The Orange County Tribune May 27, 2023

High school graduation schedules announced

Graduation ceremonies are coming for high schools in the Garden Grove Unified School District.. Ceremonies will be live-streamed as well at https://grad.ggusd.us/. Here are the schedules as submitted by the GGUSD.

Wednesday, May 31

• Bolsa Grande, 2 p.m., Bolsa Stadium

• Garden Grove, 2 p.m., Monsoor Stadium

• Los Amigos, 6 p.m., Monsoor Stadium

• Pacifica, 6 p.m., Bolsa Stadium

Thursday, June 1

• La Quinta, 3 p.m., Bolsa Stadium

• Santiago, 3 p.m., Monsoor Stadium

• Hare, 6 p.m., on campus

• Rancho Alamitos, 6:30 p.m. Bolsa Stadium.

E-Billboard Plan Pushed Back to July

Council majority balks and wants ‘more information’

By Jim Tortolano Orange County Tribune

Electronic billboards on city property along freeways that would show advertisements to motorists and put – potentially –millions of dollars into the city treasury.

Not so fast.

Wednesday night’s meeting of the Westminster City Council descended into angry exchanges among council members and between City Manager Christine Cordon and one coun-

For the third consecutive week, the number of confirmed new cases of coronavirus has declined in Orange County.

According to the county health agency, this week’s tally shows 436 new cases, compared to 463 last week and 548 the week before. It had peaked at 1,859 three weeks back.

The county is no long posting statistics on hospitalizations and the use of ICUs for treating COVID-19.

cil member.

Finally, the council voted 5-0 in favor of tabling the matter until the meeting of July 12.

What the council was considering was the selection of Branded Cities LLC to develop, construct, operate and maintain electronic billboards at two city-owned sites adjacent to the San Diego (405) Freeway.

Income to the city over 30 years from advertising revenue could be as much

G. Grove police investigate a fatal sidewalk shooting

Garden Grove police detectives are investigating the fatal shooting of a man early Thursday morning.

According to Sgt. Nick Jensen of the GGPD, officers were dispatched to the 12300 block of Trask Avenue (east of Harbor Boulevard) at around 3:45 a.m. in reference to a report of a man lying down on the sidewalk.

Upon arrival, they found

a man – identified only as a male Hispanic, 25-to-35 years old – unconscious and suffering from a gunshot wound.

Other police responded along with personnel from the Orange County Fire Authority and the victim was pronounced dead at the scene.

At this time, said Sgt. Jensen, there is no suspect

Continued on page 2

DR. DAWN MILLER of the Strawberry Festival Association hands out cake to visitors Friday on the first day of the celebration in Garden Grove. The festival is at Village Green (Main and Euclid) and continues Saturday

POMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE TIME (OCT photo).

Westminster city council

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as $121.7 million, but no money would come to Westminster until the billboards have been completed. some time in 2024.

The proposal includes doublefaced e-boards which would be 60 feet wide and 20 feet high.

The proposed project was a result of city’s strategic planning goal of stabilizing city finances.

“I was blown away by the Branded Cities team. They were very impressive,” said Assistant City Manager Adolfo Ozaeta, who was part of the city panel that interviewed candidates for the project.

But Councilmember Amy Phan West had objections. “I don’t feel comfortable voting on this tonight,” she said. “I need more information. I don’t want to be voting in the dark.”

Vice Mayor NamQuan Nguyen was also skeptical, expressing concern that the council wasn’t given enough time to study

The Orange County Tribune

the proposal. “I think councilmembers should be involved somewhere along the way,” or schedule a study session for the council.

Mayor Chi Charlie Nguyen joined in by raising questions about the project, asking for information about the “second or third best” applicant.

City Manager Christine Cordon, responding to suggestions that council members had not been informed about the project, fired back, saying “I find this insulting. I spoke to each of you individually about this” and quipped that if they wanted to get involved in planning there were jobs available in city hall.

