The Idyllwild Water District directors approved a $1.9 million budget (water and sewer programs), which includes a six percent water rate increase. Even with the rate increase, the district will use nearly $115,000 of its reserves to balance the budget. Without the rate increase, the overall loss would have approached $190,000. The water and sewer…

In a special meeting, the Idyllwild Fire Protection District commission adopted a preliminary 2011-2012 budget. The fiscal year begins July 1 and the budget package is more than $30,000 in the red. The preliminary 2011-12 budget projects $1.7 million of expenditures and revenues totaling $1.67 million. Revenues are nearly $110,000 less than the current 2010-11…

A judge at a Palm Springs probate hearing removed Keith Harper as trustee of missing Garner Valley resident Lydia “Dia” Abrams’ estate this week. The judge was responding to a motion by Abrams’ adult children Clinton and Crisara, reporting that Harper was trying to sell the Bonita Vista Ranch, where he lived with Abrams before…

Arrested twice, charges dropped once, nearly 10 years after the crime, 27-year-old Christin Smith’s defense in a triple-homicide case is much more aggressive than that of his co-defendant and friend Robert Pape, 28. Both men were re-arrested in June and charged with committing a 2006 triple homicide in Pinyon. The victims were Jon Hayward, Vicki…