Guest Column: Germs are mightier than the pen

In 1945, Milton Reynolds received a patent for the first commercially available ballpoint pen. It first went on sale at Gimbles in New York City Oct. 29, 1945, and thousands of pens were sold in a week. At that time, I was a youngster earning my spending money as a locker boy at a local resort hotel...

Letter: It's the season of fraudulent calls

It must be tax time. I received my annual fraudulent phone call from someone with a heavy accent claiming to be from the Internal Revenue Service Tax and Audit Department. The message left on the answering machine said this was legal notice that I was in trouble, and I’d better call the...

Letter: Partnership will prove to be an asset

Forty years ago VHH community hospital was born on a hill bordering Glendale and La Cañada. Over the four decades the hospital has been through its ups and downs. Thousands of the local communities' children have been born there — and many more have made unscheduled visits to the...

Guest Column: The mountains offer clarity in a sea of fog

The change in temperature from tropical to Arctic — you’ll forgive the slight hyperbole, I hope — and the resulting 50 shades of gray enveloping our city has cast a gloom on many of us. Ira Gershwin had the same response to a foggy day in London town:

Letter: Reasons to have one trash hauler

Re: “City leaders should serve the electorate,” Thoughts from Dr. Joe, March 12. I take issue with the claim in Joe Puglia's column that he is...

Letter: People are unlikely to give up cars

Re: “The long road toward rethinking transportation,” Piece of Mind, March 12. I read with interest the column regarding the 710 Freeway. Two...

Letter: Congratulations to council members

This week our city clerk swore in two terrific people as our next La Cañada Flintridge City Council members, Terry Walker and Len Pieroni. I am confident that Len and...

Letter: Red Cross honors Everyday Heroes

It is Red Cross Month and we would like to recognize our Everyday Heroes who reach out to help their neighbors when they are in need.

Letter: Grand Marshal naming is an honor

Thank you, LCF Chamber of Commerce, for honoring the La Cañada Flintridge Trails Council as the 2015 Memorial Day Parade Grand Marshal! We always look forward to marching in the parade, waving to our family, friends, and supporters. This year will be especially exciting for us as the Grand...

Letter: Hospital stay at USC VHH was not problem-free

I read with interest the March 5 op-ed article by Paul Craig and Dr. Steve Hartford about negotiating union contracts at our USC Verdugo Hills Hospital (“...

Letter: Survey respondents need more to go on

 Re: “Council briefed on survey,” March 5. The recent poll results covering single company trash collection were extremely disappointing. Personally I have to wonder how this poll was...

Letter: Arrest seems to be based on man's race

The first item in the March 5 Crime Report, which began “Soliciting without a permit,” bothered me enough that I just had to write. It describes a “nicely dressed...

Letter: Bark beetles threaten our trees

APB, All hands on deck! Save our urban forest! Please residents, act now to save our canopy of trees from the plague of the bark beetle. Clearly visible, it spans from Castle Road, up to the line of deodars along Fairmont Avenue and beyond. Our neighbor's tree went from 5% to 30% brown in two weeks....

Guest Column: There's no denying L.A.'s climate appeal

Everyone knows what the legendary crossing of the United States to California is like: Calistoga wagons baking near dried-up water holes, Okies in overheated cars, stumbling miners crazed with thirst (have you ever known of one who wasn’t?).

Op-Ed: Negotiating with an eye toward the future

“How can you sit silently by while others throw stones at you?” It’s a frequent question from those who champion the merits and value of USC Verdugo Hills Hospital, as we work through routine contract negotiations with labor unions. Our supporters see those outside the bargaining...

Guest Column: Lines of cable run through it

The circling helicopters that added an intriguing element to life in La Cañada last week have gone, and the cables that double the capacity going into Gould Mesa substation are in place to bring electricity from windmills in the Tehachapi hills to the California grid.

Guest Column: The power and the politeness

Crews are just finishing adding new power lines into the Gould Mesa substation in La Cañada which carry twice as much capacity as the existing lines. The current, which will go into the California grid, comes from Kern County, where the electricity is generated mainly by windmills.

