As previously reported, on July 13, in Riverside County Superior Court, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) filed its complaint seeking damages for fire suppression, investigation and other costs stemming from the 2013 Mountain Fire that began in Mountain Center. On Aug. 20, Cal Fire filed its first amended complaint in…

Late Friday, Jan. 19, John Hawkins, Cal Fire’s Riverside Unit chief and the Riverside County Fire Chief, has been removed as chief. His temporary replacement is Dan Talbot, deputy chief for the county’s eastern operations. “All I have right now is Chief Hawkins is no longer the fire chief and the department has put an…

The modern celebration of Thanksgiving commemorates the first harvest festival of the Pilgrim colonists at Plymouth, Massachusetts, but that was one of many days of Thanksgiving observed by early European settlers, and only became the center of one of our foundation myths in the late 19th century. Days of Thanksgiving were decreed by the Spanish…