nevada county law enforcement and fire protection council raised about twenty five thousand dollars from the red light ball this past weekend according to event organizers saturday night event at the county fairgrounds was attended by four hundred fifty people about fifty guests fewer than last year said bill durand founder and president of the nonprofit the weather had something to do with that referring to the rain pounded outside during the night nevada county narcotics task force one the two thousand and eight public safety commitment award at the event in nevada county sheriff's captain accepted the plan under the administration of sheriff royal the task force includes one sergeant one full time police officer from nevada city one full time police officer from gr for sheriff deputies the sheriff's office says he is the group's leader agency the group was credited with a cry down on illegal drugs including a large number of commercial marijuana raids and meth lab raids among other achievements when you receive into your ward last year the group said it took action against five large pot growers who are suspected links to mexican drug trafficking groups marijuana has become the number one countries no counties number one cash crop the union has reporting to tell us force agrees that hard drugs such as meth are more serious problem and have made seizures of mass heroin cocaine ecstasy so sudden opium steroids an illegally sold pharmaceutical drugs the members of the task force were asked to stand and were roundly applauded by the guests when the award was given no photographer who was allowed to protect a task force members animated part of their job includes drug sales sting operation event included a buffet dinner and live band as in the past guest paid forty five dollars per person threadlike ball is one of two fund raising events arranged by the nevada county law enforcement and fire council said allen kill board member of the council this is the events knights year the other fundraisers is the gunned in hoses golf tournament in june said kilbane together the two fundraisers have raised more than two hundred fifty thousand dollars to date the money has been used to buy police and fire equipment and also for scholarships settlement talks are heating up in grass valley is ongoing lawsuit with newmont mining corps it dispute that has led to a multi year drain of more than three point one million dollars from the city coffers according to one city lawyer who is handling the case if lori of work has been going on behind the scenes as the city and deep pocketed denver based company prepare to square off in sacramento courtroom on march twenty fifth lawyer can't name said the grass  newmont two sides have been embroiled in a lawsuit since two thousand and four after negotiations broke down treating the water at the city sewer plant has cost grass valley more than one point five million dollars beyond typical treatment expenses on top of that the city  in the city if you want spokesman wouldn't characterize the status of settlement talks but said the mining group is working hard to end the matter we've been very forthcoming with our office said new month spokesman omar jabara declining to provide details we've been working very hard to reach a fair and equitable settlement on the added a little more but it did say settlement discussions typically increase prior to trials such as the one the city faces new city administrator dan holler is not looking forward to facing the lawsuit a day after he's slated to begin his tenure hopefully that will be solved before i get here said hall or during an interview with the union last week the costly and resolved dispute was one factor that led to the to the the special meeting is set for six p m press fellows city hall one twenty five east main street the trial is set for eight thirty a m march twenty fifth in federal court in sacramento more than eight years since the problem was  found the shaft in february two thousand and one digging into the ground near wolf creek to expand the treatment plant according to the lawsuit the city traced it back to the old massachusetts hill mine which was bought by the north star mining company in coming from the money company has until the end of may need to complete its investigation and report back to the board jabara declined to comment on what you might have done to meet the st speculation is growing that state senator tom mcclintock will announce a run for the congressional seat being vacated by john doolittle perhaps as early as this week a draft tom for congress effort was highly visible at the past weekend's california republican party convention in san francisco complete with campaign signs and stickers talk amongst attendees is that our conservative standard bearer could throw his hat in the ring as early as this week says marriages the announcement and the buzz of the convention is that we will soon be referring to senator mcclintock as congressman clinton well that's if it gets by charlie brown mcclintock republican from thousand oaks has said he considering a run for the fourth district seat held by doolittle who will not seek a reelection in november on friday as spokes woman for mcclintock in sacramento reiterated to the union that he was considering whether to enter the race but would not discuss the timing for the decision for x republican doug ose a six percent for former senator rico over and thirty six undecided according to the roll call newspaper about three hundred voters were surveyed in the february tenth eleventh poll and other such poll is expected soon p challenger is democrat charlie brown in roseville who narrowly lost to do a little two years ago though he beat him in nevada county he is a formidable challenger but mcclintock is a widely recognized and respected conservative in th if you look at the fourth district john would be a natural fit a g o p insider told roll call the national republican committee is eager to hold onto the g o p see election year with the presidential race up for grabs and a democrat controlled congress  year in two thousand and six and declining registration last year chairman ron neighboring told the los angeles times clinton has lost three bids for a statewide seat for governor in