Councilmember Carlos Manzo called the meeting “Bizarro” and Councilmember Kimberly Ho termed the controversy “demoralizing” to city staff.

The next council meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, June 14.

GG homicide

Continued from page 1

information and police are seeking help from the public. Anyone with information that would be useful to the investigation is asked to call GGPD Detective Rogers at (714) 741-5413 or GGPD Dispatch at (714) 7415704.

JIm Tortolano Editor and Publisher Marilyn Lewis Tortolano General Manager

The Orange County Tribune is published on Wednesdays and Saturdays with some exceptions. Address is 9402 Luders Ave., Garden Grove, 92844.

E-mail : orangecountytribune@gmail. com.

Website: www.orangecountytribune. com.

Phone: (714) 458-1860.

Established Aug. 6, 2016. All opinions expressed in The Tribune, unless otherwise stated, are those of the individual writer or artist and not necessarily those of The Tribune.

A member of The Associated Press, the Garden Grove Downtown Business Association and Garden Grove Chamber of Commerce.

Ignoring the violence in a violent world HB Wins $22.4 Million Case

Me and some other guys stabbed another guy to death. At that same spot, a girl died of poisoning.

That was a a “few” years ago during a sixth grade Shakespeare Festival at a local public school. I was Marcus Brutus and my associates – using plastic swords – fatally ventilated Julius Caesar in a scaled-down version of the play by the same name.

Marilyn, playing Queen Gertrude in “Hamlet,” drank of a vial of some lethal concoction and expired right there on stage.

Retorts

Jim Tortolano

All that “violence” took place, of course, on stage in front of students and parents a long time ago. We got applauded.

In Fullerton there’s a controversy about a youth staging of “A Sound of Music,” a story made famous by the film starring Julie Andrews. In the original proposed version, pupils portraying Nazis wear the swastika and shout “Heil Hitler.” A controversy has ensued, as you might expect.

While a more circumspect educational operation might have said ixnay on the swastikanay, let’s face it. Kids are exposed to a ton of violence and prejudice every day.

Toy sections in stores are filled with Nerf guns, which – while not too dangerous – represent the shooting of one person by another. Video games and TV shows depict many evil characters threatening innocents.

A more-than-cursory reading of religious texts from just about all faiths includes gory sequences of man’s inhumanity to man. Recent research about the impact of social media suggests there is

City triumphs in lawsuit filed back in 2008

A payment of $22.4 million –plus interest – is coming to the City of Huntington Beach after the city’s court victory in a case about a loan made to developers back in the era of redevelopment agencies.

It’s a final victory in the case of City of Huntington Beach vs. State of California, a case first filed in 2008. In a letter to the city, the state finance agency wrote it “no longer denies this item … [and] in compliance with the judgment, the agreement for purchase and sale of property … is considered an enforceable obligation.”

Many cities – including Huntington Beach and Garden Grove – took out loans or made other financial arrangements – to spur

development under then-existing redevelopment law.

When the state dissolved all such agencies, cities that were in the process of developing projects needed the approval of the state finance department to proceed.

Huntington Beach used the redevelopment process to develop three hotels in a resort district

Lampson street work to start

Beginning Monday, June 5 through September 2023, Lampson Avenue from Springdale Street to Lamplighter Street in Garden Grove will undergo a sewer improvement project causing temporary traffic delays. To facilitate construction work, eastbound Lampson Avenue will be closed, reducing traffic to one

lane in both directions. Motorists are asked to use alternate routes to avoid congestion.

Access to residences and schools around the construction area will be maintained at all times.

Eastbound Lampson traffic will be detoured south at Springdale

along Pacific Coast Highway. “I am pleased there are no barriers to the city immediately collecting the taxpayer money that was improperly denied by the state for many years,” said City Attorney Michael Gates, referring to “a win for the city that most said before was improbable.”

n STANTON CITY COUNCIL

Applications for park grants are approved

Resolutions to apply for a grant for improving Stanton Central Park and the Dotson Park Splash Pad were approved at Tuesday’s meeting of the Stanton City Council. The vote was 5-0.

