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49TH COURT
ZAPATA COUNTY INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT
Trial to begin Mon.
Search yields finalist
Two alleged Zetas men are facing murder charges
In line for superintendent’s job is former science teacher LAREDO MORNING TIMES
A Texas A&M International University graduate and former teacher in Laredo has been named the lone finalist for superintendent at Zapata County Independent School District. Raul Leonidas Nuques, who
NUQUES
teacher at United South High School in Laredo in 2003. Nuques, a native of Ecuador who was raised in New York City, said Wednesday that he was “honored and blessed” to have been named the lone finalist. “My next step and final
step is to plan to settle in Zapata,” he said, adding that he used to fish there when he was a student at TAMIU. “Overall it’s a great district. People are very friendly … (and) the board members are open-minded about
See SUPERINTENDENT
PAGE 11A
IMMIGRATION
‘STASHED’ IN A HOUSE
By PHILIP BALLI THE ZAPATA TIMES
The first day of jury trial for the case involving two men who are charged with murder and who were allegedly operating on behalf of the Zetas drug cartel in Mexico is set to begin Monday in the 49th District Court. The trial’s start date was moved from Friday, following the completion of the jury selection process, to Monday due to motions filed by defense attorney J. Eduardo Peña on evidence and expert witnesses. Instead, a hearing took place Friday before 49th District Court Judge Joe Lopez to determine the state’s expert witness’ qualifications to testify in the trial. Nicolas Reyes-Sanchez and Jose Roberto Obregon are accused of the shooting death of Fidencio Rios-Cardenas, 31, who was gunned down Sept. 14, 2010, outside his trailer home in the 300 block of El Monte Loop in Northwest Laredo. Reyes-Sanchez and Obregon, among others, were arrested in connection with the case. They were indicted on capital murder and engaging in organize crime charges in July. Both had recently pleaded guilty in federal court in Laredo to firearms smuggling. Their sentencing dates are pending. The men are also allegedly involved in the killings of Guillermo Ramos Rodriguez and Ramon Lucero Ramirez. Reports have indicated that the Zetas would contract Reyes-Sanchez, a U.S. citizen, to carry out contract killings in Laredo. However, Peña said the evidence will show that a high-ranking Zeta was the cell leader and not ReyesSanchez as prosecutors have alleged. The trial is anticipated to take up the better part of next week, Peña said. (Philip Balli may be reached at 728-2528 or pballi@lmtonline.com)
has been director of special education at Austin ISD since January, was named the finalist March 6 during a ZCISD Board of Trustees meeting. He started his education career as a science
Photo by Cody Duty/Houston Chronicle | AP
People wait outside a house as authorities hold an investigation Wednesday, in southeast Houston. The suspected stash house was found during a search for a 24-year-old woman and her two children that were reported missing by relatives Tuesday after a man failed to meet them.
Hundreds questioned By MICHAEL GRACZYK ASSOCIATED PRESS
Photo by Cody Duty/Houston Chronicle | AP
Authorities search people Wednesday, in southeast Houston. Five men also were in custody, two of whom were arrested after driving from the home on Wednesday.
HOUSTON — U.S. immigration authorities on Thursday were interviewing more than 100 people presumed to be in the country illegally after they were discovered crammed into a small house in south Houston. Five men also were in custody, two of whom were arrested after driving from the home on Wednesday. Authorities suspect it was a socalled stash house, a place where smugglers bring the people they’ve brought into the U.S. illegally and keep them until they or their family members pay a ransom. Police who found handguns and documents in the car suggesting illegal activity then went inside and
See HOUSE PAGE 11A
MEXICO VIOLENCE
Killings mark Mexico’s drug corridor By FELIPE LARIOS AND MARK STEVENSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
HERMOSILLO, Mexico — The massacre of seven men near the Mexico-Arizona border came in a previously quiet area increasingly used as a drug-trafficking corridor, and a U.S. expert said Friday the attack in the newly valuable territory could be the work of rivals of the once-dominant Sinaloa cartel trying to exploit the arrest of the gang’s leader.
Analysts have expected rival cartels to try to move in on Sinaloa territory in response to the capture of Joaquin Guzman Analysts have expected rival cartels to try to move in on Sinaloa territory in response to the Feb. 22 capture of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman and the apparent death in December of one of his top lieutenants in a shootout with federal police.
The ambush-style attack this week happened in a rural area near Sonoyta, Mexico, close to the U.S. border crossing at Lukeville, Arizona. The crossing is frequently used by U.S. travelers to reach the Gulf of California beach town of Puerto Penasco.
The seven men apparently were attacked by rival drug traffickers as they delivered drugs. Their bodies were found inside or near a pickup truck Wednesday night. Authorities say an eighth man was found wounded on a nearby hill and he told state
police the victims had just dropped off marijuana Tuesday when gunmen opened fire with automatic rifles on their pickup truck. All of the men are believed to have been from the state of Sinaloa, the home of Guzman’s cartel. Anthony Coulson, retired head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s office in Tucson, Arizona, said the attack
See MEXICO PAGE 11A
PAGE 2A
Zin brief CALENDAR
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
AROUND TEXAS
TODAY IN HISTORY
SATURDAY, MARCH 22
ASSOCIATED PRESS
TAMIU Planetarium shows: “Earth, Moon and Sun” 3 p.m.; “Wonders of the Universe” 4 p.m.; “Two Small Pieces of Glass” 5 p.m.; “Pink Floyd’s The Wall” 6 p.m. General admission $4 children and $5 adults. Premium shows $1 more. Call 3263663.
MONDAY, MARCH 24 Zapata County Commissioners Court meeting. 9 a.m. Zapata County Courthouse. Call Roxy Elizondo at 7659920.
THURSDAY, MARCH 27 Orthopedic clinic. 8 a.m. Ruthe B. Cowl Rehabilitation Center, 1220 N. Malinche Ave. Clinic benefits children with cerebral palsy, club foot, scoliosis, spina bifida and more. $5 processing fee. Patients must register before day of clinic. Call 722-2431. Los Amigos Duplicate Bridge Club. 1:15 p.m. to 5 p.m. Laredo Country Club. Call Beverly Cantu at 7270589. Villa San Agustin Genealogical Society meeting. 4:30 p.m. Martin High School, room 218 (Park Street door entrance). Luis R. González as guest speaker; “Tejano and Laredo History” in curriculum. New members are invited to join. Call Sanjuanita M. Hunter at 722-3497.
FRIDAY, MARCH 28 Christian Life Seminar: What It Means To Be A Christian. 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., every Friday until April 11. San Martin De Porres Catholic Church’s St. Elizabeth Room. Free. Light snacks served. Contact Leah Cayanan at 2860654 or leigh.cayanan@gmail.com.
SATURDAY, MARCH 29 65th Annual UMW Flower & Art Show. 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. First United Methodist Church, 1220 McClelland Ave. Tickets available at door. Contact 722-1674 or fumc_office@sbcglobal.net. TAMIU Planetarium shows: “Zula Patrol: Under the Weather” 3 p.m.; “Black Holes” 4 p.m.; “The Great Space Race” 5 p.m.; “Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon” 6 p.m.. General admission $4 children and $5 adults. Premium shows $1 more. Call 3263663.
SUNDAY, MARCH 30 65th Annual UMW Flower & Art Show. 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. First United Methodist Church, 1220 McClelland Ave. Tickets available at door. Contact 722-1674 or fumc_office@sbcglobal.net.
MONDAY, MARCH 31 Monthly meeting of Laredo Parkinson’s Disease Support Group. 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Laredo Medical Center, Tower B, First Floor Community Center. Patients, caregivers and family members invited. Free info pamphlets available in Spanish and English. Call Richard Renner (English) at 645-8649 or Juan Gonzalez (Spanish) at 2370666.
FRIDAY, APRIL 4 Christian Life Seminar: What It Means To Be A Christian. 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., every Friday until April 11. San Martin De Porres Catholic Church’s St. Elizabeth Room. Free. Light snacks served. Contact Leah Cayanan at 2860654 or leigh.cayanan@gmail.com.
Photo by Baylor Health/Wieck | AP
This undated photo provided by Baylor Health in Dallas shows one of the Seals quintuplets born at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas on Tuesday. Michelle Seals delivered four girls and one boy at the hospital. The babies were born at 29 weeks, about eight weeks early.
Doctor: Quintuplets doing ‘good’ By JAMIE STENGLE ASSOCIATED PRESS
DALLAS — Premature quintuplets born this week in North Texas are doing “remarkably well,” their doctor said Thursday. Dr. Vijay Nama, director of neonatology at the Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas, said during a news conference that the four girls and one boy were breathing on their own after birth, and although four were later put on machines to help their breathing, all are expected to be off the machines soon. He expects the babies to remain in the hospital for six to seven weeks. “Overall, they’ve done remarkably well. They’re premature and they’re quintuplets, but they’ve done pretty good,” he said. Their mother, Michelle Seals, delivered the babies Tuesday at 29 weeks, which is about eight weeks early.
Spa owner accused of fake injections
Retail gasoline prices jump 8 cents
Remote camera reveals ocelot kitten
McALLEN — A South Texas spa owner has been charged with injecting beauty customers with unapproved substances such as silicone. Federal prosecutors in McAllen say 37-year-old Elva Navarro remained in custody Thursday pending an initial appearance before a magistrate. Navarro, who ran Bella Face and Body Spa in McAllen, was arrested Wednesday.
IRVING — Retail gasoline prices have jumped 8 cents this week across Texas. AAA Texas on Thursday reported the average price per gallon has reached $3.34. The association survey found San Antonio has the cheapest gasoline statewide at $3.24 per gallon. The Dallas-Fort Worth area has the most expensive gasoline at $3.43 per gallon.
SAN ANTONIO — Wildlife scientists say a remote camera captured the image of a 2-monthold ocelot kitten in South Texas earlier this month. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wildlife biologist Hilary Swarts says the kitten means the rare wildcat’s population in the refuge grew from 11 to 12. There are fewer than 50 ocelots in the wild in the United States.
Fort Hood soldier who had explosives gets prison
DPS graduates new canine teams
WACO — A Fort Hood soldier caught with explosive materials and metal pipes has been sentenced to more than two years in prison. Judge Walter Smith Jr. on Wednesday also fined Spec. Jason Alan Garthwaite Sr. of Copperas Cove $1,100. Garthwaite in January pleaded guilty to possession of an unregistered destructive device.
AUSTIN — It’s graduation day at the Texas Department of Public Safety for two new canine teams. Both teams were certified in Friday ceremonies at DPS headquarters in Austin. One of the canine teams will be devoted to detection of hidden explosives; the other will focus on detection of illicit drugs. — Compiled from AP reports
Presidential jet getting repainted FORT WORTH — A wide-body jet that serves as Air Force One when President Barack Obama is aboard landed at Fort Worth Meacham (MEE’-chum) International Airport on Thursday for a paint job. A Boeing spokeswoman says the aircraft is completing a yearlong heavy maintenance cycle and is to be repainted.
SATURDAY, APRIL 5 Used book sale, hosted by First United Methodist Church. 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. 1220 McClelland Ave. Hardback books are $1, paperback books 50 cents, and magazines and children’s books 25 cents.
FRIDAY, APRIL 11 Christian Life Seminar: What It Means To Be A Christian. 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., every Friday until April 11. San Martin De Porres Catholic Church’s St. Elizabeth Room. Free. Light snacks served. Contact Leah Cayanan at 2860654 or leigh.cayanan@gmail.com.
MONDAY, APRIL 14 Zapata County Commissioners Court meeting. 9 a.m. Zapata County Courthouse. Call Roxy Elizondo at 7659920.
MONDAY, APRIL 28 Zapata County Commissioners Court meeting. 9 a.m. Zapata County Courthouse. Call Roxy Elizondo at 7659920.
Mia weighed 2 pounds 10 ounces, Tessa 2 pounds 14 ounces, Gracie 2 pounds 7 ounces, Rayleigh 2 pounds 8 ounces, and Brant 3 pounds 6 ounces. Seals said she had a history of miscarriages, so she had been taking fertility medication. She and her husband, Steven, who live in the small town of Maud about 150 miles northeast of Dallas with their 2-year-old son, knew early on that she was pregnant with multiples. “I was thinking multiples meant twins. There at the beginning we’d go back every week and they’d find a few more,” she said. “We were shocked.” The new mother said she and her husband will need the help of family and friends when they return home. But she is looking forward to finally being able to hold her babies and bring them home.
