NEWS RELEASE
November 30, 2011

Contact:
Truc Dever
Director of Community Affairs
Office: (562) 944-9656 x 510
Cell: (562)244-2648
Email: tdever@glacvcd.org

Santa Ana Winds May Help Fight Invasive Tiger Mosquito

Santa Ana Winds May Help Fight Invasive Tiger Mosquito West Covina, CA - A High Wind Warning has been posted by the National Weather Service for the San Gabriel Valley beginning late Wednesday and continuing through Saturday. Very strong Santa Ana winds are expected which may provide ideal conditions to aid in the fight against the invasive Asian tiger mosquito.

This mosquito thrives in the moist, humid microclimates created in southland backyards by unsuspecting residents. Lush yards dominated by tropical ornamentals and potted plants require frequent watering and can raise the relative humidity in that yard substantially, providing the necessary microclimate this species needs to survive in southern California.

In experiments conducted by scientific staff at the San Gabriel Valley Mosquito & Vector Control District, ecologists have found that eggs laid on the edges of containers by this invasive species appear to be susceptible to desiccation if exposed to drying conditions in this area. "We are pleased that Mother Nature is offering her assistance," notes Vector Ecologist Tera Sorvillo.

District experts are asking residents to help us take advantage of the opportunity presented by the Santa Ana winds and place all containers where eggs may be present out into the sun and wind so the eggs can be killed:

• Walk around your yard and look for any containers that are or have been holding water (old tires, buckets, decorative pots, plant saucers, etc.)
• Empty out the water, and place those containers in the sun in areas not protected from the coming winds
• Be cautious and weigh down any lightweight items that might be blown away by gusty winds
• After the winds, remember to move those containers inside a garage or shed during the winter months so they will not fill up with rainwater with the next storm

Vector control districts in Los Angeles County are committed to doing everything in their power to eradicate this invasive mosquito from our communities.

For more information, or to request service, contact:
San Gabriel Valley Mosquito & Vector Control District at 626-814-9466 or www.sgvmosquito.org
Greater Los Angeles County Vector Control District at 562-944-9656 or www.glacvcd.org

CUDAHY, CA - SCE will soon be performing maintenance on the electrical system in the area. In order to perform this work safely, SCE must temporarily interrupt electric service and turn off power. This outage will allow SCE to upgrade aging infrastructure, make needed improvements, and complete other repairs. SCE realize this temporary service interruption may cause some inconvenience, and we appreciate your understanding as we work to increase system reliability for the future.

Planned Outage scheduled for Thursday, October 13, 2011 between 8:30 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. will affect service at the following address(es):

8110 Atlantic Ave.		8222 1/2 Atlantic Ave.
Cudahy, CA 90201		Cudahy, CA 90201
SA: 3-000-0545-46		SA: 3-016-7614-69
Meter: 222012-872803		Meter: 222012-872794

Please note that the power may be off for the whole period or may be turned off more than once. This planned outage may not begin exactly at the stated start time, and some conditions may cause this planned outage to be postponed. The times noted are our best estimate and circumstances may affect both the start time and the completion time indicated above.

How to Prepare
To lessen the impact of an outage on your facilities, please follow these tips:

• To prevent the loss of data and/or damage to your equipment, be sure to shut off or disconnect all sensitive electronic equipment, such as computers and fax machines, before the outage begins. Please note that a system reboot may be required if your business must disconnect from its mainframe and/or servers, and turning off or disconnecting some equipment may cause cached data to be lost.
• outage will affect your alarm systems and may affect private phone systems. Please notify security and/or phone companies that provide your business with service of this outage.
• Make sure you can override or manually operate your security gates.
• If you plan to operate an emergency generator, please notify SCE before the outage so we can protect our employees from possible electrical back feed. To notify SCE of a generator, please call 1-(800) 990-7788.
• If you do not have a generator, you might consider renting a portable one if needed. Please note that SCE cannot reimburse you for this cost.
• For more information and current status on a planned outage, please visit www.sce.com/outage.

For information on the status of this outage, please call 1-(888) 759-6056 and reference the planned outage number 474728. If you have any questions, please contact SCE at scepoc@sce.com, or 1-(714) 973-5764 between 8:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m., Monday through Friday, at least 24 hours prior to the scheduled start of the outage.

CUDAHY, CA (June 29, 2010) – The Superior Court case, "City of Cudahy ex rel. Monforton v. Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton," that was recently reported in various media outlets does not actually have any Cudahy residents, staff or elected officials involved. It is a lawsuit contrived to be in the name of Cudahy that was actually brought by Matthew Monforton, as a qui tam plaintiff, against a law firm that previously represented the City Council of Cudahy. It is unfortunate that Mr. Monforton and his attorney, Mr. Brian Condon, have tried to drag the city’s name into their litigation that is ostensibly to discredit Monforton’s former employer and possibly provide them personal financial gain and fame.