According to estimates, $450,000 will be required to complete the renovation of the tennis courts and address concerns with existing infrastructure surrounding the courts in Central Park. Another $425,000 will be required to complete the replacement of the splash pad at Dotson Park. The grant funding requires that applicants match with 50 percent of the cost of the project, meaning that Stanton would need to provide $437,500. That much is available from the general fund, park in-lieu fees fund or the American Rescue Plan Fund.

THE WATERFRONT BEACH resort in Huntington Beach.

LAMPSON AVENUE construction at Springdale (City of GG)

Deadline on Debt Extended; Biden Says Deal ‘Very Close’

The deadline to avoid a default on the nation’s credit was pushed back Friday to Monday, June 5 as President Joe Biden said that a deal was “very close” to being reached.

Associated Press is reporting that Biden said, “It’s very close, I’m optimistic.”

However, by the time that the president and Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy

More prison sentences in Jan. 6 attack on Capitol

Prison sentences continue to be handed down to persons convicted of criminal charges in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021 storming of the U.S Capitol.

In Washington, on Friday a federal judge sentenced Jessica Watkins to eight years and six months in federal prison and Kenneth Harrelson to four years behind bars.

They were acquitted of seditious conspiracy charges but found guilty of other offenses related to the attempt by rightwing extremists to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election to the presidency.

That comes after the sentencing on Thursday of 18 years in

prison of Matthew Graves, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy. He’s the founder of the Oath Keepers extremist group.

left the capital for the Memorial Day weekend, no deal had been reached.

According to the AP, both sides are closing in on a twoyear agreement that will cut the federal budget and extend the debt limit into 2025, after the 2024 presidential election.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned that if a deal is not reached by the deadline, that would cause “severe hardship to American families” and American leadership.

The weather forecast for West Orange County area is mild and consistent.

Saturday through Tuesday will see morning clouds with afternoon sun.

Saturday’s daytime high will be 69 with an overmight low of 59. Temps will slowly cool all rhe way to 64 on Tuesday.

STORMING of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 (Wikipedia)

‘Hurt My Feelings’ Feels Good

A rom-com with a real difference from the norm

By Jake Coyle AP Film Writer

If I didn’t like Nicole Holofcener’s latest film, would I tell her?

OK, sure, it wouldn’t be so odd for a critic to give an unvarnished opinion. But what about a sibling? Or a spouse? If they didn’t care for Holofcener’s movie, what’s more important: Being honest or making a loved one feel good about themselves?

Do any of us really want straightforward feedback or do we just want emotional support?

That’s the rich vein that Holofcener, a master of nagging neuroses, mines so expertly in “You Hurt My Feelings” – a film that I very much adored. I swear.

For Holofcener, something as commonplace as little white lies between a married couple is just as fertile territory as, say, time travel is to Christopher Nolan. To her, such a minefield of insecurity is a playground.

And in “You Hurt My Feelings,” it’s glorious – albeit in a profoundly awkward way that can be mortifying – to watch her at play.

Beth (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), a writer, and her husband, Don (Tobias Menzies), a therapist, are a long-married New York couple whose harmonious if humdrum life runs into a crisis at Paragon Sports on Broadway. The trouble isn’t infidelity or even a nasty fight over athletic socks. Don is chatting there with his brother-in-law, Mark (Arian Moayed of “Succession”), when Beth and her sister Sarah (Michaela Watkins) come to meet them.

They approach slowly, wanting to hear what they’re talking about. When they get near, Beth

Movie Review

is horrified to hear Don confessing that he hates Beth’s new book.

He has always supported her writing. He’s read every draft and only offered encouragement. So this revelation is for Beth like a betrayal, and it shatters her trust in him.

Middle-aged Manhattanites with hurt feelings, of course, may not seem like the end of the world. Surely Holofcener’s title is a little ironic, like something a child would say. But she is brilliant in finding the major heartache in minor slights. For Beth, her husband’s confession isn’t just a blow to her ego but goes to the heart of whether her husband truly loves her. Beth’s work is herself, she thinks, so how can he not like it?