AROUND THE NATION Giant birthday cake served for Nevada’s 150th CARSON CITY, Nev. — Colorful characters from Nevada’s past mingled with present-day dignitaries Friday to carve up a giant birthday cake as part of a yearlong celebration of the Silver State’s sesquicentennial. Nevada’s first lady, Kathleen Sandoval, had the honor of carving the first slice of the angelfood creation at Carson Tahoe Regional Medical Center. The day marks the 150th anniversary of when President Abraham Lincoln signed legislation that allowed Nevada to write a constitution, paving its way to statehood on Oct. 31, 1864. Portrayals of Lincoln and Mark Twain mingled in the crowd.
Boy, 14, charged with murder in bus shooting NEW YORK — A 14-year-old
Today is Saturday, March 22, the 81st day of 2014. There are 284 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On March 22, 1934, the first Masters Tournament opened under the title “Augusta National Invitation Tournament,” which was won three days later by Horton Smith. On this date: In 1312, Pope Clement V issued a papal bull ordering dissolution of the Order of the Knights Templar. In 1638, religious dissident Anne Hutchinson was expelled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for defying Puritan orthodoxy. In 1765, the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act of 1765 to raise money from the American colonies, which fiercely resisted the tax. (The Stamp Act was repealed a year later.) In 1820, U.S. naval hero Stephen Decatur was killed in a duel with Commodore James Barron near Washington, D.C. In 1894, hockey’s first Stanley Cup championship game was played; home team Montreal defeated Ottawa, 3-1. In 1933, during Prohibition, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a measure to make wine and beer containing up to 3.2 percent alcohol legal. In 1943, the Khatyn Massacre took place during World War II as German forces killed 149 residents of the village of Khatyn, Belarus, half of them children. In 1958, movie producer Mike Todd, the husband of actress Elizabeth Taylor, and three other people were killed in the crash of Todd’s private plane near Grants, N.M. In 1963, The Beatles’ debut album, “Please Please Me,” was released in the United Kingdom by Parlophone. In 1978, Karl Wallenda, the 73-year-old patriarch of “The Flying Wallendas” high-wire act, fell to his death while attempting to walk a cable strung between two hotel towers in San Juan, Puerto Rico. In 1994, “Woody Woodpecker” creator Walter Lantz died in Burbank, Calif., at age 93 (some sources say 94). Ten years ago: Terry Nichols went on trial for his life in the Oklahoma City bombing. (Nichols, already serving a life sentence for his conviction on federal charges, was found guilty of 161 state murder charges, but was again spared the death penalty when the jury couldn’t agree on his sentence.) Five years ago: The Mount Redoubt volcano in Alaska began erupting (it took about six months to settle down). One year ago: The Internal Revenue Service said it was a mistake for employees to have made a $60,000 training video spoofing “Star Trek” and “Gilligan’s Island.” Today’s Birthdays: Composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim is 84. Evangelist broadcaster Pat Robertson is 84. Actor William Shatner is 83. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, is 80. Actor M. Emmet Walsh is 79. Actor-singer Jeremy Clyde is 73. Singer-guitarist George Benson is 71. Writer James Patterson is 67. CNN newscaster Wolf Blitzer is 66. Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber is 66. Actress Fanny Ardant is 65. Sportscaster Bob Costas is 62. Actress Lena Olin is 59. Thought for Today: “Do not the most moving moments of our lives find us without words?” — Marcel Marceau, French mime (1923-2007).
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A giant birthday cake in honor of Nevada’s 150th anniversary of statehood awaits slicing Friday in Carson City, Nev. The angel food creation measured 21 feet long, 13 feet wide and weighed 1,300 pounds. boy was arrested on a second-degree murder charge Friday after police say he fired a gun inside a New York City bus in a street gang dispute, killing a bystander. The victim, Angel Rojas, 39, wasn’t the target in the Thursday night shooting, Police Com-
missioner William Bratton told reporters. Rojas died from a gunshot wound to the head. Investigators suspect the shooting stemmed from a dispute between two gangs. Police had not found the target. — Compiled from AP reports
SUBSCRIPTIONS/DELIVERY (956) 728-2555 The Zapata Times is distributed on Saturdays to 4,000 households in Zapata County. For subscribers of the Laredo Morning Times and for those who buy the Laredo Morning Times at newsstands, the Zapata Times is inserted. The Zapata Times is free. The Zapata Times is published by the Laredo Morning Times, a division of The Hearst Corporation, P.O. Box 2129, Laredo, Texas 78044. Phone (956) 728-2500. The Zapata office is at 1309 N. U.S. Hwy. 83 at 14th Avenue, Suite 2, Zapata, TX 78076. Call (956) 765-5113 or e-mail thezapatatimes.net
National
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
THE ZAPATA TIMES 3A
Police keep phone-tracking a secret By JACK GILLUM ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON — Police across the country may be intercepting phone calls or text messages to find suspects using a technology tool known as Stingray. But they’re refusing to turn over details about its use or heavily censoring files when they do. Police say Stingray, a suitcase-sized device that pretends it’s a cell tower, is useful for catching criminals, but that’s about all they’ll say. For example, they won’t disclose details about contracts with the device’s manufacturer, Harris Corp., insisting they are protecting both police tactics and commercial secrets. The secrecy — at times imposed by non-disclosure agreements signed by police — is pitting obligations under private contracts against government transparency laws. Even in states with strong open records laws, including Florida and Arizona, little is known about police use of Stingray and any rules governing it. A Stingray device tricks all cellphones in an area into electronically identifying themselves and transmitting data to police rather than the nearest phone company’s tower. Because documents about Stingrays are regularly censored, it’s not immediately clear what information the devices could capture, such as the contents of phone conversations and text messages, what they routinely do capture based on how they’re configured or how often they might be used. In one of the rare court cases involving the device, the FBI acknowledged in 2011 that socalled cell site simulator technology affects innocent users in the area where it’s operated, not just a suspect police are seeking. Earlier this month, journalist Beau Hodai and the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona sued the Tucson Police Department, alleging in court documents that police didn’t comply with the state’s public-records law because they did not fully
Photo by Nam Y. Huh | AP
A youth checks his smartphone in Glenview, Ill. Local police may be tracking your cell phone. But they are regularly censoring information about how the technology’s used or how much it costs taxpayers.
The FBI acknowledged in 2011 that so-called cell site simulator technology affects innocent users in the area where it’s operated. disclose Stingray-related records and allowed Harris Corp. to dictate what information could be made public. Revelations about surveillance programs run by the federal National Security Agency have driven a sustained debate since last summer on the balance between privacy and government intrusion. Classified NSA documents, leaked to news organizations, showed the NSA was collecting telephone records, emails and video chats of millions of Americans who were not suspected of crimes. That debate has extended to state and local governments. News organizations in Palm
Springs, Calif.; Tallahassee, Fla.; Sacramento, Calif., and Pittsburgh are among those that have been denied records about Stingrays or Stingray-like devices, including details of contracts that Harris has with government agencies. In a response to a records request from the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper about Florida’s use of cell-tracking technology, the state’s top police agency provided a four-page, heavily censored document signed by a police investigator. The newspaper reported that the document referred to guidelines concerning the purchase of items and sought the depart-
ment’s agreement to the “provisions/content of the Non-Disclosure Agreement.” The Desert Sun of Palm Springs made a similar request to the San Bernardino County Sheriff ’s Department, which said it had to maintain secrecy even though the newspaper found information online about cell site simulators. And in Sacramento, the local sheriff ’s office told a TV station it would “be inappropriate for us to comment about any agency that may be using the technology” in light of a Harris nondisclosure agreement. Many of the requests were part of an effort to investigate the devices by Gannett Co. Inc., which publishes USA Today and owns other newspapers and television stations around the country. “I don’t see how public agencies can make up an agreement with a private company that breaks state law,” said David Cuillier, the director of the Uni-
versity of Arizona’s journalism school and a national expert on public-records laws. “We can’t have the commercial sector running our governments for us. These public agencies need to be forthright and transparent.” A representative for Melbourne, Fla.,-based Harris Corp. declined to comment or elaborate on how the company’s agreements comport with open records laws. Court documents in Hodai’s case show Harris’ agreement required the Tucson city government not to “discuss, publish, release or disclose any information” about its products without the company’s written consent. The agreement also required the city to contact Harris when it receives public-records requests about a “protected product,” like a Stingray, so that the company can “challenge any such request in court.” The police department declined to comment on Hodai’s lawsuit. He had sought Harris contracts and police emails about how the technology is used. Email records show a Harris contract manager advised a Tucson police sergeant on what records couldn’t be released to the public; the manager relied on the U.S. Freedom of Information Act, which governs records of the executive branch of the federal government. Nathan Freed Wessler, a staff attorney with the ACLU, said there’s often a distinction in public-records laws to protect bona fide trade secrets — such as circuit board diagrams — as opposed to broader information like agency policies governing a Stingray’s use or purchase agreements. He said police in Florida have declined to tell judges about the use of Stingrays because of non-disclosure agreements. A December 2013 investigation by USA Today found roughly 1 in 4 law enforcement agencies it surveyed had performed tower dumps, and slightly fewer owned a Stingray. But the report also said 36 additional agencies refused to provide details on their use, with most denying the newspaper’s publicrecords requests.
PAGE 4A
Zopinion
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
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COLUMN
OTHER VIEWS
A look back helps move us forward By DAVID BROOKS NEW YORK TIMES
VANCOUVER, British Columbia — The TED conference is dedicated to innovation. Most of the people who give TED talks are working on some creative project: to invent new bionic limbs for amputees, new telescopes, new fusion reactors or new protest movements to reduce the power of money in politics. The speakers generally live in hope and have the audacity of the technologist. Naturally enough, they believe fervently in their projects. “This will change everything!” they tell the crowds. And there’s a certain suspension of disbelief as audiences get swept up in the fervor and feel themselves delightedly on the cutting edge. The future will be insanely great. Everything will change at the speed of Moore’s Law. But at this year’s TED conference, which was held in Vancouver, the rock star Sting got onstage and gave a presentation that had a different feel. He talked about his rise to stardom and then about a period in middle age when he was unable to write any new songs. The muse abandoned him, he said — for days, then weeks, then months, then years. But then he went back and started thinking about his childhood in the north of England. He’d lived on a street that led down to a shipyard where some of the world’s largest ocean-going vessels were built. Most of us have an urge, maybe more as we age, to circle back to the past and touch the places and things of childhood. When Sting did this, his creativity was reborn. Songs exploded from his head. At TED, he sang some of those songs about that shipyard. He sang about the characters he remembers and his desire to get away from a life in that yard. These were songs from his musical “The Last Ship,” which he’s performed at The Public Theater and which is expected to go to Broadway in the fall. Most TED talks are about the future, but Sting’s was about going into the past. The difference between the two modes of thinking stood in stark contrast. In the first place, it was clear how much richer historical consciousness is than future vision. When we think about the future, we don’t think about the texture and the tensions, the particular smells, shapes, conflicts — the dents in the floorboards. But Sting’s songs were about unique and unlikely individuals and life as it really is, as a constant process of bending hard iron. Historical consciousness has a fullness of paradox that future imagination cannot match. When we think of the past, we think about the things that seemed bad at the time but turned out to be good in the long run. We think about the little things that seemed inconsequential in the moment but made all the difference. Then it was obvious
Most of us have an urge, maybe more as we age, to circle back to the past and touch the places and things of childhood. When Sting did this, his creativity was reborn. Songs exploded from his head. how regenerating going home again can be. Sting, like most people who do this, wasn’t going back to live in the past; he was circling back and coming forward. Going back is a creative process. The events of childhood are like the Hebrew alphabet; the vowels are missing, and the older self has to make sense of them. Robert Frost’s famous poem about the two paths diverging in the woods isn’t only about the two paths. It also describes how older people go back in memory and impose narrative order on choices that didn’t seem so clear at the time. The person going back home has to invent a coherent tradition out of discrete moments and tease out future implications. He has to see the world with two sets of eyes: the eyes of his own childhood self and the eyes of his adult self. He has to circle back deeper inside and see parts of himself that were more exposed then than now. No wonder the process of going home again can be so catalyzing. The process of going home is also reorienting. Life has a way of blowing you off course. People have a way of forgetting what they originally set out to do. Going back means recapturing the original aspirations. That’s one reason Jews go back to Exodus every year. It’s why Augustine went back during a moment of spiritual crisis and wrote a book about his original conversion. Heck, it’s why Miranda Lambert performs “The House That Built Me” — to remind herself of the love of music that preceded the trappings of stardom. Sting’s appearance at TED was a nice reminder of how important it is to ground future vision in historical consciousness. Some of the TED speakers seemed hopeful and creative, but painfully and maybe necessarily naïve. Sting’s talk was a reminder to go forward with a backward glance, to go one layer down into self and then after self-confrontation, to leap forward out of self. History is filled with revivals, led by people who were reinvigorated for the future by a reckoning with the past.
