Democrats and Republicans in Sacramento have not been able to agree on whether to raise taxes and fees, or where to make cuts, but virtually every plan that has come to the table has included cuts to school budgets.
Costa Mesa is relying on sales taxes from South Coast Plaza over the holidays for needed revenue, but it remains to be seen how well local retailers did. There are plenty of indicators nationally that consumer confidence is hitting rare lows.
It also looks like public employee salaries and benefits might be up for reconsideration as Costa Mesa City Council members have called for extensive information on contracts. Police, fire and staff salaries and benefits packages make up a large share of the city budget and Mayor Allan Mansoor has said that possible cuts must be explored.
Hawks couple’s murder trials: The horrific nature of the case garnered national headlines. A loving, retired Newport Beach couple looking to sell their yacht to spend more time with their grandchild in Arizona were killed, thrown overboard alive strapped to an anchor.
The man who did it — a former child actor who used his own wife and child to deceive the couple — orchestrated a complicated web of lies and forgeries to numerous people to get away with the crime. In September, Skylar Deleon was convicted of murdering Newport Beach couple Tom and Jackie Hawks aboard their yacht, the Well Deserved, and killing another man, Jon Jarvi, in an unrelated incident in the Mexican desert a year earlier.