Guest Column: Utility pole's days might be numbered

If we look back to the history of the telephone pole, we find it is responsible for ushering in an era of communications that changed the world. Using the original telegraph, it enabled President Lincoln the ability to micromanage the Civil War. It brought forth an era of growth at a staggering...

Letter: Liu's name absent from reportage

Re: “State looks into Peevey,” Feb. 5. Conspicuously absent in the news articles about Michael Peevey and the Public Utilities Commission is...

Letter: Warm hopes for a far-flung progeny

I’m told that at Carleton College in Minnesota last weekend my freshman son, Martin, climbed a wall of ice with ice axes in weather so cold that when he was at last able to speak his friends had to thaw his words over a fire before they could tell what he was saying. Yet, on Briartree Drive,...

Letter: Flowers bloom forecasts change

One thing I could always count on and looked forward to, for decades, was that my mother's cymbidium orchids would bloom in March. Mom's blooming orchids equals March.

Letter: Where did all the school money go?

I was shocked to read your Jan. 22 article entitled “Teachers seek help online.” As a former teacher in a low-low income district. I was always buying supplies, etc....

Letter: Climate change, as a matter of fact

Re: “Disproving claims of climate change,” Jan. 22. People are entitled to their own opinions, but they aren't entitled to their own facts. Just as, for...

Guest Column: A man who saw possibility in all things real

People say, “Once you knew Howard, you couldn't forget him.” Howard Schultz, a former resident of La Cañada, passed away unexpectedly last month while celebrating his 28th wedding anniversary on family vacation in Hawaii. He was 61. He recently moved to Boulder, Colo., where he...

Letter: Disproving claims of climate change

Last Saturday the L.A. Times headline read, “Heat hits new high,” an article accompanied by a map of the world glowing red hot. Scary stuff? True? Not so much. This is pretty much the standard “crisis” effort intended to get the public behind “saving the earth.”

Letter: Online system left them out of sorts

Re: “Victims can log on to a system of SORTS,” Valley Sun, Jan. 1. My son’s bike worth about $400 was stolen on Dec. 31. It...

Letter: Cap the freeways, reap the benefits

In December the L.A. Times had a column “Capping freeways for open space” about how “Planners around the Southland tout building parks atop interstates.”

Letter: Changes in town mean changes in life

My family moved to La Cañada in 1943. At that time there were many horses, one public elementary school, one small grocery store, grape vineyards, open spaces and a small population. Now we have fewer horses, many more schools, lots of grocery stores, no vineyards, almost no open space and...

Letter: It's past time to eradicate RINOs

The Republican landslide election of November 2014 brought great hope to many Republicans. It increased Republican numbers in the House of Representatives, gave control of the Senate to Republicans and increased the number of Republicans in state legislatures across America.

Guest Column: Surviving the frustration of the plumbing season

For everything, they say, there is a season. A time to weep and a time to laugh, etc. The season your household doesn’t want to experience, however, is to have a blocked drain between Christmas and New Year. As you can tell, I speak in the season for bitterness. It started with a phone call to...

Letter: A delayed but heartfelt thank you

This past year our family planned our first wedding, celebrated first and new jobs, and experienced the loss of a father, friend, community volunteer and my husband Andy. Many have said to me, “I don’t know how you all are handling all this.” I can only look to another life-...

Letter: Zina's issue goes beyond landlord and tenant

I spoke before the La Cañada Flintridge City Council on Dec. 15 about property owner Arun Jain and his attempts at terminating a multiyear lease established prior to his August 2014 property acquisition and the eviction of tenant Zina’s Healthy Corner.

Letter: Encounter with an aggressive dog

My friend and I were out walking our dogs this morning, enjoying the cool, wet weather. We were on Alta Canyada when a large, aggressive brown boxer attacked our dogs. He first went for my friend's English Retriever, Blondie, but then turned on my 25-pound goldendoodle, Doodly Do-right. We were...