While the District Attorney's office did indeed investigate the City of Cudahy 10 years ago in regard to conflict-of-interest allegations, no charges were filed. The lead investigator at the time was current Superior Court Judge Terry Bork, who recommended that the case be dropped.

The city legally hired the law firm of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter and Hampton, to represent it during the investigation. The government code provides for such representation provided that the council’s action was within the course and scope of their official duties. It should be noted that the recent ruling in the aforementioned case by Superior Court Judge Debre Weintraub was particular to the law firm's records and specifically did not rule that any wrongdoing by the Cudahy City Council had occurred.

CUDAHY, CA (JUNE 29, 2010) – Los Angeles County Sherriff's Department will assume police services in the City of Cudahy effective July 1, 2010.

With the previous police service provider unable to fulfill its commitment, the City Council acted proactively to ensure safety and police coverage were provided uninterrupted. In fact, the new agreement with the Sherriff’s Department adds additional coverage and patrols from previous contracts.
All emergency calls will remain the same:

• Dial 911 for emergencies only.
• Regular service calls Dial 323-264-4151

IMPROVEMENTS TO 710 FREEWAY WILL CAUSE DETOURS FOR CUDAHY ACCESS ON WEEKEND NIGHTS AUG. 13 – OCT. 11

CUDAHY, CA. – The City of Cudahy would like to let residents and visitors know that Interstate Freeway 710, known as the Long Beach Freeway and the closest freeway near Cudahy, will be closing south of the city on the nights of eight consecutive weekends from August 13 to October 11, 2010. If you plan to be driving at that time, we encourage you to plan for detours and extra travel time in order to be safe.

The closures will be from Firestone Boulevard to the 105 freeway (Glenn Anderson Freeway) and will include the Florence Avenue and Firestone Boulevard ramps.

The work is part of the "I-710 Long Life Pavement Rehabilitation Project" intended to rehabilitate the older old pavement between the 405 and 5 freeways and provide the roadway with several decades of improved pavement and a smoother ride for the traveling public.
The closures will occur twice during each weekend:

• Fridays at 11:45 p.m. until Saturdays at 6 a.m.
• Sundays at 11 p.m. until Mondays at 5 a.m.

The dates of the closures are:

August 13-16		September 10-13		October 1-4
August 20-23		September 17-20		October 8-11
August 27-30		September 27-27

Please note that there will not be any closures or work on the freeway during the Labor Day Weekend of September 3-6.
The extended weekend closures begin on Friday nights to install moveable median barriers. When the freeway re-opens to traffic on Saturdays at 6 a.m., the median barriers will guide all motorists to shift to the northbound side of the freeway so that the construction crew can work safely on the southbound side of the freeway. On Sundays at 11 p.m., the freeway will close again to remove the temporary moveable median barriers in time for Monday morning commuters.

In the redirected traffic areas, speed limits will be reduced to 45 mph and no oversized loads will be permitted on this section due to narrow lanes (trucks are advised to use Garfield Avenue).

Closed northbound on-ramps: Rosecrans Avenue and Imperial Highway.

Closed southbound on-ramps: Florence Avenue, Firestone Boulevard and Imperial Hwy.

Closed Freeway Connectors: Eastbound and westbound 105 to northbound 710.

For more information, including detour maps, please visit: www.dot.ca.gov/dist07/travel/projects/710

CUDAHY, CA (June 29, 2010) – The Elizabeth Learning Center (ELC) in the City of Cudahy has announced that it will host Summer Programs for elementary and middle school students. The City of Cudahy is a supporter of these programs.

The "Summer With Youth Services Plus at ELC" is an enrichment and physical fitness activity program for students kindergarten through 12th grade. The program is from noon to 6 p.m. and runs July 1 through August 27, 2010. An application for the program is at the ELC offices or via Mr. Mendieta or Ms. Torres-Ring.

Also, the "Community Feed at ELC" program is open to all kids ages 1-18 in the community. The program is from 12:30 p.m. to 1:20 p.m. and runs July 1 through August 27, 2010.

Summer Classes are available for students from kindergarten through high school via the ELC Summer Transition Bridge Program and the Maywood Academy. Classes run from 8 a.m. to noon and start July 12 (last day of class is August 6 or 13th, depending on the class). Students are eligible to take an Adult School/Summer School class at “The Maywood Academy” only if taken previously and if received a grade of D or fail.

