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TUESDAY AUGUST 9, 2011 Breaking news at: www.redbluffdailynews.com Back to school See Inside American Profile RED BLUFF Red Bluff vs Utah KBLF 1490 Today 4:30 p.m. Sunny 96/64 Weather forecast 8B By PAUL WISEMAN AP Economics Writer The stock market buckled Monday under the weight of a crisis in Europe and danger of recession at home. Reeling from a downgrade of American debt, the Dow Jones industrials plunged 634 points. It was the worst day for the market since the financial crisis in the fall of 2008 and extended Wall Street’s sudden, sharp decline. Stocks have lost 15 percent of their value in just two and a half weeks. Monday was the first trading day since Standard and Poor’s 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 Stocks plunge worldwide — Dow’s 6th-worst loss downgraded the United States’ risk-free credit rating, and the selling started at the opening bell. The Dow dropped 250 points in minutes. For the rest of the day, investors looked for safer places for their money. With few buyers left for stocks, the market could only drift lower. The Dow finished the day down 5.5 percent. The point decline was the worst since Dec. 1, 2008, and the sixth- steepest ever. The average ended at 10,809.85, its first close under 11,000 since November. In a bit of irony following the ‘‘The S&P downgrade of U.S. government debt is the least of our problems. The bigger worry is subpar economic growth and the threat of a new recession.’’ — economist Scott Brown at Raymond James & Associates S&P downgrade, investors decided U.S. debt was one of the safest places to be. They also sought refuge in gold, which set a record price. ‘‘The S&P downgrade of U.S. government debt is the least of our problems,’’ economist Scott Brown at Ray- mond James & Associates. ‘‘The bigger worry is subpar said economic growth and the threat of a new recession.’’ Economists at Goldman Sachs peg the chances of anoth- er recession at one in three, most likely in the next six to nine months. The threat was barely talked about earlier this summer. The U.S. economy grew at a feeble 0.8 percent annual pace Traditional blessing the first half of 2011, its slowest since the end of the Great Recession in June 2009. Manu- facturing and consumer spend- ing have slowed dramatically. Oil prices plunged 6 percent to the lowest price of the year Monday — $81.31 a barrel. Investors predict a weakening See STOCKS, page 8B Pot operation releases stats By JULIE ZEEB DN Staff Writer Statistics from Operation Full Court Press, a marijuana raid that took place in six counties in the Mendocino Nation- al Forest from mid July to the first week of August, contin- ue to be reported. As of Monday, the total operational statistics following the end of the second phase were reported in a release by the Glenn County Sheriff’s Office as follows: There have been 632,058 marijuana plants eradicated at 86 sites, among which 392 indoor plants have been counted. The operation has resulted in 150 arrests and 10 warrants served in the first phase. The second phase saw 132 arrested. Of those arrested, 118 persons were booked on various fed- eral and state charges to include marijuana, firearm, and immigration violations. In addition, there were 14 foreign nationals detained on administrative immigration violations. They will be processed for removal from the United States. During the operation there were 1,986 pounds of processed marijuana found. Other drugs found include one gram of methamphetamine, 22 Xanax pills and two grams of hashish. Daily News photo by Tang Lor Monks from the Abbey of the New Clairvaux chant as they start the fifth annual Bless- ing of the Grapes ceremony Friday at the New Clairvaux Vineyard in Vina. The celebra- tion is a long-standing tradition that gives thanks for the harvest and blesses the vine- yard and those involved in the winemaking. Hundreds attended the ceremony, which was followed by a wine tasting that included the debut of the vineyard’s red table wine. The winery’s tasting room is open daily from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. with complimentary tast- ings. Visit www.newclairvauxvineyard.com for information. There have been 38 weapons seized along with $28,031 in cash and about 20 vehicles impounded. There have been 32 sites reclaimed with more than 51,404 pounds of trash including 64 propane tanks, 210 cargo nets for a total of 18 trash dumps. About 40 miles of irrigation line were taken out. Also collected were 5,459 pounds of fertilizer, 149 pounds of pesticides and 95.5 pounds of rodenticides. There