It’s down two cents at the shell station. Sorry, I don’t know why it’s rotated.

From my favorite Niles chat group:
Police Chief Craig Steckler joined a discussion about speed bumps and started talking about red light cameras.

In Fremont red light cameras seem to have reduced accidents at intersections equipped with the cameras.
From 7/1/1995 to 6/30/2005 a 5 yr. period before the installation of the first set of cameras we had 734 traffic signal related accidents.
From 7/1/2000 to 6/30/2005 the rate went down to 626 accidents or a 15% decrease. In those five years we also had an overall increase in traffic volume in Fremont.
As to fines from red light violations. By Penal Code statutes the City of Fremont receives between 9% and 11% of each traffic fine with the rest of the money going to the State of California and the County of Alameda.
We would actually make more money if we did red light enforcement only with traffic officers since we have a contract with RedFlex who installs and maintains the systems and they receive a portion of the fines. We truly did install them to reduce accidents and by all accounts they have helped with this problem. Read the rest of this entry »

The Chronicle has the story. Read it here.

There’s a lot of anger on the blog lately. Once again, I’ll leave it to Cat Stevens to show us the folly of our ways:

Thanks to Dan Sarka, who took this picture of two squirrels sharing a home near Rainbow Lake in Fremont. Who says squirrels are territorial? I think we should name one of them Patty and the other, Alice.

I mentioned in a post last week that The Argus had just four reporters, down from 11 in 2000. I spoke too soon. Our company made 29 editorial employees walk the plank Wednesday including our best feature writer and third-best poker player, Todd R. Brown. 

Todd covered Newark, Ohlone, ethnic communities and pirate stores. Now, I guess,  he’ll wander the streets of Fremont looking for decent salmagundi.

You’ve probably read recently that the newspaper business seems to be in Davy’s grip. Revenue is down, circulation is down, newsprint is up, and our parent company has some debt issues.

The lubbers are supposed to meet next week at corporate headquarters and figure out what this will mean for the three of us still here. For now, though, I am your Fremont, Newark and (shiver me timbers) Union City reporter. 

Fair Winds, Todd. Fair Winds.

I just  shook Shawon Dunston’s hand. For the uninitiated, Dunston played major league ball for long time, had a great throwing arm and is now a Fremont Recreation Commissioner. I need to go to more of those commission meetings.

After clasping my sweaty palm, Dunston got into his Cadillac SUV, and, I’m proud to say, followed the new cell phone law to a tee.  He’s Mr. Bluetooth these days.

It looks like New Haven Unified is close to naming a new chief business officer to manage the district’s $104.4 million budget — and the headaches that come with dealing with budget cuts. Its last CBO, Carol Gregorich, retired as of Monday, and the district interviewed candidates for her position last week.

New Haven’s spokesman confirmed this afternoon that the district has a person in mind to fill Gregorich’s shoes, but he wouldn’t divulge any more details. He said the district hopes to call a special meeting on Tuesday so that the board can appoint this person.

The district also is in the process of looking for a new director of operations. The last guy, Enrique Palacios, has taken a job with the Gilroy school district as the assistant superintendent of administrative services.

With the current state budget crisis, it may come as no shocker that there seems to be more CBOs leaving this year than usual, as one HR person at a local school district told me.

Minuteman Charles Bartlett just called to say his group has decided to march in Fremont’s Fourth of July Parade.

He also said that at least two members of the Golden Gate Minutemen will run for City Council this year. Should be interesting.

The minutemen and their allies apparently have inched closer to gaining a majority of the Alameda County Republican Central Committee. The group’s write-in candidate in Livermore, Judy Fenta,  has been elected, Bartlett said. None of the three write-in candidates backed by what Bartlett called “the country club Republicans” got enough votes, he said.

Fremont’s SeaWolf Trading Company had some pretty neat merchandise and a great web site name: www.pirateswag.com. That was enough to merit not one, but two big stories in The Argus. But even the free publicity wasn’t enough to keep one of Fremont’s quirkiest stores afloat.

We’ll have a story tomorrow that the pirate store is closing at the end of August after nearly three years at 36511 Fremont Blvd. Let’s hope the replacement shop isn’t Applebees #3.

*  *  *

UPDATE: Unbeknownst to Matt, what the pirate store’s owner, Don Hatcher, also told me is that his stepdaughter, an Ohlone College student who helped out at the shop’s counter, recently decided “to make some money” this summer by taking a job at … the Pacific Commons Applebees. Talk about irony, argh!

– Todd