Featured Articles from the Daily Pilot

Three local high school boys' basketball teams open the CIF Southern Section playoffs at home on Wednesday at 7 p.m. One program is giving out free pizza and T-shirts to students who show up. Corona del Mar is hoping the free grub and gear entices fans. Estancia and Costa Mesa have nothing special planned as far as giveaways to fans. All season, the Sea Kings haven't had a large crowd come see them play. Estancia and Costa Mesa have played in front of a packed gym. The most recent time was against each other last week.

The Orange County Board of Supervisors approved a resolution Tuesday to implement a new pension plan for sheriff’s deputies, raise their retirement age, reduce benefits and ask them for the first time to contribute to their retirement plans. All four sitting supervisors voted to implement the agreement with the Assn. of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs, although Supervisor John Moorlach, 2nd District, had voted in February against approving it. Supervisor Bill Campbell, 3rd District, said the plan will save the county only a modest sum now but will bear more fruit in the future as current employees retire and new ones are hired.

COSTA MESA - Ever since he graduated from Palisades High in 2007, J.R. Bromberg has been the little brother who could. Drafted by the Minnesota Twins in 2007 and 2008, the latter after his freshman year at Los Angeles Pierce Community College, the 6-foot-3, 210-pound right-handed pitcher has teased scouts and college coaches alike with an above-average fastball, a fluid motion, a big-league physique and impressive genes. But unlike his older brother David, who has risen to the Triple-A ranks in six professional seasons in the Twins' organization, J.R. has been beaten up and bounced around.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is the ninth in a series of the top stories of each year since 2000. Look for the 2009 story of the year Thursday. The 55-foot yacht where Thomas and Jackie Hawks met their fate between Newport Beach and Catalina Island is still up for sale at a local yacht brokerage firm. Yacht broker Jerry Wakefield of Dixon Yachts International in Newport Beach has had serious buyers look at the Well Deserved, a fiberglass Lien Hwa trawler with a hand-carved teak interior, but none have been able to put the funds together to finance the boat.

A group of former Newport Beach Junior Lifeguard instructors have launched a capital campaign to build a new program headquarters. They will be raising funds at Junior Guard tryouts, which begin Sunday and continue into March. Their new organization, the Newport Beach Junior Lifeguard Foundation, plans to continue after the headquarters capital campaign. Its goal is to "preserve, complement and enhance the city of Newport Beach Junior Lifeguard Program," according to a news release.

I want to introduce myself as the hapless individual who inadvertently provoked the "near riot" at the special Costa Mesa City Council meeting Monday. I've studied and worked on policies concerning government-mandated construction wage rates, known as prevailing wages, for more than 17 years. I wrote the first and only book on the status of prevailing wage policies in California's 120 charter cities. As a result, I am able to comment about the technical nature of the state's prevailing wage laws in a way that gets some special interest groups very angry.

Military wives of Newport Beach's adopted 1st Battalion 1st Marines were treated Monday to a day of R&R - including manicures, brow shaping and haircuts - in the spirit of Valentine's Day. "It means more to me than I can say," Mary Ann Everingham said as her voice cracked with emotion. "He works so hard, and to me, he's just so brave. " Everingham spoke of her husband of 12 years, Marine Lt. Spencer Everingham. FOR THE RECORD: An earlier version incorrectly stated that the Newport Beach Sunrise Rotary organizes the annual mess night.

Lolita Harper It was an innocent time full of innocent fun, when teenagers from all over Southern California flocked to the Balboa Peninsula. It was "Bal" Week -- short for Balboa -- and it was good clean fun. Nita Middleton and Lucille Stafford, now neighbors in West Newport, recounted fond memories of their weeks of revelry in the 1940s, during which they would escape the halls of academia for Easter week and travel from inland Pasadena to the beaches of Newport.

COSTA MESA — When Aidan Rowe, 8, had his birthday last week, he decided some things were more important than presents. For his March 20 party, he asked his second-grade classmates at the Waldorf School in Costa Mesa to give him donations for the relief efforts in Japan. Over the past week, he's raised more than $1,000 with the help of his friends and their families. When asked why he wanted to help, the Newport Beach youngster said, "Since the tsunami and the earthquake … and since I like Japan a lot. " His mother, Chiyo Rowe, said that because the children learn Japanese in school, many of them feel a close connection to Japan.

NEWPORT BEACH - A gruesome skeleton hung from the bow of the ship. A giant skull and crossbones graced the mainsail. Pirates stood around guarding chests of treasure. A sailor kept watch from the crow's nest. Others stood ready at the cannons. With his hands on the wheel, Capt. Bloodbeard looked out from his ship to the colorful sea that his misfit crew created on the sand below. "Welcome aboard the S.S. Scurvy," proclaimed Bloodbeard, also known as Jimmy Newton, a junior lifeguard instructor.

Likely launching the harbor's first significant dredging since its inception, the Newport Beach City Council is planning to approve an agreement Tuesday to dump more sediment at the Port of Long Beach. Already, the city has been towing barges of polluted mud from the Rhine Channel to the port, and officials recently secured space for additional contaminated dirt. That muck, and some non-toxic silt, however, has formed shoals throughout Lower Newport Bay, causing boats to increasingly run aground.

Lolita Harper COSTA MESA -- Differing in age by more than 70 years in some cases, students at St. John the Baptist Catholic School and area veterans came together Friday to recognize the cost of defending freedom. More than 50 veterans joined 600 children in the sanctuary of St. John the Baptist for an hourlong assembly thanking men and women in service who defended -- and continue to defend -- the rights of all citizens. "It is the soldier who serves the flag and whose coffin lays under the flag that allows the protester to burn the flag," Vice Principal Mary McMenamin said.

COSTA MESA - It's pretty impressive whenever a student of the Gracie Barra school of Brazilian jiu-jitsu gets a black belt. Even more impressive is when one of those students is 78. Gene Pace was awarded his black belt Thursday night during a ceremony after his regular twice-weekly class and sparring session at the Costa Mesa studio. More than 100 of Pace's friends and supporters showed up to see his milestone. "It was overwhelming. And last night... " Pace started with a pause, then laughed.

A man accused of killing one person and injuring two others while allegedly driving the wrong way on the freeway is scheduled to enter a plea in court Thursday, according to prosecutors. Ruben Gurrola, 23, of Pomona is facing felony charges of murder, driving under the influence causing bodily injury, and driving with a blood alcohol level of .08 or more. He has a sentencing enhancement for causing great bodily injury and causing great bodily injury to multiple victims, according to the Orange County district attorney's office.