Community, Diversity, Sustainability and other Overused Words
Community, Diversity, Sustainability and other Overused Words
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Bruce Thomson was a beloved track and cross country coach and teacher. After graduating from Hamilton High School in 1978, Bruce taught for over 20 years at San Pedro High School. He suddenly collapsed during a workout on Tuesday, July 6, 2021, and died of uncertain causes. Below is an obituary written by a friend of his, Richard Greifinger. RIP Bruce Kinloch Thomson , 2/2/60 - 7/6/21 There are times when us mere mortal people realize that there are powers greater than us, and...
Courts & Rulings Thomas slams 'One-Size-Fits-All' immunity approach Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas used a college campus First Amendment case to sound off Friday about jurisprudence that affords school officials the same immunity give to police officers. "But why should university officers, who have time to make calculated choices about enacting or enforcing unconstitutional policies, receive the same protection as a police officer who makes a split-second decision to...
Courts & Rulings Judicial misconduct requires reversing murder conviction The Court of Appeal for this district on Friday reversed a conviction for second degree murder based on judicial misconduct on the part of then-Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Edmund Willcox Clarke Jr. It is a foregone conclusion that defendant Phillip Dorsett, convicted of a second-degree murder, will not be retried in light of Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón’s stated aversion to le...
Courts & Rulings Judge asked to boot Gascón's special assistant from case Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Brian C. Yep will be asked this morning to recuse a prosecutor who, according to a motion on behalf of the family of a murdered man, is a former deputy public defender who, after becoming a special assistant to District Attorney George Gascón, continues to fight for the interests of criminal defendants. The recusal is sought in a case where, at stake, is whether a man w...
Courts & Rulings Tentative ruling stops LA County's most ambitious justice reform measure A Los Angeles Superior Court judge has published a tentative ruling that it appears will stop the voter-approved Measure J from taking effect. The ruling does not address the intent of the measure, which was to divert hundreds of millions of dollars from the County's budget each year away from law enforcement activities, but instead focuses on an underlying authority of government issue,...
James Dean walked down the hallways of the History Building at Santa Monica High School in Rebel Without a Cause. Protestors at SamoHi last Saturday tried a last minute effort to save the building. The History building was originally constructed in 1913, but largely rebuilt as a WPA project in the 1930's. The building is undergoing asbestos abatement. Which means the contractor awarded the $200 million contract to replace the historic structure with a "state of the art Career...
A high school student from Santa Monica has been selected to participate in the 17th annual GRAMMY Camp program., operated by the GRAMMY Museum. Jaq Adelman will be among 81 talented high school students from 67 U.S. cities who will take part in the annual summer camp that will be held virtually from Tuesday, July 20 to Saturday, July 24. Adelman will focus his efforts on the Keyboard Instrument. All Time Low, Echosmith, and The War and Treaty will be this year's guest...
SamoHi's first 2021 graduation was on a gorgeous day, as California loosened its Covid restrictions. There are still many rules to follow for everyone's safety. We were all sent the guidelines ahead of the ceremony. The principal read the rules to us ahead of the ceremony, because it was only by complying with the county guidelines, were we able to have a graduation. People were asked not to congregate afterwards, and to keep their masks on. But I would say most family kept a...
The Santa Monica-Malibu(for now) School District seeking to demolish the art moderne History building in the center of the Samohi campus teaches the public an important civics lesson. Never vote in favor of school bond measures. You may have five children in the district - you still shouldn't vote for them. Here's why. School bond money cannot be used for the things your children actually need: more teachers, smaller class sizes, high-quality teaching staff. It can't even be...
May 18, 2021 - In the early hours of the morning on Monday, a man who was openly carrying a handgun in his waistband walked into the AM PM market at 3rd and Pico together with a woman companion. Police were alerted and arrived to detain the man as he exited the store. They successfully disarmed him and discovered he was a convicted felon. For most people, it is illegal to carry a firearm in California. It is an additional crime to carry a gun if you are an ex-felon. The woman...
More than half of the students in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District have returned to campus for in-person instruction and the percentage is increasing daily, school officials said on Monday. But SMMUSD parents have until this Friday, May 14, to finalize their decision about in-person or distance learning for their children for the rest of this school year, said Supt Ben Drati in an email to parents. "Following this date, parents will no longer be able to switch...
During the Covid-19 lockdown, at least one person noticed the increased workload on the delivery personnel, the drivers for Amazon, FedEx, UPS, and the post office. During the summer heat wave, Eileen Tennant-Grant was unable to watch the delivery workers come and go without feeling that something should be done to help them out. So Eileen took to keeping cold bottles of water in the refrigerator, which she handed out to every delivery person who came to the door. Using the...