COLUMN
You can register for anything except as a GOP or Dem AUSTIN — Texans who call themselves registered Republicans are lying. So are Texans who call themselves registered Democrats. In Texas, you can be a registered nurse. You can be a registered sex offender. But you can’t be a registered Republican or a registered Democrat. (If you’re cattle, you can be a registered Brangus. You also can be a Polled Hereford. As a city boy, I wonder what the Polled Herefords were asked. Their support for moooveon.org? Yes, a small portion of what you paid to read this goes into my pocket. Astonishing, isn’t it?) The attempted point is we don’t have party registration in Texas. When you sign up to vote, you sign up as a voter, nothing else. With the proper ID, you’re free to vote in either or no primary. But, unbeknownst to some voters, you declare party allegiance when you vote in primaries. I, for example, apparently am a Republican because I voted in that primary this year on a ballot that said: “I am a Republican and understand that I am ineligible to vote or participate in another political party’s primary election or convention during this voting year.” The Democratic ballot said the same thing, starting with “I am a Democrat ... .” I’m not really a D or an
“
KEN HERMAN
R. I’m an independent who has and will cast votes for Ds and Rs. I’ve found things to dislike about both parties. Many Texas Repubs have swung too far to the right for my tastes. And many Texas Dems believe anybody who disagrees with them is stupid. Back when I covered politics and was dutybound to keep my politics out of my coverage, I skipped primaries in order to avoid appearance of party allegiance. Now that I’m paid to share my opinions (and third-grade humor, see above, moooveon.org), I vote in primaries. I voted in the March 4 Repub primary because I wanted to participate in the four-way race for the GOP nomination for lieutenant governor, which I viewed as the most important really contested race on either ballot. FYI, if you voted in either primary, you can only vote in the May 27 runoffs of that party. If you voted in neither primary, you can vote in either runoff. Do you know the top vote-getter in the March 4 primaries? The answer is “yes,” and it came in one of the nonbinding propositions the parties put on their ballots. In general,
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“I am a Republican and understand that I am ineligible to vote or participate in another party’s primary election...”
they are questions like “Don’t you really, really like the stuff we really, really like?” The only thing lots of voters know about the just-for-show propositions is the ballot blurb about them. For example, GOP Prop. 5 said: “All elected officials and their staff should be subject to the same laws, rules, regulations, and ordinances as their constituents.” How many red-blooded, red-state Repubs could be against that? The answer is 8,583, or 0.63 percent of voters who weighed in on GOP Prop. 5, which drew more votes than anything else on either ballot, including the contests for U.S. senator, governor and
lite guv. “Yes” on GOP Prop. 5 got 1,344,230 votes, more than anybody or anything on the ballots. There were more votes cast on five of the six GOP props than in the GOP lite gov race. Odd, especially because the props are at the bottom of the ballot. Another oddity: 13 percent of GOP voters (174,594 of them) said “no” on Prop. 2: “Texas should support Second Amendment liberties by expanding locations where concealed handgun licenseholders may legally carry.” On the Dem side, each of the four props drew more voter participation than anything else on that ballot. The highest turnout was on Dem Prop. 2: “Congress should pass legislation raising the federal minimum wage to at least 110 percent of the federal poverty level for a family of four without exception.” Of the 559,337 votes cast on that one by folks who declared themselves to be Dems, 10.9 percent, 60,977 voters, said Congress should not do that. Bottom line: It’s got to be comforting to our enemies to know that more of our voters participate in nonbinding ballot measures than those that bind. Ken Herman is a columnist for the Austin American-Statesman. Email: kherman@statesman.com.
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SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
THE ZAPATA TIMES 5A
6A THE ZAPATA TIMES
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
Other case closed by wreck judge Houses capped at 4 unrelated residents ASSOCIATED PRESS
FORT WORTH — A Fort Worth state district judge who gave a North Texas teen probation for a deadly intoxication manslaughter wreck refused Thursday to open records in a separate juvenile murder case — or to say why. Judge Jean Boyd came under national scrutiny after giving probation to a teen who killed four people in a drunken wreck, a case that also drew attention for a defense expert’s claim that the teen suffered from a condition he called “affluenza.” The teen, Ethan
Couch, was given 10 years’ probation and will spend an undetermined amount of time in a rehab facility. Amid Couch’s case, several North Texas media organizations petitioned Boyd to re-open proceedings in a separate case involving a 16-year-old boy who was sentenced to 26 years in prison for murder. According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Boyd closed her courtroom twice, on Jan. 10 and Jan. 22, in the case after typically allowing media access to previous juvenile court hearings. The media organizations
argued Boyd needed to offer “good cause” to close her courtroom, even in a juvenile case. Prosecutor Riley Shaw told Boyd on Friday that she could not close a hearing without first hearing evidence and offering a reason for closing the hearing. The judge told Shaw, “I disagree.” Couch was drunk and had prescription drugs in his system when he plowed his family’s Ford pickup truck into the crowd of people helping a driver whose vehicle had stalled. Four people were killed
and several others were injured. After Couch’s sentence became the subject of national debate, Boyd barred the media from a hearing at which she determined the rehab facility for Couch and declined a prosecution request to sentence Couch to jail time for two related counts of intoxication assault. She did not explain her decision to close the Couch hearing — a move opposed by prosecutors but supported by Couch’s attorneys. Boyd is not running for re-election this year.
Nuke waste may come to state By JERI CLAUSING AND BETSY BLANEY ASSOCIATED PRESS
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — With the nation’s only permanent nuclear waste dump shuttered indefinitely by back-to-back accidents, officials are making plans to ship radioactive waste from Los Alamos National Laboratory to rural West Texas. The Department of Energy and the operator of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad in southeastern New Mexico say they have signed an agreement with Waste Control Specialists to truck the waste to its site in Andrews County. The agreement will help Los Alamos meet a June deadline for getting the last of thousands of barrels of plutonium-contaminated clothing, tools, rags and other debris off its northern New Mexico campus before wildfire season hits its peak. The waste, which is shipped and stored in huge sealed canisters, would come back to New Mexico for final disposal once the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant reopens. “We are pleased that WCS is in a position to provide temporary storage for this waste while the WIPP is shutdown,” said Waste Control Specialists President Rod Baltzer. “This will allow the Los Alamos National Laboratory to meet its goal of having this material removed by this summer so it can no longer be threatened by wildfires. WCS has never had a wildfire because all surrounding areas are covered with asphalt and caliche roadways. In addition, the waste will be in storage facilities that have
Photo by Jeri Clausing | AP
A member of the community speaks of the Feb. 14 radiation leak during a community meeting in Carlsbad, N.M., on Feb. 24. sprinkler system, and in the event of an emergency, WCS has its own fire truck on site.” The West Texas site has in the past taken some less toxic waste from Los Alamos, but the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is the nation’s only permanent repository for low-level radioactive waste from nuclear weapons facilities. Waste Control Specialists is licensed to take radioactive materials such as uranium, plutonium and thorium from commercial power plants, academic institutions and medical schools, as well as some DOE waste. It is also the burial ground for dirt from a Hudson River Superfund site that’s tainted with PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls. Chuck McDonald, a spokesman for the plant, said federal officials are
working with regulators at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to make sure that storing the Los Alamos waste is allowable under its permits. The state of New Mexico pressured Los Alamos to get the waste off its campus in the northern New Mexico mountains following a massive 2011 wildfire that lapped at the edges of lab property. The waste from decades of bomb building has been stored outside on a mesa. Following the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant shutdown, the state and Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., emphasized that the deadline was nonnegotiable. “Removing waste from the mesa in Los Alamos before fire season is critical to ensure safety in the greater Los Alamos community,” Udall said in a statement Thursday.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
AUSTIN — Updated occupancy restrictions for parts of Austin mean just four unrelated adults will be allowed to live in new single-family residences or duplexes instead of the current six occupant limit in a dispute over how many people can call a place home. The Austin City Council on Thursday approved the two-year plan amid concerns about so-called “stealth dorms” in the city that’s home to the University of Texas. Homes built in the future can have only four unrelated adults as residents, the Austin American-Statesman reported. The cap, which takes effect in 10 days, means existing homes that house up to six unrelated people can continue to do so, as long as the owners do not build large additions. Councilman Bill Spelman voted against the measure, saying the change would apply to a too-large swath of Austin instead of the few neighborhoods that have a glut of dorm-style homes. Some residents have complained about an overflow of residents, traffic and trash. “If this (cap) had been restricted to neighborhoods where stealth dorms are likely to be built in the future, I
could live with it,” Spelman said. “But we would be extending it throughout the vast majority of the central part of the city, and I think it’s overly broad.” Opponents of the change have said Austin is growing and residents need affordable housing options with possible multiple roommates. Council member Chris Riley voted for the cap, but raised concerns about options for new residents. “We still need to figure out ways to have new housing types available to meet diverse and growing demands in the central city. That problem is going to require a lot more hard work on the part of many different people,” Riley said. The new cap will apply to about 15 ZIP codes. The four-person restrictions will apply only for two years, when the city should be done rewriting land use and development rules. “I think this will be virtually impossible to enforce,” Mayor Lee Leffingwell said Thursday. But for the next two years, “we’ll give it a spin and see how it works.” City code enforcement officers cannot enter a home to count tenants or beds without a resident’s or owner’s permission.
