EAST COUNTY ROUNDUP: LOCAL AND STATEWIDE NEWS

January 29, 2015 (San Diego’s East County)-- East County Roundup highlights top stories of interest to East County and San Diego’s inland regions, published in other media. This week’s top “Roundup” headlines include:

LOCAL

• Flu Season Deaths Rise To 9 In San Diego County (KPBS)
• Planning commission still up in the air in Lemon Grove (UT San Diego)
• Planners put conditions on solar proposal (Ramona Sentinel)
• They haul meat: Golden eagle tracking project yields unexpected data (San Diego Reader)
• Drug-Laden Drone Crashes Near US-Mexico Border (KPBS)
• Groundbreaking home for disabled (U-T)
• Nude pics posted online humiliated women (U-T)
• Will San Diego be a pot mecca? (U-T)

STATE

• Big Brother in Your Car (Reason)
• Fewer Kindergarteners Skip Vaccinations Under California Law (KPBS)
• California's public-worker payroll increased post-recession (AP)
• California runs risk of financial relapse, ratings agency says (LA Times)
• Suspected Ebola patient admitted to California hospital (Reuters)

For excerpts and links to full stories, click “read more” and scroll down.

LOCAL

Flu Season Deaths Rise To 9 In San Diego County (KPBS)

Five more people died of influenza-related causes in the San Diego region last week, bringing the "flu season" death toll to nine, the countyHealth and Human Services Agency reported Wednesday. Their ages ranged from 68 to 95 years, and all had underlying medical conditions, according to the HHSA.

Planning commission still up in the air in Lemon Grove (UT San Diego)

Council weighs commission's benefits and drawbacks, costs and responsibilities.

Planners put conditions on solar proposal (Ramona Sentinel)

By a 10-3 vote, Ramona Community Planning Group approved with conditions San Diego Gas & Electric's solar plant proposal for Creelman Lane.

They haul meat: Golden eagle tracking project yields unexpected data (San Diego Reader)

Since three local scientists studying golden eagles started trying to catch the birds in October — to swab them for DNA and pathogens and release them with a GPS transmitter attached — they've gone through 6800 pounds of bait meat.

Drug-Laden Drone Crashes Near US-Mexico Border (KPBS)

 Police in Tijuana said a drone overloaded with illicit methamphetamine has crashed into a supermarket parking lot.  Police spokesman Jorge Morrua said Wednesday that police were alerted after the drone fell Tuesday night near the San Ysidro crossing at Mexico's border with California.

Groundbreaking home for disabled (U-T)

 When a first ceremonial shovel of dirt is dug from the earth in Spring Valley Friday, it will be groundbreaking in more than one way.  A new housing development on the 11-acre campus of Noah Homes, a nonprofit residential community for people with developmental disabilities, is said to be the first in California designated specifically for those with both Down syndrome and Alzheimer’s disease.

Nude pics posted online humiliated women (U-T)

....What had been private moments, shared between a girlfriend and boyfriend or a husband and wife, suddenly become public two years ago when nude photos of the women showed up on a website called YouGotPosted.com.  In many cases, other personal or identifying information was included in the posts.... The women testified in the trial of Kevin Bollaert, 28, of San Diego who is accused of running YouGotPosted.com and its sister site, ChangeMyReputation.com, through which the women whose images were posted online could pay to have them removed

Will San Diego be a pot mecca? (U-T)

 With every city in the county declining to allow medical marijuana dispensaries except San Diego, the city could become a sort of mecca for legal pot in the region.  From Poway to Oceanside to Imperial Beach and Santee, people seeking legal medical marijuana will have to rely on the roughly 30 dispensaries expected to start opening in the city of San Diego this spring, or the one dispensary the county government allowed to open last summer near El Cajon.

STATE

Big Brother in Your Car (Reason)

 We can drive without being obsessively concerned about getting pulled over because there (thankfully) aren't enough highway cops to stop us every time the speedometer hits 75 mph. But what if the traffic cop were a computer that always is transmitting data about our driving habits to a government agency? That question, writes Steven Greenhut, is increasingly being asked given technological advancements and a new proposal by the state's air-quality control agency to expand the information your car's computer would be required to collect and potentially transmit to officials.

Fewer Kindergarteners Skip Vaccinations Under California Law (KPBS)

 Under the immunization law that took effect last year, parents claiming a personal-belief exemption from vaccines must have a signed form from their doctor saying that they have received information about the risks of opting out.  Fewer California parents opted out of vaccinations for their children entering kindergarten last year following the adoption of a law that makes it harder to go without the shots, state figures show....

California's public-worker payroll increased post-recession (AP)

California's public-employee payroll increased again last year as the state emerged from the recession that shrank salaries and the size of its taxpayer-supported workforce, a newspaper reported Saturday.

California runs risk of financial relapse, ratings agency says (LA Times)

When Gov. Jerry Brown released his latest budget proposal earlier this month, he said California's finances were balanced but remain precarious. / On Wednesday, a report from Wall Street ratings agency Standard & Poor's echoed the governor's concerns and questioned how sustainable California's recovery will be.... / If the stock market shifts from gains to losses, Standard & Poor's said, the budget could be dramatically affected because about half of the state's revenue comes from the wealthiest 1% in California. / That means lawmakers should treat surging revenue as a "temporary upswing" and "build a modest cushion for the next downturn while beginning to address its existing long-term commitments," the report said.

Suspected Ebola patient admitted to California hospital (Reuters)

A patient suspected of being infected with Ebola was admitted on Thursday to the University of California, Davis, Medical Center in Sacramento, the hospital said in a statement.