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DECEMBER 28-29 2013 WEEKEND Breaking news at: www.redbluffdailynews.com Lack of Rainfall Ag Page — 6A DAILY NEWS RED BLUFF Sunny 68/37 Weather forecast 10B TEHAMA COUNTY $1.00 T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U NTY S I N C E 1 8 8 5 For divided Congress, water projects are a unifier WASHINGTON (AP) — Big multimillion-dollar water projects, once a favorite target of good-government reformers who made them a poster child of political pork, are back in vogue as a rare force of concord in a dysfunctional Congress. Republicans and Democrats who found little common ground in 2013 are rallying around a bill they hope to pass early next year authorizing up to $12.5 billion over the next decade for flood diversion in North Dakota, widening a Texas-Louisiana waterway, deepening Georgia's rapidly growing Port of Savannah and other projects. That's the Senate bill's total. The House version would cost about $8.2 billion. Negotiators are confident they can merge the two and pass the package for President Barack Obama's signature early in 2014. Unlike a farm policy-food stamp bill also the subject of ongoing House-Senate negotia- 'The important thing is that we all care about reform' — Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa. tions, the differences in the two houses' water project bills are modest and the acrimony is less. Negotiators say the roughly $4 billion gap between the two bills is more about how they are written than substantive policy or political differences. ''The important thing is that we all care about reform,'' said Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., chairman of the House Transporta- Society offers helping hand By RICH GREENE DN Staff Writer The Tehama County Society for Crippled Children and Adults helped 56 local families in 2013, spending close to $5,000. The organization looks to provide immediate help to fill the gaps between public agencies and private insurance when people have nowhere else to turn. It assists families with transportation costs to medical treatment centers, lodging and food while away from home, prescriptions, eyeglasses, baby food, tires and supplies. The illnesses people needing assistance had in 2013 included cystic fibrosis, leukemia, heart disease, cancer, cerebral palsy, seizures and birth defects in children. This year's Theme Child was Ali Ben Lanes, a 2-year-old Corning boy who was diagnosed with Peter's Plus Syndrome 12 days after he was born with completely white eyes. Ben Lanes, who is especially small for his age, also showed signs of atrial and ventricular septal defects of the heart, glaucoma and blindness. His parents, Anis and Elizabeth, said without the assistance of the Society they did not know how they would have managed to keep up with the constant medical trips they had to make to the University of California, Davis Medical Center. The family had to take See HAND, page 9A tion and Infrastructure Committee. Shuster's Senate counterpart, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., has said much the same thing. The last time Congress enacted a water projects bill was 2007, and it took two-thirds majorities in both houses to override President George W. Bush's veto of it. Negotiators held their first formal meeting just before See WATER, page 9A Inmates to learn woodworking By ANDRE BYIK DN Staff Writer Photo courtesy of Studio 530 Photography Ali Ben Lanes, a 2-year-old Corning boy, was born with eye and heart defects. His family's burden from constant medical trips was eased by the help of the Tehama County Society for Crippled Children and Adults. Tehama County in the new year will add woodworking to its stable of inmate rehabilitation programs that have stemmed from state prison realignment. At a Dec. 17 Tehama County Board of Supervisors meeting, Chief Probation Officer Richard Muench presented a plan that will convert a Red Bluff cabinetry shop into a woodworking training program for offenders on supervised release. "What this is is another AB 109 funded initiative," Muench told the board. As a result of Assembly Bill 109 — the state prison realignment bill — low-level offenders who would have gone to state prison instead are sentenced to county jail or supervised release. As jail populations increased because of the change in the law, counties have created programs that put inmates to work, freeing up space at their jails and cutting costs. Muench said the woodworking shop, which will train eight to 10 offenders at any given time, will attempt to replicate the success of the Tehama County Sheriff's Department's automobile repair shop that opened in July 2012. The California State Association of Counties in November praised Tehama County for its inmate auto shop, and it presented the 2013 Challenge Award to county chairman Dennis Garton and Sheriff Dave Hencratt. The woodworking plan was lauded by the board as another example of outside-the-box thinking to alleviate jail overcrowding. The board approved two-year agreements, which include leasing and instruction costs, that will total about $160,000. The county will enter agreements with Mike Shaffer, who ran Shaffer Cabinets on Baker Road, for instruction and the leasing of his warehouse. Muench said Shaffer was "about ready to close down his shop." The agreements are effective from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2015. Chairman Garton stressed that the woodworking program should not be construed as the county entering the private sector to compete and make money. Any materials produced will not be made available to the public. Materials can only be used by the county, schools and nonprofits. "The county is not going into private business to compete," Garton said. Garton added Shaffer's name will come down from signage at the shop's location to make a point of that idea. Health insurance enrollees urged to make payments SACRAMENTO (AP) — With its first major deadline in the past, California's health insurance exchange is urging the thousands of people who enrolled for coverage to take the next step and pay for it. Premiums are due by Jan. 6 for policies starting in the new year. Those who missed the cutoff will have three months to get coverage before a tax penalty kicks in under the federal health insurance reforms. It's important for people to realize that their policies will not take effect simply because they enrolled for coverage, said Anne Gonzales, a spokeswoman for Covered California, the agency running the state's health exchange. ''They have to submit their payments,'' she said. The latest tally from Covered California, released Friday, shows 428,000 people have signed up for an insurance plan since open enrollment under the federal Affordable Care Act began in October. That number might have been higher, if not for technical problems on the Covered California website and jammed phone lines at the agency's three call centers throughout the state. The exchange was overwhelmed with demand as Monday's deadline loomed and people rushed to get coverage starting in the new year. Between Dec. 20 and Dec. 23, 103,000 people enrolled, Gonzales said. That compares to the roughly 31,000 people who signed up during all of October. The problems people were having in completing their applications on Monday led Covered California to modify the signup period for certain people. Executive Director Peter Lee said anyone who showed a ''good faith'' effort to start an application before the Monday deadline would have until the end of the week to complete it. That grace period was to end at 8 p.m. Friday. Some of about 19,000 paper applications that were caught in a backlog are still being processed, but all of them should be entered into the agency's computer system by the end of the weekend, Gon- zales said. The comment section of Covered California's Facebook page was filled with people who were still See HEALTH, page 9A The Daily News office will CLOSE AT NOON Tuesday, Dec. 24 & Tuesday, Dec. 31 CLOSED: Christmas Day, Wednesday, Dec. 25 CLOSED: New Years Day, Wednesday, Jan. 1 Retail advertising deadline for these editions is Monday, 10AM Classified deadline Tuesday, 11AM DAILY NEWS RED BLUFF TEHAMA COUNTY 527-2151 • FAX 527-3719 545 DIAMOND AVE., RED BLUFF