National
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
More calling out for change By JEFFREY COLLINS AND MICHAEL BIESECKER ASSOCIATED PRESS
FORT BRAGG, N.C. — At nearly the same time Thursday, sexual assault cases against an Army general and a former Naval Academy football player came to a close, and neither produced a conviction on that charge. Some members in Congress and advocates for women said the results were more proof the military justice system needs an overhaul. On the other side of the debate, people say the system worked like it was supposed to because, they say, neither case should have gone to trial in the first place. Still, no one disagreed the military has a pervasive problem of sexual assaults within its ranks, and the cases served as a reminder that politics was never far away from any decision. Eugene R. Fidell, who teaches military law at Yale, said military commanders who forged ahead with the trials were mindful of the political climate. “They are aware, trust me on this. They are aware the Senate will not confirm people to higher pay grade if they are believed to be soft on sexual offenses,” Fidell said. Just last week, Congress debated ways to curb the assaults and the Senate approved a measure to protect victims and bar the “good soldier defense” to ensure evidence alone determines a defendant’s fate, but the debate is far from over. Sexual assault charges were at the center of both cases, but they were far from the same. In Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair’s case, he had a threeyear affair with a female captain who accused him of twice forcing her to perform oral sex on him. The
Photo by Ellen Ozier | AP
Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair, right, arrives at the courthouse with attorney Richard Scheff for sentencing Fort Bragg, N.C., on Thursday. case started to crumble as Sinclair’s lawyers hammered away at the woman’s credibility and raised questions about whether Sinclair’s commander improperly pressed ahead with a trial because of political considerations — namely, a desire to show the Army’s resolve to combat sexual misconduct. Ultimately, Sinclair pleaded guilty to lesser charges of adultery and conducting inappropriate relationships with two others by asking them for nude pictures and exchanging sexually explicit email. Despite facing more than 20 years in prison, he was spared any time behind bars Thursday and sentenced to a reprimand and a $20,000 fine — a punishment some members of Congress decried as shockingly light. Sinclair, 51, immediately announced his retirement, capping a humiliating fall for the battle-tested commander once regarded as a rising star in the Army. A disciplinary board could still bust him in rank and severely reduce his pension. “The system worked. I’ve always been proud of my Army,” Sinclair said outside court after reacting to
his sentence with a smile and an embrace of his lawyers. “All I want to do now is go north and hug my kids and my wife.” Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif., called Sinclair’s sentence “laughable.” “Even when the world is watching, the military has demonstrated incompetence at meting out justice,” Speier said in a statement. “This is another example of how truly broken the military justice system is. This sentence is a mockery of military justice, a slap on the wrist nowhere close to being proportional to Sinclair’s offenses.” The judge, Col. James Pohl, did not explain how he arrived at a much lighter sentence. Prosecutors had no immediate comment. If Sinclair had not announced his retirement, an Army disciplinary board would have almost certainly forced him into it. Now the board will decide whether to demote him, which could cost him hundreds of thousands of dollars in pension benefits. Sinclair made about $145,000 a year in base pay. In the other case, a military judge acquitted Navy Midshipman Joshua Tate, of Nashville, Tenn., of rap-
ing a woman who had been drinking heavily at a party. Prosecutors initially accused two other students, all of them football players at the time, of sexually assaulting the woman during the party, but those charges were dropped. The judge, Col. Daniel Daugherty, said the case presented “difficult and complex questions” and the vast majority of testimony was clouded by alcohol and the passing of time. Philip Cave, a retired Navy lawyer who is now a private defense attorney, said the military loses credibility when it goes forward with a case like Tate’s, adding it leads to “increasing cynicism” and mistrust. But Susan L. Burke, an attorney for the woman in the case, said the military justice system remains badly broken. “Like so many survivors of sex crimes in the military, our client was twice victimized: first by her attacker and then by the failed investigation and prosecution of this case,” Burke said in a statement. Both alleged victims spent hours testifying about intimate details of their lives. A Pentagon report released last year estimated that as many as 26,000 military members may have been sexually assaulted in the prior year and that thousands of victims are unwilling to come forward out of fear their careers might be derailed. “We think victims ought to be supported and people ought to be encouraged to come forward and the right cases brought. This was not the right case,” said Sinclair’s lawyer Richard Scheff. Greg Jacob of the Service Women’s Action Network said the case demonstrated the need for legislation that would strip commanders of the authority to prosecute cases and give that power to seasoned military lawyers.
THE ZAPATA TIMES 7A
Checks could have stopped doc’s actions By MARYCLAIRE DALE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WILMINGTON, Del. — The lawyer for an abortion provider convicted of killing babies who were born alive said he thinks regular inspections at his client’s Philadelphia clinic would’ve kept him from going so far astray. Longtime doctor Kermit Gosnell “was not a stupid man” and would have met the standards required to keep his clinic open, defense lawyer Jack McMahon said at a law school seminar on Friday. “That doesn’t excuse the behavior that occurred here, but I think that (inspections) would have prevented it, because Dr. Gosnell was not a stupid man. He may not have been at the Mayo Clinic (level), but he would have risen to a higher level of competence ... to remain open,” said McMahon, who joined Gosnell trial judge Jeffrey Minehart on a panel on high-publicity trials at Widener University School of Law. Gosnell, 73, is serving a life sentence after his conviction last year for killing three babies born alive and the overdose death of a woman who was a clinic patient. Investigators described his clinic as a chaotic “house of horrors,” replete with fetal remains in the staff refrigerator, specimen jars of severed feet in his office and dirty medical instruments in the surgery rooms. Authorities in Pennsylvania had failed to conduct routine inspections of all its abortion clinics for 15 years by the time
Gosnell’s facility was raided as part of a prescription drug investigation. Gosnell later pleaded guilty in federal court to running a pill mill for addicts and drug dealers. In the scandal’s aftermath, two top state health officials were fired, and the state imposed tougher rules for clinics. McMahon said he believes that regulators turned a blind eye to Gosnell’s West Philadelphia clinic because it was providing “a cheap service” to poor, minority women. Former clinic employees testified that Gosnell routinely performed illegal abortions past Pennsylvania’s 24-week limit. They said that Gosnell delivered babies who were still moving and that he and his assistants killed them by snipping their spines with scissors. Gosnell’s biggest transgression may have been hiring high school dropouts and other unqualified people to act as doctors, McMahon said. The employees performed abortions, administered anesthesia and monitored high-risk patients. Four former clinic employees pleaded guilty to murder and four more to other charges. The co-defendants included Gosnell’s wife, a cosmetologist who helped perform abortions. Despite the life sentence, Gosnell was acquitted in the deaths of four other babies. Minehart, a Philadelphia Common Pleas Court judge, said Gosnell’s trial “was a fascinating trial to be a part of.”
PÁGINA 8A
Zfrontera ZAPATA COUNTY INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT
Agenda en Breve
Último finalista
LAREDO 03/22— SOFTBÓL: El equipo Dustdevil de Sóftbol de TAMIU recibe a University of Texas-Permian Basin (DH) a las 2 p.m. en el Campo Dustdevil. Costo: 5 dólares. 03/22— Planetario Lamar Bruni Vergara de TAMIU presenta: “Earth, Moon and Sun” a las 3 p.m.; “Wonders of the Universe” a las 4 p.m.; “Two Small Pieces of Glass” a las 5 p.m.; “Pink Floyd’s The Wall” a las 6 p.m. Costo: 4 dólares, niños; 5 dólares, adultos. 03/22— La escuela St. Augustine celebrará su 2ª Noche de Casino Anual (estilo Las Vegas), a partir de las 7 p.m. en Laredo Center of the Arts. Costo: 75 dólares. Ganancias benefician a estudiantes. 03/22— BÉISBOL DE LIGA MEXICANA: Tigres de Cancún contra Águilas del Veracruz a las 7 p.m. en el Estadio Uni-Trade. Costo: 8 dólares, 12 dólares y 14 dólares. Informes en el (956) 7LEMURS. 03/24— BÉISBOL DE LIGA MEXICANA: Tigres de Cancún contra Equipo de las Estrellas (Tecos) de Nuevo Laredo (México) a las 7 p.m. en el Estadio Uni-Trade. Costo: 8 dólares, 12 dólares y 14 dólares. Informes en el (956) 7LEMURS. 03/25— BÉISBOL: El equipo Dustdevil béisbol de TAMIU recibe a Texas A&M University-Kingsville a las 6 p.m. en el Estadio Uni-Trade. Costo: 5 dólares. 03/25— Reto Nacional para Donación de Sangre “César Chávez”, de 9 a.m. a 3:30 p.m. en la Biblioteca Sue and Radcliffe Killam de TAMIU. Evento gratuito y abierto al público en general. Pida informes en el (956) 326-2707. 03/25— Recital de la Facultad por parte de John Reimund, quien toca la tuba, a las 7:30 p.m. en la Sala de Recitales del Center for the Fine and Performing Arts de TAMIU. Evento gratuito. 03/26— Reto Nacional para Donación de Sangre “César Chávez”, de 9 a.m. a 3:30 p.m. en la Biblioteca Sue and Radcliffe Killam de TAMIU. Evento gratuito y abierto al público en general. Pida informes en el (956) 326-2707. 03/27— Clínica Ortopédica en el Centro de Rehabilitación Ruthe B. Cowl, 1220 N. Malinche Ave., a partir de las 8 a.m. La clínica beneficia a niños con parálisis cerebral, pie equinovaro, escoliosis, espina bífida, entre otros. Hay un costo de 5 dólares por proceso. Pacientes deben registrarse previamente en la clínica. Pida informes en el (956) 722-2431.
NUEVO LAREDO, MÉXICO 03/22— Festival Infantil “Primavera y Duendes” a las 2 p.m. en Estación Palabra. Entrada gratis. 03/22— “Tertulia en el jardín”, un evento con música y lecturas, a las 3 p.m. en el jardín de Estación Palabra. Entrada gratuita. 03/24— Se presentará el monólogo “La Madre Pasota” a las 6 p.m. en la Casa de la Cultura. Entrada libre. Más información llamando al 715-3618. 03/25— Bingo en apoyo a la Familia Chapa Flores, en su lucha contra el cáncer, a las 4 p.m. en el Casino Expomex. Costo del boleto: 10 dólares. 03/25— Cine Club presenta “Tercera Llamada”, a las 6 p.m. en la Casa de la Cultura. Entrada libre. Más información llamando al 7153618. 03/26— Se realizará una lectura es atril “El Tercer Fausto” y “Boda Mortaja”, a las 6 p.m. en la Casa de la Cultura.
SÁBADO 22 DE MARZO DE 2014
TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
Un egresado de Texas A&M International University y ex profesor de UISD ha sido nombrado el único finalista para ocupar el puesto de superintendente del Zapata County Independent School District. Raúl Leonidas Nuques, quien ha sido director de educación especial en Austin ISD desde enero de 2013, fue nombrado finalista el 6 de marzo durante una junta de la Junta de Fideicomisarios de ZCISD. Inició su carrera en la educación como profesor de ciencias en United South High School en 2003. Nuques, un nativo de Ecuador, quien creció en New York City, dijo el miércoles que fue “honrado y bendecido” al ser nombrado co-
mo el único finalista. “Mi siguiente paso y el final es planificar mi estadía en Zapata”, dijo, añadiendo que solía pescar ahí cuando era estudiante de TAMIU. “En general, es un gran distrito. La gente es muy amable… (y) los miembros de la junta tienen la mente abierta acerca de algunas cosas”. Stephen Trautmann Jr., abogado para ZCISD, dijo que los fideicomisarios entrevistaron a seis de las 17 personas que solicitaron el cargo de superintendente. Dos de los seis fueron llamados para una segunda entrevista, dijo Trautmann. “Fue un proceso completo y bien pensado”, añadió. Bajo la ley estatal, los nombres de aquellas personas que solicitaron ser considerados para el pues-
to de superintendente son confidenciales. Un distrito solo puede dar a conocer los nombres de los finalistas. Regularmente, solo se nombra a un finalista. Trautmann dijo que ZCISD está negociando el contrato de empleo de Nuques. Una junta escolar en Texas no puede votar para contratar a un superintendente hasta 21 después de que sea nombrado finalista. En el ciclo escolar 2012-2013, ZCISD inscribió a alrededor de 3.600 estudiantes y tuvo aproximadamente 515 empleados. Alrededor de 2.800 estudiantes, o 78 por ciento, fueron calificados como económicamente desfavorecidos y el 26 por ciento estaban aprendiendo el idioma inglés. Nuques dijo que educar a los estudiantes de educación especial,
estudiantes de inglés y a aquellos que proceden de medios socioeconómicos bajos son sus fortalezas principales. Dijo que trabajó con tales poblaciones estudiantiles en UISD, Uvalde y Austin. En 2007, Nuques dejó su posición como instructor de ciencias en Los Obispos Middle School para convertirse en subdirector y decano de educación en McAllen ISD Middle School. Después se convirtió en subdirector en McAllen ISD High School. De abril a diciembre de 2012 fue director en Uvalde Junior High. Nuques tiene una licenciatura en química y una maestría en comercio internacional de TAMIU. También tiene una maestría en administración de escuelas públicas de TAMIU.
TAMAULIPAS
HUD
TODOS EN CONTRA DEL DENGUE
Asignan fondos para mejoras TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
Foto de cortesía | Gobierno de Tamaulipas
El Secretario de Salud, Norberto Treviño García Manzo, durante un discurso dirigido a la población donde les solicita tomar medidas para erradicar dengue.
