Cost of college, economic woes have high school seniors weighing options

From left, Alden Mitchell, 16, Rachel Brown, 17, and Sheri Park, 18, critique paintings during an advanced placement art class at Menlo-Atherton High School in Atherton, California, on April 15, 2009. Brown is a senior who is currently deciding on colleges for the next school year. This is the time of year that students and parents must finally commit to the school of their choice. (Gary Reyes/San Jose Mercury News/MCT)

By Dana Hull
San Jose Mercury News
(MCT)

SAN JOSE, Calif. _ Mike Maietta was eating lunch when he got a text message from his mom.

"Notre Dame," it said. "Big envelope!"

Mike, a senior in high school, whooped for joy. The big envelope meant the storied Catholic university in South Bend, Ind., had offered him a coveted slot in its Class of 2013. But the $51,300 annual price tag is a formidable obstacle. So Mike and his parents are considering offers from several other colleges and calculating the costs _ tuition, housing, holiday trips home.

This year, money is the driving factor for a growing number of high school seniors, who are spreading out the acceptance letters and crunching the numbers to decide what colleges to attend this fall. Layoffs, plunging home values and decimated college savings accounts have vastly changed family finances.

"We're ecstatic that Mike got into so many great schools," said Michael Maietta, his father, an engineer at Microsoft. "But if you consider going to school out of state, you've got to think about all of the other costs: moving, flying back and forth for the holidays. You're looking at about $3,000 a year just for travel."

More than 7.6 million students have filled out the FAFSA, or Free Application for Federal Student Aid, a 19.9 percent increase over last year.

The federal Department of Education this month urged college financial aid officers to give more help to families suffering from the recession. And a record 30,428 students applied for 2,300 slots at Stanford, in part because the university boosted financial aid for families earning below $100,000.

Students have until May 1 to decide on a school, and many campuses require "matriculation deposits" up to $400 to secure their slots for the fall. As families weigh their options, some are going back to financial aid offices in hopes that packages can be boosted.

"The most heartbreaking appeals at this point are from families where parents are just being told about layoffs in the last few weeks," said Karen Cooper, director of financial aid at Stanford. "Even those who thought they had a plan in place are scrambling to come up with new options."

Mary Nucciarone, an assistant director of financial aid at Notre Dame, said several families of admitted students are asking the university to consider new information.

"Loss of bonus income, loss of home equity, decrease in assets, mortgages underwater," she said. "People are coming back to us and saying, 'Did you consider this?'"

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Santa Clara University, where tuition, room and board top $46,000 a year, is concerned accepted students may choose more affordable alternatives instead. So nearly 400 alumni volunteers are now telephoning every admitted student; the most highly valued prospective students receive calls from President Michael Engh or Provost Lucia Albino Gilbert.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

Mike Maietta got into eight colleges, and narrowed his top choices to a final five: Notre Dame, Vanderbilt, Loyola Marymount, Gonzaga and the University of San Diego.

As the Maiettas turn the options over in their minds, numerous factors come into play. Loyola Marymount and Gonzaga offered Mike partial scholarships, but Notre Dame and Vanderbilt did not. Loyola, in Los Angeles, is within driving distance. But the cost of housing at Gonzaga, in Spokane, Wash., is slightly cheaper.

"Fifty thousand dollars a year is a lot of money," said Mike, who wants to study mechanical engineering. "I'd like to go to Notre Dame or Vanderbilt, but I can see myself at LMU."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

Rachel Brown was ecstatic when she got a thick envelope from New York University; she's always wanted to live in Manhattan. But given tuition and the cost of living in New York, she's seriously considering the University of California-San Diego.

"The tuition for NYU is like twice as much as UCSD," said Rachel, 17, who is struggling to decide. "My mom doesn't want me to have a big debt when I graduate, and I don't want that either. I'd have to take out a loan for like $15,000 ... I'm going to check and see if there's any way that NYU can offer me any financial aid."

Jonathan Kaslow got into nine colleges, including Occidental, George Washington University and Lewis & Clark. But he's pretty much decided on UCSD.

"The cost of the private schools just isn't worth it," said Jonathan, who plans to study political science. "My mom got laid off from Sun Microsystems and is completely flipping out about money. I can see myself at UCSD, and sometimes Southwest has $40 fares so it won't cost too much to fly home."

___

© 2009, San Jose Mercury News (San Jose, Calif.).

Visit MercuryNews.com, the World Wide Web site of the Mercury News, at http://www.mercurynews.com.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

_____

PHOTOS (from MCT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): COLLEGECOSTS

School strip-search case reaches Supreme Court this week

By David G. Savage

Chicago Tribune

(MCT)

SAFFORD, Ariz. _ When Savana Redding, now 19, talks of what happened to her in 8th grade, it is clear the painful memories linger.

She speaks of being embarrassed and of fearing and distrusting a nurse, and of staying away from school for two months. And she recalls whispers and stares from others in the small eastern Arizona mining town of Safford after she was strip-searched in the nurse's office because a vice principal suspected she might be hiding an extra-strength ibuprofen in her underwear.

This week, the Supreme Court will hear her case. Its decision, the first to address the issue of strip-searches in schools, will set the legal limits, if any, on the authority of school officials to search for drugs or weapons on campus. And while Savana's story provokes outrage from many who hear it, the school district warns that its ability to keep all drugs out of its schools must be preserved.

Matthew Wright, the school district's lawyer, said the vice principal was concerned because one student had gotten seriously ill from taking unidentified pills.

"That was the driving force for him. If nothing had been done, and this happened to another kid, parents would have been outraged," Wright said. "If there are drugs and weapons at school, how much do we want to tie the hands of the administrators?"

Only once has the high court ruled on a school-search case, and it sounds quaint now. It arose in 1980 when a New Jersey girl was caught smoking in the bathroom, and the principal searched her purse for cigarettes.

The justices upheld this search because the principal had a specific reason for looking in her purse. However, they did not say how far officials can go _ and how much of a student's privacy can be sacrificed _ to maintain safety at school. That's the issue in Safford Unified School District v. Redding.

Savana was an honors student, shy and "nerdy" when the 8th grade began in the fall of 2003, she said.

She first learned she was in trouble when Kerry Wilson, the vice principal, came into a math class one morning and told her to come with him to the office.

He was in search of white pills. "District policy J-3050 strictly prohibits the non-medical use or possession of any drug on campus," he said later in a sworn statement.

Wilson knew a boy had gotten sick from pills he obtained at school. And that morning, another 8th-grader, Marissa Glines, was found with what turned out to be several 400 mg ibuprofen pills tucked into a folded school planner. A few days before, Savana had lent Marissa the folder. The vice principal also found a small knife, a cigarette and a lighter in the folder. When asked where she got the pills, Marissa named Savana Redding.

These "could only be obtained with a prescription," Wilson reported. Marketed over the counter as Advil and Motrin with recommended doses of 200 to 400 mg, they are commonly used for headaches or to relieve pain from menstrual cramps.

Savana, however, said she knew nothing of the pills in Marissa's folder.

"He asked if he could search my backpack. I said, 'Sure,' " she recalled. When nothing was found, Wilson sent Savana to the nurse's office, where the nurse and an office assistant were told to "search her clothes" for the missing pills.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Savana said she kept her head down, embarrassed and afraid she would cry. After removing her pink T-shirt and black stretch pants, she stood in her bra and panties. She was told to pull her underwear to the side and to shake to see if any pills could be dislodged.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

It was "the most humiliating experience" of her life, she said.

"We did not find any pills during our search of Savana," Wilson reported.

Upset and angry, Savana's mother, April Redding, complained to the principal's office, then to the superintendent's office nearby. Both denied at first knowing that a student had been strip-searched.

"It was wrong. I didn't think anything like that could happen to my daughter at school," she said. "Why didn't they call me? I couldn't get them to explain it."

Contacted at the school last week, Wilson declined to discuss the case, as did other school officials.

When no one apologized, April Redding sued the school district. Her lawyers say the strip-search goes far beyond the bounds of reasonableness, especially when there was no imminent danger.

April Redding says she had a simple goal. "I wanted a judge to say what they did was wrong," she said.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

After the strip-search, Savana refused to return to the middle school. She did not want to be in the presence of the nurse or the office assistant who humiliated her. She went to an alternative high school in Safford, but dropped out before graduating. She is taking psychology classes at nearby East Arizona College.

___

© 2009, Chicago Tribune.

Visit the Chicago Tribune on the Internet at http://www.chicagotribune.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

EPA declaration sets stage for more regulation

By Jim Tankersley

Tribune Washington Bureau

(MCT)

WASHINGTON _ The federal government's declaration Friday that greenhouse gases are a threat to public health marked a first step toward likely regulation of the tailpipe emissions of cars, power plants and factories that scientists blame for global warming.

The decision by the Environmental Protection Agency was a clear break with the Bush administration, which downplayed concerns about global warming, and set the stage for a possible national standard for vehicle emissions and other federal efforts to curb such pollution.

The Obama administration already is developing a plan to make the U.S. auto fleet cleaner by regulating carbon dioxide emissions from tailpipes. But the move Friday also gives it the capacity to either regulate larger emissions producers like power plants or prod Congress to set limits, which the administration would prefer.

Lawmakers have begun debating legislation that would crack down on power plant emissions, which generate twice as much greenhouse gas as cars and trucks. But the prospect of the White House taking action could push Congress to come to an agreement.

