ADVERTISEMENT 2
ADVERTISEMENT 3
Error: No articles to display
ADVERTISEMENT 1
ADVERTISEMENT 4
Aclosed-door meeting was held with angry parents and some EPISD administrators which included Superintendent Gilbert Gonzalez and Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction Samuel Mijares. The reunion which lasted about 55 minutes was held at the District Service Center Board Room as parents, some of whom had seemingly taken time off of work to attend, filed into the assembly. "Hay cosas que affectan a los niños que con el tiempo les puede hacer daño,<These are things which can affect our children that with time can do them harm>" said one father who spoke to us when exiting the gathering, "Nos dijo que no sabe nada, y nosotros le dijimos que porque nos hablo a una junta si no sabe nada<He said they don't know anything, and we asked him 'Why did you call us to a meeting if you don't know anything>. Me dijo 'Si se quiere ir vallase.' <He said, 'If you want, you can leave'> Eso fue la respuesta <That was his answer>. y yo le dije, 'Como me voy a ir si me preocupa mijo.' <and I told him, 'How can I leave if my child is important to me, I care about my son>." Parents came out of the meeting maybe even with more questions and concerns than when they arrived as they spoke to the media on they way out.
A.D. Ibarra
-Maverick County
Courthouse
GEO have given Maverick County a thirty day notice that they will not continue with their contract with the county.
"We won't be specific about the future Commissioner's Court will be going in in reference to the facility, but what I can mention are the possibilities which exist for the future of that facility. What we're looking at is that GEO has come in and the bond holders have decided not to continue the contract with Maverick County. What we're here to do today is to notify the citizens of Maverick County and the employees that work there that we're doing our best as a county and we've already started investigating avenues that can exist for the operation of that facility."
Eagle Pass Police Dept. and DEA conduct raid at local homes; four arrested
EAGLE PASS, Texas -- On Thursday, October 3, 2013, at approximately 10:25 am, The Eagle Pass Police Department with assistance from the Drug Enforcement Administration, executed a State Search Warrant at 127 Colorado Street. At the scene three males, one female, and one male juvenile were detained for investigation. All four adults were formally charged and arrested for numerous charges. Armando Narciso Ramirez, 24, Jesus Mendoza, Jr., 27, Mark Anthony Ojeda, 21, and Aidee Azucena Ramirez, 38 all of Eagle Pass, Texas were arrested. Defendants are being charged with Possession of Marijuana with intent to Distribute, Possession of Cocaine with Intent to Distribute, and Possession of a Controlled Substance with Intent to Distribute.
Also taken into custody at the scene were a 20 gauge shotgun and a 40 caliber pistol. An assortment of drug paraphernalia used for packaging and distribution was seized as well. Several Marijuana plants used for cultivation and marijuana individually packaged and ready for distribution were retrieved at the address. An undisclosed amount of U.S. Currency was also found and seized.
This arrest was done after a four month long investigation conducted by the Criminal Investigation Division with the cooperation from the Drug Enforcement Administration. The case still remains open and defendants have been turned over to the District Attorney’s Office for further prosecution.
The Eagle Pass Police Department takes a firm stand against its fight against drugs and will not tolerate this type of activity in our community.
Parents to meet with superintendent
Staff
-Eagle Pass
Parents will meet with EPISD Superintendent Gilberto Gonzalez Thursday morning at 11:00 A.M. at the EPISD Board Room where he will answer all their questions and concerns dealing with recent school closings at both LDC and Austin schools.
What parents are most concerned about is the lack of communication both when the decision was made to cancel classes last week from Wednesday through Friday and Tuesday when parents were advised that classes were also cancelled at Austin Elementary.
"We have been going by rumors, maybe we're going to the old junior high, maybe we're going to Austin," said an anonymous parent, "We got a memo on Monday, but no memos were sent out after that, we found out on TV and on Facebook."
Superintendent Gonzalez is repeatedly announcing on the school district's TV channel that due to fumes at the school which has not been used for at least two years when Cerna Elementary was built, as the district rushed to prepare the school to give classes to the children of LDC.
"The head of the district is having trouble making decisions," stated an irate parent in a telephone conversation with News Gram officials, "And if the leader is making decisions that do not make sense, his subordinates are going to make mistakes too," referring to the fact that a central office administrator who is not the superintendent or the assistant superintendent for support services made the decision to use oil based paint at Austin Elementary.
According to sources, there were many water lines which were in need of repair in the school and the water fountains had not been used during this time.
They say that the toilets were too high for use by children ages pre-kindergarten and kindergarten.
At LDC, the three rooms which are in the back of the building were repaired, the walls were torn down and workers replaced insulation and sheet rock in these rooms. Parents want to know why the rest of the school did not receive the same treatment during the summer.
The parents said that the superintendent had sent bottled water on Monday for the children to drink and they also appreciate that he is taking the time to meet with them, but they still want answers to all of their concerns.
The News Gram had not received official communication from the district at press time.
