Chris Amico: Journalist

LITTLEROCK — Lancaster Mayor Henry Hearns apologized to the Antelope Valley and the Lancaster City Council on Wednesday for allowing a convicted child molester to help plan a youth sports camp at Jackie Robinson Park.

The camp is a church event sponsored by the Living Stone Cathedral of Worship, where Hearns serves as bishop.

Maurice Wyre will no longer work with the camp, which ends Friday, Hearns said at a press conference at the park. He was responding to an article published in Sunday’s Valley Press disclosing Wyre’s role in the camp. While Hearns spoke, about 50 children inside the park’s gym listened to a former Olympic athlete instruct them to work hard, persevere and live a balanced life. (more…)

LITTLEROCK — A convicted child molester listed on the Megan’s Law sex-offender registry is helping plan a youth sports camp at Jackie Robinson Park for the Living Stone Cathedral of Worship, with the support of the church’s leader, Bishop Henry Hearns, the mayor of Lancaster.

Maurice Wyre is listed on the registry for continuous sexual abuse of a child.

He underwent 90 days of psychiatric evaluation after pleading no contest to molestation — a lesser charge — in 1995 and served five years’ probation, which would have ended in 2000.

The 42-year-old former athlete and scion of a locally renowned sports family will not coach or be a counselor at the camp, which starts Monday and runs for a week, according to Hearns. The mayor and clergyman said he is aware of Wyre’s criminal record but that he is unwilling to cast the man out. (more…)

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LANCASTER — The Lancaster School District board of trustees voted to implement a “philosophy” of science instruction that encourages students to question Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution and that permits science teachers to insert critiques of the long-standing and accepted scientific theory into the curriculum.

The new statement, updated from an older document, does not include any alternative theories such as “intelligent design,” which posits a master plan or master “designer” as an explanation of how the universe began. Outside groups quickly pounced on the move as a way of sneaking creationism — or a divine explanation — in the back door of the classroom. (more…)

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LANCASTER — A state-appointed trustee with veto power over the principal’s decisions will take up residence at Antelope Valley High School in the coming weeks as part of the long-troubled school’s efforts to boost student achievement.

The decision follows a blistering report issued last month on the state of education at the Valley’s oldest high school and three years of state monitoring. State Superintendent Jack O’Connell handed down sanctions for six schools around the state, including two in the Antelope Valley and two in Kern County. (more…)

Starting this fall, every ninth-grader in the Antelope Valley Union High School District will take algebra or a higher math class. The district announced this week it will adopt a more rigorous math sequence in order to give more students options when they graduate, but some skeptics worry it will push some kids too far, too fast.

“Our mission is that the district is to provide students with options,” said David Vierra, the district’s superintendent.

The algebra requirement is part of a broader push to align curriculum at all eight comprehensive high schools in the district. “Whether a student lives in the north valley, south valley, east valley or west valley, we want to offer the same things,” said Michael Vierra, assistant superintendent of educational services and the superintendent’s brother. (more…)

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The day after losing her seat on the Palmdale School Board, Shawny Barcelona was back at work, running her salon, trying not to let the loss get to her.

She was frustrated but hoped to get back on the board when another seat opens up. She says she’ll at least stay active.

“I ran a good, positive campaign, and I’m very happy with that,” she said. “I think everyone else is more sad than me.”

Barcelona lost her seat to newcomer Jeff Ferrin, a vice principal at William J. “Pete” Knight High School. Both had the backing of Valley Republicans, and Ferrin had state Senator George Runner, R-Lancaster, behind him. Republicans also endorsed incumbent Sheldon Epstein.

Ferrin, Epstein and Sandy Corrales, the current board president, all of whom won seats in Tuesday’s election, were on the slate of candidates endorsed by the California Teachers Association. Barcelona drew the union’s wrath for supporting Governor Arnold Schwarzennegger, whose propositions the union adamantly opposed. She came in fourth, finishing 466 votes behind Ferrin.

The big winner in this election, locally and at the state level, was the California Teachers Association. (more…)

A half-dozen residents blockaded the intersection of Avenue A and 190th Street West, protesting farm trucks they claim have destroyed the only roads in and out of an isolated rural community between Neenach and Rosamond.

Grimmway Farms had sent trucks to harvest fields just north of Avenue A, the dividing line between Los Angeles and Kern counties. A line of 20 big rigs stood idle for several hours while company representatives negotiated with residents. Kern County sheriff’s Deputy Ed MacKay eventually convinced both parties to settle it in court if they could not reach an agreement.

Several protesters were confident that the confrontation was enough to keep Grimmway’s trucks off 190th Street West, a road they say is their only connection to the rest of the Antelope Valley.

“Until this thing today, there was no interest on the part of Grimmway in our situation,” said Mike Houchen , who led the protest. He said the grower agreed not to use 190th Street West. “But it took this kind of action to reach this solution.” (more…)

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LANCASTER — Spc. Eric Huff is ready to be done with the Army. Ten months after an attack by three fellow American soldiers outside his barracks in South Korea that nearly killed him, the stricken soldier has not fully recovered.

Deborah Huff, Eric’s mother, wants her son out of the military, too. “I know my son is not fit to be in the U.S. Army anymore,” she said in an interview at her Lancaster home.

Huff spent a weekend in Lancaster, where he grew up, following the last of his attackers’ courts-martial. He has been stationed at Fort Lewis, Wash., since the attack.

“He’s come a long way, but he’s not like a normal 20-year-old male,” Deborah Huff said. “He can’t do things he’s supposed to be able to do.” (more…)

PALMDALE — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Monday night fund-raising dinner put at least two Palmdale School District trustees in the awkward position of supporting the governor but opposing a pillar of his “Year of Reform.”

At the same time, two other trustees from that district were marching in protest outside the Antelope Valley Fairgrounds. (more…)

ACTON — Since deciding not to seek a third term on the Acton-Agua Dulce Unified School Board, Trustee Steve Harbeson has clashed frequently with his fellow board members.

Now the only incumbent not running for re-election has turned on his colleagues, endorsing three challengers in the Nov. 8 election.

Harbeson said Larry Layton, Deborah Jauregui-Rocha and Leona Sexton are “the only candidates that I feel really care about the children of our district.” (more…)