"The Obama administration now has the legal equivalent of a .44 magnum" to fight global warming, said Frank O'Donnell, president of the environmental group Clean Air Watch. "The bullets aren't loaded yet, but they could be."

Environmentalists celebrated the EPA's action as the clearest signal yet that the Obama administration is prepared to act boldly to combat global warming. O'Donnell called the move "a landmark moment in environmental history."

But critics say the EPA decision, and the regulations that could accompany it, could chill an already recessionary economy.

"An endangerment finding would lead to destructive regulatory schemes that Congress never authorized," a group of eight leading conservative and free-market activists warned the EPA in a letter this week. They added that "the administration will bear responsibility for any increase in consumer energy costs, unemployment and GDP losses" that result.

In its ruling, the EPA declared that carbon dioxide and five other greenhouse gases endanger public health. "In both magnitude and probability, climate change is an enormous problem," the agency declared. "The greenhouse gases that are responsible for it endanger public health and welfare within the meaning of the Clean Air Act."

The ruling includes a lengthy summation of scientific warnings about human contributions to climate change, and of the potentially devastating impacts that could result.

But in finding that greenhouse gases endangered public health "within the meaning of the Clean Air Act," the EPA also moved beyond what most Americans think of as air pollution, said Bill Farland, a former top EPA scientist who is now senior vice president for research and engagement at Colorado State University.

The EPA is equating otherwise benign gases that are leading to rising temperatures with traditional pollutants such as smog and lead, he said.

"Clearly, you can expose animals and humans to (carbon dioxide) without a harmful effect," Farland said. "On the other hand, in today's society there's mounting information that if you continue to release CO2, it's going to be problematic from a climate change perspective."

Friday's decision said that automobiles, which produce about 20 percent of the nation's greenhouse gas emissions, contribute directly to climate change. The administration is expected to develop vehicle emissions limits along the lines of strict regulations that California and other states are attempting to adopt.

Some industry groups said the text of the decision appeared to give the administration an "off ramp" to avoid widespread regulation.

William Kovacs, a vice president for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said the finding allows the EPA to delay emissions limits until technology improves and compliance costs fall, a move he said would avoid "disastrous" regulations that would all but put the EPA in control of the entire economy.

Obama often links carbon emissions limits _ and the price increases they would assuredly impose on fossil fuel energy _ with the creation of millions of jobs through renewable energy development. EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said in a press release Friday that global warming "has a solution _ one that will create millions of green jobs and end our country's dependence on foreign oil."

The next move belongs to Congress. The House will reconvene Monday after a two-week break, with a major climate bill on its agenda. One of that bill's drafters, Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., on Friday called the EPA decision a "game-changer" that will force representatives to assume that if they don't limit emissions, the administration will.

Markey was echoed by the Senate's lead climate bill drafter, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who said that if Congress fails to pass a climate bill, "then I will call on EPA to take all steps authorized by law to protect our families."

The EPA will accept public comments on its finding for two months, and it has scheduled public hearings in suburban Washington and in Seattle. Industry groups will ramp up their economic warnings. The Sierra Club on Friday launched a campaign to generate a half-million comments in support of the finding and other parts of Obama's climate agenda.

___

© 2009, Tribune Co.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Obama: No prosecution for CIA operatives in interrogations

By Margaret Talev and Marisa Taylor
McClatchy Newspapers
(MCT)

WASHINGTON _ President Obama said Thursday that the United States will not prosecute CIA officials who participated in controversial terrorism interrogation techniques _ including waterboarding and slapping and sleep deprivation _ that were secretly authorized under President Bush and have since been rescinded.

"This is a time for reflection, not retribution," Obama said in a written statement issued as the Justice Department prepared to turn over by a court deadline Bush-era memos that authorized various legally questionable techniques.

"In releasing these memos, it is our intention to assure those who carried out their duties relying in good faith upon legal advice from the Department of Justice that they will not be subject to prosecution," the president said.

The memos were issued between 2002 and 2005 by the Bush Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. The Obama administration was being compelled to release them to the American Civil Liberties Union under a federal court-imposed deadline in an open records lawsuit being brought by the group.

CIA director Leon Panetta told employees in a memo Thursday that despite Obama's assurances, "This is not the end of the road on these issues" to expect more pressure from the Congress, the public and the courts to release more information.

At the same time, he said, it was important to understand the "context" of the memos, coming soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

He said: "The fact remains that CIA's detention and interrogation effort was authorized and approved by our government. For that reason, as I have continued to make clear, I will strongly oppose any effort to investigate or punish those who followed the guidance of the Department of Justice."

Panetta also said the CIA would provide legal representation to any staff investigated for their actions.

The memos are being released late Thursday afternoon.

The administration was redacting at least some information, at the request of intelligence officials.

In his statement, the president said of intelligence operatives, "we must protect their identities as vigilantly as they protect our security, and we must provide them with the confidence that they can do their jobs."

Obama also said: "The exceptional circumstances surrounding these memos should not be viewed as an erosion of the strong legal basis for maintaining the classified nature of secret activities."

The four memos are said to detail the type of "enhanced" interrogation techniques that were condoned by the Justice Department for use by the CIA.

For years, the Bush administration has refused to release memos that provided the legal underpinning for harsh interrogations, eavesdropping and secret prisons, citing national security, attorney-client privilege and the need to protect the government's deliberative process.

Shortly after Obama took office, Attorney General Eric Holder pledged to release as many of the still-secret Office of Legal Counsel memos and opinions as possible while protecting national security information.

Critics of the prior administration see the release of the documents as necessary to determine whether former administration officials should be held accountable for legal opinions that justified various antiterrorism measures, including the use of waterboarding, an interrogation technique that simulates drowning.

Two previous Justice Department memos in 2002 and 2003 had approved the use of waterboarding and other harsh methods so long as they did not cause pain similar in intensity to that caused by death or organ failure.

But those memos were widely condemned and later withdrawn because of questions about whether they were encouraging torture. The disclosure of them also forced President Bush to declare, "We do not torture," a phrase he would come to repeat often when defending the administration's anti-terrorism policies.

___

© 2009, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau on the World Wide Web at www.mcclatchydc.com.

Sheriff deputy sentenced after offering surveillance for fake drug delivery

By Vanessa Blum

Sun Sentinel

(MCT)

A former Broward, Fla., sheriff's deputy was sentenced to eight years in prison Thursday for agreeing to guard a shipment of 50 kilograms of cocaine.

Kevin Frankel, 39, was busted last year in an FBI corruption sting after receiving $3,000 to provide surveillance for what he thought was a drug delivery at the Pompano Beach Air Park in Pompano Beach, Fla.

In reality, the "smugglers" were undercover FBI agents posing as mobsters and a drug distributor.

Along with Frankel, U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra in West Palm Beach sentenced Robert Baccari to seven years and Christopher Provenzano to six years for their roles in the attempted drug smuggling operation.

All three pleaded guilty to possessing with the intent to distribute 50 kilograms or more of cocaine.

Richard Tauber, a veteran Broward sheriff's deputy and the group's apparent ringleader, is set to be sentenced May 15.

Tauber, a former Marine who went by "Wingnut", and Frankel, a law enforcement recruit with the nickname "Tattoo," worked for the Broward Sheriff's Office in Deerfield Beach.

Authorities arrested the men last year following a 16-month investigation. According to court records, Tauber was paid $25,000 to help smuggle cocaine, diamonds and Krugerrand gold coins.

Tauber recruited friends Baccari and Provenzano, who together received roughly $23,000. Frankel was brought into the circle to act as a lookout during a supposed cocaine delivery.

After his arrest, Tauber turned on Frankel and wore a wire to record incriminating conversations.

In court papers, Frankel's attorneys asked for leniency, describing the deputy as a minor participant in the crime led astray by his desire to provide financially for his wife and two daughters.

___

© 2009, Sun Sentinel.

Visit the Sun-Sentinel on the World Wide Web at http://www.SunSentinel.com

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

House Democrats unveil sweeping plan to reshape energy in America

By Renee Schoof and David Lightman

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

WASHINGTON _ Democrats in the House of Representatives on Tuesday announced a sweeping plan to change how the nation produces and uses energy in order to reduce the risk of dangerous climate change.

No environmental legislation in America has ever attempted such wide-reaching changes. The bill _ an incomplete draft that will evolve in the months ahead _ would provide incentives to boost wind, solar and other renewable energy, would improve efficiency so that homes and businesses need less fuel and would support the development of cars that run on biofuels and electricity.

It also would make using fossil fuels more expensive _ and that will be the central issue of debate in Congress, with armies of lobbyists on both sides.

The measure contains a variety of terms intended to help businesses survive the energy transition, but it leaves open for debate the central question: how revenues from pollution permits would be used. That means the question of how consumers would be helped also remains to be worked out.

The plan calls for a system to limit for the first time the amount of global warming pollution _ mainly carbon dioxide from coal and oil combustion _ that's permitted from utilities, oil companies and large-scale industries, which make up 85 percent of the U.S. economy. They'd have to buy permits for each ton of emissions.

The total emissions amount would be lowered each year until it was 83 percent below 2005 levels in 2050. That's the amount that science suggests will be needed as part of a global effort to prevent irreversible problems from steadily increasing warming.

Companies that need more permits could buy them from companies that need fewer of them. This system of a declining cap on overall emissions and a market for permits is known as "cap and trade."