two thousand and three for lieutenant governor in two thousand and six and for state controller in two thousand  the state assemblyman doesn't reside in the fourth district either n h or the brown is expected to drum home to voters on the other hand the fourth district is solidly republican and voters here likely would rather have a strong conservative such as mcclintock based on his ideology entered the race the battle of the endorsement will no doubt heat up between county supervisors who horne and down low for another closely watched campaign g o p slot in the third district assembly race for june logue was has won indorsements from kean and state senator sam anastasia republican from grass valley while horne is focusing on more grassroots endorsements from city and county leaders do little announced on january tenth that he wouldn't seek reelection to the tenth term congressman is under federal investigation for his ties to jailed lobbyist jack abramoff doolittle denies any wrongdoing he spent seventeen years in congress but clinton has spent nineteen years in state legislature he and his wife have two children and that's it for our local news today turkey's ground invasion of northern iraq has endured his fifth day of march the largest cross border ground offensive since iraq since the fall of saddam hussein since attack began on thursday turkey says that over one hundred kurdish militants have been killed along with fifteen turk soldiers both iraqi and kurdish governments have called on turkey to end the offensive raul castro has become the new president of cuba and in fidel castro's forty nine year rule after being selected by the cuban national assembly well castro said he would continue to consult his brother on important matters he also said i assume the responsibilities of that you have given to me with the conviction that the commander in chief of the illusion is a person only one person for dollars fidel we all know well that fidel cannot be replaced and the people will continue their work when he is not here physically the cuban national assembly elected seventy seven year old jose rim on which out of inter as first vice president fidel castro remains that the communist party's chief in the united states republican presidential front runner john mccain criticized his democratic rival barack obama for saying he would be willing to meet with raul castro mccain said raul in many ways has a worst record in fidel and again i think it's naive to think you can sit down and have unconditional talks with a person who has been part of government that has state sponsored ers and not only in the hemisphere but throughout the world in other campaign news consumer advocate ralph nader has announced another bid for the white house he announced his decision on n the press with tim russert ralph nader said one feels an obligation tim to try and open a door ways to try to get a better ballot access to respect dissent america in the tenets of third parties and independent candidates to recognize historically that great issues have come in our history against slavery and women's rights to vote and worker and former progressive's through little parties that never ran one any national election dissent isn't mother of  that context i have decided to run for president later said he is running because none of the other candidates are discussing important issues such as military bloated budget government support for nuclear power and corporate subsidies neither criticized the policies of john accuses obama switching his views on israel palestinian conflict once he became a u s senator ralph nader said he was populist tinian when he was in illinois before he ran for state during he ran during the state senate now he's supporting the israeli destruction of a tiny section called gaza with million and a half people he doesn't have any sympathy for a civilian death ratio of about three hundred to one three hundred palestinians to one israeli clinton obama both criticize nader for entering the race clinton accuses nader of preventing al gore from becoming president in two thousand in other campaign news senator clinton expressed outrage at saturday over what she called republican like tactics employed barbara rock obama clinton accuses a bomb of distributing leaflets in ohio that were spreading false and misleading information about or else care plan and now after senator hillary clinton said so represented clinton's position on health care and her past support for nafta senator barack obama said what this mailer does is point out the differences that she herself surfaced in describes what the mandate that she's calling for would mean which is that the government would force you to buy health care that's indisputable so the notion that we're engaging in the various tactics is pretty hard to swallow and news on john mccain's run for the white house newsweek has uncovered more information on the mccain lobbying scandal last week mccain issued a sweeping denial to rebute to rebut the new york times story about his ties to the washington lobbyist according to the times became wrote to lead letters to the federal about the matter but that claim seems to be contradicted by mccain's own past statement in two thousand and two game said i was contacted by mr lowell passing on this if he wanted to share approval very bad for purposes of his business appears in a sworn deposition from two thousand to obtain by newsweek meanwhile the mccain campaign suffered another setback friday with the indictment of republican congressman rick renzi of arizona r justice department has revealed its internal ethics office is investigating the department's decision to give cia legal approval to waterboarding prisoners beginning in two thousand and two just department attorneys today series of millions authorizing the use of interrogation practices that is widely considered a form of torture one of the justice department documents declared that interrogation methods are not torture unless they produce pain equivalent to that produced by organ  iranian president mahmoud ahmadinejad is calling on the united states and its allies to apologize for the international atomic energy agency has praised praised iran for being more transparent about its nuclear program