred on June 7, 2005, when Davis Police Officer Pheng Ly was dispatched to the home of Adrienne Wonhof-Gustafson to investigate claims that her Mazda had sustained damage resulting from a hit-and-run collision. Officer Ly made the determination that the Buzayan family was responsible, and the family paid for the damages. However, six days later, Officer Ly would arrest their then-16-year-old daughter on misdemeanor charges of hit-and-run.
The County Board of Supervisors this week discussed a proposal that would ask Yolo County voters to approve a measure that would raise the sales tax by half a percent to generate somewhere between five and seven million to alleviate struggles at the County level that have produced a twenty million dollar deficit for the coming fiscal year and will lead to a widespread cutback in services ranging from health and mental health to law enforcement.
The Vanguard is certainly sympathetic to the county’s plight particularly in light of the devastating cuts to health care services that will put all county residents at a great health risk. However, the Vanguard does not believe that this is a feasible plan.
Back in November, the City Council unanimously told the developers to go back and work with neighbors to resolve differences over the features of a 27-unit project.
The most controversial portion of the project was the reduction of he long-established 50-foot riparian buffer zone along the Putah Creek Parkway down to 30 feet. This went against the recommendation of the Open Space and Habitat commission and was seen by the council as going too far.
On March 9, 2010, the challenge to the West Sacramento Gang Injunction will go to trial in Yolo County court. That was determined on Tuesday as Yolo County Superior Court Judge David Reed denied the District Attorney’s office move for summary judgment.
In the meantime, lawyers fighting against the injunction that would place strict limitations on the actions of those deemed to be gang members in West Sacramento, appealed Judge Kathleen White’s ruling from last year that put in place a temporary injunction.
Yolo County is facing huge deficits this year again as it has to cut 21 million from its operating budget. One of the problems that it faces is a huge amount of lands are preserved for agriculture. 97.2% of its unincorporated land is designated for agricultural use with 416,519 acres of those lands (69% of all acres designated for agricultural use) are in Williamson Act contracts.
As a result of its land use policy and directing urban development into its cities, the county receives the lowest share of property tax in the state and it also receives almost no significant sales tax revenue.
While Yolo County Sheriff Prieto on Tuesday once again expressed skepticism about the girl’s claims, telling the Sacramento Bee, “I doubt seriously whether anybody put a gun to this young girl’s head… It’s common sense: Do you really think a policeman would perceive a 9-year-old girl as a threat?” New evidence emerges that leads to a very different conclusion.
The Vanguard has obtained the emergency room report from the family of now 10 year old Cristal Ochoa, it shows that the family had to pay more than $3000 for the visit. Given the family’s lack of insurance and lack of means, is it lnot ogical that the family would incur those expenses if the charges were not true?
Yolo County Superior Court Judge David Reed allowed the case by the family of Ricardo Abrahams against Yolo Community Care Continuum to proceed despite strong arguments by attorney Ronald Enabnit who argued that death was not a foreseeable consequence of calling the police.
Judge Reed ruled that the duty of care ends with discharge and that there is a factual dispute as to when discharge occurred that needs to be determined along with other questions of fact during trial rather than during demure.
Dear UC Davis Faculty Members:
On September 24th we began the year by walking out of our classes and work- places in solidarity: students, faculty, workers, and staff who faced furloughs, lay- offs, pay cuts and tuition hikes, all left their buildings, classes and jobs to rally and march together against the privatization of education.
Workers and students showed overwhelming support for faculty grievances that day. We called attention to the lack of budget transparency and to faculty issues around self-governance. When administration claimed the Sept 24th walkout was led chiefly by faculty concerns, we refused to let that claim stand. We insisted we shared one struggle, and wouldn’t be divided by departments, titles, age or salary. We called ourselves equals—and took the future of our education, workplace, and university into our own hands. But since the walkout, the faculty voice has been almost entirely absent from the opposition to student fee increases and worker layoffs.
The Vanguard on Sunday morning was the first to report on nine-year-old Crystal Ochoa, who is now suffering from what appears to be post traumatic stress disorder stemming from treatment she received by Sheriff’s Deputies last June, the same team from the gang task force led by Sgt. Dale Johnson and including Deputies Bautista and Ovieda that had a little over a month before shot and killed Luis Gutierrez.
On Thursday night, the Davis School Board established that the modernization of Emerson Junior High now ranks as the district’s highest facilities priority. The most immediate priorities are updating the science classrooms, expanding the art and wood shop classrooms, and a new shade structure for the lunch area outside.
The complete modernization of the Emerson campus would cost between 17 million and 19 million dollars, according to architect Steve Newsom who spoke on Thursday. Unfortunately, the district lacks the money even for the highest of priorities.
Not everyone was appreciative of the panel’s efforts however, as both Yolo County District Attorney Jeff Reisig and Yolo County Sheriff Ed Prieto dismissed the panel as politically motivated and lacking credibility. However, as far as we can tell, neither attended nor had any of their deputies attend the weekend’s testimony.
That arrangement ended abruptly last week, as she sent out a farewell email to the department.
One of the key witnesses, described in great detail what she had seen. She provided far more detail than what was made available by the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office in their report on the incident. She described the incident in great detail and told the commission that she had not seen a weapon, and that Mr. Gutierrez was retreating as he was shot.
A Joint Legislative Audit Committee voted 10-0 this week to have the state auditor examine the University of California’s financial practices following complaints and questions by many asking why student fees have gone up consistently while at the same time UC Executives have received lucrative raises and bonuses.
Among the requests of the state auditor will be to: identify the sources of UC’s public funding; review and evaluate the policies and practices UC uses to track and allocate public funds; determine how the UC has spent its state appropriation, student fees, and funds from the federal government; evaluate UC’s practices for non-salary expenditures including travel, consultants, and entertainment; assess expenditures for instruction and identify the average amount per student UC spends on instruction; determine what funds are restricted and how; and examine auxiliary organizations, including expenditures.
Overall one has to say the news could have been far worse when the Pew Center on the State puts California’s state retirement system into the “needs improvement” category as opposed to the lower category of “serious concerns.” Moreover, the study show the impact on the public pension system due to the collapse of the financial markets, however it does not include the rebound that occurred at least on Wall Street after mid-2009.
Overall the numbers look like this: California’s state retirement systems have promised current and retired workers around $3.35 trillion in pension, health care, and other post-employment befits as of 2008 but have $2.35 trillion on hand to pay for them. Strictly looking at the retirement system, there were $454 billion in pension and benefits on the book in 2008, $59 billion was unfunded liability, that means that the fund had the assets to cover 87 percent of its obligations.