Sponsors declared that their plan would create jobs in clean energy that couldn't be shipped offshore, would reduce dependence on foreign oil and would make the United States an exporter of energy technology, all while making sure that American consumers and coal-dependent parts of the nation are spared from sharp cost increases.

"This legislation will create millions of clean energy jobs, put America on the path to energy independence and cut global warming pollution," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, who sponsored the draft along with Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., the chairman of the committee's Energy and Environment Subcommittee.

Waxman and Markey modeled their cap and trade plan on a consensus report that U.S. Climate Action Partnership, a group of 26 large businesses _ including ConocoPhillips, Shell, BP America Inc., Duke Energy, Alcoa and the U.S. automakers _ and five environmental groups released in January.

Environmental groups supported the draft.

Democrats are pushing for ambitious climate-change legislation this year before a global conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December that aims to set new goals for reducing the emissions that contribute to global warming.

Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., called the Waxman-Markey plan a "new national energy tax" and asserted that it would cost households up to $3,100 a year and reduce the number of U.S. jobs.

House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio attacked the plan with similar arguments and added that AK Steel, which is in his district, would pay more under cap and trade than competitors in places such as China would.

"Their costs will skyrocket and their customers will simply buy cheaper imported steel," Boehner said.

The draft, however, contains provisions to protect businesses from foreign competition and leaves open for debate how consumers will be protected. One idea that has some bipartisan support is returning all or most revenue from pollution permit sales to taxpayers.

Another suggestion is to give permits to companies free in the plan's early years. That also could help hold down costs to consumers if the companies passed the benefits along.

In a sign of the argument to come, Republicans unleashed a series of ads Tuesday aimed at 54 politically vulnerable House Democrats, charging that a cap and trade plan would send energy prices soaring. Ken Spain, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, warned of a "fiscally irresponsible cap and tax proposal that will increase energy bills, raise taxes and overwhelm the budgets of American families."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

Scott Paul, the executive director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, said he was glad that the draft bill included plans to protect American industries from competitive disadvantage. Still, he said it would take time to analyze the 640-page draft to determine how effective and how costly the bill would be.

The bill's section on global competitiveness calls for some industrial sectors to receive rebates to compensate for additional costs. If the rebates aren't sufficient, the president could impose tariffs on foreign manufacturers and importers to cover the carbon they emitted in making their exported products.

James Mulva, the chairman and chief executive officer of ConocoPhillips, said at the National Academy of Sciences on Monday that businesses wanted certainty about energy prices so they could make investment decisions. He predicted that this issue will be a difficult fight in Congress and called for work toward an "environmentally effective, economically sustainable and fair" approach.

Mulva said that a "significant proportion" of the permits should be given free to businesses to help consumers and protect against competition from foreign countries without mandatory controls.

The measure offers other provisions that businesses sought. One is offsets; companies can increase their emissions if they obtain reductions of emissions elsewhere at a lower cost which offsets those increases. Total offsets would be limited.

___

© 2009, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau on the World Wide Web at www.mcclatchydc.com.

Bankruptcy advocates say GM's best bet may be 'prepack'

By Michael Oneal

Chicago Tribune

(MCT)

CHICAGO _ Faced with an auto industry that is bleeding cash and seemingly unable to fix itself, President Barack Obama began laying the groundwork Monday for a possible government-sponsored Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC.

After threatening to cut off government aid to both companies unless they meet strict new deadlines for forging restructuring plans acceptable to the president's auto task force, Obama said that bankruptcy filings could represent part of the solution to either company's woes.

The move to put a Chapter 11 filing squarely on the table is an abrupt repudiation of the conventional wisdom in the auto industry that bankruptcy would be disastrous for car sales and the general economy. But with the automakers burning through billions while negotiations with creditors, unions and other stakeholders drag on, Obama may be ready to take that risk, experts said.

"If anybody was under the illusion that the Obama administration was going to sink billions of dollars into this industry until the end of time, they were disabused of that notion" on Monday, said Douglas Baird, a bankruptcy expert at the University of Chicago Law School.

Several observers said the administration's willingness to consider bankruptcy may have both practical and tactical elements. On the practical side, few restructuring experts have ever felt GM or Chrysler could work out their myriad problems without the aid of a bankruptcy judge. Obama's auto task force may be coming to this view.

Tactically, the task force may be sending a signal to creditors, unions and company managements that the government's patience and checkbook are not unlimited and that if they can't stomach the cuts needed to make GM and Chrysler viable, a court will have to make the cuts for them.

On Sunday, the Obama administration eliminated one longtime opponent of a bankruptcy filing when it asked GM Chairman Rick Wagoner to resign.

Wagoner and other auto industry officials had warned since the car companies began running out of cash late last year that a bankruptcy filing by any of the Big Three would be disastrous for the entire industry. They said it would crush sales by scaring away consumers worried about buying such a big-ticket item from an unreliable company. And, because the industry is tightly intertwined, they said it would set off ripple effects that would threaten dealers, suppliers and other car companies responsible for a large swath of the U.S. economy.

"The people who say bankruptcy is a good idea don't understand the complexity of the industry," said David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich. "It's mostly bankruptcy lawyers who are saying that because they will feast on it."

Those advocating a bankruptcy process argue that a so-called "prepackaged" Chapter 11 filing with financing supplied by the government may be the best option for a company like GM. In a "prepack," the various stakeholders agree to a solution in advance and use the court to enforce it in a relatively quick, in-and-out process.

That can solve a lot of problems, experts said.

GM's debt, for instance, is currently trading at around 15 cents on the dollar, but bondholders have so far signaled support only for a deal worth a little more than 30 cents. Getting all the bondholders _ a group numbering in the thousands _ to agree to cuts so drastic might be impossible out of bankruptcy court, Baird said. But under the rules of a pre-arranged bankruptcy, half of the bondholders by number, or two-thirds by dollar amount, can cut a deal and drag the other, more recalcitrant investors along with them, making for a smoother process.

During his speech Monday, Obama seemed to embrace the idea of a prepackaged filing while taking pains to address concerns about spooking consumers. A Chapter 11 filing, he explained, would not mean the failure and unwinding of either GM or Chrysler.

"What I'm talking about," he said, "is using our existing legal structure as a tool that, with the backing of the U.S. government, can make it easier for General Motors and Chrysler to quickly clear away old debts that are weighing them down so that they can get back on their feet."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

Obama also introduced specific measures to stimulate sales and make jittery car buyers more comfortable about buying from a manufacturer in financial trouble.

First, he said the government would guarantee all auto warranties so buyers don't have to worry about being stuck with a damaged car if its manufacturer is incapacitated. Then he announced one initiative to allow car buyers to write off sales and excise tax on new cars and another to provide incentives for replacing older, less fuel-efficient cars with new ones.

One thing Obama made clear is that Chrysler and GM are very different.

Chrysler was given 30 days to complete a global partnership agreement with Italy's Fiat.

General Motors, on the other hand, will have 60 days to forge a compromise between management, the United Auto Workers and the company debt-holders. In addition to the debt restructuring, the UAW will likely have to agree to more wage cuts and a controversial debt-for-equity swap to fund its retiree health trust. And management will have to show how its restructuring adds up to viability.

Fritz Henderson, GM's new interim CEO and a longtime Wagoner lieutenant, acknowledged to reporters after Obama's speech that the risk has increased that the company will have to reorganize through bankruptcy, because of greater demands from the Obama administration to get debt off its balance sheet.

In a statement, the company said: "Our strong preference is to complete this restructuring out of court. However, GM will take whatever steps are necessary to successfully restructure the company, which could include a court-supervised process."

___

© 2009, Chicago Tribune.

Visit the Chicago Tribune on the Internet at http://www.chicagotribune.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Fargo residents hold on as storm puts sandbags to the test

By Kaylee King
Chicago Tribune

(MCT)

FARGO, N.D. _ Flood-weary homeowners watched Monday as the water line inched down the trunks of sunken trees, sparking the hope that the worst of the damage by the rising and marauding Red River was over. But we weren't out of the woods yet.

We spent the weekend filling and stacking sandbags, and people were starting to breathe a sigh of relief as the river levels began rapidly dropping throughout Sunday and Monday.

But with the positive, there also came a negative: a winter storm warning. Local weathermen wearily reported the area would be blasted with 12 inches of snow. Meaning, the Red River could jump back as high as 41 feet, increasing pressure on already exhausted homeowners and sandbag dikes.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Nicholas Shannon, a friend of mine whose parent's home usually welcomes the beautiful flowing river in their backyard, flew back from a spring break trip to help in the battle against the Red.

"I felt bad, because when I got here all the hard labor work was done," Shannon said. "It's OK though, now my dad and I stay up all night watching the pumps and spending good time together."

Shannon lives in St. Paul, Minn., and attends St. Thomas University. He will take the week off of school to stay home and help his dad while his mom is out of town.

Folks like Shannon are sprinkled throughout Fargo and are easy to pick out. They have dark bags under their eyes and glassy stares from the fight against the icy water that threatens their homes.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

It was late last Wednesday when I got the call that solidified my decision to head home to help in the fight to save Fargo from flooding disaster. Nervously, my dad explained on the phone the flood of 2009 was an entirely different ballgame from the flood of 1997, and the crest could reach anywhere from 42 to 43 feet.

To most, those crest numbers mean nothing, but to the residents of Fargo, a few precious feet equal the gap between staying dry and losing a home to the muddy, murky depths of the Red.