Letter: Comparing GUSD to the Russian leader

The ongoing debate between the Glendale Unified School District and the La Cañada Unified School District brings to mind the struggle the world is experiencing with Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, who is hell-bent on achieving power at the expense of logic and peace. It is...

Letter: A question for LCUSD from GUSD

GUSD to LCUSD: The state gives money to school districts to educate students. You get to educate students from the Sagebrush area. We get to keep half the money. What’s wrong with that?

Letter: L.A. River bikeway is an unknown asset

One of the best kept secrets in the San Fernando Valley is the L.A. River Bike Path that begins on the Griffith Park side of the Victory Boulevard freeway overpass and goes east nearly 10 miles to the I-5 overpass near Figueroa Street. The path is well paved, lit at night, and mostly flat to ride...

News-Press Cartoon: Sagebrush

Cartoonist Bert Ring offers his take on the ongoing saga between the Glendale and La Cañada unified school districts over a potential transfer of the Sagebrush...

Letter: Who is leaving bags of dog waste?

As an avid dog walker who picks up after her dog and throws it in the trash can, I daily see multiple poop bags on the curb or gutter. I took a photo of one on Descanso Drive this morning. That bag is about to be washed down to the ocean. Why do some dog walkers think their job is done when they...

Letter: Hunting column took some pot shots

Re: “Within city limits hunting is a no-no,” Anita Brenner’s Around Town column, Nov. 13. The first paragraph in Brenner’s column...

Op-Ed: Keeping our kids safe from predators

Families all over America rely on after-school programs, summer camps and other youth-serving institutions to get their children involved in activities that enrich their lives and help them grow up to be healthy, productive adults. Sadly, these programs can also be a vulnerable target for child...

Letter: Glendale Unified is an 800-pound bully

It should not surprise anyone that the Glendale Unified School District Board wants about $23 million to release the Sagebrush area to the La Cañada Unified School...

Letter: Welcome students but not indebtedness

I understand that residents of the Sagebrush area would like to join the La Cañada Unified School District. We have worked hard to maintain our excellent schools, a difficult task when resources are so limited. It has been a financial struggle. Any deal that uses LCUSD funds or property to...

Letter: Project's speed and scale are electrifying

Like many others I’ve been watching, fascinated, as helicopters, hovering motionless, lower huge metal structures onto the electricity towers being built on our neighboring hills. Today on a hike I decided to take a closer look, which involved scrambling a few feet off the Mt. Lukens fire...

Letter: An opportunity to restrict Washington

With the exception of a few liberal strongholds like California, last week’s election showed that America’s drunken binge of give-me-more-freebies has ended. Why? Most Americans realize that healthcare isn’t free if their neighbors pay for it, that piling massive debt on their...

Letter: Devil's Gate meeting slated Nov. 12

Re: “LCF gets the dirt on Devil’s Gate,” Oct. 23: The L.A. County Flood Control people have issued a final summary of their proposed project. I doubt...

Letter: Leash ordinance exists for a reason

Re: “Patrol puts dog owners on notice,” Oct. 16 and subsequent letters to the editor saying unleashed dogs should be allowed.

Letter: Hoping for the return of a lost camera

On Oct. 28, I am almost certain I did something very foolish. I left my camera in a red cloth bag on top of pump No. 5 at the Chevron station next to the post office on Foothill Boulevard in La Cañada.

Letter: Riding club hosted a successful mixer

The Flintridge Riding Club was delighted to host the LCF Chamber of Commerce Mixer last month. It was our pleasure to see so many members of the community enjoying our lovely patio set in the foothills of the beautiful San Gabriel Mountains.

Letter: Transfer is not about property values

Re: “Stop the Presses: This looks like a case of Sagebrush burning,” Dan Evans, Nov. 1. I am disappointed in this column, another instance of stereotyping La Ca&...

Re: “Move to stem potential suit may backfire,” News-Press editorial, Oct. 25. I have to take exception with the editorial regarding Ms....