Free Republic

Want to take a ride on a real camel in northeast Fresno to get an experience of the Middle East? The Islamic Cultural Center of Fresno is offering camel rides -- and more -- at its first bazaar, which will be from 4 to 10 p.m. Oct. 27 at the center, 2111 E. Nees Ave. The center is making arrangements to bring the camel from the Los Angeles area. Huda Munjy, chairwoman of the bazaar and a board member at the center, says the camel rides are to provide the community with an experience they can enjoy and remember for...

“Fairy tales do not tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed.” - G. K. Chesterton --IMAGE HERE-- Yesterday morning a Fresno California woman came face-to-face with every mother’s worst nightmare. Just after 8:30 in the morning, a man wearing a ski-mask invaded her home while she and her child were inside. But the horror doesn’t end there. The man was there with a goal. He wanted her 2 year-old daughter. This story is eerily similar to a 2003 kidnapping in San Jose California which I wrote about...

<p>For a while, we’ve been wondering why President Obama doesn’t do any public events while he flies through the Bay Area to swoop up campaign cash. If you think that’s tough, he has NEVER visited Fresno during his campaign nor his presidency. And Monday night, in an interview with ABC 30 in Fresno, Obama was asked, essentially, “What’s up with that?”</p>

In a bold move for teacher independence in Fresno, California, a group of local teachers, led by veteran educator Mike Cerrillo, recently voted to disaffiliate from the California Teacher Association (CTA) and the National Education Association (NEA) in favor of local representation. The newly formed Washington Unified Faculty Association (WUFA) will now bargain independently and rely on the non-union Association of American Educators for nonbargaining member benefits and services such as liability insurance and legal counsel. The process to sever ties with the CTA/ NEA was lengthy and often dramatic for this tight-knit group of hardworking teachers. In the diverse...

FRESNO, Calif. — It was the sound of a wailing cat that first caught the neighbor’s attention. When she looked toward the sound she told authorities that she saw her next-door neighbor cutting off the crying feline’s head with a knife. The call she subsequently made to deputies started a bizarre animal cruelty investigation that has focused attention from around the country on a working-class neighborhood in a Bakersfield suburb where a man allegedly was fileting cats and cooking them on his backyard barbecue. “I’ve been getting calls on this from around the country,” Kern County Sheriff’s spokesman Ray Pruitt...

Bishop Armando X. Ochoa Fresno, Calif., Dec 1, 2011 / 01:58 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Bishop Armando X. Ochoa of El Paso, Texas was named today as the new bishop of Fresno, Calif. by Pope Benedict XVI.“I am humbled and deeply honored that the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, would offer me this new challenge at my age,” said Bishop Ochoa, who will fill a position left vacant by the death of Bishop John Steinbock in December 2010. Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the Vatican's recently appointed representative to the U.S., made the announcement in Washington D.C. on Dec. 1.Bishop Ochoa...

<p>A Fresno Pacific University basketball player went on a naked rampage Monday night near campus after being told that he had been kicked off the team, Fresno police said Tuesday.</p> <p>Leonard Tyrell Young, 21, ran naked through a convenience store parking lot, tried to steal a police car, beat a police officer and police dog and withstood three Taser strikes before finally being subdued, police said.</p>

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Fresno County is getting armed as the number of concealed weapons permits is rising drastically. "I hear it's the number one issue of importance to people in Fresno County -- to be able to legally carry a concealed weapon," said Sheriff Margaret Mims. The numbers show the increase has been dramatic. Last year, the Mims's office issued about 1500 concealed weapons permits. Through July of this year, the number was already about 1900. That puts the county on pace to issue more than 3000 permits in 2011. Fresno County is now second in the state in...

Sutter County jurors on Wednesday found a Fresno man not guilty on all counts in the March shooting of Obadiah Samuel Mitchell at the Yuba City IHOP restaurant. Jessie Hipolito Pena, 44, was charged with attempting to murder Mitchell after confronting him inside the restaurant for using profanity. Jurors could have found Pena guilty of the lesser charge of attempted voluntary manslaughter but also rejected that option. The jury forewoman declined comment as she left the courtroom, but another member of the panel, Ashley Yetter of Yuba City, said jurors felt evidence was insufficient to indicate whether Pena acted in...