were 14 man-made dams located and 39 man-made reser- voirs. The three-week multi-agency marijuana raid took place in Colusa, Glenn, Lake, Mendocino, Tehama and Trinity counties and targeted large scale, illegal marijuana grows in See POT, page 7A City to hold user fees at current rates By TANG LOR DN Staff Writer Prices and fees for city services will not go up despite an increase in the cost for the city to do business. The Red Bluff City Council decided to postpone fee increases despite the consumer price index for urban consumers showing the cost of services having gone up by 3.23 percent from a year ago based on numbers by the Bureau of Labor Statis- tics at the end of December 2010. The council has not raised user fees for the past two years despite inflation. If the council were to, in the future, recoup its entire costs based on the inflation rates between 2008 and 2010, it would have to raise fees by about 9 percent. Councilman Wayne Brown said he is against any fee increases at this time, but was concerned about the back log being created by delay- ing increases. “No one wants any increases now, but what’s going to happen if we get so far behind,” Brown said. “I don’t know what to do here. I’m not in favor of an increase, but if we leave it, it’s going to creep up.” The majority of the council agreed with Brown and were against raising fees at a time when people are strug- gling during an eco- nomic recovery. Only councilwoman Daniele Jackson voted against postponing the fee increases. Mayor Bob Carrel, a retired business man whose family owns the long existing business Bud’s Jolly Kone, com- pared the dilemma to running a business. “Just because the CPI-U goes up, I don’t want to increase prices,” Carrel said. “In the true business world, if your costs go up, you have to consider do you pass it on to the con- sumer.” 7 5 8 5 5 1 6 9 0 0 1 9 Some city staff want- “In the true business world, if your costs go up, you have to consider do you pass it on to the consumer.” — Mayor Bob Carrel ed the council to con- sider the impacts of not implementing fee increases, saying by not increasing the fee, the city is failing to recu- perate the costs associ- ated with employees performing the tasks. Police Chief Paul Nanfito said, for exam- ple, if it costs a police officer $150 to impound the car of a drunken dri- ver but the city only charges a recovery fee of $46, then taxpayers are subsidizing the remainder of the cost. “The fees are there to recover the costs for doing business,” Nanfi- to said. Also, in regards to specifically the car recovery fee, a 9 per- cent fee increase is rela- tively small compared to other cities. Even with the increase, the overall cost of recover- ing a car is less than what surrounding cities are charging for the COMPLETE AUTO REPAIR Smog Inspection $ 2595 + cert. (MOST CARS & PICK-UPS) Pass or FREE retest 195 S. Main St. Red Bluff 530 527-9841 ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR 2011/2012 SCHOOL YEAR FREE Public school with small classes (15 students avg. per class) SAFE, CARING learning community for GRADES 6-12 1660 Monroe St., Red Bluff CA. or Call: 530-529-1650 for an application or visit us on the web at: www.discoverycharterschool.org Established August, 2001, WASC accredited Visit us at same service, he said. Rob Schmid said in the case where a drunk- en driver is breaking the law, the offender should have to pay a higher fee, but for other fees, such as sewer, people are already paying fees and being taxed on their monthly service charges. Public Works Direc- tor Bruce Henz said fees are used to support infrastructure and main- tenance of the sewer system. The system continues to be used and deprecated even if higher fees are not being collected. The city eventually will run out of money to keep up with maintain- ing the system if fees are not collected at the appropriate rate at which the service is being used and main- tained, he said. Planning Director Scot Timboe suggested the council revisit a time and motion study that was conducted a few years ago to help establish user fee rates. The council can use the information from that study to decide if the rates should be increased and by how much. While inflation rates are calculated monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the city usual does an annual review of user fee rates. A review of the fees prob- ably will not be dis- cussed again until next year. But in the mean- time, the council will most likely review the time and motion study. ——— Tang Lor can be reached at 527-2153, Ext.110 or by e- mail at tlor@redbluffdai- lynews.com.