Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/44320
Monday, October 10, 2011 – Daily News 7A SPREE Continued from page 1A was represented at tables throughout the event. Jessica Espinoza of Gerber, a certified nurse's assistant at Enloe Medical Center in Chico, came to the fair with her family. Interested as both a health professional and a parent, she was impressed with all the fair had to offer, she said. Her 3-year- old daughter Jennifer got a mini cast put on her wrist as a demonstration by the FAIRE Continued from page 1A "The Calico Faire is not our biggest money maker, but it is a fun, free community event," Gray said. They continue to put it on for the children and the families, she said. The children look forward to helping out with booths, getting to know people and participat- ing in all the fun games and activities. This year, some of the highlights included many youth performances, such as the opening with the national anthem by two local girls, Gray said. There were also a series of contests, such as the pumpkin bake-off, in which all recipes had to incorpo- rate pumpkin as an ingredient, and the second annual fun run in the morning. Children also lined up mid-day for a costume con- test. First place winners were Tessa Long for the 4 and younger, Chloe Gray for the 5 to 6 year olds, and Paige Gonczeruk for the 7 to 14 year olds. Long, a 9-month-old girl from Red Bluff, was none to happy to keep inside her costume. She was a purple polka dot crock pot, an outfit make by her grandpar- ents. Her parents, Lucius Long and Hidie Herren, along with her grandmother Janie Marino, were tickled about her winning. The costume developed as a family project, Lucius Long said. He calls her chubby little legs ham hocks, and the idea of "eating her up" led to the idea of putting her in a crock pot, he said. Chloe Gray, daughter of Kristin and Joey Gray, won as a bee in her division. For the oldest group of winners, a brother and sister took home the top two prizes. Paige Gonczeruk and her brother Aiden won first and second place. Paige was a purple and black witch while Aiden was a robber in all black. The two Sacred Heart students brought their prizes, a backpack and another bag both full of prizes, back to their mother in one of the game booths. Mother Amy Gonczeruk was one of many parents helping organize and work during the faire. Each class- room was responsible for a booth. The Calico Faire is one of several events throughout the year put on by the Sacred Heart Parish School. The parent volunteer group organizes the fundraisers to try to raise at least $70,000 a year to offset the costs of tuition, Gray said. With the event growing more every year, Gray hopes the tradition will continue. AID Continued from page 1A in the country. ''It is absolutely, fun- damentally wrong and unfair and it is an insult to people who have worked and played by the rules, including those who have come to this country legally,'' he said. Ginny Rapini, coordi- nator for the NorCal Tea Party Patriots, said there should be consequences for illegal immigrants and giving them an edu- cation funded by Califor- nia taxpayers isn't fair to the legal residents who can't afford to pay for their own tuition. ''What part of illegal do we not get? When people come here illegal- ly they need to come here with the same rules and regulations that other people came here with,'' Rapini said. Supporters argue that children whose were brought to the U.S. ille- gally by their parents shouldn't be punished. Cedillo said the legis- lation will make Califor- nia more competitive in the global economy by educating a workforce that has already shown resilience and leadership. Bad immigration policy has been hurting the economy, he said. Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said the bill ''invests in the dreams of talented undocumented students and in the economic future of our state.'' The state Department of Finance estimates that 1 percent of all Cal Grant funds, the state student financial aid program, will be affected by the legislative package when it goes into effect in Jan- uary 2013. The depart- ment says that 2,500 stu- dents would qualify for aid under the bill and estimates the costs to equal $14.5 million of a $1.4 billion program. In Calif., no more tanning beds for under-18 crowd SACRAMENTO (AP) — California has become the first state to make it illegal for teenagers under 18 to use tanning beds. Gov. Jerry Brown said Sunday that he has signed SB746 into law. It goes into effect Jan. 1. Currently, children 14 and under cannot use tanning beds in California. Children ages 15-17 can tan with their parents' permission. The bill's author, state Sen. Ted Lieu, says California is the first state to set a higher age limit. Texas has the next highest age limit, ban- ning tanning bed use by teenagers under 16. Lieu says 30 other states also have some age restrictions on the use. The Torrance Democrat from says Illinois, New