Official Calls For Riverside, 12 Other Counties To Secede From California Link to Article and Poll New state would have no term limits, part-time legislature July 1, 2011 10:24 AM RIVERSIDE (CBS) — Is the state of California about to go “South”? Riverside County Supervisor Jeff Stone apparently thinks so, after proposing that the county lead a campaign for as many as 13 Southern California counties to secede from the state. Stone said in a statement late Thursday that Riverside, Imperial, San Diego, Orange, San Bernardino, Kings, Kern, Fresno, Tulare, Inyo, Madera, Mariposa and Mono counties should form the new...

Public outrage over lavish government employee compensation and pensions is becoming more heated as new revelations about excesses seem to crop up every week. The latest: Newport Beach, California, where some lifeguards have compensation packages that exceed $200,000 and where these "civil servants" can retire with lucrative government pensions at age 50. Newport Beach has two groups of lifeguards. Seasonal tower lifeguards cover Newport’s seven miles of beach during the busy summer months. Part-time seasonal guards make $16 to $22 per hour with no benefits. They are the young people who man the towers and do the lion’s share of...

Gus Zernial, the former major league slugger who settled in Clovis after his 11-year career ended and became a sports broadcaster and one of the Fresno Grizzlies' biggest advocates, died Thursday after a long illness. He was 87.

Gov. Jerry Brown announced this afternoon that he is closing three field offices, including Fresno's, and will not have a cabinet secretary or deputy cabinet secretaries. Brown ... is reducing his press and communications staff and closing field offices in San Diego, Fresno and Riverside.

Environmentalism: Fresno, Calif., stands as the de facto capital of California's mighty Central Valley, the breadbasket of America. So why is that city preoccupied with winning a $1 million prize to stave off hunger? Local newspapers and Fresno County officials are trying to rally Facebook users to vote for Fresno in a corporate contest sponsored by Wal-Mart for $1 million in charity food donations for the hungry. Fresno, a city of 505,000, has taken the national lead because 24.1% of Fresno's families are going hungry. Civic spirit is good, but something big is wrong here. Fresno is the agricultural capital...

They called it "dozing for dollars." Pilots with the California Air National Guard 144th Fighter Wing based in Fresno had a lucrative arrangement: After their normal day jobs flying F-16 Fighting Falcon warplanes, they often grabbed shifts on alert at full pay. Alert duty is akin to what firefighters do at the station house, waiting for an alarm to sound. Pilots must be available to "scramble" – intercept enemy air attacks, or intervene in another emergency.

CLOVIS, Calif. (AP) — It has become a never-ending heartache within the hallways of Buchanan High School: news that another former student has died in Iraq or Afghanistan. Eight former students have been killed in the two wars, including a Marine sergeant who will be laid to rest Saturday after dying Dec. 2 of a head wound in Afghanistan. The community in the heart of California's farm country has become all-too-familiar with the rituals of grief that have followed each death — tearful remembrances, flag-draped coffins, candlelight vigils. The school even built a memorial garden where the names of the...

FRESNO (AP) — The trial has been pushed back for a Central California high school wrestler charged with the sexual battery of an opponent during a practice match. Defense lawyer Stephen Quade told the Fresno Bee that his 17-year-old client is now scheduled to go to trial on Jan. 13 in juvenile court. The trial had been set to start Thursday.

FRESNO, Calif. (AP) - A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that air quality regulators in California's smog-laden San Joaquin Valley have the right to charge home builders a fee to control their pollution emissions. A three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco upheld the local air district's rule requiring developers to reduce emissions from new housing projects by building features like bicycle lanes and energy-efficient cooling systems. If they don't do enough to preserve air quality, they must pay fees that have averaged about $500 per house. The valley, stretching 240 miles from Stockton...

Pedro Ramirez, Fresno State's student body president, is an undocumented immigrant serving in the position without pay. Ramirez, 23, attends school on scholarships and pays in-state tuition. California is one of 10 states that permit undocumented immigrants to pay in-state tuition -- a position that was upheld by the state Supreme Court this week. After his election last June, he told the administration he would serve without pay -- a $9,000 stipend -- because he could not lie on employment papers. On Tuesday, an anonymous tip to the college newspaper forced Ramirez to go public.