Press Release -Texas Attorney General's Office October 1, 2013 365th District Court
Final sentencing was held in the 365th district court of Maverick County in the cases of State vs. Martha Zamarripa and State vs. Cesar Perez. Zamarripa was sentenced to 12 months deferred adjudication community supervision on a lesser included class A misdemeanor theft by a public servant, a $500 fine and 50 hours community supervision. This was on a plea agreement. The court also sentenced Cesar Perez after a contested sentencing hearing. Perez was convicted by a jury on August 15 for theft by a public servant, 3rd degree felony as charged in the indictment. After hearing evidence and arguments of counsel, the court sentenced Perez to 8 years in the institutional division of the Texas department of criminal justice, probated for 8 years, a $5,000 fine, $1,594 restitution to Maverick County, and 500 hours of community service. Pérez sentenciado a 8 años de libertad condicional, $ 5,000.00 multa por robo de $1,500 - $20,000 Comunicado de Prensa -Oficina del Secretario General 01 de octubre 2013 365a Corte de Distrito Sentencia final se celebró en el Tribunal de Distrito 365 del Condado de Maverick en los casos del Estado frente a Martha Zamarripa y el Estado frente a César Pérez. Zamarripa fue condenada a 12 meses de supervisión comunitaria diferido de adjudicación de un robo de delito menor de clase A por un funcionario público, una multa de $500 y 50 horas de supervisión comunitaria . Esto fue un acuerdo entre la acusada y el estado. El tribunal también condenó a César Pérez después de una audiencia de
Markets rise even as US government shutdown starts
STEVE ROTHWELL, AP Markets Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — Investors stayed calm on the first day of a partial shutdown of the U.S. government Tuesday and sent the stock market modestly higher.
A long-running dispute in Washington over President Barack Obama's health care law caused a deadlock over the U.S. budget, forcing about 800,000 federal workers off the job and suspending all but essential services. With the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and Democratic-controlled Senate locked in a stalemate, it was unclear how long a temporary bill needed to finance government activities would be stalled.
Despite the political rancor, investors didn't push the panic button. That suggests that, at least for now, they aren't anticipating that the stalemate will cause enough disruption in the economy to threaten a gradual U.S. recovery and a four-year bull run in the stock market.
"The trend of the economy appears to be in a positive direction," said Michael Sheldon, chief market strategist at RDM Financial Group. "Unless this really gets ugly, we think the markets should start to look ahead to what we believe should be better economic data over the next six to 12 months."
In the latest encouraging news on the economy, a private industry group reported Tuesday that U.S. manufacturing expanded at the fastest pace since April 2011 last month on stronger production and hiring.
The Dow Jones industrial average was up 37 points, or 0.2 percent, to 15,165 as of 2:25 p.m. The S&P 500 index gained nine points, or 0.5 percent, to 1,690.
In other trading, the Nasdaq composite rose 31 points, or 0.8 percent, to 3,803.
The tech-heavy index was given a boost by Apple, which rose $10.07, or 2.1 percent, to $486.60, after billionaire investor Carl Icahn told CNBC about his dinner meeting with Apple's CEO Tim Cook. Icahn, who said he has invested $2 billion in Apple, is pushing for Apple to spend $150 billion buying its own stock.
"I feel very strongly that this should be done," Icahn told CNBC. "It's a no-brainer."
The Standard & Poor's 500 index climbed to a record Sept. 18 after the Federal Reserve surprised investors and said that it would continue with its economic stimulus. The index has shed 2 percent since then, falling on seven out of eight days before the shutdown.
"We're not jumping in with both feet but we're selectively putting money to work," said Joseph Quinlan, chief market strategist for U.S. Trust Bank of America Private Wealth Management. "On the other side of the government shutdown, you've got continued support from the Fed and a global economy that's rebounding."
Many investors still predict that the budget fight will be resolved before it spills over into a dispute about raising the nation's borrowing limit. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said last week that the government would run out of borrowing authority by roughly Oct. 17.
The last time the borrowing limit, or debt ceiling, issue came up in August 2011, it led to Standard & Poor's downgrading the United States' credit rating. The Dow went through nearly three weeks of triple-digits moves almost daily.
"To some extent investors are conditioned to a certain amount of drama and if we can get the drama behind us quickly it won't be a big deal," said Dean Junkans, Chief Investment Officer for Wells Fargo Private Bank. "If this goes beyond the middle of next week, the market will get increasingly more worried about the debt ceiling."
In government bond trading, the yield on the 10-year note rose to 2.65 percent from 2.61 percent late Monday.
The price of oil fell 77 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $101.56 a barrel. Gold fell $40.90, or 3 percent, to settle at $1,286.10 an ounce.
The dollar fell against the euro and the Japanese yen.
Among stocks making big moves:
— Merck rose $1.15, or 2.4 percent, to $48.75 after the drugmaker said it plans to cut another 8,500 jobs as part of a plan to reduce its annual costs by about $2.5 billion by the end of 2015.
— Walgreen rose $2.31, or 4.3 percent, to $56.08 after the drugstore chain said its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings soared 86 percent after it booked gains from its method of inventory accounting and its acquisition of a stake in European health and beauty retailer Alliance Boots.
