Cops spread holiday cheer with food boxes -more-

Saturday, Dec. 23

Where has all the sewer money gone? -more-

Lampley scores 25, Wethers hits career-high 21 in win -more-

“While the merry men pound the nails...the capitalists, who are to own the (Claremont) hotel...are thinking up new ideas that are calculated to put it in the front rank of modern hotels.” -more-

After only three years at Cal, Dennis Gates will achieve at the end of the spring semester a feat rarely accomplished by students, not to mention intercollegiate athletes. He will graduate as a junior with a degree in sociology. -more-

Nefarious crimes have a natural home in libraries. Book lined shelves have witnessed murders, mayhem, lies and resolutions in hundreds of mystery stories by renowned authors such as Agatha Christie and Anne Perry. -more-

On Sunday BART will be following its regular Sunday schedule with service beginning at 8 a.m. and running until midnight on three lines: Richmond-Fremont, Pittsburg Bay Point-Colma, and Dublin/Pleasanton-Daly City. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — A city affirmative action officer says he was discriminated against, demoted and harassed on the job after testifying before a federal grand jury about alleged wrongdoing in the city’s minority contracting program. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Emergency crews searched the waters off Baker Beach late Friday for a 13-year-old boy who was swept off shore. -more-

SANTA ANA — Two students sued the Anaheim Union High School District for removing 10 biographies on homosexuals from their school library in what they contend is a violation of constitutional free-speech rights. -more-

SAN JOSE — A Santa Clara County superior court judge turned down the paint industry’s request to dismiss a suit filed against it by the county over allegedly dangerous levels of lead in paint. -more-

OCEANSIDE — The political honeymoon lasted only four days for the city’s new mayor who has been fending off demands for an apology after he told a civic group that the Police Department is plagued with “deep-rooted racism and sexism.” -more-

LOS ANGELES — University of California regents said Friday they will offer eligibility to certain high school students who applied for enrollment next fall but whose schools didn’t forward the necessary transcripts in time. -more-

LOS ANGELES — A man sought in the fatal shooting of his estranged wife and a daughter and the wounding of two other daughters was found dead Friday after an apparent leap from a freeway into the shallow Los Angeles River, police said. -more-

LOS ANGELES — An explosion and flash fire severely burned five workers after a halogen lamp ignited lacquer fumes on the 23rd floor of a condominium near the UCLA campus. -more-

Regulators have voted for rate increases that would affect millions of customers across the state starting next month in an effort to rescue two shaky electric companies tangled in a deepening power crisis. -more-

LOS ANGELES — California’s energy crisis has some of the state’s most powerful players, including lawmakers, public utilities and consumer watchdog groups, calling for the return of a regulated market. -more-

LOS ANGELES — Plagued with financial troubles that nearly led to her eviction, the woman who threw her two young daughters off a downtown courthouse before jumping to her own death appeared to have grown increasingly despondent, family members said. -more-

As his expedition pushed into the upper reaches of the Missouri River nearly two centuries ago, Meriwether Lewis marveled at the “scenes of visionary enchantment” in the cliffs and promonotories along the shoreline. -more-

MIAMI — A test conducted minutes before the polls opened on Election Day showed that 13 of 20 voting machines were faulty at the two Miami-Dade County precincts with the highest rates of discarded ballots, The Miami Herald reported Friday. -more-

WASHINGTON — Here’s the story line: In a bizarre and hotly contested election, the son of a U.S. president is installed as chief executive, barely edging a Democratic former U.S. senator from Tennessee who won the nation’s popular vote in the general election. -more-

AUSTIN, Texas — President-elect Bush, promising a Justice Department “guided by principle, not by politics,” on Friday nominated Sen. John Ashcroft, a staunch conservative, to be attorney general. In a delicate balance, Bush also tapped moderate New Jersey Gov. Christie Whitman as environmental chief. -more-

America’s protracted election, the tug-of-war over Elian Gonzalez and the terrorist bombing of the USS Cole ranked as the top news stories of 2000, according to The Associated Press annual survey of its members. -more-