m again a job described the n watchdog report as a victory over the west which has accused tehran of seeking nuclear weapons u n nuclear watchdog chief mohamed el baradei said his agency had made good progress in clarifying iran's nuclear program thanks to increased iranian cooperation on a dell but there is said in the last four months in particular we have made quite good progress unclear from the outstanding issues that had to do with iran's past nuclear activities with the exception of one issue and that is the alleged studies that supposedly iran has conducted in the past we have managed to clarify all the remaining outstanding issues including the most important issue which is the scope and nature of amerind enrichment program very they also called on one neither the zionists nor their agents will be able to protect the entire internal front no one will be able to protect the internal front from our rockets guzman were also shot but they survived one of the men were on detective michael oliver and gives guardo is nor i were charged with manslaughter and could face up to twenty five years in prison technic mark cooper faces mr gerges who could f year behind bars and a local c b s in alabama which is a being accused of censorship after it blacked out a portion of sixty minutes last night that dealt with the prosecution and imprisonment of former alabama governor don s new york but c b s told them harper's magazine w h n t's claim is not true and that there was no transmission problem and the film taxi to the dark side took the oscar last night for best documentary film reveals the story of an afghan taxi driver who was detained by the united states and then tortured to death this is director alex give nice acceptance speech he said my wife and i was hoping i'd make a romantic comedy but instead honestly after guantanamo abu by the rule of law let's hope we can it can turn this country around move away from the dark side and go back to life the documentary made headlines earlier this month when the discovery channel announced it had dropped plans to air the film given he said the network told him that the film's controversial content might damage discovery's public offering last week h b o bought the rights to the film from discovery a bill to strengthen laura's law to get people's mental health treatment involuntary if there's a threat to themselves or others has been introduced to the california legislature some women leland yee a democrat from san francisco introduced the bill friday in sacramento laura's law was named after a shooting victim laurel wilcox one of the three people killed by mental patients got to work on january tenth two thousand and one in nevada county the law allows for people like stuart who have stopped taking their medications or refused treatment and have become dangerous to get involuntary mental health services from the county the original two thousand and two bill had no funding tied to it and only los angeles county used the portion of it in its court program for mentally ill defendants the funds are now available after the two thousand and four passage of props exceed three but many counties found that the last bill to strictly written to utilize you said in a statement nevada county has just started its laura laws program the assemblyman's streamlining would remove the rule that a number of voluntary services be tried first before involuntary outpatient treatment he would also removed in a sense that he a board of supervisors approving the use of the law and provided planning stage for people released from hospitals to keep them mentally stable and out of washington d c governors are debating priorities if congress takes up second stimulus package with some state leaders pushing for federal money to repair roads water systems and bridges governors help to raise the issues of infrastructure on monday with president bush at the white house there are a lot of projects in every state where there agriculture designs have been done a little early they're ready to tap into the ground and begin construction some democratic governor ed rendell of pennsylvania rendell and a bipartisan group of governors are pushing public works as part of a potential second stimulus package democrat eliot spitzer of new york and republican arnold schwarzenegger of california are among the governors demanding federal action we owe it to the people of america to join together and rebuild our country swardson acres several governors on sunday announced their support for the building america's future coalition public works advocacy group that includes new york mayor michael bloomberg the group estimates the country's infrastructure needs to exceed one trillion through a weekend of meetings in washington governors discussing infrastructure frequently cited last august collapse of the interstate thirty five west bridge in minneapolis into the mississippi river which killed thirteen people and injured one hundred  forty five at a private meeting sunday governors also right staff members of the national governors association to begin listing positions the group could take on the second stimulus package the energy a chairman tim paul and to the republican governor of minnesota didn't roll up public works projects but he questioned their short term value is helpful in the intermediate term said paul lente in terms of the immediate boost a lag time between when those things get approved and we actually get dirt moving last month governors ask congressional leaders debating the in initial stimulus package to freeze plant reductions to medica the state federal health insurance program for poor families and children they're also asking for six billion dollars in a flexible block grant to be used as states see fit polities said sunday that governors never got a response governors are eager to continue fighting the medicaid cuts seen because to me is not the time to reduce the safety net for the poor in our states to do more financially states across america are facing some real constraints on their budgets and are exasperated exasperate that to the tune of thirteen billion dollars for these medicaid medicaid regulations changes is particularly an opportune time right now said republican governor jim douglas of vermont