York, Ohio and Rhode Island have consid- ered similar bans but had yet to enact them. emergency services of St. Elizabeth Community Hospital. The Latino Outreach of Tehama County offered a game and prizes for chil- dren. The booth promoted their free multi-cultural health fair scheduled for Oct. 29 at the Carlinos Event Center at Rolling Hills Casino. The health fair also complemented the farmer's market hosted during the morning out- side the event buildings. Next year, the committee hopes to partner with them more, Smith said. ART Continued from page 1A of Show winner received $100. Sponsors of the event included the Red Bluff Art Association, Sacred Heart Parish School, the Tehama County Arts Council, The Big Picture Gallery and Gifts, Discover Earth, Mike and Louise Stovich, Norm's Printing, Philbrick Family Trust, Plum Crazy Hair Design and Boutique, Prairie Rose Boutique and Skin Care, and Wink Fashion and Salon. A volunteer of the Tehama County Photo Club took pictures of the 100 Continued from page 1A By the time of the statewide election on Oct. 10, 1911, voter discontent had reached a crescendo, with Californians feeling frustrated and disenfran- chised. Stories of political cor- ruption and bribery trials of corporate executives and labor leaders were fixtures of the newspapers. The Southern Pacific Railroad controlled nearly every lever of power in California, including many of the state's largest newspapers that were beholden to its advertising revenue. Lawmakers rode the rails for free and dined on the company's dime. Hiram Johnson, an upstart lawyer who had tried to elicit change from outside the halls of power, seized the moment. In his 1910 cam- paign for governor, he promised to end the tyranny of robber baron railroad offi- cials and return power to the masses. ''Nearly every govern- mental problem involving the health, the happiness or the prosperity of the state has arisen because some private interest has intervened or has sought for its own gain to exploit either the resources or the politics of the state,'' Johnson decried in his first inaugural address in 1911. ''The first duty that is mine to perform is to eliminate every private interest from the government, and to make the public service of the state solely responsible to the people.'' The new governor and a slate of lawmakers in what came to be known as the Progressive Era put direct democracy on the ballot that year. On Oct. 10, voters approved the most expansive initiative and recall powers in the nation during a special statewide election that fea- tured 23 ballot measures, including one that gave women the right to vote, nine years before that right was enshrined in the Consti- tution. The movement had not begun in California. South Dakota become the first state to adopt the initiative process, in 1898, and nine other states adopted it before California voters did. In 1903, Los Angeles became the first California city to allow ballot initiatives. In the years since, howev- er, no state has come to embody direct democracy like California, where the initiative process has become like a fourth branch of government. Voters are wary of any efforts to change a system that is widely regarded as useful, even if it's imperfect. ''There's a strong belief that voters and the initiative process are better at making public policy than the gover- nor or the Legislature,'' said Mark Baldassare, president of the Public Policy Institute of California, which has found support for maintain- ing direct democracy since it began polling on the issue in the 1990s. The people see it as a ''flawed but necessary'' process, he said. The 1911 special election ballot carried 23 proposi- tions, including questions about judicial powers, public utilities and railroad regula- tory authority. Many of those topics would go before winners with their prizes and artwork which was framed and matted by The Big Picture Gallery and Gifts. The Red Bluff Art Association judged the art for originality, creativity and interpretation of theme. The winners were: Division I - grades K-2 – First – Ben Penner of Reeds Creek School; Sec- ond – Aston Farorre of Gerber Elementary School; and Third – Madi- son Reynolds of Gerber Elementary School. Division II – grades 3-5 – First – Chloe King of Lincoln Street School; Second – Lily Hewitt of Lincoln Street School; and voters again and again in the coming decades. The voters proved them- selves wise students, at least on the first ballot. After studying the large broad- sheet newspapers that print- ed the legal text of the 23 measures in tiny, eye-strain- ing type, Californians approved all but one — a measure that would have allowed the Southern Pacific to continue giving travel tickets to elected officials. Almost immediately, direct democracy became a means of going around unin- terested or unwilling law- makers. Women had been lobbying the California Leg- islature for voting rights since 1879; the people grant- ed them in their first