NEW ORLEANS — A federal appeals court on Friday threw out the murder conviction of Wilbert Rideau, saying the celebrated prison journalist was the victim of racially biased selection of the grand jury that indicted him in 1961. -more-

SAN JOSE — In a case provoking tough questions over who controls the Internet, Yahoo! Inc. is asking a federal judge to block a French court’s order that the popular Web portal keep computer users in France from accessing auctions of Nazi paraphernalia. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — A hacker broke into the computer systems of Egghead.com, forcing the online retailer to alert credit card companies and 3.5 million customers to the security breach and the possibility that their financial information was accessed. -more-

NEW YORK — Santa Claus finally arrived on Wall Street on Friday, giving the beleaguered Nasdaq composite index its strongest performance in more than a week and its fifth-biggest percentage gain ever. -more-

-more-

-more-

Developer is not for affordable housing -more-

Santiago Casal has been dreaming of a sun calendar memorial for over 20 years, and he’s willing to wait as long as it takes to bring the project to fruition. -more-

Friday, Dec. 22

-more-

It seems Nick Slater has hit a nerve with a petition drive claiming that a George W. Bush presidency would be illegitimate. -more-

-more-

The Associated Press -more-

LOS ANGELES — In what prosecutors call the largest case ever involving fraudulent medical bills submitted by a California laboratory, a federal grand jury has indicted four people on charges of billing the Medi-Cal program for nearly $20 million worth of bogus blood tests. -more-

LOS ANGELES — Every few minutes Thursday, someone would lean over the ninth floor courthouse balcony, standing on tiptoes to peer over the wall. -more-

Here we are in the 21st century, and still infusing life into our winters with cut evergreen boughs, just as did the ancient Egyptians, Persians, Jews, Christians, and Druids. -more-

Along fields and in the woods over much of North America, your eye could catch some bright color even this time of year. -more-

-more-

Organic food could become cheaper and more widely available now that uniform federal organic standards, a decade in the making, have finally become law. The standards are expected to draw big growers into the small but growing market. -more-

-more-

The California Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the constitutionality of a state law that exempts religious organizations from local preservation laws and lets them raze and replace historic church buildings. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — In the strongest sign yet that millions of Californians will soon be paying sharply higher electric bills, state utility regulators Thursday said consumers should pay more to keep the state’s largest electric companies from going bankrupt. -more-

NEW YORK — Investors sought bargains on Wall Street Thursday, sending blue chips soaring while leaving the Nasdaq in positive territory for the first time in eight sessions. -more-

HODGKINS, Ill. — Not counting Santa’s workshop, or maybe Macy’s on Christmas Eve, it would be tough to find a busier place during the holidays than UPS’s mammoth package-processing plant outside Chicago. If the slowing economy has put a chill on holiday shopping, no such evidence was visible at the frenzied facility Tuesday on “Peak Day,” the busiest shipping day of the year. -more-

After neighbors of a proposed antennae site raised concerns about exposure to electromagnetic radiation emissions, the City Council adopted a 45-day moratorium Tuesday on the placement of all new antennae that support wireless communications. -more-

Thursday, Dec. 21

When eligible voters do not participate, what do you expect? -more-

Riding a three-game winning streak, Cal hopes to maintain its momentum when the Bears meet Georgia in the fourth annual Pete Newell Challenge Thursday, Dec. 21. Cal is also a perfect 3-0 in previous Challenges, with wins over BYU (68-64 in 1998), North Carolina (78-71 in ’99) and Gonzaga (72-64 in ’00). -more-

As Californians wait for the energy crisis to send utility rates through the roof, the City Council is looking into the possibility of running its own electric company. -more-

Crises in housing, health care and the environment are just a few of the issues stacked regularly on the Alameda County Board of Supervisors’ plates. -more-

The omnibus budget bill that passed Congress last week allocated $350,000 to improve the safety and security systems at Berkeley High School. -more-