Louis-Dreyfus, working with Holofcener for the second time following 2013’s also great “Enough Said,” is incredibly good here. We all know by now that Louis- Dreyfus is one of our

greatest comic actors ever, but she’s a much stronger dramatic performer than tends to be acknowledged. When Beth’s need for reassurance and validation crashes in “You Hurt My Feelings,” Louis-Dreyfus is movingly crestfallen.

This isn’t the only story running here, either, though. With a terrific ensemble, “You Hurt My Feelings” digs into the halftruths that keep self-doubt at bay in all of these characters. Don, himself, might not be such a great therapist, a realization that he’s coming to. “He’s an idiot,” one patient (Zach Cherry) mutters while exiting an appointment.

David Cross and Amber Tamblyn, married in real life, play a bitterly bickering couple who agree on nothing except that they want their money back from Don after years of sessions.

Sarah, too, is nursing Mark’s acting dreams with words of encouragement while her interior-design clients reject all her ideas.

Great: HHHH

No one in “You Hurt My Feelings” seems to be all that great at their jobs. Holofcener’s film is remarkably perceptive in its characters’ faults while subtly arguing that we should overlook them.

After a prolonged argument, Beth begins to realize how she, too, sweetly lies to prop up her husband.

It really crystallizes as a parent. When their son, Elliot (Owen Teague), is depressed after a breakup, what mother or father in their right mind would do anything but tell him what he wants to hear?

White lies, maybe, make the world go round.

Would you, too, agree? This was a good review, right?

Please be honest.

“You Hurt My Feelings,” an A24 release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association for language. Running time: 93 minutes.

JULIA LOUIS-DREYFUS stars in “You Hurt My Feelings” (A24 Pictures)

Retorts: Violence, theater, hatred and Julie Andrews

Continued from page 3

also a lot of “kids’ inhumanity to kids,” in the form of cyberbullying, shaming and worse. I suspect very few of these incidents come from anyone watching someone else sing “Climb Every Mountain.”

We are steeped in violence and tribalism. Two of our most popular sports are football and stock car racing, and the snippets that appear on ESPN Sports Center often involve particularly forceful tackles and car crashes. The argument is that the “little sponges” that kids are will be influenced by certain dangerous images. But I ask in reply what

kind of positive images are the parents giving to those same kids?

If a few minutes of play-acting in the multi-purpose room can give your kid a desire to annex Austria, you have bigger problems than a grade school play.

Climb your own mountain toward teaching your child about right and wrong, and how evil will always be in our world, and we must be brave enough to reject and resist it.

Jim Tortolano’s Retorts appears on Wednesdays and Saturdays.

Moving tales of big-league relocations

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blessing of American League owners – would have had the new Los Angeles Browns move into L.A.’s Wrigley Field, home of the then-minor league Los Angeles Angels, who would then relocate to Long Beach.

Date of the official vote was planned for Dec. 8, 1941. By then, California was a potential war zone, and the Browns stayed until 1953 when they moved east and became the Orioles.

Strange things happen. Who knows? Maybe the A’s will end up in St. Louis some day.

Win a championship and meet the President

Continued from page 8

sports and politics.

There were scattered protests after that – a member of the Baltimore Ravens, for example, refused to visit with the rest of his football team because President Barack Obama supported abortion rights – but clashes proliferated under President Donald Trump.

When members of the Golden State Warriors suggested they would spurn a White House visit after winning the NBA title, Trump announced that the invitation was being withdrawn. Some of the players instead

visited the National Museum of African American History and Culture with local students.

More and more athletes started facing questions about whether they were willing to visit the White House. Frommer, who wrote ‘’You Gotta Have Heart,’’ a book about Washington and baseball, said trips became “a bit of a litmus test.’’

Biden, who has promised to turn down the temperature in Washington, has largely avoided such clashes. But sparks flew in preparation for Friday’s visit with the women’s team from Louisiana State.

