County Urges Residents to Use Caution When Cleaning Up Rodent Droppings;

Video Provides Tips for Homeowners

January 20, 2011 (Alpine) -- A wild deer mouse trapped in Alpine during routine monitoring has tested positive for the potentially deadly hantavirus, San Diego County vector control officials said today.

Artist’s reception for Abigail Kurtz Migala  on February 6

January 20, 2011 (La Mesa) – Police confiscated an arsenal of weapons from the home of David Schreiner, whose phone call to police about a shooting at Helix High School promoted authorities to secure the campus January 14th. Search warrant records obtained by ECM news partner 10 News indicate that authorities seized 40 rifles, pistols, shotguns and muskets as well as six knives, a dagger, a tomahawk, a hatchet, a machete, a leather sap, and a camouflage ballistic vest.

Donations of cash, food also sought by rescue volunteers

January 19, 2011 (San Diego’s East County) – Nine-year-old Makena Sacks of Blossom Valley volunteers with her mother, Cate Sacks, to train dogs rescued from shelters. Now Makena asks help from ECM readers to save cats slated to be destroyed.

“I am hoping that I can save them but there are so many,” she writes. “The people at the shelter are putting cats down starting today, I need help taking these cats.”

January 19, 2011 (San Diego) -- San Diego River Park Foundation announces a series of events to raise funds for establishing trails, parks, gardens and visitor centers along the 52-mile-long San DIego River.  The events include San Diego Days, San Diego RiverFest, and a Healthy River Run.

January 19, 2011 (San Diego's East County) -- Motorists traveling on Mission Gorge Road to southbound State Route 125 in Santee will lose one lane for the next four weeks, Cal-Trans has announced.  Southbound traffic will be directed along a shoulder to the future 52/125 southbound onramp starting Thursday morning at 5 a.m.

On Friday, March 4, the cities of La Mesa and Santee will hold the Miss La Mesa and Miss Santee Pageants. Pageant organizers are currently seeking outgoing women ages 13-26 to participate in a program that has been a tradition in the cities since the late 1960’s and is an outstanding mentoring program for young women. The pageants are sponsored by the local Chambers of Commerce and focus on community service. There is no swimsuit competition--and is no entry fee to participate.

Miss La Mesa and Miss Santee 2011 will each receive at $1,000.00 scholarship while Miss La Mesa Teen and Miss Santee Teen 2011 will each receive a $500.00 scholarship.

January 18, 2011 (Palomar) --If you see smoke, don't panic.  The United States Forest service will be conducting a controlled burn today and tomorrow near the intersections of Palomar Divide Truck Trail and Halfway Road placing it on a North East / East aspect of Palomar Mountain.

January 17, 2011 (Rancho Penasquitos) – Vandals spray-painted swastikas and “666” (numbers symbolizing the devil) on at least 14 vehicles early this morning, also defacing property at Hilltop Community Park, Black Mountain Middle School, and Sunset Hills Elementary School. A witness reports seeing two white teens spray painting in the area around 1 a.m., the San Diego Union-Tribune reports. Another source indicates they were driving a green car.

“It’s disturbing and shameful,” said Kevin Keenan, San Diego director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

Lawsuit Charged Lack Of Medical And Mental Health Care Led To Death and Unnecessary Suffering

Egyptian proprietor also serves up coffee, snacks, and free classes to help Arabic-speaking residents

By Miriam Raftery
 

January 17, 2011 (El Cajon) --

On Saturday, throngs of well-wishers  stopped by on Saturday to bid welcome (ahlan wa sahaln, أهلا وسهلا) to Zohny Hanna at his new business, Serenity House in downtown El Cajon. The store/coffee shop offers Christian books, art, and music in Arabic. Located on Main Street just east of Magnolia, Serenity House also offers free classes in English and community orientations for East County’s growing population of Arabic-speaking immigrants, asylees, and refugees.

“This is my land now. America is my new home,” says Hanna, who came here on a tourist vista back in 1997 with his wife and children, then received asylum status due to persecution of Coptic Christians in his native Egypt.

January 17, 2010 (Poway) – Ramona resident Cynthia Clay, founder of Clay’s Canine Sidekicks and Leashes for Leaving, died Christmas night, December 25th, one day before her 58th birthday.

“Cyndy, while seriously disabled herself, created and managed over the years two service dog training groups,” said Hope Goodwin, a client who owns a service dog obtained through Clay. “I believe that Cyndy's training group is the only one in the U.S. that teaches the disabled how to train their own Service Dogs,” she said of the two-year program.

January 17, 2011 (La Mesa)--Grossmont Healthcare District (GHD) is continuing its support of Communities Against Substance Abuse (CASA), East County's oldest, community-based, non-profit organization dedicated solely to substance abuse prevention. The GHD board of directors recently voted unanimously to approve a grant of $49,000 to help fund CASA’s Students Together Against Alcohol ‘N Drugs (STAAND), a youth advocacy program.

January 16, 2011 (La Mesa)—Author Linda Schroeder will discuss her novel, Artists & Thieves, a mystery set in the Monterey art scene, in the Friendship Hall of United Church of Christ of La Mesa on February 12th. The novel introduces heroine Mai Ling who, in the words of Editor Mary Holden, is “a new kind of detective on the literary scene: smart, beautiful, respectful of her elders and her cultural history.”

Case to be moved to San Diego

January 16, 2011 (San Diego) – Larry Burns, a federal judge in the U.S. District Court’s Southern District in San Diego, has been assigned to preside over the case of Jarod Lee Loughner, the accused gunman in last week’s Arizona massacre. Loughner is accused of shooting 19 people in Tucson, Arizona, killing six. The dead include Arizona’s chief federal judge John Roll and a nine-year old girl. The injured include Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot through the brain.