This weekend was spent throwing hundreds of sandbags, checking multiple pumps and hearing story upon story of the flood experiences of neighbors. More than 75 close family friends were issued mandatory or voluntary evacuation notices _ often coming in the middle of the night from city officials or National Guard members. Five more family friends' sandbag dikes surrendered to the pressure of the river as water rushed into the basements and lower levels of properties, destroying everything in its path.

The skies above Fargo are consistently humming as massive Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters and U.S. Coast Guard choppers circle the area using infrared cameras to survey the dikes in search of the slightest leak, or worse, a total breach.

Non-essential businesses are closed, except hardware stores, which have extended their hours _ some to 24 hours _ in order to give the people of Fargo any possible resource to stock up on generators, pumps, rubber boots and other flood essentials.

The city has suggested no travel on the main arteries of the city, making it extremely difficult to get around. National Guard men and women sit at almost every intersection directing traffic, building clay dikes and helping in emergency dike breaches.

Residents in high-risk areas are on constant high alert, staying up every waking hour to make sure their pumps don't freeze or dikes become weak. But, unfortunately some fall asleep and disaster strikes.

Dennis Walaker, the mayor, revealed in the morning flood meeting that federal officials nudged him to evacuate the entire city, but he resisted. If the people of Fargo were not here to fight the water, the city would have been lost _ no question.

But surprisingly, the energy in Fargo is of positive nature. While sandbagging this weekend, jokes flew and people laughed at the bizarre nature of the entire situation. Hundreds of thousands of gallons of water lay bound behind a leaking clay dike a mere 150 feet away as we bagged a backup dike to protect the neighboring development. But worrying about the leak was not going to bring people down. Their attitude was simply "We are here, and we're going to have a good time battling this."

Behind the smiles and kind eyes, though, the people in Fargo know the state of affairs is precarious. Residents have seen floods before, obviously nothing like this record-shattering flood, but rising water is nothing new.

All they can do now is wait. The next battle is the major winter storm that threatens the integrity of not only the dikes, but could cause ice jams in the Red.

Come hell or high water, the people in Fargo won't let the city go down.

___

© 2009, Chicago Tribune.

Visit the Chicago Tribune on the Internet at http://www.chicagotribune.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Red River drops below 40 feet, the lowest depth since Thursday

By Bill Mcauliffe, Matt McKinney and Emily Johns

Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

(MCT)

RED RIVER VALLEY _ The Red River dipped below 40 feet for the first time in three days Sunday in Fargo, N.D.-Moorhead, Minn. But a brewing snowstorm, a swamped school and the start of an overwhelming cleanup kept any euphoria in check.

Schools, colleges, many nonessential businesses and area roads remain closed as a new week dawned, with life far from back to normal. The river, at least, was dropping from historic levels.

After a record crest of 40.82 feet early Saturday, the Red had fallen to 39.80 feet by Sunday evening with projections of a steady decline all week.

"Amen. It's a great feeling," said Kyle Norman, a Moorhead resident. "We have said we're going to fight this thing and win, and we did."

Not that their work is close to done. Roger Degerman, who lives in the Horn Park area of Moorhead, dragged water-logged carpeting, furniture and even Christmas ornaments from his soaked basement.

With no trash pickup service expected for days, the huge garbage pile in front of Degerman's home is going nowhere. He worries that the adrenaline-laced volunteer effort might slacken as the cleanup intensifies.

"I think there will be a lot of victories in the cleanup, too," he said, hoping volunteers remain gung-ho.

Another sign that the cleanup has begun: Upstream in Breckenridge, Minn., Wilkin County highway engineer Tom Richels met with FEMA officials to assess more than 300 spots of damaged local roads.

WEATHER: GOOD, BAD, UGLY

Although the area could pick up more than three inches of new snow tonight, continued cold with temperatures in the teens are giving flood fighters at least a short-term break.

"The cold keeps the faucets turned off and allows water in the main stem of the Red, hopefully, to work its way up to Canada before the warm weather returns and ice melts back into the basin," said Scott Dummer, the hydrologist in charge of the North Central River Forecast Center.

Wind gusts up to 35 mph tonight could actually hasten evaporation and help matters. But prolonging flood conditions offsets some of the cold's benefit, Dummer said, because drawing out the high water saturates and stresses levees, dikes and flood walls.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

That's what happened about 1:30 a.m. Sunday, when water tunneled under a flood wall and swamped two buildings at the Oak Grove Lutheran school in Fargo. The school, nearly wiped out by the 1997 floods, had built a metal barrier on one side of the campus to keep out floodwaters.

Neighbors of the school were awakened by automated telephone calls that a dike had failed.

"It was really hard to get the call last night," said Dawn Robson, who lives less than a block away. Her two children are in the eighth and 10th grades at the school.

Several hours after the dike failed, water continued to flow into a performing arts center and gym, prompting the North Dakota National Guard to attempt an aerial sandbag drop to plug the leak. Helicopter pilots unloaded at least nine 1,000 pound bags of sand onto the broken dike.

"I broke down in church this morning," said Robson, who learned that a charity she supports had opened an office in Fargo. "It was just overwhelming to think that now we're on the receiving end."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

Many others were overwhelmed with gratitude for all the volunteer help.

"To have such a tremendous sense of community," said Errol Schoenfish, is one of the great lessons of this flood as he thanked the people who came to build a dike around his Briarwood home south of Fargo.

In Moorhead, the dikes held for another day as residents continued what Mayor Mark Voxland called the "vigil" of watching the dikes and keeping up with leaks.

Some residents worried about Moorhead's construction of a secondary dike on S. 8th Street, but Voxland insisted the city isn't expecting the primary dike to fail.

"But that river is moving very fast right now," he said. "And that live movement against the dike wall causes problems."

Moorhead officials said that they have lost five homes to flooding, although they don't have statistics on how many have been lost in Oakport Township, a low-lying area on the north side of Moorhead where "several" homes were flooded, according to city manager Michael Redlinger.

Fargo also reported five homes "inundated," according to public information officer Dan Mahli.

Voxland said he has no idea how much all the disaster preparation has been costing his city. "The checkbook is open," he said, "and we haven't been able to balance it yet."

When the number becomes available, he said, "you'll know, because I'll be extremely pale."

Minnesota has received a federal emergency declaration, which means that the city will have to foot about 25 percent of the bill, although it could end up being less.

To the north, ice jams

Down the Red near Oslo, Minn., a series of ice jams and a 4-mile-long slab of ice have prompted officials to place boxcars on a railroad bridge in hopes that the extra weight will keep the span in its moorings. Using explosives to break the jam has been ruled out for environmental reasons, Minnesota emergency spokesman Doug Neville said.

The ice slab is 18 miles south of Oslo. Officials fear the backup caused by the jams could lift the railroad bridge into the river about 25 miles north of Grand Forks, N.D.

___

(Staff writers Curt Brown and Kevin Giles contributed to this report.)

___

© 2009, Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

Visit the Star Tribune Web edition on the World Wide Web at http://www.startribune.com

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

8 dead in N.C. nursing home shooting

By Samantha Thompson Smith, Wade Rawlins and Marti Maguire

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

CARTHAGE, N.C. _ When Michael Cotten pulled into Pinelake Health and Rehab on Sunday to see his aunt, a big man in overalls fired a shotgun at him before he could even park.

The blast Cotten described was apparently the first in a shooting rampage that left seven elderly residents and one staff member dead, Cotten and two others wounded, and the suspected gunman in custody and hospitalized, police said.

The shootings took place at about 10 a.m. at the facility, located at 801 Pinehurt Ave. in Carthage, N.C., about 60 miles southwest of Raleigh.

"As I was pulling into the parking lot, he started shooting my vehicle before I came to a stop," said Cotten, 53, a food-bank outreach coordinator and retired corrections assistant superintendent.

Police identified the suspect as Robert Stewart, 45, of Moore County, N.C., who faces eight counts of first-degree murder.

District Attorney Maureen Krueger identified the dead as: Tessie Garner, 88; Lillian Dunn, 89; Jesse Musser, 88; John Goldston, 78; Margaret Johnson, 89; Louise Decker, 98; Bessie Hendrick, 78; and Jerry Avent, age not given.

Stewart's estranged wife, Wanda Luck, worked as a certified nurse assistant at the nursing home, according to Mark Barnett, a neighbor of Wanda's parents. Barnett said she was working at the facility at the time of the shooting on Sunday. She was not listed as one of the victims in the shooting.

"This is a tragedy beyond comprehension for Moore County," said State Sen. Harris Blake, who represents the area.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Blake said Stewart was being transported to a hospital in Wake County Sunday because of security concerns at a local hospital.

"I was told he would be moved to Wake County," Blake said. "He is going to have to have some surgery. Apparently, he got hit with some bullets."

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

Police released only limited information Sunday about the shootings. But survivors' accounts recreated a horrifying series of events in which a heavily armed intruder ranged freely through the center, shooting elderly residents, some in wheelchairs.

Resident Ellery Chisholm, 64, said she heard shots and screams coming up the hall when a stout man appeared in her doorway, pointing a gun at her roommate. Chisholm wasn't sure why he turned away and started shooting into the hallway instead of the room.

"I couldn't do nothing," said Chisholm, whose legs have been amputated from the knees down. "He just twisted around and started shooting."

