With storms brewing in next week's forecast, Arcadia city officials scrambled Thursday to arrange a meeting with residents and survey homes vulnerable to mudslides from the charred slopes of the Angeles National Forest.
A blaze that gutted a house at 78 W. Las Flores early Saturday morning appears to have started accidentally. The blaze left a man and a woman dead, and a 7 year old boy in critical condition.
City Councilman Gino Roncelli, who was named last year to the board of directors of Santa Anita Park, will also join the board of the race track's parent company, MI Entertainment Corp.
After months of preparation and more than $300,000 expenditures in the aftermath of the Santa Anita II fires that diverted a wall of mud from homes, the fire-ravaged hillside seemed to be holding despite the rain storms.
The city's efforts to save homes beneath the fire-ravaged hillsides from a flood of mud and debris have been praised, but mud and debris are still flowing onto Highland Vista, Monte Place, Vista and Santa Anita Avenues.
Public Services Director Pat Malloy met with the Highland Homeowners Association to update the residents on the work that has been done after the fire that denuded the hillsides above their homes.
Improving an 8th grade school project has proved profitable for Arcadia High School senior Kyle Tarplee, who won $1,500 in savings bonds for his "range-finding glasses," which help visually impaired people detect objects in their path.
The District Attorney's Office announced this week it won't prosecute an Arcadia Police Officer for elder abuse for accepting $9000 from an elderly woman. Arcadia Resident Bernis St. Thomas, 89, told investigators she wanted to give officer Michael Castro the money.
A man dressed in woman's clothing, Rudolfo Anderson, was arrested by the Arcadia police after he carjacked a Honda Accord at the Santa Anita YMCA in Monrovia and collided with an automobile at First Avenue and Floral.