In the continuing effort to make entering exhibits in the Amador County Fair as easy as possible, the Fair office will now be able to take entries on line through their website. This entry method is also seen as a way to help the Fair’s efforts to be environmentally friendly. “We have seen a trend in the Fair industry that is remarkable. The percent of entries on-line has increased by triple digits in one year.  Reducing the number of printed handbooks we need not only helps our bottom line, but it is earth-friendly, too,” explained Troy Bowers, CEO. Even though entry forms are due in early July in order to plan exhibit space, most actual exhibits are not due until closer to the Fair. A complete schedule of due dates, judging and release dates can be found online at www.AmadorCountyFair.com. The fair takes place July 24-27

The long and exhilarating Supervisors’ races came to their conclusion last night, as the final tallies from election day were calculated at exactly 10pm. Months of campaigning paid off for John Plasse who, with 54 percent of the votes, cinched the District 1 Supervisor seat in a landslide victory. John Gonsalves placed a distant second with 17 percent of the votes. Rosalie Pryor Escamilla and Ken Berry weren’t far behind him with 14.83 and 13.87 percent of the votes,In the District 4 Race, Incumbent Supervisor Louis Boitano beat out David Pincus with 58 percent. Pincus held steady with just over 42 percent of the votes throughout the evening.

Both winning candidates will be interviewed during our TSPN news broadcast this week, beginning today with Supervisor Louis Boitano. John Plasse will be interviewed during our Thursday noon newscast. In other voting news, Alyson Huber swept the State Assembly District 10 Democratic primary vote with 66 percent of the votes to opponent Jim Cook’s 33 percent. Of the three competitors for the Republican District 10 primary seat, Jack Sieglock took 48 percent while David Sander and Paul Heygi placed second with 25 percent each. Two controversial propositions dealing with eminent domain and rent control issues were also on the ballot. Amador residents voted against Proposition 98, 55 percent to 44 percent. Proposition 99 was favored, 56 percent to 43 percent. respectively.

The City of Ione proudly announced yesterday that the Ione Police Department has recently been awarded first place in the 2007 California Law Enforcement Challenge. The Law Enforcement Challenge is a competition between similarUnited States. The areas of concentration include enforcement efforts and educating the public about occupant protection, impaired driving, and speeding. The winning safety programs are those that combine officer training, public information and enforcement to reduce crashes and injuries within respective jurisdictions. This accomplishment marks the Ione Police Department's second consecutive first place victory within its category. 

“The back to back first place finishes reflect the hard work of our officers and assures that we will remain competitive for future grant funding”, says Michael Johnson, Chief of Police of Ione. “In this time of shrinking budgets and limited funding sources, we need all the grants that we can get.  Ultimately it is the residents of the city that benefit from these traffic enforcement grants by making our roadways safer for all drivers and pedestrians." The City of Ione has experienced a dramatic decrease in traffic collisions in the past three years as a direct result of increased traffic enforcement efforts.

There were 46 accidents in 2005 and 26 accidents in 2007 -about a 45 percent decrease in accidents overall.  The use of seatbelts has increased the State average of 94% compliance. This program is financed through a grant awarded to the International Association of Chief’s of Police by the National Highway Traffic Safety Association. Representatives of the Ione Police Department will be traveling to Sacramento in September to be honored and receive the award.  For more information, contact Chief Michael Johnson at the Ione Police Department 209-274-2456, ext 108. sizes and types of law enforcement agencies. It recognizes and rewards the best overall traffic safety programs in the

The California State Assembly has just passed “The Subprime Lending Reform Act of 2008,” which was introduced in January by Assembly Member Ted Lieu. Officially titled AB 1830, the bill will amend and add to the State Financial Code and will require lenders to qualify borrowers based on their ability to pay over the life of the loan, not just the initial “teaser” rate, as well as eradicate some types of bonuses for mortgage brokers who steer customers into high-risk loans.  Also, the bill will prohibit a high-cost subprime loan from including prepayment penalties, and looks to do away with negative amortization loans, which occur when the borrower pays less than the accrued interest each month. The need for mortgage lending reform stems from what we all know as the “housing boom” of a few years ago, when home prices rose dramatically and lenders were handing out loans to just about anyone. 