Buscan prevenir problemas de salud TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
G
obernador, presidentes municipales fronterizos y Federación unen esfuerzos para fortalecer la salud de los tamaulipecos y privilegiar la participación ciudadana en acciones de prevención de enfermedades El Secretario de Salud, Norberto Treviño García Manzo, y la alcaldesa de Matamoros, Norma Leticia Salazar Vázquez, encabezaron una reunión con los integrantes de los Comités de Salud para fortalecer las medidas contra el dengue y promover el concurso estatal de Comités Activos de Salud “Dr. Rodolfo Torre Cantú”. “Estamos haciendo mucho
énfasis en la eliminación de los criaderos, es ahí donde se desarrolla y crece el mosco”, señaló Treviño García Manzo luego de señalar que el huevecillo que depositan las hembras, sobre todo en las llantas, pueden sobrevivir hasta 14 meses sin agua, surgir con las primeras lluvias y casi un 20 por ciento de ellas ya tiene el virus del dengue en sus ovarios. A la fecha, la Jurisdicción Sanitaria de Matamoros sólo registra un caso de dengue, sin embargo, las medidas preventivas continúan intensificándose, principalmente las de educación y promoción de la salud. Más tarde y para continuar su agenda de este jueves, el Se-
MIGUEL ALEMÁN
cretario de Salud, Norberto Treviño García Manzo y el alcalde de Reynosa, José Elías Leal, encabezaron otro encuentro con los Comités de Salud de esta Jurisdicción Sanitaria, con la misma temática. En ambos encuentros, el funcionario estatal hizo énfasis en los requisitos del Primer Concurso de Comités Activos de Salud “Dr. Rodolfo Torre Cantú” por el que se premiará el esfuerzo de los cinco primeros lugares de cada una de las 12 jurisdicciones sanitarias que cumplan con una serie de actividades, previamente detalladas en la convocatoria y que se harán acreedores a una bolsa superior al medio millón de pesos en vales.
FORT WORTH — El Departamento de Vivienda y Desarrollo Urbano de EU (HUD, por sus sigas en inglés) entregó 70.964.692 millones de dólares a autoridades de vivienda pública de Texas. Los fondos entregados serán utilizados para realizar mejoras importantes a gran escala. El programa que proporciona financiación anual de aproximadamente 3.100 autoridades de vivienda pública para la construcción, reparación, renovación y/o modernizar la vivienda pública en sus comunidades. A diferencia del mantenimiento de rutina, las necesidades de capital son mejoras necesarias para que la vivienda digna y económicamente sostenible. “Estos fondos son de vital importancia para las agencias de vivienda pública a medida que trabajan para ofrecer la mejor vivienda posible para sus residentes”, dijo Tammye Treviño, Administradora de la Región VI de HUD. “Si bien los fondos anunciados nunca serán suficientes para satisfacer la enorme acumulación de necesidades de capital, HUD está trabajando estrechamente con el Congreso para ampliar los esfuerzos para generar aproximadamente 6.000 millones en inversión privada para la recapitalización de la vivienda pública”. Durante 75 años, el gobierno federal ha trabajado e invirtiendo en el desarrollo y mantenimiento de la vivienda pública y multifamiliares— incluida la prestación de apoyo crítico a través de las subvenciones del Fondo de Capital. A nivel nacional 1.8 billones han sido otorgados a las autoridades de vivienda pública en los 50 estados del país, así como a los Distritos de Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico y las Islas Vírgenes, que abarcan 1.1 millones de unidades de viviendas públicas de la nación. La nación pierde aproximadamente 10.000 unidades de vivienda pública cada año, principalmente debido a mal estado. En 2011, HUD publicó las necesidades de capital en el Programa Vivienda Pública. El estudio encontró que 1.1 millones de unidades de vivienda pública de la nación se enfrentan a un estimado de 25.6 billones en reparaciones de gran escala.
PRESENTAN DONACIÓN
Logran rescate de cinco personas TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
Cinco personas que se encontraban privadas de su libertad fueron rescatas por elementos de la Secretaría de la Marina en la ciudad de Miguel Alemán, México. Una denuncia ciudadana realizada a la línea 089 reportó que en un domicilio ubicado en el sector centro se encontraban varias personas secuestradas, indica un comunicado de prensa.
Personal de la Marina aseguró el domicilio, logrando rescatar a tres hombres y dos mujeres menores de edad. Una de las personas era originaria de Guatemala y el resto de México, agrega el comunicado. Ellos fueron plagiados cuando pretendían cruzar hacia Estados Unidos. Las víctimas declararon ante las autoridades que tenían varios días en el domicilio, donde eran sometidos a maltratos físicos.
Foto de cortesía
Tejano Monument, Inc. presentó 30.000 dólares a la Asociación Histórica del Estado de Texas durante una sesión especial de TSHA, donde se anunció el comienzo del Manual de Tejano en el Wyndham Riverwalk Hotel, el jueves 6 de marzo. De izquierda a derecha: los miembros de Tejano Monument, Inc. Homero S. Vera y Renato Ramírez, compañeros de Emilio Zamora y Andrew Tijerina, de la Asociación Histórica.
State
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
Planned Parenthood eyes Texas race By CHRIS TOMLINSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
AUSTIN, Texas — The advocacy arm of Planned Parenthood launched a new political action fund Thursday to influence this year’s election in Texas, hoping to build on its success shaping the Virginia governor’s race. Cecile Richards, president of the national advocacy group Planned Parenthood Votes, said the Texas branch of the organization hopes to fight what it sees as an unprecedented attack on a woman’s right to make her own health care decisions, including whether to have an abortion. Richards is the daughter of the last Democratic governor of Texas, Ann Richards, who stepped down in 1994. Abortion rights will play a major role in the 2014 election for Texas governor. Republican candidate Greg Abbott opposes abortions in all instances except when the life of the mother is in danger. He has the support of antiabortion groups who wield enormous influence in the Republican Party and reliably turn out a large percentage of Texas voters. “This is a real opportunity to ensure that women and men are aware of the position of candidates running for election and the positions of officeholders who have taken away health care access to thousands of women in the state,” Richards said. “I think that Greg Abbott, and certainly Gov. Rick Perry, are out of touch with where Texas voters are.” Wendy Davis, the Democratic nominee, filibus-
tered a measure last summer that imposed some of the strictest abortion regulations in the country, rallying thousands of demonstrators to the Capitol for some of the largest protests in recent memory. “We saw an outpouring of young activists and voters that have not been engaged in politics and women’s health issues in a long, long time,” Richards said. “What is exciting to me is to see the engagement of a new generation.” Both campaigns have worked hard to win the support of female voters, who political analysts say are likely to decide the election. Republican leaders insist that stricter abortion regulations are intended to improve women’s health care, but abortion rights supporters say they are a roundabout way of banning abortions in Texas. Yvonne Gutierrez, who will serve as executive director of Planned Parenthood Votes Texas, said the organization is a 501(c)4 nonprofit group that aims to educate voters on an issue. She said the organization will use phone banks, direct mail and other organizing techniques to turn Planned Parenthood supporters out to vote this year. “It’s important to educate women about what’s been happening in our state and how their votes can actually make a difference,” she said. “If we don’t get women into the voting booth now, it could get worse rather than get better.” After her filibuster, Davis joined Richards on a statewide bus tour to draw attention to efforts by the
Republican majority in the Legislature to curtail a woman’s right to an abortion and to cut state funding for family planning clinics operated by Planned Parenthood. A third of the state’s abortion clinics have shut down because they cannot meet the requirement to have a doctor on duty who has admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles. Planned Parenthood has sued to overturn the law, and an appeal is pending in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Richards said Planned Parenthood political and advocacy organizations played an important role in helping Democrat Terry McAuliffe win the governor’s race in Virginia, which has become a swing state. Richards said Planned Parenthood Votes spent $2.4 million to make women’s health a dominant issue in the Virginia election. “We discovered early on that women and male voters would not vote for Ken Cuccinelli because of his extreme views on women’s health, and frankly, those are the same views as Greg Abbott and Rick Perry,” she said. Texas will be a harder case, since no Democratic candidate for president or governor has won more than 42 percent of the vote in the last 12 years. The Hispanic population is growing quickly, but Texas voter turnout is the lowest in the nation and conservatives make up the majority of voters. All of the top Republican candidates for statewide office oppose abortion, except when the life of the mother is at stake.
THE ZAPATA TIMES 9A
International
10A THE ZAPATA TIMES
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
Nothing again in search for missing jet By ROB GRIFFITH AND KRISTEN GELINEAU ASSOCIATED PRESS
PERTH, Australia — Search planes scoured a remote patch of the Indian Ocean but came back empty-handed Friday after a 10hour mission looking for any sign of the missing Malaysia Airlines jet, another disappointing day in one of the world’s biggest aviation mysteries. Australian officials pledged to continue the search for two large objects spotted by a satellite earlier this week, which had raised hopes that the twoweek hunt for the Boeing 777 that disappeared March 8 with 239 people on board was nearing a breakthrough. But Australia’s acting prime minister, Warren Truss, tamped down expectations. “Something that was floating on the sea that long ago may no longer be floating — it may have slipped to the bottom,” he
said. “It’s also certain that any debris or other material would have moved a significant distance over that time, potentially hundreds of kilometers.” In Kuala Lumpur, where the plane took off for Beijing, the country’s defense minister thanked more than two dozen countries involved in the search that is stretching from Kazakhstan in Central Asia to the southern Indian Ocean, and said the focus remains on finding the airplane. “This going to be a long haul,” Hishammuddin Hussein told a news conference. The search area indicated by the satellite images — some 1,550 miles southwest of Perth — is so remote it takes aircraft four hours to fly there and four hours back, leaving them with only enough fuel to search for about two hours. On Friday, five planes, including three P-3 Orions, made the trip. While search conditions had improved from Thursday, with much
Photo by Koji Ueda | AP
Japanese Air Self-Defense Force’s Capt. Junichi Tanoue, left, and co-pilot Ryutaro Hamahira scan the ocean aboard a C130 aircraft. better visibility, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said there were no sightings of plane debris. Searchers relied mostly on trained spotters aboard the planes scanning the ocean rather than radar because the use of radar found nothing during the first day of the search on Thursday, Australian officials said. Going forward, the search will focus more on visual sightings because civilian aircraft are being brought in to participate.
The military planes will continue to use both radar and spotters. “Noting that we got no radar detections yesterday, we have replanned the search to be visual. So aircraft flying relatively low, very highly skilled and trained observers looking out of the aircraft windows and looking to see objects,” said John Young, manager of the maritime safety authority’s emergency response division. Two Chinese aircraft are expected to arrive in Perth
today to join the search, and two Japanese aircraft will be arriving Sunday, Truss said. A small flotilla of ships coming to Australia from China was still several days away. “We are doing all that we can, devoting all the resources we can and we will not give up until all of the options have been exhausted,” said Truss, who is acting prime minister while Tony Abbott is in Papua New Guinea. Experts say it is impossible to tell if the grainy satellite images of the two objects — one almost 80 feet long and the other measuring 15 feet — were debris from the plane. But officials have called this the best lead so far in the search that began March 8 after the plane vanished over the Gulf of Thailand on an overnight flight to Beijing. For relatives of the people aboard the plane — 154 of the 227 passengers are Chinese — hope was slipping away, said Nan Ji-
nyan, sister-in-law of passenger Yan Ling. “I’m psychologically prepared for the worst and I know the chances of them coming back alive are extremely small,” said Nan, one of dozens of relatives gathered at a Beijing hotel awaiting any word about their loved ones. Abbott spoke with Chinese President Xi Jinping, whom he described as “devastated.” “It’s about the most inaccessible spot that you could imagine on the face of the Earth, but if there is anything down there we will find it,” Abbott said. The Norwegian cargo vessel Hoegh St. Petersburg is also in the area helping with the search. The ship was on its way from South Africa to Australia. Haakon Svane, a spokesman for the Norwegian Shipowners’ Association, said the ship and its crew of 20 Filipinos had searched a strip of ocean stretching about 100 nautical miles (115 miles).
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
THE ZAPATA TIMES 11A
AIDE SANTOS Jan. 13, 1936 – March 18, 2014 Aide Santos, 78, passed away Tuesday, March 18, 2014, at Falcon Lake Nursing Home in Zapata. Mr. Santos is preceded in death by his parents, Remigio and Manuela L. Santos; brothers, Gilberto Santos and Eloy Santos and also by a brother-in-law, Sigifredo Gonzalez. Mr. Santos is survived by his sisters, Elma Gonzalez, Maria Elena (Carlos S.) Martinez; and by numerous cousins, nephews, nieces and friends. Visitation hours were held Friday, March 21, 2014, at 1 p.m. with a chapel service at 2 p.m. at Rose Garden Funeral Home. Committal services followed at Zapata County Cemetery. Funeral arrangements were under the direction of
By RAF CASERT AND VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV ASSOCIATED PRESS
Rose Garden Funeral Home, Daniel A. Gonzalez, funeral director, 2102 N. U.S. Hwy. 83, Zapata.