Gerry Tenney encourages his audience to sing very high and “fancy” in a rendition of a song to teach vowels as part of a series of events the library is calling “A Season of Family Celebrations.” Tenney performed at the West Berkeley Public Library Wednesday afternoon. The last session in the series will be “Drumming and Dance” with percussionist James Henry at 2 p.m. Dec. 28 at the Claremont branch of the library at Benvenue and Ashby avenues. -more-

OAKLAND— Conventional wisdom holds that the pre-Christmas rush can lead to depression, but one mental health expert says emotionally vulnerable people should pay closer attention to the calm after the storm. -more-

EMERYVILLE — Assemblymember Dion Aroner, D-Oakland/Berkeley, has scheduled meetings with Alameda County Superintendent Shiela Jordan and State Superintendent Delaine Eastin to discuss the financial status of the Emeryville School District. -more-

OAKLAND — A woman who murdered her sister and impersonated her in public after stuffing her dismembered body in a freezer was sentenced Tuesday to life without parole. -more-

SACRAMENTO — In education offices around the state, brightly colored textbooks with bunnies and tigers on the front promise to help California teachers make their students math whizzes. -more-

WASHINGTON — The on-again, off-again mission to faraway Pluto may be a go if NASA can do it on the cheap and without imposing long delays on a planned exploration of one of Jupiter’s moons. -more-

Energy Secretary Bill Richardson on Wednesday extended for a week an order requiring Western generators to sell electricity to power-strapped California. -more-

SACRAMENTO — Connecting Southern California, where power plants are humming along, and Northern California, which confronts a dwindling supply, is a congested transmission system known as Path 15. -more-

SACRAMENTO — About 400,000 people, half of them in California, could get immigration amnesty they were previously denied under a bill awaiting President Clinton’s signature. -more-

NEW YORK — Investors’ hopes for a happy end to Wall Street’s most dismal year in a decade are vanishing in a seemingly unending string of stock selloffs. -more-

NEW YORK — Christmas came early for investors in 2000. It came in March, as a matter of fact. Stocks were rising, confidence was soaring, homebuilders and carmakers couldn’t keep up with the demand. -more-

NEW YORK — Fears about a harsh economic slowdown and continuing weakness in corporate earnings sent stocks sliding Wednesday, with the Dow Jones industrials giving up more than 260 points and the Nasdaq hitting another low for the year. -more-

Berkeley Liberation Radio won’t be affected by the recent Congressional legislation limiting the number of licenses available to micro-radio stations throughout the country. It couldn’t get a license if it tried. -more-

Tuesday, Dec. 19

-more-

OAKLAND — Lakireddy Bali Reddy and four of his relatives were back in court Tuesday as a deal with federal attorneys may be unraveling. The five had said in October that they would enter guilty pleas, but Reddy’s son Prasad Lakireddy is now refusing to do so. -more-

Bay Area lawyers defending micro-radio broadcasters were dismayed by radio lobbyists’ role in passing The Radio Broadcasting Preservation Act of 2000. -more-

With only five shopping days left till Christmas, there’s a comic book character who is dying to make his way under your tree. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Four California cities rank among the nation’s best educated, new Census data show. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — More and more police departments are trying to learn whether officers target minorities for traffic stops. The trouble is they’re cops, not computer whizzes, and may not know how best to gather and analyze their findings. -more-

PASADENA — Voyager 1 is heading to the edge of the solar system, but first it must race the sun toward a milestone – a place where the supersonic solar wind backs up in a pressure wave. -more-

Experts design system -more-

SACRAMENTO — Consumers will have to help bail out two giant utilities that say they have lost $8 billion because of a retail rate freeze and big increases in wholesale electricity prices, Gov. Gray Davis said Tuesday. -more-

WEITCHPEC — Four decades after the remote Trinity River was dammed and diverted to pour water into California’s farm belt, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt tightened the spigot Tuesday, doubling the water kept in the north and outraging growers hundreds of miles away. -more-

LOS ANGELES — A veteran LAPD homicide detective who was transferred to the auto theft division after prosecutors complained about his testimony in a murder case is now the subject of a formal complaint from a prosecutor in an auto theft case, the Los Angeles Times reported. -more-