A Carthage police officer, Justin Garner, 25, was shot in the leg during the incident, but he was treated and released from First Health Moore Regional Hospital in Pinehurst. Carthage Police Chief Chris McKenzie said Garner confronted Stewart in the hallway of the nursing home. Both men fired. Both were wounded, McKenzie said.

Jerry Avent was a well-liked nurse at Pinelake Rehab.

"Everyone loved him," said resident Helen Olive, 64, and legally blind, who survived the attack by hiding in her shower. "Some of the people here are in their 80s and 90s. He had his whole life."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

HIDING TO SURVIVE

Cotten said he didn't want to die in his car, so between the gunman's second and third shot, he ran for his life into the center.

"I told them there was a gentlemen out in the parking lot shooting and they needed to call 9-1-1," said Cotten, who was wounded in his left shoulder. Then, he went searching for his aunt.

Eventually, the gunman entered the nursing home, too.

Cotten said he sought refuge in one of the interior bathrooms with several other people.

"We closed both doors hoping he wouldn't come in there" he said.

People hiding from the shooter could hear the sounds of chaos, screaming and gunshots. Cotten said he saw an elderly woman and man both shot in their wheelchairs and up the hall another elderly man shot in a wheelchair was he still alive?

"I think it's just divine intervention that I'm still here," Cotten said. "It just wasn't my time."

One victim, Jesse Musser, 88, had moved to the nursing home just six weeks ago, said his daughter, Holly Musser Foster. Jesse Musser, 88, was a retired railroad mechanic, and lived in room 405, at the end of one hall.

Foster's mother, Melba Musser, moved to the home two and a half weeks ago, but was unharmed by the gunman. She was in the Alzheimer's wing, a secure area of the nursing home that is protected with a pass code, Foster said.

"My prayer is that she doesn't know what happened," Foster said.

The Mussers had moved south from southern West Virginia six years ago to live with Foster. Recently, she found she could no longer care for them.

Foster said she typically went to visit her father at the nursing home at lunch every day during the week to be with her dad, who was blind and also had Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases.

Earier in his life, Jesse Musser loved woodworking and was a gunsmith in his free time.

"My daddy could do anything in the world," Foster said. "He could make anything, he could fix anything."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

NO SECURITY

The nursing home has no security staff, but a state regulator said that arrangement was typical of such long-term care centers.

"They are residential facilities," said Jeff Horton, chief executive officer of the state Division of Health Service Regulation. "They are not required to have security and most of them do not have it."

Sunday's shooting at a nursing home is a very rare occurrence, Horton said.

Pinelake Health and Rehab, certified in 1992, earned the highest overall rating of five stars from federal regulators recently, but was downgraded in the area of staffing, getting two out of a possible five stars.

___

(Staff writer Thomas Goldsmith contributed to this report.)

___

© 2009, The News & Observer (Raleigh, N.C.).

Visit The News & Observer online at http://www.newsobserver.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services

In Fargo, flood crest could be highest ever

Michael Stensgaard uses one of his family's boat to get back to their home a few yards away from the Red River in Minnesota, March 25, 2009. The water is over 40 feet and has completely surrounded their home. (Richard Tsong-Taatarii/Minneapolis Star Tribune)

By Matt McKinney, Allie Shah and Bill McAuliffe

Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

(MCT)

FARGO, N.D. _ Shifting from confident to jittery, flood fighters in and around Fargo intensified their dike-building Wednesday after a dire new forecast called for the Red River to swell to its highest level ever by Saturday.

Authorities used airboats, helicopters and large military trucks to rescue dozens of trapped residents in the North Dakota towns of Oxbow and Abercombie. And if the rising river weren't enough to heighten anxiety, eight inches of snow blew in with ice and wind to handicap sandbagging efforts and close highways not already swamped with floodwater.

"It's uncharted territory," Fargo Mayor Dennis Walaker said. "If nature has anything else to throw at us, it'd have to be a tornado."

The mayor pleaded for more sandbag volunteers and urged exhausted crews to raise the dikes another foot _ to 43 feet _ before Saturday's expected crest of 41 feet. That would eclipse the 1897 record level of 40.1 feet in Fargo and the 39.57 feet reached during the devastating 1997 flood.

Beginning Thursday, Fargo officials will start distributing evacuation information.

"People are starting to get worried," said Robin Mattson, a staff sergeant with the Minnesota National Guard, supervising intersections across the river in Moorhead.

When one resident tried to drive his sand-filled pickup over an earthen levee, police were called to issue a warning.

"He ignored the National Guard to put his own sand in, endangering everyone else," Mattson said.

For the most part, though, neighbors continue to help each other in an overwhelming spirit of cooperation. For a while Wednesday afternoon, Moorhead resident Scott Peterson worried he wouldn't get enough sandbags to raise his backyard dike the extra foot authorities have requested.

Just then, a group of college students arrived along with a truck towing a trailer of sandbags.

"If it wasn't for Concordia College," Peterson said, "our neighborhood would be under."

In Oxbow, a small town just south of Fargo, water from the Red spilled onto several residential streets, trapping homeowners. Cass County Sheriff Paul Laney said airboats helped on a dozen rescues and he anticipates many more in coming days.

"A large number of people are in their homes and we know they're going to need to come out," he said, adding that airboats and military trucks are the only vehicles that could pass through some of the streets submerged in 2 feet of standing water.

A Coast Guard helicopter plucked a family from a farmhouse two miles southwest of Abercrombie, N.D., where overland flooding from the Wild Rice River increased rapidly. Richland County, N.D., spokesman Warren Stokes said five adults and one child were rescued from the house by a basket and taken to a social service center in Wahpeton.

Flood-fighting crews in Abercrombie had put up dikes to protect the town against Red River flooding, but they shifted their efforts to battle overland flooding from Wild Rice River to the west.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

"We've never worried about anything from that direction," said Vice Mayor David Hammond, adding that the town would open its school to house any farmers flooded out of their homes.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

Across the river in Wolverton, Minn. _ which sits an eighth of a mile from the river bank _ water flowed into the streets in lower areas. Maryann Olthoff was hoping that sandbag dikes up to 5 feet tall around her house would hold back the water, which she said was higher than anybody in the town of 120 people has ever seen.

"God willing and the creek don't rise," Olthoff said.

Back up in Fargo, bundled-up residents and volunteers braved the miserable conditions, piling up sandbags in vulnerable neighborhoods amid blowing snow, temperatures in the 20s and a strong wind.

"The bags are starting to freeze," said Martin Fisher, adding another layer of sandbags onto his backyard dike. "That's a problem. You can't put rock on top of rock."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

Despite the city's efforts to keep the bags warm by storing them overnight in a heated garage, some bags were as hard as stone.

"Frozen!" one volunteer called out, alerting the rest of the assembly line.

Many flood-fighters swapped their rain boots for their winter boots, anticipating the pain that comes from standing outside for hours at a time in the icy mud. But slinging sandbags really builds up a sweat, and you hardly notice the cold, according to Bill Eral, who drove from St. Paul, Minn., to help.

With an outside fire pit, Sarah Keim's driveway was the place to be in Fargo's Oak Creek neighborhood. A steady stream of neighbors and volunteers popped in to warm their hands and nibble on homemade banana bread.

Between the snow and the flooding, several highways from Ada to Zerkel were closed or under water in western Minnesota. State officials urged motorists to call 511 or click on www.511mn.org for current road conditions.

___

(Staff writers Curt Brown and Bob von Sternberg contributed to this report.)

___

© 2009, Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

Visit the Star Tribune Web edition on the World Wide Web at http://www.startribune.com

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

_____

PHOTOS (from MCT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): FLOODING

GRAPHICS (from MCT Graphics, 202-383-6064): 20090325 River FLOODING and 20090325 FLOODING dikes

Huge public lands bill gets final congressional approval

Map of the U.S. locating lands to be protected as wilderness; the House has passed and sent to President Barack Obama a long-delayed bill to set aside more than 2 million acres in nine states as protected wilderness. MCT 2009

By Michael Doyle

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

WASHINGTON _ The House of Representatives on Wednesday gave long-awaited final approval to a massive public lands package designed to protect wilderness, restore rivers and expand national parks.

Years of debate and negotiations ended anticlimactically, as the 1,218-page bill strolled to victory on a 285-140 margin. Approved earlier by the Senate, the legislation now goes to the White House for President Barack Obama's signature.

"It will restore balance to the management of our public lands ... after nearly a decade in which responsible land stewardship was abandoned," said Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee.

Tactically constructed, with provisions targeting a majority of states, the bill drew 38 Republicans to join 247 Democrats. Even so, conservative GOP critics lambasted the bill as a land grab put together with what one Republican lawmaker termed "every legislative trick in (the Democratic) playbook."

House Democratic leaders brought the measure to the floor in a way that blocked potential amendments.

"The passage of this bill is another disappointing display of heavy-handed Democratic tactics that rely on secret, backroom bill-writings that are then jammed through without any opportunity for alternatives," complained Rep. Doc Hastings of Washington, the senior Republican on the House resources panel.

Dubbed the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009, the measure pulled together more than 150 separate public lands, parks and water bills into one package. Among other things, the legislation designates 2 million acres of additional wilderness in nine states and 1,000 miles of new wild and scenic rivers. It creates three new national park units, one new national monument and 10 new national heritage areas.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Provisions in the bill range from honoring President Bill Clinton's birthplace in Arkansas to creating a national institute for the study of caves. It designates a Wyoming river as wild and scenic, creates a geologic trail that tracks cataclysmic ice age floods and requires the government to research the problem of increasingly acidic oceans.