HOUSE Continued from Page 1A found the people captive. Three other men were apprehended trying to flee after police arrived. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent Brian Moskowitz told a congressional hearing in Houston Thursday the five were held on offenses that included hostage taking, weapons charges and conspiracy to harbor illegal immigrants. “It’s going to take some time,” agency spokesman Greg Palmore said. “We’re not far along that we’re going to release names at this point. We’re still interviewing individuals and we’ll follow the information where it goes. “It’s nothing that’s going to occur overnight.” Men in underwear and without shoes, more than a dozen women and two children were found inside the filthy single-story, 1,500square-foot house about 12 miles south of downtown Houston. They are primarily from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico, Palmore said. In a statement from Mexico City, the Mexican government said Thursday that at least eight of the people involved were Mexican citizens, including three minors who have been turned over to relatives. The statement did not specify if the five adult Mexican citizens were among those facing criminal charges or those held captive at the house. Houston police, responding to a tip, went to the home in a somewhat rural area during a search for a 24-year-old woman and her two children, a 7-year-old girl and a 5-yearold boy. They’d been reported missing by relatives late Tuesday after an apparent smuggler didn’t show for a planned meeting, police spokesman John Cannon said. Officers found 115 people jammed inside. Among them were the missing woman and her two kids. It was not immediately cer-
Ukraine, Crimea go own ways
tain how the people got there, but one woman told authorities she’d been held for 15 days. Cannon said the other women said they’d been captive for several days. Authorities are still determining whether the people will be deported, Palmore said. The house had power but no hot water and only one toilet. “It’s a typical stash housetype of environment,” Cannon said Thursday. “What was atypical was the number of people kept inside.” Stash houses are not uncommon in Houston, because of its proximity to Mexico, which is as little as a fivehour drive to the southwest. But the size of the operation discovered Wednesday is more prevalent closer to the border in South Texas. Palmore described the number of people as “the largest I’ve seen in one location” in his seven years on the job in Houston. “This case demonstrates the human tragedy that occurs as a result of our broken borders,” said U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, who was in Houston Thursday for a hearing on human trafficking. “Last year over 100,000 people entered the United States illegally through Texas alone and the Department of Homeland Security has no plans to stop the flow,” he said. In 2012, four people were arrested when 131 people were found in a house near Alton in Hidalgo County, about 8 miles north of the border. An additional 115 were discovered the same year nearby in a cluster of stash houses near Edinburg, also in the Rio Grande Valley. “It’s sporadic,” Palmore said. “It’s nothing you can predict. Some weeks we can encounter five days straight, five separate incidents. Then other weeks we may have none at all.”
BRUSSELS — Two almost simultaneous signatures Friday on opposite sides of Europe deepened the divide between East and West, as Russia formally annexed Crimea and the European Union pulled Ukraine closer into its orbit. In this “new post-Cold War order,” as the Ukrainian prime minister called it, besieged Ukrainian troops on the Crimean Peninsula faced a critical choice: leave, join the Russian military or demobilize. Ukraine was working on evacuating its outnumbered troops in Crimea, but some said they were still awaiting orders. The chief of the U.N. came to Kiev and urged calm on all sides. Many eyes were on Russian President Vladimir Putin, as they have been ever since pro-Western protests drove out Ukraine’s president a month ago, angering Russia and plunging Europe into its worst crisis in a generation. Putin sounded a conciliatory note Friday, almost joking about U.S. and EU sanctions squeezing his inner circle and saying he saw no reason to retaliate. But his government later warned of further action. Russia’s troubled economic outlook may drive its decisions as much as any outside military threat. Stocks sank further, and a
possible downgrade of Russia’s credit rating loomed. Visa and MasterCard stopped serving two Russian banks, and Russia conceded it may scrap plans to tap international markets for money this year. Despite those clouds, Putin painted Friday’s events in victorious colors, and fireworks burst over Moscow and Crimea on his orders, in a spectacle reminiscent of the celebrations held when Soviet troops drove the Nazis from occupied cities in World War II. At the Kremlin, Putin signed parliamentary legislation incorporating Crimea into Russia, hailing it as a “remarkable event.” At nearly the same time in a ceremony in Brussels, EU leaders sought to pull the rest of cashstrapped Ukraine westward by signing a political association agreement with the new Ukrainian prime minister. The highly symbolic piece of paper is part of the same EU deal that touched off Ukraine’s political crisis when then-President Viktor Yanukovych rejected it in November and chose a bailout from Russia instead. That ignited months of protests that eventually drove him from power. Ukraine’s new prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, a leader of the protest movement, eagerly pushed for the EU agreement. “This deal meets the aspirations of millions of Ukrainians that want
SUPERINTENDENT things.” Stephen Trautmann Jr., ZCISD attorney, said trustees interviewed six of the 17 people who applied for the superintendent job. Two of the six were brought back for a second interview, Trautmann said. “It was a well thought out and thorough process,” he added. Under state law, the names of those who apply for a superintendent position are confidential. A district must only release the names of finalists for the job. Typically, only one finalist is named. Trautmann said ZCISD is negotiating Nuques’ employment con-
Continued from Page 1A
tract. A school board in Texas cannot vote to hire a superintendent until 21 days after he or she was named the finalist. In the 2012-13 school year, ZCISD enrolled about 3,600 students and had about 515 staffers. About 2,800 students, or 78 percent, were classified as economically disadvantaged and 26 percent were English language learners. Nuques said educating special education students, English language learners and those from low socioeconomic backgrounds are his main strengths. He said he worked with such student popula-
MEXICO could be the start of a turf war between another gang and the Sinaloa cartel. With Guzman in custody and top lieutenant Gonzalo Inzunza possibly dead, “you have a territory in dispute ... a key important territory,” he said. “Who controls that corner controls how trafficking goes into California, which was a Chapo Guzman stronghold that he took over from the Arellano Felix organization,” Coulson said. “That’s a key strategic point, because of such a huge uptick of trafficking into Southern California.” There is little doubt that despite the area’s relatively calm reputation, it had become a major trafficking corridor for Sinaloa. In December, Puerto Penasco was the scene of an hours-long gunbattle between cartel gunmen and federal police who were trying to catch Inzunza. Government Blackhawk helicopters fired on at least 10 vehicles trying to flee a luxury beach condo complex during the firefight. No tourists or residents were injured, but five gunmen were killed. Inzunza’s body was not found at the scene, but federal officials said they believed he had been shot and carried by fleeing gunmen, as cartel gunmen sometimes do with fallen gang members or leaders. Local officials denied Inzunza operated out of the re-
to be a part of the European Union,” Yatsenyuk said in Brussels. The agreement includes security and defense cooperation, he said, though it is far from full EU membership and doesn’t include an important free-trade element yet. But the EU decided to grant Ukraine financial advantages such as reduced tariffs to boost its ailing economy until the full deal can be signed. Those trade advantages are a blow to Russia, which had hoped to pull Ukraine into a Moscow-focused customs union instead. In exchange for the EU pact, Ukraine’s government is promising economic reforms. “In the long term, the biggest challenge will be to build a strong Ukrainian economy, rooted in strong institutions that respect the rule of law,” British Prime Minister David Cameron said at the summit. Amid its political crisis, Ukraine is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy, struggling to pay off billions of dollars in debts in the coming months. The U.S. and the EU have pledged to quickly offer a bailout. Russia’s foreign minister dismissed the EU pact, saying the current Ukrainian leadership lacks popular support and should have held elections before making such a decision. Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, visiting Ukraine’s capital, urged talks between Kiev and Moscow.
tions at UISD, Uvalde and Austin. In 2007, Nuques left his position as a science facilitator at Los Obispos Middle School to become an assistant principal and dean of instruction at a McAllen ISD middle school. He later became an assistant principal at a McAllen ISD high school. From April to December 2012, he served as principal at Uvalde Junior High. Nuques has a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and a master’s degree in international trade from TAMIU. He also received a master’s degree in public school administration from TAMIU.
Continued from Page 1A sort, but federal police said later that Inzunza had “set up his center of operations in Puerto Penasco” to run drug-trafficking networks. The resort is in Sonora state, which has been relatively free of the drug violence that has plagued other northern border states. The Sinaloa cartel may have chosen the area as a base because other border areas are under the control of rival cartels or feeling the effects of government crackdowns. Raul Benitez, a security expert at Mexico’s National Autonomous University, said that “Puerto Penasco is an area with a lot of movement, a lot of traffic, and it’s perfect for setting up a corridor to sell cocaine, heroin or marijuana and ship it into the United States.” As the Mexican government tries to shut off the other big corridors in Texas and California, “the Sonora corridor was the one left for the Sinaloa cartel,” he said. It appears at least one other gang is now trying to move in on the corridor. Mexican law enforcement officials declined to say who was behind this week’s mass killing, but Coulson said it might be the Beltran Leyva gang, which controlled the area around Mexicali to the east before two of its top gang leaders were arrested or killed. “My best guess is this is the Beltran Leyvas trying to re-establish control in Sonora,” Coulson said.
12A THE ZAPATA TIMES
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
ON THE WEB: THEZAPATATIMES.COM
Sports&Outdoors HIGH SCHOOL POWERLIFTING: ZAPATA LADY HAWKS
Lady Hawks finish fourth
Photo by Clara Sandoval | The Zapata Times
The Zapata Lady Hawks tied for fourth place at the Texas High School Women’s Powerlifting state championships with Springtown with 11 points each in the 42-team meet. Brianna Gonzalez recorded the highest finish of the team as she placed second in the 114-weight class with a total lift of 730 pounds.
Zapata has 10 seniors wrap up their careers at state championships By CLARA SANDOVAL THE ZAPATA TIMES
The road to the Texas High School Women’s Powerlifting state championships was a long and hard season that
took the Lady Hawks from the depths of the Laredo meets all the way to Corpus Christi, the site of the state meet. Zapata tied for fourth place overall with Springtown with 11 points each out of 42 teams at the state meet to con-
clude the season. Crystal City took the 3A team title with 21 points and was followed by College Stattion (16) and Monahans (13). "Long, hard working season for the girls," Zapata powerlifting coach Veron-
ica Arce said. "I wish I could award them all with a state champion victory, because I truly believe they are champions, no matter the outcome.
See ZAPATA PAGE 2B
NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE: DALLAS COWBOYS, HOUSTON TEXANS
DALLAS SIGNS DT Cowboys add Melton ASSOCIATED PRESS
IRVING, Texas — The Dallas Cowboys have signed defensive tackle Henry Melton to an incentive-laden one-year contract with the free agent coming off a major knee injury. The deal signed Wednesday has a $1.25 million base salary and could be worth up to $5 million. The Cowboys hold a threeyear option after the 2014 season. The 27-year-old Melton missed most of last season for Chicago after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee against Pittsburgh on
File photo by Morry Gash | AP
Houston traded quarterback Matt Schaub to the Oakland Raiders on Friday, a day after signing Ryan Fitzpatrick to a two-year contract.
File photo by Jose Yau | AP
Former Bears DT Henry Melton joined the Cowboys Tuesday night on a one-year deal with a team option for three more.