Santa Monica and Malibu high schools are now among the top 150 high schools in California. Santa Monica was ranked 98 while Malibu placed 146 among more than 2600 public high schools in the Golden State, according to rankings by U.S. News and World Report. U.S. News rankings are determined by college readiness scores, based on demographics, state test scores and college prep exams. Both SMMUSD high schools ranked in the top 1,000 nationally. The publication surveyed more than...
The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District is preparing to sell $280 million of bonds for both Measure M (for Malibu Schools) and Measure SMS (for Santa Monica Schools) in the coming months, district officials announced this week. Projects to be funded for by these new bonds include multiple improvement projects at Santa Monica elementary and middle schools; Samohi Exploration and Gold Gym program; and the new administration / library / classroom building at Malibu High...
Courts & Rulings Reasonable jury could find officer liable for breaking woman's arm during arrest A District Court judge erred in granting summary judgment to a police officer who was sued by a woman on whom he applied such force in arresting her for trespassing as to break her arm, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held yesterday. The memorandum opinion reverses a Feb. 21, 2019 order by Judge William B. Shubb of the Eastern District of California awarding summary...
Students in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District won't be required to take the federal and state-mandated assessment tests this school year. But they will have to take local standardized tests that measure their literacy and numeracy skills, Supt. Ben Drati said this week. In a letter to parents, released on Wednesday, Drati said school districts in California have recently been given the flexibility by the federal and the state governments to use locally selected...
Courts & Rulings New trial required in action over death of tased suspect The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday, in a 2-1 decision, reversed a judgment pursuant to a jury verdict in favor of the City of Los Angeles in an action brought by the family of a man who died after an officer used a Taser on him, holding that an initially proper order barring introduction of Police Commission findings that the officers acted unreasonably was rendered invalid in light of...
Courts & Rulings Commissioner Campos says DA's policy doesn't override CA's remand order Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Benjamin Campos on Friday reconsidered his March 3 order that dispositional proceedings involving a man who was convicted in 2016, at age 22, of a murder committed six years earlier, while a minor, will take place in Juvenile Court, deciding that, instead, he will conduct a "transfer hearing" to determine if the case did belong in the criminal court,...
Courts & Rulings Grieving family shocked as getaway driver freed in bloody murder of USC grad student from China: 'Reluctant' judge has 'no discretion' Saying he had no choice under a new narrower felony murder rule, a judge Monday changed the conviction against the getaway driver involved in the beating death of a USC graduate student from China to attempted robbery from second-degree murder and sentenced him to time served. MyNewsLA State appeals court won't hear DA's...
3/17 "I felt so accomplished and felt unbeatable," said 17-year-old Audrialice Evans about running her first race. Running has become a passion for her and 7 youths, aged 12-17 who have been training to run the LA Marathon through the Santa Monica Police Activities League (PAL) running program and Students Run LA. Despite their best intentions, COVID-19 has complicated matters yet again. With the LA Marathon postponed, the weekly PAL running program has decided to create its...
Courts & Rulings Court narrows law used to target white supremacists A federal appeals court on Thursday struck down portions of an anti-riot law used to target white supremacists. Still, the ruling found enough of the law constitutional to reinstate charges against four men prosecuted under the statute. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision overturned a district court judge's ruling in 2019 that found key sections of the Federal Anti-Riot Act violated the First...
Courts & Rulings Judge rules victims lack standing to seek recusal of District Attorney's office Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Christopher Smith has rebuffed the plea by family members of two slain females, who were half-sisters, to recuse the Office of Los Angeles County District Attorney in pending Juvenile Court proceedings against the alleged killer, now an adult, ruling that they lack standing to seek such relief. Metropolitan News-Enterprise Mandatory bar fees could...
PeopleConnect, owner of the social networking site Classmates.com, has settled a consumer protection lawsuit alleging the website did not properly inform its users regarding automatic subscription renewals, the Santa Monica City Attorney's Office announced last week. A final court judgment was entered last Monday by a San Diego judge that calls for PeopleConnect Inc, to pay to $550,000 to settle a consumer protection lawsuit filed by the California Automatic Renewal Task...
Santa Monica and other wealthy communities in the Westside have some of the highest Covid-19 inoculation rates in Los Angeles County even though their residents were less affected by the coronavirus, according to new data released by the Public Health Department this week. On the other hand, lower-income communities in the Eastside, which were devastated by the pandemic, have seen fewer vaccines for their residents, health officials said. More than 21% of the residents of Sant...
The developer of the $1 billion Frank Gehry housing project across from the Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles is asking Santa Monica's Architectural Review Board for concessions with its plans to replace the "crime Vons" on Lincoln with a massive 63,000-square-footprint mixed-use housing development. Once a corridor of single-story commercial buildings housing such businesses as auto repair, tile, sewing and crafts, the area on Lincoln Boulevard near the 10 Freeway...
