Visalia Times-Delta from Visalia, California • 15

I City Editor: Jim Houck 735 3276 VisaliaTimes Delta wwwVisaliaTimesDeltacom INSIDE State Hispanic to lead UC Riverside campus4C Deaths2C Classified4C A WEDNESDAY I I II A I April 10 2002 jV kJ JL 1 i IN BRIE Visalia runs short of day care children growth State subsidies go unused Houston Goshen progress seen Accused Hanford priest pleads innocent Staff reports ive more quarterly progress reports will be given on Goshen and Houston elementary schools Students are tak ing standardized tests signed in January the schools must report every three months on their efforts to improve their Standardized Testing and Reporting scores Parenting classes at Goshen Elementary School lowed a state audit because of poor test scores are seeing good results so said Doug Bartsch an area adminis trator for the school dis trict As part of the agreement According to a report in Hanford Sen tinel Hart confirmed after the court hearing that the teen ager accepted a ord Mustang from lores at the time she worked for him in Hanford Hart also revealed that a Hanford woman will testi fy that she ended a rela tionship with the priest are one step being taken to improve the test scores Homework support has also been added to the curriculum are also turn ing in lesson Bartsch said The practice of turning in lesson plans has helped classes improve according to Houston Principal Pam Merkel teachers have told me changed the way the plan their Merkel said a good the Visalia YMCA said a sliding scale is used to determine the costs based on family income and the number of children in the home example a family with three children that earns $30000 a year would pay less than $8 a day for all three she said Subsidy rates run approximately $350 a day for full time Care for the first child then drop to $175 a day or lower for subsequent children Staff and wire reports HANORD A Roman Catholic priest accused of raping a 16 year old girl pleaded innocent Tuesday Additional rape charges have also been filed against the Rev Miguel lores 34 according to Kings County District Attorney Patrick Hart lores now faces three Information Contact the Visalia YMCA's enrollment office at 627 0700 to find out if you qualify for subsidized child care next Tulare County supervi sors are expected to form a steering committee in two weeks that will devel op a process by which the General Plan will be updat ed including getting public input Man wanted in Arkansas killing seized An Arkansas murder suspect was arrested by deputies in Tipton Tues day morning the Tulare County Depart ment reported The arrest happened about five days after deputies based at the Pixley sub station received word that Daniel Anthony Bal lard was in the area Ballard 40 is wanted by authorities in Craw ford County Ark on sus picion of two counts of murder Before he was arrested deputies were watching a home in Tipton at which Ballard was reportedly staying He was arrested with out resistance in Tipton when he left the home in a maroon Cadillac authorities said He was taken to the Tulare County Main Jail to await extradition pro ceedings The subsidy money is generally available to chil dren in a wide variety of circumstances including those in foster care child welfare services children whose parents are enrolled in job training courses or job searches and even those whose families for medical rea sons cannot care for a child at home It helps low income families who are working in job train ing or going to school and it helps families of chil dren who are develop mentally or physically dis abled Clark said the only fam ilies who qualify are essentially those whose children stay home and just want to pay for occa sional child care The problem Clark said is that many families Gasoline truck scale gear stolen Somebody stole 25 gal lons of gasoline and a dig ital readout monitor for a truck scale from the Tip ton area the Tulare County Depart ment reported Tuesday The theft which hap pened between Sunday evening and Monday morning cost the owner an estimated $538 The theft occured at the Dairy 15625 Avenue 144 in Tipton it progressed into anything He said no one else has surfaced to claim having a relationship with lores lores has been a Catholic priest for seven years and had worked at the Hanford church for one month police said lores has been released on $70000 bond Electronic gear stolen from school Someone broke into El bow Elementary School in Ivanhoe over the week end and stole nine laptop computers a digital cam era and a clock radio a teacher reported to the Tulare County Department The electronics valuec at a combined $21267 were taken from a lockec cabinet and a desk at the school located at 31411 Road 160 The laptop computers are valued at $2299 each the camera is valued at $536 and the clock radio which also plays compact discs is valued at $40 Visalia Unified Schoo District area administra tor Doug Bartsch saic there were no visible signs of forced entry into the building other than the prying open of the cabinet assume they earn too much to qualify for subsi dized care no one thinks they she said Michele Morrow was one of those people who as a single parent was being pinched by child care costs until she was encouraged to apply for assistance Both of her children a kindergartner and a fifth grader attend ed Veva Blunt Elementary School a YMCA child care site requested an applica tion and was elated to dis cover that I did indeed qualify for subsidized funding she said I not made that call and completed the application process I know what I would have SeeYMCA3C By Melinda Morales Times Delta or the first time the Visalia child care program have enough children And state grant money that helps pay for child care will go unused if par ents take advantage of it Brandi Clark youth and family services director of the Visalia YMCA said the centers can take in as many as 200 more chil dren with the money available The Visalia YMCA received an influx of mon ey late last year from the California Department of Child Devel opment Division that has to be completely dis tributed The child care program exhausted its money in April 1 The YMCA used money from other funds to keep the child care programs run ning Clark applied for and received a new grant worth more than $330000 came in but not until Clark said now sitting on a ull fee child care at the YMCA and its school