Texans trade Schaub By JOSH DUBOW ASSOCIATED PRESS
Sept. 22. Dallas is trying to rebuild its defensive line af-
ter franchise sacks leader DeMarcus Ware was released and 2013 leader Ja-
See COWBOYS PAGE 2B
ALAMEDA, Calif. Matt Schaub and Oakland Raiders both hoping to put
— the are the
mistakes of 2013 in the past. The Raiders acquired Schaub from Houston on Friday for an undisclosed draft pick, giving the quarterback a sec-
ond chance after he lost his starting job with the Texans last season. The deal also is a second chance for Oakland
See TEXANS PAGE 2B
NCAA BASKETBAL: TEXAS LONGHORNS
Longhorns moving on after last-second thriller By BRIAN DAVIS AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN
MILWAUKEE - From the moment this Texas men’s team came together, everyone bought in. Their January success showed the Longhorns how much fun this ride could be. February showed them how tough it really was. Still, they stuck together. As a reward, these young Longhorns now have an NCAA Tourna-
ment victory they’ll remember forever. Texas’ Jonathan Holmes missed a 3-pointer with 3 seconds left, but 6-foot-9 center Cam Ridley somehow corralled the loose ball and scored just as the horn sounded. Just like that, Texas captured an 8785 thriller over Arizona State at Bradley Center on Thursday night. "It looked like one of the Arizona State players caught it and dropped it,"
Ridley said. "When I saw it hit the ground, I tried to get it as quick as possible and put it up." Demarcus Holland said he saw Ridley get the ball and muscle it up on the glass. "It was such a great feeling," Holland said. "It was like a welcome to March Madness." The seventh-seeded Longhorns (24-10) came leaping off the bench and mobbed the sophomore in
what became an instant Texas classic. The coaches just looked at each other in amazement while head coach Rick Barnes stood off to the side, both hands raised to the sky. Officials hustled to the scorer’s table to review it, but there was no question. Not many thought the Longhorns would even get in the NCAAs. But they’re staying in Milwaukee two
See LONGHORNS PAGE 2B
Photo by Morry Gash | AP
Texas center Cameron Ridley goes up for the game-winning shot against Arizona State on Thursday in Milwaukee. Texas won 87-85.
PAGE 2B
Zscores
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
Andrus a grizzled vet, leader at 25 in Texas By STEPHEN HAWKINS ASSOCIATED PRESS
SURPRISE, Ariz. — Elvis Andrus arrived at the Texas Rangers’ spring training camp rested after his longest offseason without playing any games, and with a beard reminiscent of Abraham Lincoln’s. Maybe that bit of presidential motif is appropriate. The 25-yearold shortstop does have some top billing in the Texas clubhouse after only five major league seasons. Andrus is the Rangers’ longest-tenured position player. His 757 games played are nearly two full seasons more than any other current Texas player, making him a grizzled veteran and a primary leader for this team. “You realized sometimes how crazy baseball is and how everything can change in a couple of years,” Andrus said. The Rangers had their only off day of spring training Wednesday, with Andrus again experiencing soreness in his right arm. He dealt with flexor tendinitis in that throwing arm early in camp, which was blamed on overwork after not playing winter ball for the first time in his professional career. Andrus has insisted that he’s OK and there is nothing to worry about, but the Rangers scratched him from the lineup Tuesday. He won’t throw again until he can be evaluated by Dr. Keith Meister later this week. Third baseman Adrian Beltre, who in his three seasons in Texas has become like an older brother to Andrus, said he has seen the shortstop grow a lot — and not just the hair on his face. “He understands he needs to be a model for those young guys
Photo by Darron Cummings | AP
Despite being only 25 and having five years of major league experience, Texas shortstop Elvis Andrus is the longest-tenured position player for the Rangers. coming up, and he’s maturing a lot,” said Beltre, the team’s oldest position player. “He’s got some little things that he needs to improve in, but so far he looks like he’s getting it, and looking forward for him to be the main leader in this clubhouse.” Andrus was only 20 and had never played above Double-A
when before spring training five years ago the Rangers anointed him their new starting shortstop. They switched All-Star and Gold Glove shortstop Michael Young to third base to make that possible. Now Andrus is a two-time AllStar who played in every game of both of the Rangers’ World Se-
TEXANS Continued from Page 1B general manager Reggie McKenzie, whose trade last spring for Matt Flynn was a bust when he couldn’t win the starting job and was eventually released early in the season. Schaub comes in as the presumptive starter ahead of Terrelle Pryor and Matt McGloin, who were inconsistent last year as Oakland had a second straight four-win season. Schaub, 32, was Houston’s starter from 2007 until last season, when he was benched in favor of Case Keenum after a terrible start to the year. The Texans were expected to contend for a Super Bowl last season, but instead became the NFL’s worst team, sinking to 2-14, which tied the worst record in franchise history. It was clear after last season that Schaub didn’t have a future in Houston, but his departure looked to be imminent on Thursday night when the Texans signed veteran quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick. “People look at Schaub and only look at his last year,” said Raiders safety Charles Woodson, who officially signed his one-year contract to return earlier in the day. “I think they base his career off of his last year. But, I see a guy that, in my opinion, has been very steady. He’s done some really good things throughout his time. Sometimes you just need a fresh start, a new set of circumstances to restart, to restart your history. Hopefully this is the place that he can get it done.” Along with failing in the Flynn trade, McKenzie also wasted a fourth-round draft pick on quarterback Tyler Wilson, who did not make the roster out of training camp and was eventually signed off the practice squad by Tennessee. The move takes pressure off Oakland to use a high draft pick on a quarterback in May when Teddy Bridgewater, Blake Bortles and Johnny Manziel are all projected as firstround picks. The Raiders pick fifth overall in the draft but could use that selection to fill another hole. The Texans might be in the market for a quarterback with the top pick. With loads of salary cap room to start the league year, the Raiders have targeted veterans with only one of their acquisitions younger than 29. That appears to be part of an effort to turn the team around quickly. McKenzie and coach Dennis Allen oversaw back-to-back four-win seasons since arriving in Oakland and owner Mark Davis is running out of patience with this regime.
ries. He got a new contract last spring through 2022 — two years longer than any other Texas player, and with a vesting option for even another season. “It’s obvious what he brings. He brings game,” manager Ron Washington said. “He plays tremendous shortstop, gives you good at-bats, is a versatile guy,
and cares about his teammates.” So is there any added pressure because of that long commitment that will eventually pay him $15 million per season? Andrus did have a bit of an up-and-down 2013 while hitting .271 with a careerhigh 42 stolen bases. “I mean, yeah, you can say that, for sure,” Andrus said. “It’s not something I was thinking actually, but again, it happens. I think you have to realize that I get paid for what I’ve been doing so far, not what I’m going to do in the future. It’s in the past right now, and right now I’m focused on today and the future.” Not only did Andrus skip playing winter ball at home in Venezuela, he spent the offseason in Dallas. “It felt twice as long. I feel good, I feel rested,” Andrus said early in camp about skipping winter ball. “That was something the organization wanted me to do, and I do believe I did need that break.” Beltre, who turns 35 a week into his 16th major league season, has played 441 games for Texas. That’s one fewer than Mitch Moreland, who made his major league debut midway through the 2010 season and is the only position player other than Andrus to play in both of the Rangers’ World Series. Andrus is accepting of his standing in the clubhouse while maintaining his easy-going personality. “If I changed that, they’re probably going to get mad at me, and then it’d be really quiet,” he said. “Every year is a little bit more pressure, and I like it. That’s what you want as a player. You want to grow and have more expectation and more pressure on you. You can show them the best of you.”
ZAPATA Continued from Page 1B
They are hoping last year was an aberration for Schaub. While the Texans had plenty of problems, Schaub’s poor play was perhaps the biggest. The Texans won their first two games before Schaub began to struggle and he threw six interceptions, three of which were returned for touchdowns in the next three games. He started the sixth game of the season and left with an injury before being replaced in the starting lineup by Keenum, an undrafted free agent who spent 2012 on the practice squad. Keenum was injured late in the season, forcing Houston to go back to Schaub for the last two games. He didn’t fare any better than he had before he was benched and he threw four interceptions combined in the last two games as Houston wrapped up the season with a 14-game skid. The 32-year-old is a two-time Pro Bowler, who last made the game in 2012. He had been solid for the Texans since taking over the job after being traded from Atlanta in 2007, but his best seasons came in 2009 and 2012 when he started every game. In 2009, he led the NFL in yards passing (4,770), completions (396) and attempts (583) and was fifth in touchdown passes (29). In 2012, he threw for 4,008 yards with 22 touchdowns and 12 interceptions to help Houston to its second straight AFC South title. He spent three seasons with the Falcons as Michael Vick’s backup before joining the Texans, and has thrown for more than 24,000 yards with 130 touchdowns in his 10-year career.
Texans sign a safety HOUSTON — The Houston Texans have signed free agent safety Kendrick Lewis. Lewis played in every game last season for the Kansas City Chiefs with 15 starts. He had 56 tackles, including three for losses, and an interception. The 25-year-old Lewis has spent his entire four-year NFL career with the Chiefs after being drafted in the fifth round in 2010. Lewis has started 50 games, including all 16 in 2011 when he tied a career high with three interceptions. The move comes at the end of a busy 24 hours for the Texans. who signed quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick on Thursday night before trading quarterback Matt Schaub to the Oakland Raiders on Friday for a sixth-round pick in this year’s draft.
"We will definitely miss the 10 seniors that will be leaving us, but I already hear the underclassmen talking about and setting their goals for next year." The Zapata seniors that have concluded their high school careers are Aileen Campos, Lily Cantu, Delaney Cooper, Jackie Garcia, Secilia Mata, Elise Munoz, Crystal Navarro, Gina Rodriguez, Daniela Vela and Clarissa Villarreal. Brianna Gonzalez recorded the highest finish of the team as she placed second in the 114-weight class with a total lift of 730 pounds. Gonzalez started off the meet with lifting 295 in the squat followed by 125 on the bench press and 310 on the deadlift. Alexandra Garcia placed fourth overall as she had lifted 255 in the squat, 135 in the bench press and 315 in the deadlift. Coming in third place in the 105weight class was Jackie Garcia who had a total lift of 665 pounds. Garcia lifted 265 in the squat, 130 in the bench press and 270 in the deadlift. Amanda Esquivel placed fifth in
the 181-weight class with a total combined lift of 855 pounds. Esquivel lifted 315 in the squat, 190 in the bench press and 350 in the deadlift. The Lady Hawks came home with two sixth place finishes with Muñoz in the 181-weight class and Gaby Reyes in the 220-weight class. Muñoz started off with 345 in the squat, worked her way to 180 in the bench press and concluded the day with a 310 in the dead lift for a total lift of 835. Reyes ignited her quest for a state title with a lift of 325 in the squat, 165 in the bench press and 325 in the deadlift. Placing in the top 20 at the meet were Joeli Castillo (11th, 105 weight class), Cantu (12th, 123 weight class), Mata (12th, 165 weight class) and Crystal Navarro (14th, 123 weight class) to round out all of Zapata’s team scoring at the meet. Castillo had a total lift of 565 while Cantu hauled in 655 at the state meet. Mata was at 750 pounds and Navarro grabbed 635 pounds. Clara Sandoval can be reached at sandoval.clara@gmail.com
COWBOYS Continued from Page 1B son Hatcher signed with Washington. Melton has 151/2 sacks in 48 career games but will be needed more as a disruptive force in the middle. His best years came in 2011 and 2012, when he had 13 of his sacks and 50 of his 63 career tackles. Melton was a running back in high school in the Dallas area before becoming a defensive lineman with the Texas Longhorns. He was a fourth-round pick by the Bears in 2009 and missed his rookie season with an
ankle injury. He will be reunited with former Chicago defensive coordinator Rod Marinelli, who now has the same title with Dallas after Monte Kiffin was reassigned after the Cowboys finished last in the NFL in total defense. “It’s like you’re betting on yourself,” Melton said on the team’s website. “I feel like with me and my rehab and coming back with Rod and the good defense that’s here, I can get back to that form. I
believe in that, and obviously they believe in me to get it done.” Melton was arrested in December in Grapevine, where he went to high school, on charges of assault and public intoxication after police say he refused to leave a bar and fought with employees. Police say Melton was accused of punching the bar manager in the face and biting his arm. Melton’s agent, Jordan Woy, said at the time that his client didn’t start the altercation.