WASHINGTON — America’s love affair with gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles and pickups is keeping national fuel economy at a 20-year low, the government says. -more-

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A jury returned a $3.5 billion verdict against Exxon Mobil Corp. on Tuesday, finding the oil company defrauded Alabama on royalties from natural gas wells in state waters. -more-

CHICAGO — A study of people who used cell phones for an average of less than three years found no evidence the devices cause brain cancer. -more-

BOSTON — Vice President Al Gore is one of about 500 people nominated for the presidency of Harvard University, according to the chairman of the university’s presidential search committee. -more-

BRUSSELS, Belgium — A bank better known for financing roads and railways said Tuesday it is earmarking $445 million to help European media companies compete with Hollywood and Silicon Valley. -more-

LOS ANGELES — Online music retailer EMusic.com Inc. is suing its Internet rival Mp3.com, saying the company violated the copyrights of the independent record labels EMusic represents. -more-

NEW YORK — The Nasdaq composite index fell to its lowest level in more than a year Tuesday after the Federal Reserve indicated it was worried about the slowing economy, but declined to cut interest rates. -more-

OAKLAND — A former state Assembly member has changed her party affiliation once again, but she’s not saying if it’s a strategic move to eventually pursue another office. -more-

In its last meeting of the year, the City Council will consider a request by Easy Does It Emergency Services Programs to increase its annual contract by $50,000. -more-

Tuesday, Dec. 19

In conceding defeat, Al Gore made a gracious and humorous speech. But it was what he didn’t say that pinpointed the limitations of his leadership and the frustration of his followers. -more-

The homeless mentally ill are often the most critically in need of basic services such as housing and medical treatment. But, in what social workers call a cruel twist, they are also the hardest to reach. -more-

It’s 12:51 a.m. Thursday morning, Dec. 14 and I’m angry and I can’t sleep. My stomach roils when I imagine that on Jan. 20, I will be the citizen of a country whose president is George W. Bush. Oh my God! Oh my God! -more-

Run-off elections are costly, voters stay away from the polls in droves, and they don’t serve third-party candidates well. -more-

Carolyn Haydu, a recent graduate from UC Berkeley’s art program, shows off a section of her art piece that will be embedded in the sidewalk in front of the new Berkeley Repertory Theater on Addison Street. The final project will be approximately 84 square feet and will give pedestrians the sensation of walking on air, she said. Haydu who plans to attend graduate school after she completes the project said: “This almost like a graduate project but in the real world.” -more-

Aimee Fisher got pregnant her senior year of high school, and the Christian day care she worked for fired her when she wouldn’t marry her baby’s father. -more-

A sociologist from the University of Berkeley at California has been named a recipient of the National Humanities Medal, to be awarded by President Bill Clinton in the nation's capital later this month. Robert Bellah joins the heady company of novelists Toni Morrison and Barbara Kingsolver, along with musician and composer Quincy Jones, in this year'’ list of 12 honorees, according to a UC Berkeley spokeswoman. -more-

U.S. Rep Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, has announced that more than $1 million in federal funding has been earmarked for three East Bay community projects. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Tsunamis generated by underwater landslides pose a serious threat to coastal communities in California and elsewhere, say researchers who are trying to determine where submarine slips are most likely occur. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Randolph Apperson Hearst, the last surviving son of newspaper billionaire William Randolph Hearst, died Monday at a New York hospital following a massive stroke. He was 85. -more-

California could keep about $350 million in federal funds to subsidize low-cost health insurance for children, under a bill approved by Congress. -more-

LOS ANGELES — Sara Jane Olson’s lead attorney was ordered Monday to appear in court and explain why he should not be taken off the Symbionese Liberation Army attempted-bombing case for failing to prepare for trial. -more-

LOS ANGELES — An arsonist torched a car during a hot, dry Southern California windstorm, sparking a fire perilously close to dozens of homes, and a 480-acre wildfire in a condor refuge burned untamed Monday, although the birds weren’t in danger. -more-

