press-news

Rishi Sharma is hoping local veterans will help him with his mission to interview combat veterans of World War II. The 18-year-old Aguora Hills resident has completed more than 100 interviews and is shifting his attention to the Inland Empire. The recent high school graduate has decided to defer his college education so that he can conduct daily interviews. “When I first started, I was an armchair historian about WWII. I knew more than the average person, but delving into this, there’s an amazing amount of raw information,” he said. “After each interview, the picture becomes slightly more clearer of what they faced.” Through his nonprofit, Heroes of the Second World War, Sharma is conductin...

ONTARIO >> The once-vacant and quiet Meredith property between Vineyard and Archibald avenues began bustling with commercial activity Monday as officials dedicated QVC’s first West Coast distribution center with an opening ceremony. The 1-million-square-foot QVC warehouse was filled with a sea of empty shelving racks Monday, but trucks bringing inventory had arrived and officials expected to begin shipping product out from Ontario this week. They expect to ramp up the operation by the holiday shopping season. The new facility should shrink delivery times up to four days, Jim Reid, vice president of customer logistics, said. “We want to speed that process up for our West Coast customer...

Long Beach’s Plaing Commission will decide Thursday whether to allow plans and permitting for the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center to move forward. If all the approvals are granted, the $103 million project would move on to the City Council, then the state Coastal Commission. The center is designed to replace the Belmont Plaza Olympic Pool, which was to down after engineers determined the natatorium was in danger of collapse in the event of an earthquake. The proposed replacement, designed by architect Michael Rotondi, includes two Olympic-sized pools (one inside a structure, the other outside), an indoor diving well, a recreational pool and other amenities. If approved, a transparent oval ...

LAS VEGAS — Nate Diaz and Conor McGregor really don’t like each other. Or apparently press conferences for that matter. Just five months after their press conference for UFC 196 broke into a wild melee, the pair and their camps hurled insults, profanities and drinks at each other Wednesday at the UFC 202 press conference at the David Copperfield Theatre at the MGM Grand. Diaz and McGregor are the main event Saturday in a welterweight rematch of their scintillating March showdown, shockingly won by Diaz via a second-round rear-naked choke. McGregor arrived nearly 25 minutes late to the presser Tuesday, which also featured UFC President Dana White and light heavyweights Anthony Johnson and Gl...

More than 150 people gathered on June 16 in the Harborview Ballroom of The Reef on the Water to mark the 40th Aual Awards Dier of the Disabled Resources Center. The proceeds from the event, themed “The Road to Ruby,” support DRC’s critical work as a nonresidential Independent Living Center. Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe received a Special Lifetime Service Award for his long-standing support and dedication to the cause of persons with disabilities. Five other awardees included: Cathy Parsa, Community Service Award; J. Cacilia Kim, Civic Leadership Award; Cynde Soto and Jerry Stein, Independent Living Award; Westly Ward and Andrew Swinton, Volunteer of the Year Award, named in memory...

A new health center offering free and low-cost services to LGBTQ residents in Long Beach and the surrounding area marked its official grand opening Wednesday inside the St. Mary Medical Center campus. Funded in part by a $650,000 grant from the federal Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration, the 7,000-square-foot Long Beach Health Center, which will serve more than 5,000 people each year, is one of the newest neighborhood centers opened by the nonprofit AIDS Project Los Angeles, and APLA Health. The center offers medical, dental and behavioral health care services to the LGBTQ community, including disease prevention counseling, HIV testing, scre...

SAN BERNARDINO >> Inland Regional Center executive director Lavinia Johnson’s eyes beamed as she talks about the outpouring of support from the public, but there were times during a recent hourlong discussion when she became a bit reserved. Associate director Kevin Urtz was much more guarded, especially when it came to discussing the events of eight months ago, Dec. 2. In fact, both said they made an effort to avoid interviews because of conces that sharing the littlest detail will cause their 600 employees to relive that day. Half a year from later, the duo broke their self-imposed silence to express appreciation for the cards, baers, stuffed toys, homemade cookies and all the sentim...

Some progress has been made in processing autopsies and toxicology results at the Losu2009Angeles County coroner’s office, where the head of the department abruptly resigned three months ago because of the number of bodies that had piled up, heavy workloads and staff shortages, according to a recent report. The report, presented to the Losu2009Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday by the chief executive office, was in response to recommendations made to alleviate the backlog at the coroner’s department. Some improvements so far include adding a few more criminologists, placing some employees on a higher pay scale, and launching a study to lea how to retain staff. •RELATED: Outgoing...

