From the Archives

A plan to reorganize state government that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was set to receive the week of July 31, 2004 was to propose eliminating 12,000 state jobs, hundreds of state boards and commissions while possibly saving $32 billion over the next five years.

Details in the 2,500-page report obtained by the Associated Press also include contracting out government work to private contractors and requiring college and university students perform community service.

Months in the making, the sweeping report by the California Performance Review Board was already being called a power grab by critics and would mark the biggest reorganization of government since the 1960s. If approved by the Legislature, it would change everything from how soon children can enter kindergarten to greatly increasing the amount Californians could win in pooled lotteries with other states.

Smith & Hawken set to

open in downtown Burlingame

A national retailer that sells outdoor furniture announced the week of July 31, 2004 that it was coming to Burlingame’s already bustling downtown the winter of 2004.

High-end garden and outdoor patio seller Smith & Hawken inked a deal to come to town, said Brett Barron, the leasing broker who handled the negotiations for Capital Realty Group The store was set to open its doors by Dec. 1 at 1208 Donnelly Ave.

"It’s really a home run for downtown,” Barron said.

Peterson mistrial denied

Requests to either declare a mistrial or dismiss the charges against Scott Peterson were denied July 29, 2004 by the presiding judge who ruled there was no prosecutorial misconduct after a police investigator allegedly lied under oath.

"There is more than 40,000 pages of discovery ... In a case of this magnitude these type of things are going to happen,” said Judge Al Delucchi.

Delucchi did add, "Unfortunately, they keep happening with Detective Brocchini.”

Testimony by Allen Brocchini, Modesto police’s lead investigator in the disappearance of Laci Peterson, was at the heart of the mistrial request by defense attorney Mark Geragos. Citing time after time when Brocchini either left out interview information from reports or lied on the stand, Geragos asked that his client be freed.

Editor asks girlfriend to marry him

Jon Mays, editor in chief of the Daily Journal, in a full page ad in this newspaper July 30, 2004, asked girlfriend Dayna Alpine if she was interested in being his wife.

She said yes.