"Altogether, it is one of the most sweeping conservation laws that Congress has passed in many, many years," declared Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

The bill will be expensive. It authorizes projects expected to cost more than $5.5 billion over five years if Congress provides the money, according to the Congressional Budget Office. It also adds an additional $900 million in spending after 2013, the nonpartisan budget office estimates.

Hastings warned the bill would restrict potential development of energy resources on public lands, while other lawmakers focused on the addition of new lands to the national wilderness roll.

"The federal government already owns 30 percent of the total land area of the United States," said Rep. George Radanovich, R-Calif. "I don't think we need any more."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, however, called the bill's passage "a day of celebration for all who treasure and enjoy our natural and cultural heritage," and numerous environmental groups had been lobbying hard for its passage. In many cases, the public lands package collected provisions that had lingered without action during the years that Republicans had controlled Congress.

One provision, for instance, names a new wilderness in California's Sierra Nevada mountains after former California Rep. John Krebs. The measure creating the John Krebs Wilderness was first introduced in 2002.

The bill's occasionally rocky road to passage included a controversy over allowing guns in national parks and a concern that some amendments might expose potentially vulnerable lawmakers to difficult votes.

___

(Les Blumenthal and Erika Bolstad contributed to this report.)

___

© 2009, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau on the World Wide Web at www.mcclatchydc.com.

_____

GRAPHIC (from MCT Graphics, 202-383-6064): 20090325 LANDS map

Medal of Honor event honors heroic acts of ordinary people

By David Goldstein

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

ARLINGTON, Va. _ Six years ago, David Bryan, a 53-year-old federal worker from Kansas City, Mo., helped rescue a man from a burning Missouri Highway Patrol car on Interstate 70 near Higginsville, Mo., after it was struck by a 1-ton pickup truck.

So on National Medal of Honor Day, Bryan and two others received the Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation's second annual "Above & Beyond Citizen Honors."

In the solemn chill of an early spring afternoon at Arlington National Cemetery on Wednesday, a ceremony recognized 35 recipients of the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military award. The event also commended acts of courage by ordinary people such as Bryan.

They "remind us that every one of us has the capacity for tremendous courage and heroism," said the foundation's Robert Howard, a Medal of Honor recipient and Green Beret during the Vietnam War.

Other recipients were Jeremy Hernandez, a 22-year-old Minnesota youth worker; and Rick Rescorla of New Jersey, a security official who died on Sept. 11, 2001.

Hernandez saved more than 50 children in August 2007 when the Interstate 35W bridge collapsed in Minneapolis. Rescorla was a 62-year-old security official at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter when hijacked planes struck the World Trade Center. He evacuated thousands of people from the burning towers but wasn't seen again after they collapsed.

His son and daughter accepted the award.

"Heroes" has become a pretty shopworn label of late.

But if there is evidence to be found of heroism anywhere in the nation's capital, it's across the Potomac River, on a patch of rolling green meadows overlooking the city that enshrines lives that were lost, and battles won and the costs.

The ceremony took place just down the hill from the Tomb of the Unknowns, where the remains of unidentified Americans from the two world wars and Korea are interred.

Moments earlier, President Barack Obama had laid a wreath at the tomb, accompanied by four Medal of Honor recipients.

The president's visit had gone unannounced to avoid crowd control problems. He made no formal remarks, only his quiet thanks to each of the 35 highly decorated veterans as he shook their hands and patted their shoulders before leaving.

There are 98 living Medal of Honor recipients.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

At Bryan's award ceremony, he stood before the same group of Medal of Honor recipients Obama had visited. Bryan's first words were to thank the motorist who aided him in rescuing Michael Nolte from the burning highway patrol car on May 22, 2003. He was unable to save the state trooper.

"I want to include Troy Brinkoetter as part of this ceremony," Bryan said. "Troy was with me to help pull Michael Nolte from the car that day. He, too, deserves your thoughts."

Missouri State Trooper Michael Newton had stopped Nolte for a traffic violation and was writing him a ticket when the truck crashed into the patrol car. Newton died and Nolte was seriously injured.

Candidates for the award can be nominated by anyone through the foundation's Web site, and apparently no one nominated Brinkoetter. A group of judges, including several Medal of Honor winners, pick finalists from each state and narrow them down to three.

Foundation president Nick Kehoe said Bryan's name came to their attention, "but we appreciate the courage of Troy."

___

© 2009, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau on the World Wide Web at www.mcclatchydc.com.

Lawmakers poised to make cuts to Obama's budget

By David Lightman

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

WASHINGTON _ Congress will begin rewriting President Barack Obama's $3.55 trillion fiscal 2010 budget Wednesday, and key lawmakers are poised to change some of his most ambitious plans significantly.

"There will be change, there's no question," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a Senate Appropriations Committee member.

The House of Representatives and Senate budget committees hope to cut hundreds of billions of dollars from the president's outline.

Obama originally proposed a 10.1 percent increase in key nondefense domestic spending last month, according to Senate Budget Committee estimates, and Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., wants to hold the increase to about 7 percent. Conrad also wants to eliminate a $250 billion reserve that Obama wants for future bailouts of troubled companies.

The committees are unlikely to back resorting to a controversial legislative tactic that would make it easier to win Senate approval of carbon emission curbs, however.

The president, who plans to meet Wednesday at the Capitol with Senate Democrats, is contending that he will have succeeded if the final budget achieves four general goals: making a "down payment" on a health care overhaul; creating a "path to energy independence"; overhauling education; and cutting the "inherited" deficit in half by 2013.

Few lawmakers from either party would disagree with those principles, but they're sharply divided over how to attain them _ and alarmed by new deficit projections.

Obama's budget estimated that the 2010 deficit would reach $1.17 trillion, but the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office last week projected the figure at $1.4 trillion. The CBO also issued new, dire warnings about the future. By 2019, it said, debt held by the public would double to 82 percent of the gross domestic product if the president's budget becomes law.

The new figures have made Democratic budget leaders in Congress more aggressive about cutting Obama's budget. Conrad will offer a plan Wednesday to cut the deficit to $508 billion by fiscal year 2014.

Among the changes that are being seriously discussed:

_The non-filibuster rule. The president's budget team has considered using the budget "reconciliation" process to bring up complex changes in health care and carbon emissions "cap-and-trade" measures. That tactic permits the Senate to enact budget-related bills with only a simple majority of the 100-member body.

Usually Senate rules permit a minority to hold up legislation until 60 members vote to move to a final vote. Democrats control 58 Senate seats, so they could ram big programs through under "reconciliation." Republicans object, however, and even some Democrats remember that when they were in the minority, they valued minority-protection rules.

The House Democratic Blue Dog Coalition, a group of 51 party moderates, has made it clear that it doesn't want the reconciliation process used to change policy. Also, senators from industrial states, worried about the impact of a cap-and-trade system to limit emissions from the auto industry, are voicing concern.

Still, House Democratic leaders are balking at abandoning the tactic for winning an overhaul of health care.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Using the tactic could wound already-bruised relations with Republicans. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who cast a crucial vote for last month's economic stimulus package, said she flatly opposed using the tactic for such big issues.

"Reconciliation should not be used to implement a major policy change," she said. "It's unfair to those who hold minority views."

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

_The financial rescue plan. Obama's budget lists a $250 billion "placeholder" aimed at giving more help to ailing industries, but Congress seems in no mood to provide it. Since the first major bailouts last fall, lawmakers have heard repeatedly from angry constituents who oppose government aid to shaky companies.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

"I don't think it should stay in. I don't think there's enough support for any additional rescue plans at this point," said Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., a key moderate.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada agreed. "I have no problem with that. ... If it's an emergency we can do it."

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

_Nondefense discretionary spending. The Senate Budget Committee says the president wants a 10.1 percent increase in domestic discretionary spending, which includes most education, labor, transportation and other popular programs.

The Blue Dogs want spending on these programs held to the rate of inflation, which is nearly zero, and Senate moderates also are concerned about runaway spending. Conrad is expected to recommend a 7 percent spending increase, but that's going to be a hard line to hold in the House, where liberals have more clout.

This looms as one of the biggest budget battles. A coalition of liberal groups began mobilizing Tuesday against major cuts from Obama's wish list, and House leaders, many of them sympathetic to liberal causes, are said to be balking at cuts too.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

_Pell grants. Currently, Congress and the president decide each year how much money this program to aid lower-income students should receive. Obama wants to make it an "entitlement," guaranteeing that it would get a certain level of funding each year.

He's proposed a maximum award of $5,550 for the 2010-11 school year, a sum that would be indexed to the rate of inflation plus 1 percent annually after that. Conrad would preserve Obama's increases, but wouldn't make the grants a full entitlement program, meaning that Congress would have more discretion to make changes each year.

Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the top House Budget Committee Republican, said that while he backed Pell grants, the president's plan would make it "another autopilot entitlement, immune from congressional oversight at precisely the time when we should be reforming" entitlements.

___

ON THE WEB

President Obama's 2010 budget outline: http://tinyurl.com/bcbxk6

Concord Coalition's budget analysis: http://tinyurl.com/cwjb2e

White House plan on Pell Grants, other education revisions: http://tinyurl.com/a9tvlo

___

© 2009, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Visit the McClatchy Washington Bureau on the World Wide Web at www.mcclatchydc.com.