— Ford gained 25 cents, or 1.5 percent, to $17.13 after the automaker said that U.S. sales rose 6 percent in September, with strong car sales making up for slower sales of SUVs.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Obama hails 'historic' launch of health exchanges
JOSH LEDERMAN, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — Hailing it as an "historic day," President Barack Obama pressed forward his flagship health care program Tuesday, inaugurating new insurance exchanges to expand access for those without coverage despite the shutdown taking hold across much of the government.
Obama said the opportunity to access affordable insurance is life-changing for those who could not do so before the launch of the exchanges, now open for enrollment for six months starting Tuesday. As a sign of how eager Americans were to get started, Obama said more than 1 million people had visited the website before 7 a.m. EDT — exceeding expectations and, in some cases, slowing down the computer systems.
"This is life-or-death stuff," Obama said in the White House Rose Garden, flanked by Americans who plan to enroll through the exchanges. He said tens of thousands of Americans die each year for lack of health insurance, and others go bankrupt. "Today we begin to free millions of our fellow Americans from that fear."
Obama urged Americans to call in or go online, promoting an online system that he said will offer more choices, more competition and lower prices. For that to work, the Obama administration needs tens of millions of Americans — mostly younger, healthy people — to sign up of offset the costs of patients whose health care costs more.
Obama acknowledged there would be glitches in rolling out the program — there have been plenty already — but said that's normal and that the problems will be fixed. The Obama administration hopes to sign up 7 million people during the first year.
Obama's appearance kicked off a major campaign by his administration and its allies to enroll as many Americans as possible through the exchanges, a centerpiece of Obama's health care law.
But any sense of festivity surrounding the opening of the exchanges was quickly eclipsed by the fact that throughout Washington and across the country, much of the federal government was shuttered. Congress, gridlocked over whether to dismantle the law, missed the midnight deadline to keep funding the government.
That meant that hundreds of thousands of federal workers were sent home — including many of Obama's own aides. The White House cut its staff by three-quarters as first partial shutdown in almost two decades began.
That his health care law remained so contentious in Congress three years after he signed it was not lost on Obama. Visibly rankled by Republicans' continued efforts to gut the law and use a shutdown as leverage, Obama denounced House Republicans for what he called an "ideological crusade to deny health insurance to millions of Americans."
"This shutdown is not about deficits, it's not about budgets," Obama said. "It's about rolling back our efforts to provide health insurance to folks who don't have it. It's about rolling back the Affordable Care Act."
"This, more than anything else, seems to be what the Republican Party stands for these days," he added.
Obama's other message to Americans: Shutdown or not, the exchanges remain open. That's because funding for much of the Affordable Care Act, like other "mandatory" functions such as Social Security, air traffic control and national defense, is protected from the whims of Congress.
"It is settled, and it is here to stay," Obama said.
Obama was also deploying top deputies Tuesday to spread the message of newly available health care coverage, the White House said. Vice President Joe Biden will appear on college radio stations. First lady Michelle Obama is publishing an editorial on a women's lifestyle website. And senior Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett and other officials will be guests on African-American radio shows.
___
Associated Press writer Nedra Pickler contributed to this report.
___
Reach Josh Lederman at http://twitter.com/joshledermanAP
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
NEWS RELEASE - The Eagle Pass Independent School District has ordered the temporary closure of the Austin Elementary building, which is currently housing the Language Development Center, due to strong paint fumes. As a precautionary measure, EPISD is conducting a thorough evaluation of the Austin Elementary building to ensure safety of the students and staff.
Superintendent of Schools, Gilberto Gonzalez has ordered the closure of the building until further notice to ensure the well being of all students and staff.
Beginning Tuesday, Oct. 01, 2013, there will be no classes for the Language Development Center (LDC) until further notice.
A.D. Ibarra
-Sul Ross Univ.
Rio Grande College
A group of UTSA representatives from the Institute for Economic Development met with community leaders, elected officials, school district, city and law enforcement personnel have been coming together to be briefed on ways to cope with sudden economic growth such as that which has been seen in the Dimmit and Zavala County area the past two years.
Assistant Director of the Eagle Ford Shale Community Development Program, John Facey, was on hand to conduct the presentation which brought out the amazing statistic that in 2012, Eagle Ford Shale activity generated over $61 billion in economic impact and supported 116,000 jobs in a 20 county area.
"Our goal is to use effective strategic planning to diversify the economic base of the region to create vibrant, resilient and sustainable economic activities," stated Facey, "How a community such as Eagle Pass is prepared to deal with a natural energy boom of its own will be based on how proactive they are in their approach to readiness in terms of housing, medical facilities and just adapting to unpredictable change."
The workshop allows community leaders to analyze infrastructure issues such as railways, air strips and airports, housing stock to attract teachers and other professionals, transportation and streets, amenities such as new stores at the mall for domestic and international consumers and other integration ideas to capture more revenue from international shopping.
This was the scene on Garrison Street where two vehicles crashed sending one of the cars nearly into the propoerty of the Eagle Pass Dental Clinic. Here one of the vehicles is towed off after sustaining significant damage. Eagle Pass Police Officers survey the wreckage and we will be awaiting official reports which will be in tomorrow’s edition of your Eagle Pass News Gram.