based sites runs $330 a month for full time care and $180 a month for part time care Part time child care typically consists of before and after school programs or families who cannot afford the full fee scale subsidy money can help offset the costs of care Rebecca Jennings pub lic relations director at Steve ujimotoTimes Delta Curtis Johnson 4 plays with a toy train during preschool day care activities at the Visalia YMCA By Shannon Darling Tinies Delta Visalia Unified School District trustees heard the first of what will be a series of presentations regarding the improvements at Goshen and Houston ele mentary schools during Tuesday board meeting It was the first progress report given to the board since the two schools entered into an improve ment agreement with the state Department of Educa tion The agreement fol Garage damage mystifies owner a mystery to Charles Drewry of Alpaugh how it happened All he knows is that he looked at his garage door after 2 am Tuesday and noticed it had been wrecked Drewry reported the incident to the Tulare County Depart ment saying he believed someone backed into his garage door The loss was estimated at $500 The department is investigating the incident as vandalism counts of rape two counts of witness intimidation and one charge of criminal threats for allegedly sexu ally assaulting a teen age girl Hart said The girl who was hired by lores to do clerical work told police the priest assaulted her eb 16 in his living quarters at Immacu late Heart of Mary Church Expert condenses three decades of past changes into report for board By Justin Stoner Times Delta Officials are preparing to update Tulare General Plan that will set the course for the next 20 years a period in which the population is expected to double The first step in the com prehensive update is already done Thirty worth of General Plan modifications and addi tions were pared down into a manageable document that planning consultant Stephen Peck said was more user friendly is a readable digest of all the applicable poli cies for the he said The next step is to form a steering committee made up of representatives of the Board of Supervisors the county Planning Commis sion the chief administra tive officer county counsel and the Resource Manage ment Agency to determine how when and what the update should include The board is expected to approve the makeup of the committee in two weeks Long range planning director George inney said the process of updat ing could take two years once that committee fig ures out how the update will occur General plans for cities and counties are made up of seven state mandated elements including land use traffic flow conserva tion open space noise housing and safety Tulare County has added a few elements of its own including the establish ment of urban boundaries for cities and unincorporat ed communities scenic highways water and liquid waste management flood control and airports Two areas of potential focus could be water and air concern now is over the transport of groundwater out of the inney said now there is no policy regarding The board has already committed to looking at ways to improve air quality through General Plan poli cies inney said which would be addressed in more detail during the update process Orosi man bled to death from wound The victim of gang related gunfire who died Sunday night bled to death the Tulare County Department reported Tuesday Jorge Lopez 20 of Orosi was killed after sev eral gang members approached him and began directing gang lin go at him Lt Dahl Cleek said Deputies have arrested six people in connection with the murder the sev enth in the county this year Cleek said there is no evidence linking Lopez to gang activity Health advocates claim indoor air can be 1000 times more dangerous By Jake Henshaw Times Delta Sacramento Bureau SACRAMENTO State regulation of air pollution would move indoors if bills that passed their first leg islative review Tuesday become law Right now state air regu lators have no real authori ty to regulate indoor air pollution according to Assembly Speaker Pro Tem red Keeley Boulder Creek the sponsor There any volun tary guidelines for interest ed school districts to fol low for their classrooms a specific target of campaign air quality frankly has been an area that has been unaddressed in the Keeley said Opponents questioned whether time for more regulation but Keeley and his supporters argued that it is overdue The advocates said this is a serious regulatory gap because indoor pollutants can be as much as 1000 times more dangerous to health than out side pollution because peo ple spend 87 percent of their time indoors Sources of indoor pollu tion include building mate rials furnishings glues coatings cleaning agents and even mold They emit gases and par Steve ujirnotoTimes Delta Preschoolers from left Elijah Salazar Daniel Suarez and Daniel Lozano all 4 check out live snails while attending the day care program at the Visalia YMCA The YMCA has more state money available for child care subsidies than it uses tides known to cause can cer heart and lung dis eases asthma attacks and eye irritations according to the legislative analysis of the bills The elderly the sick and children who actually inhale more air proportion ally than adults in relation to body weight and size are at particular risk is a very substan tial body of evidence that the current building codes and regulatory architecture as it relates to air quality in schools is inadequate to protect the health of chil dren who spend an enor mous amount of time in those Keeley said Keeley approaches the issue in two ways He wants to give the state Air Resources Board the power to regulate indoor air qual ity while setting up specific voluntary guidelines for school buildings Local school boards could decide whether to follow the voluntary school guidelines required by Assembly Bill 2223 but board members would have to make their decision in public what that will do is stimulate parents and teachers and others to put pressure on those school board frankly to say this seems like a pretty doggone good thing to do to have these kinds of Keeley said See Pollution3C 2 bills target pollution of air inside buildings County to plan future next Results should start to come in later this year Students will have another testing period before the end of the 18 month peri od dtfr I At' 1 I A Tlrfv IK II 4 I.