Treasury to spend $100 billion to lure investment in bad securities

By Jim Puzzanghera and Walter Hamilton

Tribune Washington Bureau

(MCT)

WASHINGTON _ The Obama administration on Monday released the long-awaited details of its plan to cleanse banks of bad home loans and other toxic assets, igniting a major Wall Street rally as investors glimpsed what might be the beginning of the end of a problem at the core of the financial crisis.

The Dow rocketed nearly 500 points after Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner briefed reporters on the administration's innovative but untested plan, which makes a strategic bet that partnering with private investors to buy the assets will stabilize the crisis while limiting the risk to taxpayers.

"We believe that this is one more element that is going to be absolutely critical in getting credit flowing again," President Barack Obama said. "It's not going to happen overnight. There's still great fragility in the financial systems. But we think we are moving in the right direction."

The new Public-Private Investment Program will use $75 billion to $100 billion in federal financial rescue money to lure private investors to join with the government in purchasing as much as $1 trillion in bad subprime mortgages, mortgage-backed securities and other troubled assets that are dragging down the balance sheets of financial institutions.

With Wall Street greeting the plan optimistically, experts said, the potential for generous government financing could entice investors into the troubled sector.

"I like where they're going," said Frank Pallotta, a principal at Loan Value Group in Rumson, N.J., a consulting firm that advises buyers and sellers of distressed mortgage assets. "It's a step in the right direction."

Two large money management firms, Pimco in Newport Beach, Calif., and BlackRock Inc. in New York, said they would participate in the asset-purchase program. And the Financial Services Roundtable, which represents large banks that would put assets up for sale and private-equity firms that would buy them, said it heard positive feedback Monday.

Geithner on Monday tried to ease concerns among potential investors in the toxic assets that Congress might change the rules later, reflecting a worry raised by congressional outrage over the $165 million in retention bonuses paid to employees at bailed-out insurance giant American International Group.

Getting investors to join with the government and take the risk of buying the bad assets "will require confidence among investors there's clearly established rules of the game consistently enforced going forward." Geithner said the administration would work with Congress to strike the right balance. The administration understands the anger over the bonuses, he said, and more broadly at the financial institutions that helped cause the crisis by making risky investments.

For that reason, the program is designed to limit the risk to taxpayers of cleaning up those assets, while also trying to lure private investors to help participate in the cleanup.

Geithner said the program would allow the government to share with private investors both the risks of acquiring the bad assets and the potential gains if they are bought at low enough prices. That innovative idea was selected as a better alternative to having the government buy up all the assets itself or simply allowing banks to work through the problems on their own.

"The alternative strategies would have the government either taking on all that risk ourselves, having all those losses on our balance sheet, or sitting back and let this process of deleveraging continue to weigh on the American economy, pushing viable businesses closer to the edge," Geithner said.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

The final details are still being developed and the Treasury Department hopes to launch the program within the coming weeks, in participation with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Federal Reserve. The FDIC and the Fed are partners because they have large amounts of money to provide loan guarantees.

The FDIC also has experience in selling financial assets, which it does after it seizes failed banks.

The new Treasury program targets two groups of assets that are at the center of the financial crisis: bad mortgage loans being held by banks and securities containing those loans that are held by banks and other financial institutions. The values of those assets have plummeted with the collapse of the housing market, making them almost impossible to sell. That dynamic has dragged down the value of financial institutions and made it extremely difficult for them to raise the money to provide new loans. The resulting credit crunch has pushed the financial system into crisis, deepening the recession.

Geithner's plan involves using government loans and guarantees to lure investors to buy the assets at discounted prices.

"A principal virtue of this mechanism is to use the financial interests of investors to help set the price. Because they have money at risk, they're going to make better judgments about how to set the price for these assets than the government could hope to make," Geithner said. "We have seen and I expect to see a lot of interest from the private sector."

Scott Talbott, senior vice president of government affairs for the Financial Services Roundtable, said the plan will help determine prices for the assets even if it isn't widely used, resolving the main issue holding up their sale. "They're not toxic because they have no value, they're simply toxic because they have no market, and because there is no market we don't know what the price is," Talbott said. "The proposal today cuts the Gordian knot and provides an elegant solution to an elusive problem."

___

© 2009, Tribune Co.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

_____

Sandbaggers race against time as Red River rises

By Bill McAuliffe, Matt McKinney and Bob von Sternberg

Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

(MCT)

FARGO, N.D. _ Mud-soaked and aching, residents of Breckenridge, Minn., spent Monday trying to build a walled city against the marauding Red River and its tributaries.

By evening, after a day of sandbagging to fill gaps in permanent dikes, residents and officials believed they were protected 1 foot higher than the 19-foot crest predicted to pass through the city beginning at midday Tuesday.

"That was critical," said Wilkin County highway engineer Tom Richels. "We're feeling pretty good right now."

Thousands of volunteers up and down the Red River Valley toiled mightily Monday as potential record flooding threatened those along the north-flowing river. In Fargo, where classes at North Dakota State University were postponed indefinitely so students could help, sandbaggers worked to fill nearly 2 million sandbags ahead of Thursday's anticipated crest.

"This is coming up way faster than in 1997. We had a lot more time then," said college student Krista Ramstad as she took a break Monday night with tired friends who were filling sandbags in the Fargodome. Some of them had worked since Sunday morning.

Already main roads _ Interstate 29 on the North Dakota side and Hwy. 75 in Minnesota _ were closed between Wahpeton, N.D., and Fargo because portions were under water.

Richels estimated Monday morning that 80 percent of his county's roads outside the city of Breckenridge were under water and closed.

It probably will only get worse as heavy rain, eventually turning to snow, will bedevil the region this week.

According to the National Weather Service, rain will accumulate by as much as an inch before turning Tuesday night to snow that will linger through the rest of the week.

That could be a mixed blessing, as colder temperatures slow the melting that's feeding the flood, but make it tougher for volunteers to erect the cities' flood defenses.

As night fell Monday, heavy rain was falling in Breckenridge, accompanied by thunder and lightning.

Rain of more than half an inch in the region could push the city's crest toward 20 feet, higher even than the 19.4-foot record set in 1997, which devastated Breckenridge, its sister city of Wahpeton across the river, and began a wave of misery that culminated at Grand Forks, N.D., and beyond.

For some homeowners, slinging sandbags is becoming a wearying spring routine.

Chris Vedder, heaving sandbags in a long line of volunteers trying to protect some private homes across the street from where she and her husband live, said the effort had a strange effect on her.

"You get happy to see another semi" filled with sandbags, she said. "It's a real sick excitement."

Vedder's home in Breckenridge was raised 3 feet after the foundation caved in 1997. "We can't keep doing this," she said.

Hydrologists have indicated that this year's flooding is the result of not enough of last fall's record rains draining into rivers. Much of that rain froze solid and deep in the soil, holding it all winter, along with deeper-than-average winter snows.

That said, a diversion ditch built after the 1997 flood is supposed to keep the water away from downtown Breckenridge. "We think it's going to do what it was designed to do," said Steve Buan, a hydrologist for the National Weather Service's regional forecast.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

The concrete floor of the Fargodome, the city stadium that was supposed to be getting prepared for a championship rodeo competition, instead held hundreds of volunteers swarming six piles of sand. There was no hi-tech sandbagging machinery here, just shovels and white plastic bags. A crowd of 200 volunteers swarmed the floor Monday evening, their pants and sweatshirts covered in sand as they piled 40-pound bags onto pallets for waiting bulldozers and trucks to haul away.

"The evening shift is the toughest and we've had to shut down for lack of volunteers in the middle of the night," Fargo Mayor Dennis Walaker said. "But today, we've got people coming from (NDSU) and the high school, so that should help. We still need 400 to 500 people a shift to pull this off. But things are looking better than yesterday."

Eighty football players from NDSU took shifts Monday. Public high school students were to be released if they wanted to help. Even inmates got into the act, with Cass County jail residents filling sandbags overnight.

"I think today was a really good day," said Kristi Brandt, who held open a bag as her sons Alex, 6, and Jacob, 11, worked nearby.

Memories of the 1997 flood that devastated Grand Forks have people in Fargo prepared for the worst. Ramstad, the college student who said her family lost half of their belongings in that flood, said her parents were once again shoring up their house in Ada, Minn., against a rising tide. "I was supposed to leave for school (Sunday) when my mom started screaming from the basement because the water's rushing down the walls," she said.

Her father, a highway department supervisor, hasn't been home for five days while he fights the flood elsewhere.

Ramstad said she doesn't want to go back to school. For now, she wants to sandbag.

"We were out earlier building dikes," said Jeran Hilde, who said he worked until 1 a.m. early Monday on the relief effort.

"I couldn't sit up this morning," said Ramstad, whose jeans were covered with sand. "This is pretty much what I've been wearing for the last 48 hours."

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

A student from Horace, N.D., a small town just outside Fargo, said crews shut off the city water recently to relieve the drains.

"They just turned it back on today but the whole town smells like sewer," said Jaden Fedora. No one has lost their house there, she said, but there wasn't much in the way of sandbags to stop the water.

Back on the floor of the Fargodome, volunteers prepared to work into the night.

"We can use as many as we can get," said Capt. Lee Soeth of the Fargo Fire Department.

