News

MADERA - With the pending retirement of Madera County Chief Clerk Rhonda Cargill on the horizon, the Madera County Board of Supervisors met last week in closed session to select the new Chief Clerk. While there has been no official announcement from the county, Big Valley News has learned from two members of the board that an offer of employment has been sent to Karen Rodriguez-Pogue, daughter of current Madera County Supervisor Max Rodriguez.

Pogue is the 55-year-old daughter of Max and Sarah Rodriguez and currently works in deposit services management at United Security Bank where she has been employed for the last twelve years. She also operates MEPCO,  a vending machine business she started with her former husband Mark Pogue in 1989. She is a 1989 graduate from California State University, Fresno with a degree in marketing and a 1983 graduate of Madera High School.

FRESNO – California state law is clear: Secretary of State Alex Padilla has the discretion to take measures to ensure that the Arabic- and Somali-speaking voters of Fresno and San Diego Counties, respectively, can cast their ballots in the November 2020 election. Despite testimony from these communities showing that they have been unable to participate in elections due to language barriers, Secretary Padilla has declined to provide the services that would enable them to make their voices heard this election.

A coalition of organizations dedicated to protecting the civil rights of immigrants—Council on American-Islamic Relations – Central Valley (CAIR) in Fresno, Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans (PANA) in San Diego, and the ACLU Foundation of Northern California (ACLU-NC)—is calling upon Secretary Padilla to provide translated voting materials to these communities, and to make every effort to ensure that they have access to Arabic- and Somali-speaking poll workers in November.

MADERA  – The U.S. Census Bureau is now following up with households in California and across the that have not yet responded to the 2020 Census. The current self-response rate in California is 64.5%. The Census Bureau will need to visit the remaining addresses to collect responses in person. 

Households can still respond now by completing and mailing back the paper questionnaire they received, by responding online at 2020census.gov, or by phone at 844-330-2020. Households can also respond online or by phone in one of 13 languages and find assistance in many more. Those that respond will not need to be visited to obtain their census response.

EDITORIAL - What happens when your Xfinity/Comcast Cable-TV bill tops $200 a month? You learn new (and relearn older) ways to save money on your television entertainment expenses. Over the last year, we have done everything we could think of to cut our cable bill but found the only way to really save money with Xfinity/Comcast is to forget about cutting the bill and just Cut the Cord. So that is what we did and now we have more great TV than ever before.

First thing we did was return all of our cable boxes to Xfinity/Comcast. These were costing us between $10 and $15 each per month. We replaced them with Roku streaming devices that have access to the Xfinity app. The Roku Xfinity/Comcast’s app gives you another way of watching the cable company's programming without the expensive cable box rentals. By doing this we started to save about $45 a month. 

BAKERSFIELD — The American Civil Liberties Union Foundations of Southern and Northern California today sent a letter to the Greenfield Union School District in Bakersfield, expressing deep concern that “the district has created a hostile environment for Black students and staff in its schools by subjecting them to differential treatment and degrading, off-handed comments.”

The letter details the treatment of seventh-grade English teacher Kei Jackson, whose contract was not renewed after she filed a formal complaint alleging that the district violated staff and students’ rights to free speech and expression, and maintained a racially hostile environment.

MADERA – It seems like the entire city of Madera is morning the loss of a child they never met. A sweet little boy that, in death, has touched the hearts of people shocked by what two parents are being accused of doing to someone they were supposed to love and protect.

Two murals, commissioned by Joe’s Mobile Tint Shop, have been painted to memorialize the young boy, gifts are being left in the area the young boy's burnt body was found last week. Facebook pages are popping up and there is talk of scholarships being funded for all three of Madera’s high schools in the boy’s name. There is no shortage of love for this young boy.