After the Tigers won the NCAA championship this year, first lady Jill Biden made an offhand suggestion that a second invitation should also be extended to the team they defeated, the Iowa Hawkeyes. LSU star Angel Reese called the idea “A JOKE’’ and said she would rather visit with Obama and his wife, Michelle. The LSU team largely is Black, while Iowa’s top player, Caitlin Clark, is white, as are most of her teammates.

“At the beginning we were hurt. It was emotional for us,’’ Reese told ESPN in a subsequent interview. ‘’Because we know how hard we worked all year for everything.”

Nothing came of the first lady’s idea, and only the Tigers were invited (and only champion Connecticut on the men’s side) Reese ultimately said she wasn’t going to skip the White House visit.

“I’m a team player,’’ Reese said. ‘’I’m going to do what’s best for the team.”

While Reese didn’t turn down the invitation, another group of champions will be skipping the White House altogether. Georgia’s football team said it could not make it next month because of a scheduling conflict.

Coach Kirby Smart insisted that the decision had nothing to do with politics, saying the invitation conflicted with hosting a youth camp around the same time.

But who attends and who doesn’t is closely watched in the country’s charged political atmosphere.

“Sports are politics by other means,” said Jules Boykoff, a political science professor at Pacific University in Oregon. “Sometimes it’s very obvious, and sometimes it’s buried beneath the surface.”

The politicization of White House visits has overlapped with what Boykoff describes as the “athlete empowerment era.’’ At a time when the country has experienced sweeping social movements, such as Black Lives Matter and #MeToo, athletes feel more confident using their platforms to share political messages, and they can use social media as a bullhorn. “We’re in a new era now,” he said.

Boykoff said White House events were once considered a “family friendly photo opportunity,” offerin presidents a chance to show their lighter side. But given the country’s hyperpolarization, he said, the tradition may eventually run its course. And athletes may want the platform for themselves. “It wouldn’t be surprising if

Lampson Avenue construction

Continued from page 3 Street to Stanford Avenue east; or north on Springdale Street to Chapman Avenue east, to Knott Avenue south. Normal work hours will be from 7 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday; however, the lane closure will be maintained 24/7.

One of many projects designed to minimize sewer capacity issues, the Lampson Avenue Sewer Improvement Project includes rehabilitating the Lamplighter

Street sewer, from Killarney Avenue to Lenore Avenue, and the Lenore Avenue sewer, from Lamplighter Street to Springdale Street.

The project consists of constructing approximately 1,440 feet of new piping and installation of seven new manholes. The project is funded by the Sewer Fund.

For more information, contact Associate Engineer Liyan Jin at (714) 741-5977.

they show up at the White House and have something to say, maybe even interrupt the proceedings,” he said.

Most of these visits have been memorable for more playful moments.

Harry Carson of the NFL’s New York Giants dumped a bucket of popcorn on President Ronald Reagan’s head in 1987, mimicking their tradition of dousing the coach with a Gatorade bucket after a win.

In 2021, Los Angeles Dodgers’ pitcher Joe Kelly showed up at the White House in a mariachi jacket that he got off a musician.

And just last month, Biden was presented with a helmet by the Air Force Academy’s football team. The president chuckled.

With his job, he said, “I may need that helmet.”

Pacifica’s puzzling place in rankings

Here’s an example of what’s wrong – or at least puzzling –about rankings.

Maxpreps.com’s latest high school rankings for softball show Pacifica, which last week won the CIF-SS Division 1 title over Norco 15-9, rated ninth in the nation, which is the second highest position of any California team, topped only by St. Francis of Mountain View. Norco “straggled” in at 21st.

All of that would lead to the conclusion that the Mariners are second-best in the Golden State, right?

Apparently not. Maxprep’s California rankings have Norco in the top spot and Pacifica in seventh, behind two other Orange County teams – Los Alamitos (third) and Orange Lutheran (fifth). That’s weird because the M’s are rated behind two teams – Norco and Los Al – they defeated this season.