Now, home prices are falling, and those high-risk loans that were obtained a few years ago under less-than-desirable, and sometimes-shady circumstances are now forcing many homeowners out of their homes.  Many loans were obtained by qualifying for a subprime, or “teaser” rate, such as 3 percent, which lasted maybe a few years, and now that the interest rate has popped up to 7 or 8 percent, many homeowners simply cannot afford their payments.  Then, to make matters worse, many are not able to sell their homes for what they paid, and thus began the foreclosure crisis. AB 1830 looks to prevent this type of crisis in the future.  According to the authors of the bill, it “is the centerpiece of a far-ranging effort by the Assembly Democrats to address the mortgage crisis that has led to hundreds of thousands of foreclosures, tightened credit markets internationally, and contributed heavily to the State Budget deficit.”  Lieu calls AB 1830 “the solution we need to prevent the next mortgage collapse.” The bill is now in the State Senate, awaiting a first reading.  For more information, go to www.assembly.ca.gov and click on Legislation.

At the Ione City Council meeting Tuesday evening, Laurie Lord was appointed by Mayor Andrea Bonham and approved by the City Council to assume the title of Park and Recreation Commissioner. Her current position on the Planning Commission is now open and the City will be holding an application process. Also discussed at the meeting was the work plan and priorities for the Planning Department for the upcoming fiscal year. A list of projects were given to council in a staff report, including zoning code updates, sign ordinance, landscape provisions, home occupation regulation, historical regulations for Main Street and the historical district totaling approximately 39 thousand dollars. Jack Brotherton, a citizen of Ione, mentioned to the council that “both Murphy’s and Palo Alto’s sign ordinances were extraordinary,” and he believed that looking into other agencies policies “could help to save some money”. The top 3 priorities chosen by council were the zoning code update, sign ordinance, and historical regulations totaling approximately 22 thousand 5 hundred dollars

An Amador City business owner is using her expertise to launch a new flea market. Linda Weber, 10-year operator of Linda’s Cloth Creations, is utilizing space at the Amador County Fair Grounds in Plymouth to create a new Amador County Country flea market. Like many local towns, Plymouth has its share of markets, auctions and sidewalk sales, but this will be the first year-round flea market. Weber is renting out 15 foot square places for vendors to set up and sell their goods. “We are hoping to get 200 vendors and give people the opportunity to buy a lot of things,” said Weber. Weber says running a flea market has been a lifelong dream. Spaces will cost $40 on the first Saturday of each month, beginning June 7th. The flea market will include sections for collectibles, antiques, household items, crafts, a farmers market and an area to sell cars, trailers, boats and tractors. Weber will continue to operate her business in Amador City while simultaneously running the flea market. For more information or to reserve a space, call 245-3192.

With the June 3rd election just around the corner, some may be wondering how the supervisor candidates funded their campaigns and how that money was spent.  As required by law, candidates must disclose campaign contributions and expenses to the Elections Department on a campaign disclosure statement. Here’s a look at who spent what as of May 17th. For District 1, the candidates are John Gonsalves, Rosalie Pryor Escamilla, John Plasse and Ken Berry.  All but Berry had campaign contributions. John Gonsalves has received just shy of 26,000 dollars in contributions and donations, mostly from area businesses and individuals, with the largest contributions from Stan Lukowicz and Mother Lode Real Investors for a combined total of 2800 dollars. Largely, Gonsalves spent money on campaign paraphernalia, literature, signage, and print advertising. Almost half of Rosalie Pryor Escamilla’s 10,941 dollars worth of contributions came from the Amador County Association of Realtors, with 1500 dollars out of her own pocket. So far, over 9000 dollars of that money has been spent, mostly on print and TV advertising, signage and campaign events.