Sixth Grade students should take advantage of a special orientation designed specifically for them on August 6. Freshman orientation will be from Aug. 9 – 13.

For more information or an application for the programs, please check at the ELC offices or via Mr. Mendieta or Ms. Torres-Ring.

CUDAHY, CA The City of Cudahy is unveiling an anniversary logo to commemorate this special year.

The logo, which reflects the traditional City logo compass and California Bear, adds a "50th Anniversary" in the center. The log will be used on a variety of City materials and promotions to help remind residents, friends and neighbors of the rich history of the area that is intertwined with the history of the region. Cudahy was incorporated on Nov. 10, 1960.

The Cudahy City Council has been developing a 50th anniversary commemoration that not only celebrates what Cudahy offers its residents and businesses today, but recognizes the contributions to community-building made by original incorporators and the Cudahy residents who formed a new city.

Also, the city is inviting residents to tell their stories; Residents, young and old, are being asked to prepare personal reflections of their favorite memories and stories of life in Cudahy. A schools project is also being planned so that Cudahy kids can write essays for the display at City facilities and for publication. Selected essays will be reprinted in the Cudahy News and other publications throughout the 50th anniversary year, plus selected stories will be available online at the city website.

Please check the City website for more news about 50th Anniversary events.

Cities like Cudahy prepare for everyday emergencies, but during a major disaster as we've recently seen in Haiti, emergency services can become overwhelmed with the high demand and intensity of calls.

In its on-going efforts to protect residents, the City of Cudahy has initiated a Cudahy-CERT program to build a team of highly-trained citizens who will assist emergency personnel in the event of a major disaster.

The Community Emergency Response Team or CERT, as it is commonly known, is an all-risk, all-hazard training program designed to help citizens protect themselves, their family, their neighbors and neighborhood in emergency situations.

This past January, over thirty Cudahy citizens joined with council members and city staff for a multi-day training that conclude with a mock-emergency scenario held at Lugo Park.

During the CERT training, residents learned to manage utilities and put out small fires, provide basic medical aid, search for and rescue victims safely, organize themselves and spontaneous volunteers to be effective, and collect disaster intelligence to support first responder efforts. A significant part of the training dealt with treating the three medical killers by opening airways, controlling bleeding, and treating for shock.

The CERT program developed after the 1985 Mexico City earthquake that registered a magnitude 8.1 on the Richter scale killing more than 10,000 people and injuring more than 30,000. Although Mexico City had no training program for citizens prior to the disaster, large groups of volunteers organized themselves and performed light search and rescue operations. Volunteers are credited with more than 800 successful rescues; unfortunately, more than 100 of these untrained volunteers died during the 15-day rescue operation.

In contrast, Japan took extensive steps to train entire neighborhood teams in fire suppression, light search and rescue operations, first aid, or evacuation to assist local authorities following major earthquakes.

So in 1985, the first CERT training was developed based on the lessons learned in Mexico City and Japan.

Training is available free throughout Los Angeles County, and citizens interested in becoming CERT trained should contact Cudahy City Hall for more information.

Despite the recent rain, overall we are still experiencing record-setting drought conditions. We have a limited water supply and are down to our reserves. During heavy rains, not all the water can be collected because the ground becomes saturated and the water runs off to flood channels and the sea. It's easy to save water and it will help keep your bills lower! Water saving tips:

• Turn off the water when you brush your teeth.
• Shorten your shower by just 2 minutes.
• Fix leaky facets (it’s easy and can save $$$).
• When doing the laundry, only wash when you have full loads.
• If you have sprinklers, set them to run for shorter times and before 8 a.m. (get a "Smart" sprinkler controller).
• Sweep your driveways and outside areas – don’t use the hose!
• Fix broken sprinklers and make sure they are pointed in the right direction.

Cudahy's Manuel Buenrostro selected by La Opinión and Univision as part of the Cadena Buena Gente (Chain of Good People).

Read more (English)» Read more (Spanish)»

A three-year project will help approximately 3,200 residents of Los Angeles County's southeast cities get ahead with high-speed broadband Internet access and education

CUDAHY, CALIFORNIA, PRNewswire-The California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) is presenting grant awards of $476,000 and $301,000 respectively to the Southeast Cities Technology Collaborative for a three-year initiative to close the growing Digital Divide among residents in the southeast cities of Los Angeles County. A press conference to announce the grants was held on Sept. 11, 2008, and was attended by Michael Peevey, president of the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and chairman of CETF, Ronald Garcia, president of the Southeast Community Development Corporation (SCDC), Leonis Malburg, mayor of Vernon, former State Senator Martha Escutia, and Leticia Chacon, associate director of Human Services Association (HSA) Bell Gardens.

