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MONTEREY PARK >> A memorial service for Mexican music superstar Juan Gabriel is scheduled for Tuesday at a Catholic Church in Monterey Park. The service is set for 5 to 9 p.m. at St. Stephen Martyr Catholic Church, 320 W. Garvey Ave. Gabriel, 66, whose inteational popularity spaed multiple generations, died of a heart attack Aug. 27 at his home in Santa Monica. He was known for his powerful ballads and a commanding stage presence punctuated by often-flamboyant costumes. His death came less than three days after he performed a two-hour set at the Los Angeles Forum as part of his sold-out “MeXXico Es Todo Tour.” Gabriel, whose real name was Alberto Aquilera Valadez, wrote more than 1,50...

The sound of applause has scarcely died down in the Capitol after last week’s vote to significantly expand Califoia’s requirements to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Proponents who steered the groundbreaking legislation are still basking in the afterglow of an effort that—after seeming on the brink of defeat—deftly mustered unexpected support and reaffirmed the state’s inteational leadership on climate change. But such is the unsentimentality of politics: Someone has to pop the pretty balloons and sweep up the confetti. For all that was achieved by the passage of SB 32—extending the original 2006 law and setting a new target of reducing statewide emissions to 40 percent below 1990 levels b...

LOS ANGELES >> The music manager who helped introduce N.W.A to the masses has died. Jerry Heller was 75 years old. Heller’s cousin, Gary Ballen, says Heller died Friday night at a hospital in Thousand Oaks after suffering a heart attack while driving earlier in the day. Heller co-founded Ruthless Records with Eazy-E, which released N.W.A’s seminal album “Straight Outta Compton” in 1988, launching the West Coast gangsta rap movement. Ruthless was also behind such artists as J.J. Fad, Michel’le and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. Actor Paul Giamatti played the veteran music manager in last year’s hit film “Straight Outta Compton.” Heller sued the film’s producers for defamation after its release,...

Thousands of Califoia’s foster care kids may be overdrugged with psychotropic medications, often without medical follow-up or a legally required approval from a judge or parent, according to a stinging report by the Califoia State Auditor. “The state and counties have failed to adequately oversee the prescribing of these medications,” wrote auditor Elaine M. Howle. The long-awaited report, released in August by State Auditor Elaine Howle, mirrors many findings of Bay Area News Group’s investigative series “Drugging Our Kids.” Those stories, which appeared in Southe Califoia News Group publications, including this one, highlighted how only 10 percent of the state’s 1,280 highest prescribers w...

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...

HOLLYWOOD — Rock’s top-selling duo Daryl Hall and John Oates were honored with the 2,587th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame today. • PHOTOS: Hall & Oates to receive Hollywood Walk of Fame star Music executive Jerry Greenberg joined Hall and Oates in speaking at the 11:30 a.m. ceremony in front of the Musicians Institute on Hollywood Boulevard. Hall and Oates formed their partnership in 1972, going on to record 21 albums, which have sold more than 80 million copies. They were recognized as rock’s all-time top selling duo in 1987 by the music industry trade organization the Recording Industry Association of America, a distinction they still hold. From the mid-1970s to mid-1980s, they ha...

EVERETT, Wash. >> In a surprise move, Donald Trump will travel to Mexico on Wednesday to meet with President Enrique Pena Nieto, just hours before the Republican delivers a highly anticipated speech on immigration. Trump took to Twitter on Tuesday night to say he looks “very much forward” to meeting with the Mexican leader. Pena Nieto’s office confirmed the meeting with its own tweet, saying the two men would meet privately. The unexpected trip comes as Trump seeks to clarify his stand on illegal immigration, a contentious issue that has been a centerpiece of his Republican presidential campaign. Trump has long called for deporting people currently living in the U.S. illegally and buil...

Suspended USC linebacker Osa Masina is under investigation by the Cottonwood Heights police department in Utah for an alleged sexual assault, a spokesman confirmed Tuesday. The investigation was first reported by a Fox affiliate television station in Salt Lake City. The alleged incident occurred in Salt Lake County in July. USC coach Clay Helton aounced on Monday that Masina would not travel with the Trojans for their season opener on Saturday against top-ranked Alabama in Arlington, Texas, due to an unspecified violation of team rules. Investigators from the Los Angeles police department were on campus last week and confirmed they are working with Cottonwood Heights police and on their own...

TARZANA >> Los Angeles police responded to Chris Brown’s residence in Tarzana Tuesday and later served a search warrant on the home as the singer took to social media to deny any wrongdoing and to condemn police. At a news conference Tuesday afteoon, LAPD Lt. Chris Ramirez said police were serving a search warrant on the home, and an unknown number of people were exiting the residence. The house is located in a posh, hillside neighborhood of one-and two-story homes that are nearly all protected by locked iron gates. A call initially came at 3:11 a.m. from the 5000 block of Corbin Avenue, police said earlier. “It came out as a female requesting help,” Officer Drake Madison of LAPD’s Me...

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...

Seven southe Los Angeles County cities are suing Metro over its proposed half-cent sales tax increase on the Nov. 8 ballot, arguing the language is misleading and the agency didn’t specify most of the transportation projects it would fund. The ballot description takes a kitchen-sink approach, saying Measure M is needed “to improve freeway traffic flow/safety; repair potholes/sidewalks; repave local streets; earthquake retrofit bridges; synchronize signals; keep senior/disabled/student fares affordable; expand rail/subway/bus systems/ improve jobs/school/airport coections; and create jobs ...” But it doesn’t mention that the vast majority of transportation improvements won’t touch the southe...

