For nearly 50 years, California students with an interest in creating films have been recognized during the annual California Student Media Festival. This year, students in four Sacramento-area schools and one Stockton school were awarded for their videos at the festival, held June 2, 2012, at Orange County High School of the Arts. In recent years, PBS SoCal has hosted the annual California Student Media Festival, which encourages project-based learning and meaningful student creations in media and multimedia and exists to acknowledge and reward successful classroom work. This year marked the first time the event was recorded into an hour-long program, which includes clips of student med

Welcome to the beta-test of the Sac Press news blog, where we tell you about articles that we're working on, found interesting, or otherwise thought you might want to know about today. As is always the case here at Sac Press, suggestions are welcome. [Update: 1:16 p.m] Magpie Cafe is opening a new location at 14th at O streets and Owners Janel Inouye and Ed Roehr tell Sac Bee the spot will be an "annex." Details are scant, and the owners are tight-lipped about their plans, but suggested we follow-up in a month. We will. The Beat record store at 1700 J St. is nearing the end of its lease and may have to move, according to the Business Journal. Nothing has really happened yet in this stor

A review of the proposed McDonald’s site on Second Avenue and Stockton Boulevard by the Community Development Department for the city of Sacramento has found no evidence that the restaurant would significantly impact the environment. However, some community members argue that the the environmental findings and the traffic study, reported in the Mitigated Negative Declarative released Aug. 1 does not tell the whole story about the health and traffic impact a McDonald’s would have on the Oak Park neighborhood. “I understand that McDonald’s does provide healthy choices if you choose to go down that route. I don’t think we ought to tell people what they can and cannot eat,” said Sam Allen, c

The highly anticipated five-game series between the Sacramento River Cats and Fresno Grizzlies concluded Sunday afternoon with the River Cats taking a 2-1 victory and four of the five games. With the win, the River Cats move into first place in the Pacific Coast League’s South division and also hold an important playoff tiebreaker should The River Cats and Grizzlies finish the season with identical records. The series finale was decided by an unlikely hero for the River Cats. Outfielder Jermaine Mitchell was called up from Single-A Stockton on Aug. 28 and started just his second Triple-A game on Sunday. Mitchell took the roster spot of outfielder Chris Carter, who was placed on the disa

West Sacramento, CA – On Saturday night, the River City Gators extended their winning streak to 6-0 by defeating the Stockton Trojans 49-14 at River City Stadium. The Gators gained 454 yards of offense and scored seven touchdowns on 52 plays. Quarterback Blake Mori completed 14 of 21 pass attempts for 286 yards and 5 touchdowns. Quarterback Robert Arthur completed 3 of 8 pass attempts for an additional 67 yards. The Gators spread the ball around. Paris Warren caught 6 passes for 116 yards and one touchdown. Cam’ron Mbewa caught 5 passes for 100 yards and two touchdowns. Kyle Providence caught 4 passes for 83 yards and one touchdown. Byron Wallace caught one pass for 21 yards and one touch

Efren Guttierrez wants to bring his focus on social justice to City Hall. The 54-year-old real estate broker and community activist is running for a seat on the Sacramento City Council. The Sacramento Press is interviewing City Council candidates in advance of the June election. Guttierrez is running in District 1, now represented by Ray Tretheway. The district includes North and South Natomas and Alkali Flat. Guttierrez has worked in real estate for 28 years and is co-owner of New West Realtors in Natomas. He noted that his career pays the bills, but activism is his passion. “My love has always been social justice advocacy,” he said. Guttierrez was born in Stockton and has lived in S

Master Barber Shop was established in 1958 and was acquired by Earlie D. and Mary Brown in December of 1974. During that time, the shop was located on Stockton Blvd. and 7th Ave. Since those early days, Master Barber & Beauty Shop, has had several locations. Each location being better than the last. In 1989, sons Rodney and Marichal, joined the family business. The late owner and master barber, Earlie D. Brown, established business in the hair industry in the mid 1940's with Brown's Barber Shop (two locations, San Francisco and Marin City). What started out as nothing more than a dream and a dime and a nail in his pocket has turned into a family business. He died in February 1998. Mary Br

What do a Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist and atheist have in common? Besides the fact that they all perform stand-up on the "Coexist? Comedy Tour," they are all from Northern California and have spent time in the same Prius while on the road. Saturday night, the Coexist Tour will stop at the Crest Theatre for a live taping. The show features Tissa Hami (the Muslim), Mike Winfield (the Christian), Tapan Trivedi (the Hindu), Moshe Kasher (the Jew), Keith Lowell Jensen (the atheist) and Sammy Obeid (the Buddhist) performing stand-up about their religious differences. It started a little over two years ago, with a conversation between Jensen and Trivedi about God. Jensen told Trived

According to Forbes, and as reported by Yahoo! (and as read and repeated somewhat lazily by me from my armchair) Stockton is the fifth most dangerous city* as measured in terms of violent crimes per capita. Top 5: Detroit - 1,220 violent crimes per 100,000 people Memphis - 1,218 Miami - 998 Las Vegas - 887 Stockton - 885 From the article: "Stockton is a major transit point along the I-5 corridor on the way to Seattle and Vancouver," says [Megan Wolfram, an analyst at iJet Intelligent Risk Systems, a Maryland-based risk-assessment firm]. "A lot of it is similar to crime happening in the Southwest. For the most part, it's drug gang on drug gang." And the methods: *"To determine our

Some Scary Moments in Stockton By Paul Dale Roberts, HPI General Manager/Ghostwriter It’s not Friday the 13th, but it is December 13, 2008, Saturday and it’s a big full moon. Renee Martine and Face of Off-the-Hook TV meet me at my house and we head over in Renee’s car to 1002 N. Pershing Street, Stockton, California. We have a scouting mission at this legendary home. The reason why it is legendary is because it has a reputation as being the most haunted home in Stockton. Note: There is going to be a further investigation after this scouting mission with Ghost Girls Legendary Celebrity Psychic Nancy Bradley and Shannon McCabe – Ghosthunter Extraordinaire. Of course the investigative team o