Month: June 2013

“It’s OK to own a business but we can’t have a marriage, it’s second-class citizenship,” said Chad Gardner. Gardner and his partner Roly Carvajal met online 15 years ago. Together they own Dash and a Handful Catering in Palm Springs. Now they’re looking to finalize their commitment to each other. “We would get married right

Desert Hot Springs councilman Russell Betts says construction crews are profiting from illegal mining in his city. He wants to stop it, but the land owner says, they’re just following city orders. It’s happening on a busy construction site at an open lot just off Highway 62, in the northwest part of Desert Hot Springs.

Two half-brothers being sought in the shooting of a 23-year-old Hemet resident found dead inside a vehicle in San Jacinto have ties to the Coachella Valley and should be considered armed and dangerous, authorities said today. Abram Daniel Palacios, 24, of San Jacinto and Juan Javier Mejia, 39, of Hemet are charged in the death

For the next few months, you will see young teens at Eisenhower Medical Center. One hundred and six of them to be exact. “Its very important to various departments because of a lot of our regular volunteers are snowbirds so they leave us so we really need that extra help in the summertime,” Sharon Pogue,

Saying they want to ensure taxpayer funds are spentconservatively, Riverside County supervisors today approved limiting the amountof money that can be expended on groundbreakings and other ceremonies forcounty projects. “We need some guidelines,” Supervisor Jeff Stone said. “We don’t needto host big parties to tout our accomplishments.” Stone and Supervisor John Tavaglione proposed a policy

The state Senate is poised to vote on a modified version of Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposal to revamp the state’s enterprise zone program. Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg scheduled a vote late Tuesday on AB93, which requires two-thirds votes in each house. The bill would redirect $750 million in business tax credits by using

The head of California’s prison system says a court order to evacuate thousands of inmates from two Central Valley lockups hit hard by an infectious disease could lead to racial conflicts elsewhere. Corrections Secretary Jeffrey Beard said Tuesday that officials had been awaiting the results of a U.S. Centers for Disease Control study on the

A government watchdog says lax oversight by the Internal Revenue Service allowed workers to use agency credit cards to buy wine for an expensive luncheon and, in one case, romance novels, diet pills and baby clothes. Two IRS credit cards were used to buy online pornograpIG: IRS credit cards used for wine, pornographyhy, though the

The U.S. Forest Service revised its estimate forcontaining The Hathaway Fire in the San Gorgonio Wilderness because of wherethe fire is burning. The estimated date for full containment — it had been 95 percentcontained, or surrounded, on Sunday — is now open-ended or undetermined. The northeastern head of the fire is burning in a rocky,

President Barack Obama declared the debate over climate change and its causes obsolete Tuesday as he announced a wide-ranging plan to tackle pollution and prepare communities for global warming. In a major speech at Georgetown University, Obama warned Americans of the deep and disastrous effects of climate change, urging them to take action before it’s

Police are looking for two men this morning suspected of robbing a Coachella RadioShack a gunpoint Monday night. At around 7:40 p.m., police responded to reports of an armed robbery at the RadioShack near the corner of Harrison and Westerfield. When they arrived, they learned a man wearing a black cloth mask entered the store

The sun has set on a proposed solar energy plant in the Southern California desert. The K Road Calico Solar Project would have covered as many as six square miles of land with solar panels east of Barstow. The project could have generated enough electricity for 250,000 homes. Environmentalists sued, saying the development would have

A judge has taken the unusual step of ordering a sheriff to take money from a Central California Native American casino’s till to pay a $725,000 settlement reached between the tribe and a former casino manager. The Fresno Bee reports that Madera County Sheriff John Anderson has until the end of November to carry out

California lawmakers are considering a constitutional amendment that would affirm the public’s right to inspect documents held by local governments while clarifying who should pay for making them available. The amendment was written in response to a media outcry over a bill that loosened requirements on how local governments handle requests for public information. The

California’s Supreme Court says a divorced man doesn’t have to share his pension increase with his ex. The San Francisco Chronicle says the court on Monday ruled in the case of Timothy and Julie Green. Before marriage, the Contra Costa County man was in the Air Force. He became a firefighter but his pension plan

The Supreme Court handed down a mixed ruling a major affirmative action case. Justices are sending Abigail Fisher’s case back to a Federal Appeals Court, ordering the court to take another look. She claimed her race prevented her from getting admitted to the University of Texas at Austin in 2008. The justices did rule that

The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that a key provision of the landmark Voting Rights Act cannot be enforced unless Congress comes up with an up-to-date formula for deciding which states and localities still need federal monitoring. The justices said in 5-4 vote that the law Congress most recently renewed in 2006 relies on 40-year-old data

Historic immigration legislation cleared a key Senate hurdle with votes to spare on Monday, pointing the way to near-certain passage within days for $38 billion worth of new security measures along the border with Mexico and an unprecedented chance at citizenship for millions living in the country illegally. The vote was 67-27, seven more than

Cathedral City’s mayor pro tem denied embezzlement chargestoday at his arraignment for allegedly spending funds from an employeecomputer loan program on himself. Charles Frederick Vasquez, 58, is charged with three felony counts ofembezzlement by a public officer. He entered his not guilty plea at the LarsonJustice Center in Indio and is due back in court