Radiation might have left plant
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A tiny amount of radiation could have escaped from a Southern California nuclear power plant after a water leak prompted operators to shut down a reactor as a precaution, but plant workers and the public were not endangered, officials said Wednesday.
The leak was detected Tuesday afternoon in Unit 3 at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, about 45 miles north of San Diego. The seaside plant was taken off line while investigators tried to determine what happened.
While the leak wasn’t large enough to require the plant to declare an emergency, any possible leak of radiation into the atmosphere is rare.
Also concerning was that “many” tubes that carry pressurized radioactive water were damaged, according to a spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The tubes are part of equipment that is virtually new, having been installed in 2010.
“The damage that they have found to many other tubes is unusual, and they are attempting to identify the reason,” NRC spokesman Victor Dricks said.
News of the possible release of radioactivity was slow to emerge. Shortly after the incident, Southern California Edison issued a statement saying, “There has been no release to the atmosphere.”
Grocers coming to urban regions
INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — First lady Michelle Obama on Wednesday said the campaign to bring healthy food to all Americans is happening neighborhood by neighborhood.
Standing in a vacant Southern California store set to be refurbished and reopened this summer, Obama lauded efforts to bring large grocery retailers to inner-city areas that traditional supermarket chains spurn.
“That’s how we solve this problem — one community, one household at a time,” Obama said, speaking in front of a display depicting an old-fashioned grocery store with crates stocked with fresh fruit and vegetables. “We’re not just making this generation healthy. We’re making the next, and the next and the next.”
Obama, who is on the second day of her two-day visit to the Los Angeles area, made the stop in the blue-collar, largely Hispanic neighborhood as part of her “Let’s Move!” campaign to boost healthy food and fitness.
Part of the campaign includes promoting initiatives such as the $264 million California FreshWorks Fund, which finances grocery businesses willing to open in urban areas.
Right-to-work bill signed in Indiana
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Indiana became the Rust Belt’s first right-to-work state Wednesday in a move that is sure to embolden advocates seeking to curtail union rights across the country. But whether other states can replicate the conservatives’ success in Indiana is less certain.
The political factors that aligned in Indiana were so unique, and it is unlikely the same thing could happen in other states — at least for now.
Gov. Mitch Daniels’ signature Wednesday on the bill that made Indiana the nation’s 23rd right-to-work state was the end of a contentious two-year political battle that included partisan bickering, lawmaker walkouts, legislative stall tactics and union protests. In the end, Indiana marked the first win for national right-to-work supporters who tried in vain last year to push the measure despite a Republican sweep of statehouses nationwide in 2010.
School criticized in bondage case
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Angry parents confronted school officials Wednesday, demanding to know why they weren’t told for a year that a teacher was suspected of photographing children in class for sexual thrills.
The clash came at a forum staged at Miramonte Elementary School to discuss the investigation of Mark Berndt, a third-grade teacher who is charged with committing lewd acts on 23 boys and girls, ages 6 to 10, between 2005 and 2010 at the campus where he taught for more than 30 years.
Berndt was removed from classwork in January 2011 and fired within the month, but only parents of children identified as victims were told by authorities at that time of the investigation.
Berndt’s bail was raised to $23 million Wednesday as he appeared in court for the first time on the felony charges that could bring multiple life sentences if he is convicted.
Meanwhile, at the forum, some angry parents with children at the school complained that they only learned of the investigation through the media after Berndt’s arrest this week.
School officials and investigators said proper procedures were followed to prevent anything that might harm efforts to investigate and build a case against the teacher.
“That’s cool and fine but the detectives’ children don’t go here,” said Cheremoya Dupree, 38, whose two children attend the school and were not victims. “I want them to tell the truth … because I don’t think we got that.”
Miramonte Principal Martin Sandoval told reporters that he followed proper district procedure.
Using a cheap camera, Berndt is suspected of snapping nearly 400 photographs of Miramonte students, some with a giant Madagascar cockroach from a classroom terrarium on their faces.
Others were blindfolded or had clear tape over their mouths, and some were shown with a spoonful of milky liquid placed near their lips, sheriff’s Sgt. Dan Scott said.
