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TUESDAY AUGUST 24, 2010 Breaking news at: PBR Touring Pro Division Program www.redbluffdailynews.com See Inside RED BLUFF Beer Nuts SPORTS 1B Sunny 107/67 Weather forecast 8B DAILYNEWS TEHAMACOUNTY DAILY 50¢ T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U N T Y S I N C E 1 8 8 5 County faces $3 million in budget cuts By TANG LOR DN Staff Writer Tehama County Supervisors were presented with the final 2010-2011 budget Monday. As predicted in the prelimi- nary budget, which was adopted in June, funding for non-public safety departments will be reduced by 13 percent and for public safety departments by 9.5 percent compared to 2008- 2009 levels. In all, about $3 million has been cut from the county bud- get since fiscal year 2008-2009. The supervisors have been proactive in implementing phased budget cuts since then, which has diminished the mag- nitude of the cuts and created ‘The final budget, as presented, is balanced and represents a stable financial plan for the 2010-11 fiscal year’ Chief Administrator Bill Goodwin Play ball flexibility in meeting upcoming challenges, Chief Administrator Bill Goodwin said. Without a state budget, a number of positions that are dependent on pending state funds are recommended to be cut, including two investigators See CUTS, page 7A DUI crash injures 5 An early morning crash Sunday on Antelope Boule- vard sent several people to the hospital including an 18- year-old Corning man who was flown to Mercy Medical Center in Redding. Officers were sent at 12:05 a.m. Sunday to reports of a colli- sion with injuries in the 300 block of Antelope Boulevard. Upon arrival, officers found a badly damaged gold Saturn with two people trapped inside. Mem- bers of Red Bluff Fire and Cal- Fire responded and used the Jaws of Life to free the two pas- sengers. Puckett See DUI, page 7A Kauffman Bldg tops Corning agenda Daily News photo by Tang Lor Students at Antelope Elementary School enjoy the new ball wall that was built using funds donated by the Booster Club. By TANG LOR DN Staff Writer Bouncing back from summer vacation has been a lot easier for students who are enjoying their new ball wall at Antelope Elementary School. After years of planning and fundraising, the Booster Club got the ball wall up just in time for stu- dents’ return to school. A ribbon cutting ceremony was held Wednes- day, following the first day of school. In between yells of “heads up” and mad dashes for balls flying over the wall students said they are real- ly enjoying the new playground equipment. Playing games around the wall is something that they look forward to at lunch time said a group of fourth grade girls. “Oh yeah, it’s really fun because there’s a whole bunch of games we can play,” Rebeka Valdonos said. “We were excited when we saw the wall.” The concrete structure, costing around $30,000, took the Booster Club more than 7 years to put up, said club publicist Tiffany Keffer. The culmination of this project is really important because there are parents who started work on the project who are no longer part of the district. Even though their chil- dren have grown up and they have moved on, they will be glad to see the parents who came after were able to move the project forward and finish something they started, she said. Keffer, whose oldest child is only a third-grader, was not part of the original group of parents who started the project, but she said she believes parents chose the ball wall after looking at other local schools who have ball walls and realized students at Antelope should have one of their own. “It’s just so exciting because we raised all this money and we fin- ished the project,” she said. “It’s cool that the kids will now get to use it. This will be a positive thing for the kids.” ——— Tang Lor can be reached at 527- 2153, Ext. 110 or by e-mail at tlor@redbluffdailynews.com. By JULIE ZEEB DN Staff Writer CORNING — The City Council will receive an update on the Kauff- man Building, 1302-1310 Solano St., which had a notice of dangerous build- ing mailed on Friday. The building and an offer to let the city buy it for $1 were discussed at length at a special meet- ing Aug. 17 during which the council deadlocked in a 2-2 vote. According to staff reports, three interested general contractors have looked at the building to consider taking ownership to either restore or demol- ish it. Of those, at least one has been in discussion with the owner and one has withdrawn interest. The interested contrac- tor has submitted a plan to the city in which he would like to stabilized the street facing wall and remove the dangerous second floor. Staff recommendations show that if the interested contractor obtains owner- ship of the building the city should continue to watch the progress. If the contractor should not act to take ownership, recom- mendations are for the council to accept the $1 offer to buy the building, provided it is free of liens. The council is being asked to request autho- rization for recording a second lien on the Olive Towne Terrace Apartment Homes, formerly known See BLDG, page 7A Gerber budget Chamber reports steps forward includes meters By TANG LOR DN Staff Writer By JULIE ZEEB DN Staff Writer GERBER — The Ger- ber-Las Flores Communi- ty Service District approved its 2010-2011 budget and discussed seeking to do its audit every other year at Thurs- day’s meeting. “Realistically, we’ve done quite well,” said District Manager Mike Murphy. “We are starting to set up our reserves. We’re in good shape with good, solid revenues.” The board approved Murphy’s request to go before the Tehama Coun- ty Board of Supervisors to ask about having its annu- al audit done every other year. Also discussed was AB 1881, a bill dealing with water management that says there must be a 20 percent reduction of water usage — compared to a baseline to be set in July 2011 — by 2020. Murphy said Gerber- Las Flores’ rate structure encourages conservation and therefore AB 1881 should not be a problem for the district. The district approved putting out bid requests for replacing water meters, which have “just about used up their life expectancy,” said Board Chairman Larry Long. The meters will have the capability of taking readings that will allow the district office to pull up a 30-day running report for customers that will show what time of day water has been used. “The report will show if there’s been a spike in usage, which people can then look into,” Long 7 5 8 5 5 1 6 9 0 0 1 9 See GERBER, page 7A From a boost in membership to an over- haul of its website, the Red Bluff-Tehama County Chamber of Commerce is improv- ing. In May, chamber executives, some of its members and a handful of community represen- tatives, including city officials, participated in a strategic advance that laid out the purpose of the chamber and were it wants to go. On Tuesday, mem- bers of the chamber’s board of directors updated the Red Bluff City Council on the plans. During the strategic advance chamber direc- tors identified four core competencies the cham- ber should focus on, President Kristin Behrens said. The chamber will focus on membership, group cohesion, branding and communication. The chamber has had a histo- ry of lacklus- ter member- ship and stag- nant growth, but a plan to launch an ambassador committee should result in more membership, said Caren Svejda, a chamber vice president. Already the numbers are growing. The chamber now has 346 members compared to 312 in March and has not lost any members since April. For its members, the chamber plans to pro- vide networking oppor- tunities and keep them politically informed, among other services, Svejda said. In the area of group cohesion the chamber has noticed there are a number of fragmented groups with overlapping or competing interests. The chamber wants to bring these groups together, said board member Bill Hill. There will be quicker results when every- one works together. Fractured efforts also are noticeable when it comes to marketing the area to outsiders, said board member Kathy Schmitz. “We don’t have a brand for this area,” Schmitz said. “There are different groups Schmitz, CEO of the Job Training Center, organized a recent pre- sentation that assessed the county through the eyes of visitors. After the assessment, developing a brand could take 6-9 months and other 5-7 years for the county to fully develop into the chosen brand, Schmitz said. In the meantime, short- term improvements to the downtown area and posting visitors’ infor- See STEPS, page 7A doing different things at different times. It’s a fractured effort.” COMPLETE AUTO REPAIR Smog Inspection $ 2995 + cert. (MOST CARS & PICK-UPS) Pass or FREE retest 195 S. Main St. Red Bluff 530 527-9841 ARTHRITIS, AND POST SURGERY. DR. 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