"I'm doing as much as I can, I guess," said Matt Blum, an NDSU student.

He held a bag open while a friend loaded it with sand. Behind him sat a pile of empty white bags.

Nearby, Fargo elementary school teacher Sheri Wanzek said she planned to stay, "until I tire out."

___

© 2009, Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

Visit the Star Tribune Web edition on the World Wide Web at http://www.startribune.com

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Alaska volcano remains active after morning blast

By George Bryon

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

ANCHORAGE, Alaska _ Since an erupting Mount Redoubt sent an ash cloud shooting nearly 12 miles high early Monday morning with its fifth and strongest explosion, the Cook Inlet volcano has remained highly active, the Alaska Volcano Observatory reports.

Six to seven smaller, subsequent explosions lasting about two minutes apiece have sent additional ash and gas into the atmosphere since the big blast at 4:30 a.m., AVO staff scientist Chris Waythomas said.

Ash has now been detected at 60,000 feet above sea level, the National Weather Service reported.

Midlevel winds are still carrying the ash plume north over the Susitna Valley, and minor ash fall has been reported in Skwentna, Willow, Trapper Creek and Talkeetna, according to the Weather Service, the Matanuska-Susitna Borough and eyewitness reports. Traces of ash also have now been reported in Denali National Park and at the village of Nikolai to the west.

High-elevation winds above 40,000 feet are beginning to veer toward Anchorage, but no ash is expected to fall on Alaska's largest city at this time, Bob Hopkins, the meteorologist-in-charge of the National Weather Service office in Anchorage, said.

"Eight miles up _ that's going to stay there," Hopkins said. "But that will affect aircraft at that altitude."

It's the lower-elevation winds between 10,000 and 20,000 feet, currently blowing north by northeast, that are most likely to carry ash to the ground, Hopkins said.

In the Su Valley, the ash fall is being described as fine gray dust around Skwentna, Trapper Creek and Talkeetna.

The eruption has apparently destroyed the "RSO" seismometer on the south flank of the volcano, as well as the AVO webcam inside a hut six miles from the summit, Waythomas said.

Two additional seismometers on Redoubt's north and east slopes were nonoperational for a while Monday morning, but that was due to a power outage on the Kenai Peninsula, he said.

By midmorning, residents in Kenai began reporting a sulfur smell in the air, but no ash had yet fallen there and schools are open, officials said.

Redoubt began erupting Sunday night, with the first explosion coming at 10:38 p.m., followed by another at 11:02 p.m., a third at 12:14 a.m. and a fourth at 1:39 a.m., the AVO reported.

Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport remains open, although some airlines have canceled or diverted flights. Alaska Airlines reported canceling 19 flights in and out of Anchorage because of the ash but other flights are operating.

Elmendorf Air Force Base reported that 60 planes, including fighter jets, cargo aircraft and a Boeing 747 commercial plane, are being sheltered. The base initially ordered only essential personnel to report for duty; that was later changed to all personnel reporting at 8 a.m.

Mount Redoubt, a 10,197-foot stratovolcano 100 miles southwest of Anchorage, last erupted during a fourth-month period in 1989-90. Its recent period of volcanic unrest began Jan. 25.

An official with the Federal Aviation Administration at the Anchorage airport early Monday said there were no immediate plans to close the airport.

The Weather Service advised people in areas of ash fall to seal windows and doors, protect electronics and cover air intakes and open water supplies as well as minimize driving.

___

© 2009, Anchorage Daily News (Anchorage, Alaska).

Visit the Anchorage Daily News online at http://www.adn.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

Plane crashes in Montana, killed up to 17 people

By Phillip Reese and Jennifer Garza

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

SACRAMENTO, Calif. _ A plane that left Oroville, a small town about 70 miles north of Sacramento, Calif., this morning crashed in Montana three hours later, killing up to 17 people, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman said.

"The plane was in route from Oroville to Bozeman for reasons we don't know," said FAA spokesman Les Dorr. "They diverted into Butte and crashed 500 feet short of the runway."

Tom Hagler, a mechanic at the Oroville airport, said this evening he arrived at the airport at 11 a.m. and saw the plane. He let about a dozen children who were on the plane use the airport bathroom. The plane didn't refuel.

Hagler said he spoke briefly with the pilot but he didn't recognize the pilot or any of the children. He didn't know if any members of the group were local.

Hagler said he would be surprised if as many as 17 people could have been on the single prop plane.

An FAA spokesman told the Associated Press the children could have been part of a ski trip.

The plane had left Redlands, Calif., early today and flew to Vacaville, Calif., according to records at flightaware.com. It stayed in Vacaville for 50 minutes before taking a short flight to Oroville. It was on the ground in Oroville for 30 minutes before leaving for Montana.

Oroville law enforcement authorities said they knew nothing about the plane.

Dorr says the plane was registered to Eagle Cap Leasing Inc. in Enterprise, Ore., but he didn't know who was operating the plane.

___

© 2009, The Sacramento Bee (Sacramento, Calif.).

Visit The Sacramento Bee online at http://www.sacbee.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

4th Oakland cop dies following shootouts that killed 3 officers, parolee

Police officers hide behind cars after hearing shots fired during a second shooting during a manhunt of a suspect who shot two more police officers Saturday Mach 21, 2009. In the most horrific day in Oakland Police Department history, a parolee shot to death three police sergeants within two hours of one another Saturday afternoon. When officers tracked down the suspect, a fourth officer was shot and was pronounced dead Sunday morning. (Dan Rosenstrauch/Contra Costa Times/MCT)

By Jessie Mangaliman and Mary Anne Ostrom

San Jose Mercury News

(MCT)

SAN JOSE, Calif. _ A fourth Oakland police officer has died following two separate shootouts in which three other officers and a parolee were killed.

John Hege, 41, who had been with the Oakland department since 1999, was pronounced dead at Highland Hospital shortly before noon today, said Jeff Thomason, a department spokesman.

The three other Oakland police officers were pronounced dead Saturday after a traffic stop and, later, as a SWAT team tried to apprehend the man.

The gunman, Lovelle Mixon, 27, of Oakland was fatally shot after police tracked him down to a nearby apartment.

Acting Police Chief Howard Jordan identified the other slain officers as: Sgt. Mark Dunakin, 40, who was killed during the traffic stop; and Sgt. Ervin Romans, 43, and Sgt. Daniel Sakai, 35, both killed at the apartment where the gunman was holed up. Dunakin was with the department since 1991, Romans since 1996 and Sakai since 2000.

A fifth officer, whom police did not identify, was grazed by a bullet. He was treated and released from Highland.

The killings were among the deadliest shootings of police officers in California history.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

They deeply affected Oakland police officers, California Highway Patrol officers and Alameda County sheriff deputies. Many of them were also at Highland on Saturday and this morning, hugging one another and wiping away tears of grief and shock.

"Everyone is pouring out their hearts," said Acting Police Chief Jordan said during a news conference late Saturday.

"We feel a tremendous sense of loss," said Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums.

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

After the first shooting of two police officers on motorcycles on MacArthur Boulevard, the gunman fled from the scene. Mixon was wanted on a no-bail arrest warrant for violating parole on a previous assault with a deadly weapon conviction, police said.

A tip led police about two hours later to an apartment one-tenth of a mile away in the 2700 block of 74th Avenue, blocks from a police substation in East Oakland. Heavily armed SWAT team members descended on the apartment building to take the suspect into custody.

Business workers and media responding to reports of the shootout on 74th Avenue described a "Wild West" scene, where cops yelled at pedestrians to get down and take cover behind cars.

Two more police officers were shot dead while trying to take the suspect into custody. Police said the two officers were shot inside the apartment with an assault weapon. A second weapon, which police did not identify, was used to shoot the motorcycle cops.

Traffic officers pulled over the parolee's 1995 Buick at 1:08 p.m. near the Eastmont Town Center. Eight minutes later, a caller reported two officers down in the 7400 block of MacArthur Boulevard.

After hearing gunshots, a barbershop worker nearby said he walked down the block to find the two officers on the ground near each other. He said he attempted CPR until police arrived.

"I went over to one officer and saw he was bleeding from his helmet pretty bad," said the worker, who asked not to be identified. "The other officer was laying motionless."

The officer lying near a car appeared to have two gunshots to his head. One bullet, the worker said, appeared lodged in the jaw, another in the neck.

The incident involving the gunman "is bad because he's a state ward, he's a state parolee, they let him out," said California Attorney General Jerry Brown, a former Oakland mayor. "There are hundreds of shooters walking around the East Bay. Our parole system isn't working."

Howard said Oakland police investigators believe no suspect other than Mixon was involved in the shootings. He was on parole for a conviction on assault with a deadly weapon.

(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)

Tensions have been high between police and many Oakland residents since the shooting death Jan. 1 of Oscar Grant, 22, by a BART police officer at an Oakland transit station. After Grant's death, violent protests erupted in Oakland streets.

By Saturday night, a dozen pastors were calling for calm in the city.

At the lobby of the police administration building, four bunches of white roses were placed at the bottom of a memorial that lists the names of 47 Oakland police officers who have been killed in the line of duty since 1867. The last on the list was an Oakland police officer killed in January 1999.

___

© 2009, San Jose Mercury News (San Jose, Calif.).

Visit MercuryNews.com, the World Wide Web site of the Mercury News, at http://www.mercurynews.com.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

_____

PHOTOS (from MCT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): OFFICERSSHOT