"We're pleased to support the southeast community of Los Angeles County," said Michael Peevey, president of the CPUC and chairman of CETF. "Investing in high-speed Internet access will encourage the social, educational and economic advancement and help community residents get ahead. We think that the Southeast Cities Technology Collaborative will be a model for other regions to replicate."

Although adoption of high-speed broadband Internet technology is steadily increasing across the nation and within California, many underserved populations exist without Internet access. Almost all adults with household incomes above $80,000 use computers (94 percent) and the Internet (92 percent), while those with household incomes under $40,000 are far less likely to use either computers (58 percent) or the Internet (49 percent), according to the Public Policy Institute of California. Three in four Californians (75%) report that they use a computer at home, work or school, and 70 percent use the Internet. Latinos lag far behind other groups with only 58 percent using computers and 48 percent using the Internet.

A recent study conducted by the University of California in Berkeley has shown that residents of the southeast cities, including the communities of Bell, Bell Gardens, Cudahy, Huntington Park, Maywood, South Gate, Vernon and Walnut Park / Florence-Firestone, are largely disconnected from the Internet due to the lack of broad public access to computers, technical assistance and computer literacy education. This reality, referred to as the Digital Divide, is a concern for California's future global competitiveness.

In order to bridge the Digital Divide, the Southeast Cities Technology Collaborative will conduct a three-year technology initiative in these communities to develop strong pathways for improving educational and health outcomes by expanding community broadband access, implementing a comprehensive computer literacy program and enhancing existing community service programs throughout the region.

"We're grateful for this opportunity to advance our community," said Ronald Garcia, president of the Southeast Community Development Corporation (SCDC). "For California to be a global leader in broadband, there must be a broader and deeper understanding among California policymakers, civic leaders and consumers of how broadband technology can improve quality of life, enhance economic prosperity and help reduce impacts on the environment."

This project is the first of many initiatives beginning statewide that will help underserved communities and populations get ahead by closing the Digital Divide through the use of high-speed Internet access and education. CETF's overall goal is to make a substantial and measurable impact on bridging California's Digital Divide in rural areas, urban disadvantaged neighborhoods, and among people with disabilities. Achieving this goal will require both the availability of broadband technology as well as the ability to access and use it.

The Southeast Cities Technology Collaborative will serve at least 1,700 residents, plus 500 students with the adult education training programs, and 1,000 children/youth over a three-year period. The Collaborative will develop eight Regional Technology Centers in eight communities by strategically locating 80 computer workstations in community facilities, providing space and staff members to enhance early learning skills for children, math and science skills for youth, career and workforce development and financial literacy skills for adults. A total of 500 adult students that successfully complete a three-month computer literacy class will receive a free refurbished computer and two years of free AT&T DSL service.

A mobile computer lab with 15 laptops and a projector will be established to provide life-skills, health awareness and job development classes at on-site locations that want to offer classes yet cannot accommodate a learning center. The Collaborative will partner with East Los Angeles Community College (South Gate Branch), Southwest Community College and Huntington Park-Bell Adult School and will refer students for advanced classes.

About the California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF)

The mission of the California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) is to close the Digital Divide and ensure that California is a global leader in the use of broadband technology (high-speed access to the Internet). The California Public Utilities Commission directed the establishment of CETF in approving the mergers of SBC-AT&T and Verizon-MCI in 2005. AT&T and Verizon are contributing a total of $60 million in seed capital to advance broadband deployment and adoption. CETF is a non-profit public-benefit corporation. For more information, please visit http://www.cetfund.org or call (415) 744-CETF.

About the Southeast Community Development (SCDC)

The Southeast Community Development Corporation is a nonprofit organization focused on improving the economic, social, and educational development of the residents of Southeast area of Los Angeles County. For more information, please visit http://www.scdcorp.org or call (323) 585-4579.

Cudahy and School District Break Ground on South Region Elementary School #3 and Early Education Center #1 The major of Cudahy joined the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Board Member Yolie Flores Aguilar in breaking ground on South Region Elementary School #3 and Early Education Center #1. "We are here because LAUSD and the community had a dream that students within the Southeast Cities could attend a school in their community on a single-track calendar,” Board Member Flores Aguilar said. “As someone who attended school in the Southeast area, it is a pleasure to celebrate the construction of a new school for the children of Cudahy". South Region Elementary #3 and Early Education Center

Mr. Michael Pérez brings a wealth of experience and expertise to his new position as the Principal of the Elizabeth Learning Center.