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“One night, my 3-year-old asked me if she could sleep in my bed. I told her no. She said, “That’s not fair! Why does Daddy get to sleep in your bed?” READ MORE
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CRIME-FIGHTING Effort recognized The National League of Cities has recognized Operation Phoenix, the 18-point crime-fighting program instituted by San Bernardino Mayor Pat Morris when he took office in 2006. Operation Phoenix was the centerpiece of Morris’s mayoral campaign in response to the city’s gang problem and soaring murder rate. In the first six months of 2006, seven San Bernardino youngsters under the age of 18 died by violence, including 11-year-old Anthony Michael Ramirez who died in a hail of gang bullets as he and his friends played basketball at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School. Operation Phoenix is a partnership of government, the private sector, and nonprofit organizations to combat San Bernardino’s reputation as one of the Inland Empire’s most dangerous cities. The project targeted one of the city’s most crime-ridden neighborhoods northeast of downtown. The NLC report notes that the city’s violent crime rate is at its lowest point in 10 years and robberies and thefts in the targeted neighborhood were cut by more than half. The NLC also cites a survey taken last January by criminal justice professors at Cal State San Bernardino that found that the city’s residents felt safer and were less worried about being victims of crime. “I am excited that all of our partners who work so hard on these initiatives are getting the national attention they deserve,” said Morris. “Our collaboration is not only unique, but we have proven that it is working.” –Michael J. Medley Gone fishin’ New website highlights local spots Some of the best fishing spots in the Inland Empire and Orange County are included in a new website that has been launched by the nonprofit Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation. However, there are omissions – big fishing spots in Riverside County (Diamond Valley Lake, Lake Hemet, Lake Elsinore, Lake Skinner, Lake Perris) are remarkably absent along with the many privately owned fishing lakes in the county. And, the Salton Sea is listed as an Imperial County location even though the northern half of it is in Riverside County. However, as a primer, and an idea, the website is a good starter kit. All 50 states are represented. Readers clicking on California will be sent to a page where they type in the county of their choice. The site, takemefishing.org, is designed to help families find places to fish and boat that keeps them conveniently close to home. “We want people to know that fishing and boating is easy and accessible, even for today’s often overscheduled family,” said Frank Peterson Jr., president of the Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation. “Takemefishing.org now hosts the web’s largest database of fishing spots, along with an unprecedented complement of how-to information. It’s now possible to plan a fishing or boating trip on the spur of the moment and find everything you need in one, easy-to-access location.” To help families plan a day of fishing, takemefishing.org tapped the expertise of state wildlife agencies and outdoor writers to identify the top three destinations located near major cities across the country. Each of these places is designated as a Family Fishing Hot Spot. Controversy Is day care to blame for tantrums? The report from the largest and longest-running study of American child care has found that keeping a preschooler in a day care center for a year or more increased the likelihood that the child would become disruptive in class – and that the effect persisted through the sixth grade. This was recently reported by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), which has been studying child care since 1991. “A study like this creates concern, but the reality is that for many families where both parents – or the single parent – need to work, childcare is simply a necessity,” according to Artie Wu, founder of MamaSource.com, an online community resource for mothers. In a study like this, it is important to note that every family is different. Also found in this update is that children with high-quality day care in preschool have better vocabulary scores in the fifth grade than those who had a subpar child care experience. And the HICHD carefully couched its release on this portion of the study (nichd.nih.gov/news/releases/child_care_linked_to_vocabulary_032607.cfm): “The researchers cautioned that the increase in vocabulary and problem behaviors was small, and that parenting quality was a much more important predictor of child development than was type, quantity, or quality, of child care.” Fast Fact According to a March USA Today/Gallup poll, 43% of Americans identify themselves as baseball fans. That is low by recent standards, as an average of 49% of Americans have said they were fans of the sport since Gallup started tracking this measure in 1993. |
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