DANA POINT — Sworn to serve and protect, Sheriff’s Deputy Russ Chilton never figured that pledge would extend to mussels, crabs and starfish. -more-

Happy holidays. Just not for everyone. -more-

DaimlerChrysler Company -more-

NEW YORK — Optimism that interest rates might soon be lowered sent blue chip stocks soaring Monday, while earnings worries again dogged the tech sector. -more-

With unwavering support Monday from the electors who had pledged to vote for him, George W. Bush secured the Electoral College majority needed to become the 43rd president. -more-

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine military said Monday it won’t revive negotiations for the release of an Oakland man being held hostage and instead plans to fight his captors until they “surrender or are wiped out.” -more-

COLLEGE STATION, Texas — Scientists at Texas A&M University unveiled a disease-resistant black Angus bull Monday, a feat they said could lead to safer beef and more efficient ranching worldwide. -more-

I heard local schools were looking for substitute teachers, so I registered to take the California Basic Educational Skills Test. -more-

Concerns about electromagnetic radiation prompted directors of the Jewish Community Center on Walnut Street to temporarily withdraw its application for rooftop wireless communications antennae. -more-

Monday, Dec. 18

Reader has the Berkeley Tool Library blues -more-

The University of California baseball team has signed seven athletes to national letters of intent, including four players who are listed on TeamOneBaseball.com Top-100 High School Prospects List -more-

Every school day at 11:24 a.m., a line of students streams out of Berkeley High School toward downtown Berkeley food vendors. -more-

Alameda County Supervisors are today interviewing five people who want to fill the District 3 seat left vacant by Wilma Chan's election to the California Assembly. -more-

Gasoline prices during the past two weeks fell more than 51/2 cents on average, according to an industry survey released Sunday. -more-

BERKELEY — University of California officials played down a report that they have developed preliminary proposals for major changes in admissions, including eliminating the SAT requirement. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — The rock and dust kicked up by an asteroid impact 65 million years ago was not enough to kill the dinosaurs, according to researchers – but the debris may have sparked a deadly global chemical reaction in the atmosphere. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Pacific Bell should not be allowed to sell long distance service in California until it sorts through a tangle of service issues, a report to the state’s Public Utilities Commission concludes. -more-

LOS ANGELES — The six companies that bought power plants in California when the state deregulated its utilities have seen profits rise dramatically this year, according to the companies’ third-quarter statements. -more-

A government hearing into an Alaska Airlines crash that killed all 88 people aboard ended Saturday night with investigators questioning the safety of a critical part used in the popular MD-80 and DC-9 series of jetliners. -more-

SANTEE — Council members in Santee and Oceanside are the only city officials in San Diego County who receive free home Internet access – a perk that has some people concerned. -more-

LOS ANGELES — When she was arrested a year and a half ago, Sara Jane Olson was still legally known as Kathleen Soliah, a fugitive who had eluded authorities for 25 years. Much has changed since then, including her name. -more-

At 32, Brendon Mills was already a millionaire veteran of two start-up technology companies when he left Silicon Valley and holed up last year in a rented office in Austin, Texas, equipped with a computer and a supply of caffeinated soda. -more-

MARTINEZ — A former foster mother convicted in 1996 of abusing two babies will get a new trial after a judge found the woman’s lawyer erred in his defense. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Federal and state agencies systematically deny benefits to California’s homeless and disabled by failing to evaluate their claims fully, a group of attorneys from the San Francisco Bay area claim. -more-

A two-alarm blaze gutted an unoccupied three-story home on Thousand Oaks Boulevard early Wednesday morning. -more-

SAN JOSE — Hoping to hit high-tech companies where it hurts, an environmental organization is encouraging consumers to buy from businesses that do the best job of warning the public about the toxic chemicals they use. -more-

In response to recent published reports, a University of California provost has denied that California's flagship system for higher education is considering scrapping the Scholastic Aptitude Test. -more-

SAN FRANCISCO — Two ancient Egyptian cities that mysteriously sank into the Mediterranean about 1,500 years ago could have fallen victim to floods or a major earthquake — or a combination of both, researchers said Sunday. -more-