Although John Plasse’s total contributions totals almost 44,000 dollars, about half of that amount was non-monetary contributions, including cases of wine, artwork, and other miscellaneous raffle prize items.  But the biggest contribution came from Plasse himself: over 12,000 dollars worth of jewelry that he used for a raffle and auction during fundraising events.  Plasse spread his funds throughout the media, advertising in print, radio and TV. For District 4, incumbent Louis Boitano has raised over 11,000 dollars, 2000 of which is a carryover from his 2004 campaign. Most of the remaining 9000 dollars consisted of 100 to 200 dollar amounts from local individuals and area businesses.  Boitano has spent just over 8500 dollars so far, mostly on fundraising events, print and TV advertising, campaign mailers, and signage. Also running for District 4, David Pincus has contributions totaling over 11,000 dollars, consisting of 3000 from his own pocket, almost 3000 in monetary contributions, and a 5200 dollar non-monetary donation of advertising from Jack Mitchell, Publisher of the Ledger-Dispatch. So far, Pincus has spent about 5600 dollars, mostly for signs, fundraising events, and campaign literature. Will all these expenditures pay off?  We’ll find out this Tuesday.  Don’t forget to vote!

A suspected drunk driver struck a motorcycle and then crashed a short distance after leaving the scene of the first accident Wednesday evening in Plymouth. The hit-and-run driver then fled into the hills and evaded police and a canine search dog. TSPN Contributor Bill Lavallie sent us these dynamic photos of the accident. Several units from the Amador Sheriff’s office and CHP were involved in the search, along with Fire and Ambulance crews. One CHP officer on the scene recapped the evening’s events for TSPN. According to witnesses, a couple dining at a local restaurant got into a verbal argument and were confrontational enough that they were asked to leave.  They left the restaurant, and the male, after starting the car, returned to the restaurant to retrieve something he had forgotten. While he was in the restaurant, the female speeds off in the car, and then collides with a motorcycle.  She then left the scene and crashed a short distance from the original collision. The motorcycle rider was taken by ambulance to Sutter Amador hospital. The couple are under investigation.

A widespread cheating scheme at Argonaut High School was foiled last week when students were discovered using test answers that could be traced back to a central school computer program. "About a week ago a couple of students were found in the library with these tiny little cheat sheets with the answers on them," said Amador County Unified School District Superintendent Michael Carey. Carey says the conspiracy is believed to extend to at least 16 students. The answers were stolen from a program called Accelerated Reader designed to improve student reading skills. An investigation eventually led back to one student, an 18-year old named A.T. Herrick. When confronted, Herrick admitted to stealing the information on a disc last September. Although the tests students cheated were only ten percent of their overall grade, Carey says swift punishment will be taken. Grades will be lowered, and combined with the senior status of the students, the new GPA’s could keep two or three of them from graduating. The mother of Herrick says that her son has learned a valuable lesson and is embarrassed and apologetic.

The seemingly endless effort to solve California's prison overcrowding got more complicated Friday when a panel of federal judges presented a settlement proposal that already appears to be falling apart. A court-appointed referee outlined the proposed settlement last week, calling for a gradual reduction in the state's inmate population by 2011. That plan, as originally outlined, tried to strike a balance: It would avoid an immediate early release of inmates by seeking alternate punishments for some offenders, diverting parole violators to treatment programs and making more prisoners eligible for programs that could shave time off their sentences. Prison overcrowding has become a serious issue in state prisons such as Mule Creek near Ione, where some inmates have been delineated to sleeping in bunk beds in the prison gymnasium.

The settlement proposal has been criticized by Republican state lawmakers who could try to block any deal. It also was failing to win support from local law enforcement and county officials, who fear they would end up caring for criminals who otherwise would be sent to state prisons. "The settlement appears to be dead on arrival," said state Senator Mike Machado, a Linden Democrat, who has his own concerns about the plan. The stakes for the state are high: The federal courts could order an immediate release of tens of thousands of inmates or a cap on the prison population, something lawmakers and law enforcement groups want to avoid. At the same time, the proposed solutions will cost billions as the state faces a $15.2 billion deficit and cuts to basic services. Lawyers representing police chiefs, county sheriffs, probation officers, district attorneys, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration and inmates' rights attorneys were expected to ask the three-judge panel for more time to continue negotiations.