SAN FRANCISCO >> Califoia’s $64 billion high-speed rail plan lacks reliable funding sources and is in danger of ending up with only one line that doesn’t coect to San Francisco or Los Angeles, members of a Congressional panel said Monday during a hearing. Proceeds from a state environment program that is supposed to help fund the project were far below expectations and private funding for the train has yet to materialize, Rep. Doug LaMalfa, a Califoia Republican, said. “Where is the money going to come from,” LaMalfa asked Dan Richard, chairman of the rail authority’s board. Richard said private firms have expressed interest in the system but want to see the first leg up and ruing. Th...

LOS ANGELES — Attoeys for a coalition of seven Los Angeles County cities will try again Tuesday to file a request for an accelerated hearing on a lawsuit filed last week on behalf of taxpayers conceing the ballot language for Measure M, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s proposed half-cent county sales tax ballot action. The Los Angeles Superior Court petition filed by the cities of Carson, Commerce, Norwalk, Torrance, Santa Fe Springs, Ranchos Palos Verdes and Signal Hill alleges that the ballot label for Measure M is misleading and does not include the actual 1 percent total rate of the tax to be imposed. Lawyers for the petitioners arrived too late to Judge Mary H. Strobel’s cour...

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles and a funeral home company have settled dueling litigation conceing the lease of land at six Catholic cemeteries for the operation of mortuaries, including one in Long Beach. Lawyers for S.E. Funeral Homes of Califoia Inc. filed paperwork Aug. 18 in Los Angeles Superior Court stating that the resolution includes the sale and transfer of the mortuaries to a subsidiary of the archdiocese in a deal scheduled to close Nov. 30. No additional specifics were given. S.E. Funeral Homes filed suit in September 2014, alleging breach of contract and seeking a court order to prevent the archdiocese from taking possession of the premises. The archdiocese countersued in June...

EXPOSITION PARK >> There were big crowds once again for the final day of the 13th aual FYF Fest at Exposition Park to see more than 20 acts close out the eclectic festival. The vibe at the Sunday concert was relatively relaxed and chill with the day headlined by LCD Soundsystem, the electronic dance rock collective who reunited to play the festival circuit. Also on the bill for the last day was 68-year-old Grace Jones, Blood Orange, which consists of singer-guitarists Dev Hynes, and young hip hop acts Rae Sremmurd and Young Thug. While Saturday’s event saw long lines both inside the event grounds and to get into the main gate, on Sunday the line to get into Exposition Park ran a littl...

May 2014: The Teachers Association of Long Beach distributed surveys to its members to determine how many classrooms in Long Beach Unified experience stifling heat. TALB received 200 responses from teachers with mixed results. September 2014: The district asked schools to curtail physical activity and canceled all nonleague and league competition for two days. Additionally, Long Beach Unified communicated with parents about “hot weather precautions, including the need to stay hydrated.” Parents, meanwhile, attend a school board meeting, pleading with the district to do something about the lack of air conditioning in older buildings across the district, which they say creates an unhealthy lea...

EXPOSITION PARK >> Kendrick Lamar celebrated a homecoming of sorts at the FYF Fest on Saturday, headlining the main stage just a few miles north of his hometown of Compton and, over the course of a terrifically compelling set, underscoring his standing as one of the top rappers in the game today. Lamar, alone on stage for most of his performance, his band positioned in the wings, offered all the things for which the 29-year-old hip-hop artist has been rightly celebrated during his rapid ascent in the past two or three years. Passionate poetry both personal and political that flows smoothly from the mic. A deep understanding of the soul and jazz and funk that predates hip-hop and inspir...

Hamstrung by strict limits on political contributions, Califoia lawmakers have found a way to continue to extract large sums from some of Sacramento’s most powerful special interests. Increasingly, they’re using “ballot measure committees,” little-known and barely regulated accounts that are supposed to promote or oppose state and local initiatives but in practice are paying for consultants and polling firms, new suits and trips to Mexico. And the money for the politicians’ perks comes in the form of five-figure donations from the same special interests that state rules were intended to curtail. An analysis by Digital First Media, which includes this news organization, shows that the number...

Between 1999 and 2013, Califoia’s Academic Performance Index boiled everything about the state’s K-12 public schools down to a single number between 200 and 1000. That’s going away in a new, more nuanced system that’s now under construction. In the old model, the desirability of neighborhoods or even whole communities in large part hinged on their API score. Careers were made or lost based on how far a school or district was from the magic 800 target number. And under the federal No Child Left Behind law, failure to steadily increase an API score — even an already high one — could mean dire trouble for a school or district. But the API was only based on the results of standardized tests tak...

While a majority of Americans see undocumented immigrants in a positive light, a new poll found that staunch Donald Trump supporters have a more threatening view of people who are in the U.S. without legal status. More than 76 percent of those surveyed said undocumented immigrants are as hardworking and honest as U.S. citizens, according to a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center. And, 67 percent said undocumented immigrants are no more likely than citizens to commit serious crimes. Also, 61 percent oppose building a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico. Trump backers offer a different perspective. The poll, released Aug.u200925, found that half of all Trump supporters surveyed said u...