Morning News Round-Up -- 8.25.09: A gloomy local news day...

Hillsdale High School remains closed today after Police arrested a 17-year-old former Hillsdale student on suspicion of detonating two bombs inside the school before being tackled by a teacher and arrested. San Mateo resident Alex Youshock was armed with 10 pipe bombs on a vest, a chain saw, and a 2-foot-sword. News reports suggested he might have been angry with teachers. According to San Mateo Union High School District officials the school’s disaster plan operated “smoothly.” The plan, of course, didn’t include a teacher tackling Youshock, putting themselves in danger, but that’s what happened anyway and it worked out fine.

The woman who had a massive eucalyptus branch fall on her while driving Friday afternoon died from her injuries Saturday. Lisa Fellini died after a massive eucalyptus branch fall onto her gold 1997 Lexus and impaled her as she took a connector ramp from northbound Highway 101 to eastbound State Route 92.

Rocked by the Friday night suicide of a 13-year-old girl, Palo Alto Police plan "a large presence" at schools and at train crossings this week to reach out to the community's young people, Sgt. Dan Ryan, a police-department spokesman, announced Monday morning. Caltrain officials addressed the recent spate of suicides with some advice for the community: address mental health issues and tone down the media coverage of the recent Caltrain deaths.

A "motorist shooting at pedestrians" in East Palo Alto shot one resident in the right thigh late Sunday night when the resident said he was walking in the 1300 block of East Bayshore Road, police reported. In an unrelated incident, a bicyclist was injured after he was hit by a Toyota Tacoma pickup truck while crossing El Camino Real in Palo Alto's College Terrace neighborhood Monday afternoon.

Union workers plan to hold a rally today to call for an independent audit of the San Mateo County Superior Court's finances after court officials said they may lay off 60 employees to plug a recently discovered $3.89 million deficit in last year's budget. Members of the Service Employees International Union Local 521, which represents 250 court workers, are expected to turn out for a noontime rally in front of the courthouse in protest of the possible layoffs.
Court officials initially placed blame for the shortfall on state budget cutbacks, then said Friday that "internal accounting, tracking and analysis deficiencies" had made them unaware of the $3.89 million deficit in the fiscal year that ended June 30.

In his first year in state government, Assemblyman Jerry Hill, a San Mateo Democrat, knows how to get on the Governor's good side: Make government more efficient and green. He recently had two bills passed and signed into law that well, do just that. Perhaps Hill can give some advice to the San Mateo County courthouse folks...

San Bruno Police know how to share the pain… they will take a 1.15 percent salary reduction, equivalent to a three-day furlough, as part of a one-year contract that goes before the City Council tonight for a vote.

A 65-year-old San Bruno woman who was arrested several years ago in a large-scale federal drug investigation dubbed Operation Urban Harvest has been sentenced for stashing more than $10,000 in an offshore bank account. On Friday, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston ordered the woman to turn over roughly $24,000 and a 2000 Mercedes SUV. Not the wheels!

The California Highway Patrol on today will conduct the second zero-tolerance enforcement this month of the State's hands-free cell phone law. A similar campaign on Aug. 11 resulted in 300 Bay Area drivers being cited by the CHP, and more than 350 other drivers being cited by other Bay Area law enforcement agencies, according to the CHP.

Young adults from HOPE Services continue to clean up the beaches and pier on Tuesdays. The time is changing to 9.30-11.00 a.m. and you are invited to join them. The beaches are big and the job larger than they alone can cover.