referen- dum. But a system designed to ''supplement the work of the Legislature when it failed or refused to act,'' quickly became like another branch of government, at times as flawed as the others, accord- ing to Democracy by Initia- tive, a review of the process by the Los Angeles-based Center for Governmental Studies. Many activists tried repeatedly to get their priori- ties approved by voters, no matter how many times they had been rejected. Voters considered and rejected pro- hibition in 1914, 1916, 1918 and 1920. Measures relating to the prohibition or regula- tion of alcohol were on the ballot at least 11 times through 1948. Supporters of legalizing marijuana have been trying to do that through initiatives since 1972. Despite the reforms' overwhelming popularity with voters, many newspa- pers opposed them. In an editorial, the New York Third – Kristie Baldwin of Antelope Elementary School. Division III – grades 6- 8 – First – Jalline Salazar of Maywood Middle School; Second – Tanner Vanworth of Vista Middle School; and Third – Krys- tel Memonus of Vista Middle School. Division IV – grades 9- 12 – First – Gina Con- sentino of Red Bluff Union High School; Sec- ond – Marly Adams of Corning Union High School; and Third – Ella Fleet of Mercy High School. The Division IV win- ner, Gina Consentino, also won the Best of Show award. Consentino's paint- Times criticized the newly born political process in terms that resonate a century later. ''The new method is pro- posed as a check on the machines. But the strength of the machines lies in the inattention and indifference of the voters,'' the Times warned in a piece headlined ''Anti-Democracy in Cali- fornia.'' ''When the machine managers get familiar with the working of the new method, they will work it for their own ends far more readily than they would the present method.'' That warning has come to pass in recent decades, as a process that was intended to curb the influence of spe- cial interests has evolved into a tool for corporations and wealthy individuals to enact changes they desire. ''Hiram Johnson intend- ed this as a vehicle for every- day Californians to effect change in California, and it has become a way for fewer everyday Californians to participate and more and more moneyed interests from outside California to impact our state,'' said Carl Guardino, president of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group and a member of Cal- ifornia Forward, one of two prominent government reform groups. As ubiquitous as ballot measure campaigns seem to be, of the 1,657 initiatives titled and summarized for circulation from 1911 to 2010, just 348 — or 21 per- cent — made the ballot. Of those, voters approved 116, or one-third. Since the first ones in 1911, 47 referendums to repeal a law have been on the ballot, with 19 passing. There have been just five ing featured a purple and blue space scene with a man on the horizon toss- ing up a small child in the bottom left of the canvas. The winning entries will be on display at The Big Picture Gallery and Gifts, 857 Washington St., in Red Bluff, from Oct. 11 to Nov. 5. Then, they will be displayed at the student art gallery inside the Tehama County Depart- ment of Education, 1135 Lincoln St., through the end of November. The artwork will also be presented at various local events until April 2012. For more information go to www.tehamaarts.org. successful recalls in 100 years. Most famously, Cali- fornia voters ousted Democ- ratic Gov. Gray Davis in 2003 and replaced him with bodybuilder-turned Holly- wood star Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republi- can, drawing national atten- tion and some derision for California's political process. The initiative process also has allowed California voters to make far-reaching decisions about state spend- ing. That includes limiting the amount property taxes can increase through Propo- sition 13 and guaranteeing that schools will receive a large part of the state budget through Proposition 98. Since television became the preferred method of cam- paigning in California, costs have climbed dramatically. Just gathering signatures to qualify an initiative for the ballot costs about $3 million. Spending on initiative cam- paigns has risen by 750 per- cent during the last 30 years, even accounting for inflation, according to the Center for Governmental Studies. For those with enough money to qualify initiatives and launch ad campaigns, there is little incentive to change the system. Two bipartisan groups, California Forward and Think Long California, have emerged in recent years to seek govern- ment reforms, including an overhaul of the initiative, ref- erendum and recall process. ''The political-industrial complex, the people who have the power, they don't want to give it up. They want to be able to write the check for $10 million or $20 mil- lion and get a law they want,'' said former Assem- bly Speaker Bob Hertzberg, a Democrat and member of both groups.