Los Angeles police have stepped up their resources while other agencies vowed to remain vigilant after three law enforcement officers were killed and three more were injured Sunday in a shooting in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said the city added resources Sunday to ensure the Los Angeles Police Department, along with other public safety agencies, are better supported. “This includes doubling our (helicopters patrolling the city), shifting Metropolitan Division officers. ... To help back up patrol officers responding to calls for service, and adding additional resources to help screen our 911 calls,” Garcetti said in a statement. The Metropolitan Division, which i...

Officials in Signal Hill have paved the way for Auto Center dealerships to expand storage and services. The City Council recently approved an ordinance allowing dealerships at the Auto Center to maintain wholesale facilities and vehicle storage yards, and perform auto body repair, painting, and other services. Officials said dealerships at the Auto Center need additional space for inventory, trade-in vehicles and previously leased vehicles. “As automakers have changed their sales model from buyers ordering cars with options, to actually having that car on site for the buyer to get the day of the purchase, dealerships are in need of more space to carry a larger inventory, as well as providing...

The shocking sight of several barren Coral trees in Bluff Park, a place where hundreds gather regularly to practice yoga and find shade under the sprawling branches, has created a stir on social media. Posts began circulating around Facebook on Tuesday after residents snapped shots of city workers chopping off large branches of trees and began tagging the mayor, asking him what was going on. Mayor Robert Garcia responded on Facebook, saying he, too, was surprised and upset. “When I saw the photo on Facebook I was both incredibly upset and saddened,” he wrote. “Those were beautiful trees and, as you know, we featured the trees and yoga on the bluff in our LB video a few months back.” Garcia ...

Businessman Darrell Park’s lead in the race for the second spot in the runoff election for the Fifth District seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors grew again Monday. Park has a 2,237-vote lead over Sen. Bob Huff, R-San Dimas, according to the update of the count of provisional and vote-by-mail ballots released Monday by the Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk. Park held a 1,661-vote lead entering Monday’s count. He had a 417-vote lead over Huff in the semiofficial ballot count released June 8. Park has 53,735 votes, 15.43 percent, to 51,498 for Huff, 14.79 percent. Kathryn Barger, chief of staff to outgoing Supervisor Michael Antonovich, leads the eight-candidate field with 103,5...

LOS ANGELES >> Hundreds of registered nurses at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center began a four-day strike today -- the second walkout at the hospital in three months. Officials with the Califoia Nurses Association/National Nurses United union contend the walkout is part of a push for increased staffing levels to improve patient care, but Kaiser officials denied that claim, saying nursing staff ratios at the hospital “meet or exceed state guidelines.” “This strike is not about quality or adequate staffing levels,” according to Kaiser. “The quality of care our teams at LAMC provide has never been higher. In fact, in 2015 LAMC was named one of the Top 10 Best Hospitals in Calif...

BAGHDAD — Iraqi special forces battled their way into the center of Fallujah on Friday, capturing a key neighborhood and a govement complex from Islamic State group fighters, and thousands of residents fled as the militants’ grip on the city appeared to crumble. As ISIS fighters abandoned some checkpoints that had kept people bottled up in the city, residents surged to leave, some jumping into the Euphrates River to swim to safety, others picking their way down roads laced with hidden bombs. In some cases, ISIS allowed people to leave only if they took the jihadis’ families with them. Iraqi forces now control around 80 percent of Fallujah, with the remaining militants largely concentrated i...

CLEVELAND — Golden State center Andrew Bogut will need six to eight weeks to recover from a left knee injury, ruling him out for the remainder of the NBA Finals and almost certainly affecting his Olympic plans as well. The Warriors are calling it an “impaction injury” that resulted in serious bone bruises. Bogut will not need surgery, the team said. Bogut was hurt Sunday night about 90 seconds into the third quarter when he blocked a shot by the Cleveland Cavaliers’ J.R. Smith, then landed awkwardly. It’s a major blow to Golden State’s defensive scheme. Bogut blocked five shots in Game 2 of the finals, and the Warriors’ defensive numbers are typically much better when he is on the floor. Wi...

Sitting at a rare, public designated smoking area in the San Feando Valley, Marlene Tucker took a midday drag off her cigarette Thursday and said she knows there are health risks that come with her habit. But she’s an adult, she said. “An 18-year-old isn’t equipped to understand the risks,” Tucker, 62, said. “They just think it’s really cool, that it’s not going to affect them.” That’s why she agreed with the new law that took effect Thursday increasing the minimum age for the sale of tobacco products in Califoia from 18 to 21. When Gov. Jerry Brown signed the law in May, Califoia became the second state in the nation, following Hawaii, to raise the minimum age for tobacco sales. The change...