PHS did lose two of three to the Griffins, but the blue, black and white beat the Cougars black and blue in the championship game, winning by six runs. Puzzling, ain’t it?

Hurrah for the mighty, beloved L.A. Browns

A lot of folks – and I’m one of them – have had some fun at the expense of the Athletics baseball franchise, which seems to move around the map like an air hockey puck.

Yes, Philadelphia, Kansas City, Oakland and perhaps now, Las Vegas, not counting a lengthy flirtation with San Jose. But to be fair, the A’s are not the only big league team, in any sport that hasn’t pulled up stakes and moved more than once.

Sports Retorts

Jim Tortolano

Everyone knows that the Los Angeles Lakers used to be the Minneapolis Lakers (hence the

name, Minnesota being the “Land of a Thousand Lakes”), but how many know the franchise originated as the Detroit Gems?

The Clippers, of course, came to L.A. from San Diego but originated as the Buffalo Braves. The Washington Wizards were originally the Baltimore Bullets, later the Washington Bullets. The nickname was changed at a time when the nation’s capital was beset by a wave of homicides.

Over in the NHL, the current Carolina Hurricanes started as the Boston Whalers, became the Hartford Whalers and moved south in 1997.

Some of the more intriguing “moves” were moves that never happened. In 1941, the St. Louis Browns were poised to move from the Show-Me State –where they were perpetually in the shadow of the more successful Cardinals – to Los Angeles, extending big league ball from coast-to-coast.

The deal – which had the

outshine Dodgers,

By David Arthur Orange County Tribune

The Tampa Bay Rays, the team with – far and away – the best record in Major League Baseball, made its point with vigor on Friday, hammering the Los Angeles Dodgers 9-3 in Florida.

The Rays, now 38-15 and in first in the American League West, posted an early 4-1 lead and went on to deliver a sound defeat to the best team in the National League, now 31-21.

In their throwback Devil Ray uniforms, Tampa Bay bedeviled the Blue Crew with home runs by Yandy Diaz and Jose Siri, who combined for five hits and four RBIs. Catcher Christian Bethancourt went 3-for-4 with a double and two singles, driving in one run and scoring two.

A Tricky Path To The White House

By Chris Megerian and Josh Boak Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Calvin Coolidge wasn’t as big a baseball fan as his wife, Grace. But even Silent Cal got swept up in the excitement of the Washington Senators’ unexpectedly successful season in 1924.

After the team clinched the American League pennant, the players swung by the White House to shake hands and pose for pictures with Coolidge. It was the beginning of what would eventually become a tradition of victorious athletes

visiting the president, and it’ll continue on Friday when Joe Biden hosts the championship men’s and women’s college basketball teams.

But what started as a nonpartisan rite of passage has become increasingly tangled up in politics, a shift that some peg to Bill Clinton’s presidency.

Tom Lehman, a professional golfer, declined a White House invitation and described Clinton as “a draft dodging baby killer.”

“That’s really when it started,” said Fred Frommer, a former Associated Press journalist who has written about the history of

As for the Dodgers, with nine hits and six walks, they had their chances but batted only 3 for 14. Freddie Freeman, Will Smith and J.D. Martinez each had two hits, but none of those hits were for extra bases.

Noah Synderegard (1-4) was again the victim. He pitched six innings, giving up eight hits and six earned runs. He struck out three and walked one.

The two teams will meet again on Saturday with Clayton Kershaw (6-4) expected to start for LAD.

Angels lose 6-2 to the Marlins

Miami Marlins snapped the Los Angeles Angels’ fourgame winning streak on Friday, beating the Halos. 6-2. With the loss, the Angels are 28-24 and remain in third place in the American League West, three ganes out of first.

Gio Urshela was 3-for-4 and Brandon Drury homered for the Angels.

PRESIDENT CALVIN COOLIDGE autographs a baseball for the1924 Washington Senators’ team (Library of Congress).

A championship tradition can now be fraught with some political implications

Tampa Bays’ Rays

9-3