LONGHORNS Continued from Page 1B more days to face No. 2 seed Michigan on Saturday. It’ll be the first time the Longhorns have faced the Wolverines since the 1996 NCAA Tournament, a game also ironically held in Milwaukee. "It’s just the way we drew it up," Barnes said with a grin. "I do think they had prepared well. When it wasn’t going well, we still found a way to make some plays." Prior to the game, the Longhorns talked about how they were "second-guessing" themselves. After finishing the regular season by going 6-6 record in their last 12
games, they had every right to question everything. But confidence shouldn’t be a problem now. Six players finished in double figures as Ridley led the way with 17 points. As a team, Texas shot 53 percent from the floor. The way the game turned down the stretch, it looked like Texas was head for major heartbreak. The 10th-seeded Sun Devils (21-12) chopped down a 14-point deficit and eventually took an 83-82 lead with 44 seconds remaining. But Texas had an answer. Javan Felix missed an open 3-pointer, and
the ball landed right in Holmes’ hands right under the basket. Texas’ only upperclassmen scored an easy layup, drew the foul and the players on the Texas benched nearly jumped through the roof. He made the free throw with 32 seconds left, and the Longhorns led by two. It wasn’t over. ASU’s Jahii Carson (19 points) knew to go right at Texas, especially considering he got Felix in foul trouble early by attacking the rim. Carson went right down the middle but got soundly rejected by Ridley. ASU kept possession and eventually
tied the game at 85-85 with Jonathan Gilling’s two free throws. On the game’s final possession, Texas freshman Isaiah Taylor brought the ball down in a rather nonchalant fashion. Forget overtime, Barnes though. He started screaming at Taylor to get moving, which set up the final sequence. "Most rebounds come off long, but it just took a funny bounce and my man read the ball better than I did," said ASU’s Jordan Bachynski, who battled Ridley all night long. "He read the ball and got the bucket."
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
THE ZAPATA TIMES 3B
HINTS | BY HELOISE STRAY-CAT SHELTER Dear Readers: Meow, meow! A recent hint from a reader about making a SHELTER FOR A STRAY CAT outside sure got a lot of attention! Here are just a few comments that came in: “I also have a stray cat. I have put out a covered litter box (removing the swinging door) and placed a thick bath rug and a furry pillow inside. I wrapped it in an outdoor furniture cover that has felt backing, and covered this with an old bath sheet. Now he has a very comfy place to stay.” — Janice F., Youngstown, Ohio “Towels or blankets will collect moisture and will actually make the cat colder. I have a feral cat that lives in my yard. I bought a foam cooler and cut a small hole in the side. Because it is already insulated, the only other thing needed was straw to keep the kitty warm. It does not collect moisture like fabric does, so the kitty hunkers down and stays warm and dry.”
“
HELOISE
— Paula Q., Arlington, Texas The outdoor cats say, “Meow, meow,” which I think means “thank you” for taking care of them. Many feral cats are lucky to be cared for by kind people. One note: If you can “catch” a familiar feral cat, many vets and animal groups do have low-cost spay and neuter services. Then bring or take them to where they live. It helps stop the profusion of litters that go unwanted or worse. — Heloise PET PAL Dear Readers: Alfred Hall, via email, sent in a picture of his small Pomeranian, Pipi, sitting in the shopping cart helping pick out her toys. To see Pipi’s picture, go to my website, www.Heloise.com, and click on “Pets.” — Heloise
DENNIS THE MENACE
FAMILY CIRCUS
PEANUTS
GARFIELD
DAILY CRYPTOQUOTES — Here’s how to work it:
DILBERT
Sports
4B THE ZAPATA TIMES
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 2014
Baylor coasts in rout of Cornhuskers By PAUL J. WEBER ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAN ANTONIO — In January, Baylor couldn’t have even counted on making the NCAA tournament. This kind of March hot streak is starting to look familiar to the Bears. Cory Jefferson scored 16 points and the sixth-seeded Bears coasted in their first tournament game since falling in the Elite Eight two years ago, beating No. 11 seed Nebraska 74-60 in the second round Friday. The Cornhuskers lost again in their seventh tournament appearance. And they lost their cool: Big Ten coach of the year Tim Miles was ejected with 11 minutes left, punctuating a frustrating end to an otherwise fabulous season for a program that has long been an afterthought at footballcrazed Nebraska. But basketball success is expected at Baylor (25-11), which has won 11 of 13 after a dismal start in the Big 12. The Bears didn’t make the tournament last year after having rolled to the Elite Eight in 2010 and 2012. Now they’re surging again. “The past Elite Eights that we did have were good runs, but this year we’re just looking at it as checking it one game at a time,” said Jefferson, a senior who was with Baylor for both those trips. “We had ours today, the next one is on Sunday. We’ll look at one game, and we’ll move on from there.” Baylor will play No. 3 seed Creighton on Sunday in the third round of West Regional. The Bluejays beat Louisiana-Lafayette 76-66. Terran Petteway scored 18 points for Nebraska (19-13), which hadn’t played on this stage since 1998 and often looked like it. Nebraska missed nine of its first 10 shots, labored through a 9-minute scoring drought then lost their coach midway
Photo by David J. Phillip | AP
Cory Jefferson scored a team-high 16 points for Baylor on Friday in a 74-60 win over Nebraska in San Antonio. through the second half. The officials tossed Miles after ringing him up for a second technical foul in nearly as many minutes. He first erupted after Petteway, the Big Ten’s leading scorer, picked up his fourth foul just after Nebraska cut the lead to single digits. Two minutes later, Miles charged toward the scorer’s table. He said afterward he was trying to tell the officiating crew the shot clock hadn’t started, only to be hit with an-
other technical for stepping too far out from the bench. Gone. And not long afterward, so was Nebraska in this tournament. “I mean, what do you do? I mean, the shot clock doesn’t run for, I don’t know, 7 or 8 seconds,” Miles said. “I just wanted them to stop the game and get the shot clock right. It had nothing to do with the officiating.” Miles said he didn’t want an “unfair
competitive advantage” when it came to foul calls, but also didn’t make excuses. “Officiating is not what did us in,” he said. In a statement after the game, referee Karl Hess acknowledged a shot clock error that both the operator and officials didn’t notice. But he didn’t suggest that giving Miles a second technical was wrong, referencing a section of the NCAA rule book that prohibits “inciting undesirable crowd reactions” and certain conduct while objecting to an official’s decision. As Miles walked toward the tunnel, he drew a standing ovation from a Texas crowd splashed with a healthy swath of Big Red. It was a big day for the state of Nebraska at the AT&T Center: Creighton’s game was next up, and fans shed red shirts at the buzzer to reveal Bluejay blue underneath. Isaiah Austin scored 13 points and Brady Heslip added 12 points for Baylor. The Bears didn’t outshoot the Cornhuskers but got to the free throw line three times as often — they made 38 of 48, compared to 10 of 16 for Nebraska. Shavon Shields scored 16 points and Ray Gallegos had 15 for the Cornhuskers. That Baylor and Nebraska are even here was a doubtful scenario just two months ago. Both teams nosedived toward February with a combined 2-11 record in conference play, with the Cornhuskers fulfilling historically low expectations and the Bears bottoming out after being ranked high as No 7 in the nation. Their turnarounds were almost simultaneous. Refusing to settle for a fourth losing season in five years, Nebraska won 10 of its last 13 and seized an unlikely status as one of the biggest surprises in the country. Baylor, meanwhile, won 10 of its final 12 during a hot streak that included a dominating march to the Big 12 tournament final.
Photo by Ted S. Warren | AP
Seattle Sounders’ Clint Dempsey, right, has been suspended for two games by MLS. He was suspended for violent conduct toward a Toronto player in a match last week. Photo by Jon Super | AP
Manchester United’s Robin van Persie will miss up to six weeks after colliding with Kostas Manolas on Wednesday.
Van Persie out for 4-6 weeks with knee injury By STEVE DOUGLAS ASSOCIATED PRESS
MANCHESTER, England — Manchester United’s Robin van Persie will miss up to six weeks with a left knee injury, ruling the Netherlands striker out of both legs of a Champions League quarterfinal against Bayern Munich and potentially six Premier League games. It is a major blow to United’s hopes of winning the Champions League, the club’s only realistic route back into Europe’s top competition next season. Following a second scan on the injury on Friday, United said Van Persie has a “sprained knee which will keep him out for around 4-6 weeks.” He appears to be in no danger of missing the World Cup finals in Brazil beginning in mid-June — the worst-case scenario according to United’s diagnosis is that Van Persie is out until the start of May, leaving him available for the last two or three league games in United’s season. Van Persie, who has scored 23 goals in 29 games for club and country this season, was carried off on a stretcher after hurting his knee in a challenge from behind toward the end of Wednes-
day’s 3-0 victory over Olympiakos, in which he scored a hat trick to send his team into the last eight. United is seventh in the Premier League after its humiliating 3-0 loss to Liverpool last weekend, 12 points behind fourth-place Manchester City having played two more games. A finish in the top six would qualify United for next season’s Europa League, and sixth-place Everton is three points ahead with a game in hand. It will be a second significant spell on the sidelines for Van Persie this season — he played just two games across 21/2 months over the turn of the year because of groin then thigh problems.
Bayern gets Man United, Madrid faces Dortmund Defending champion Bayern Munich will play Manchester United in the Champions League quarterfinals, and Real Madrid will face Borussia Dortmund in a rematch of last season’s semifinals. Spanish clubs Barcelona and Atletico Madrid will also meet in the quarterfinals, while Paris Saint-German and Chelsea
were drawn together. The matches are April 1-2 and 8-9. For Manchester United, an already arduous season just got tougher, with the English champions drawn Friday against the favorite and five-time champion. “Perhaps they are not in the best form, but they are still a top team,” said Bayern winger Arjen Robben, who scored a late goal to eliminate United from the competition at the same stage four years ago. “It’s a good draw, we play away first.” United, under manager David Moyes, is seventh in the Premier League and likely needs to win the Champions League to qualify for next season’s competition. Bayern, meanwhile, is unbeaten in 50 Bundesliga games under coach Pep Guardiola and leads second-place Dortmund by 23 points. Dortmund beat Madrid in the semifinals last year before losing to Bayern in the final at Wembley Stadium. But Madrid is unbeaten in 31 games in all competitions, and Cristiano Ronaldo leads the Champions League with 13 goals this season. Three Spanish clubs reached the quarterfinals and at least one is guaranteed to play in the semifinals.
MLS suspends Seattle’s Clint Dempsey 2 games ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK — Clint Dempsey will be a spectator for the next two weeks of Major League Soccer play. U.S. national team coach Jurgen Klinsmann might be the most upset about the decision. Dempsey, the U.S. captain and Seattle Sounders midfielder, was suspended for two games by MLS on Friday for violent conduct toward Toronto FC defender Mark Bloom in last week’s match. The MLS players union appealed but the suspension was upheld. Dempsey will miss Seattle’s match this weekend at Montreal and next week’s home match against Columbus. He’ll be eligible to return on April 5 when Seattle travels to rival Portland. Klinsmann was not pleased that one of his key pieces on the U.S. World Cup team will be sitting at a time when finding his form is important. Dempsey is expected to be called in for national team duty when the Americans face Mexico on April 2 in Glendale, Ariz. “A two-game suspension for that moment seems very harsh, and it comes at a very bad time for us as it throws him out of a rhythm before the game against Mexico,” Klinsmann said. Dempsey’s action came in the 40th minute of To-
ronto’s 2-1 victory. Dempsey hit Bloom in the stomach/groin area, a blow that was not seen by officials but was captured by television cameras. Dempsey said after the match that he was trying to slap Bloom’s hand off his back and did not intend to strike his body. Klinsmann noted the amount of fouls that Dempsey has taken since returning to the MLS last summer. According to stats from MLS, Dempsey has been the most fouled player in the league since Aug. 10 of last season. “It’s very disappointing to see Clint be the only person punished from this game,” Klinsmann said. “There is a foul against him in the sixth minute that should have been a red card. The persistent fouling continued throughout the game, and he’s getting punished for a reaction following all those fouls. Yes he made a mistake, but if opponents don’t get penalized for consistently fouling, it only encourages them to continue that approach.” Dempsey wasn’t the only player to receive a suspension from the league. Chicago defender Lovel Palmer was also suspended two games for violent conduct toward Portland’s Maximiliano Urruti. New York defender Armando was suspended
one game for a serious foul against Colorado’s Deshorn Brown and Montreal midfielder Justin Mapp received a fine.
Montreal Impact MLS home opener postponed by snow MONTREAL — The Seattle Sounders game scheduled for Saturday against the Impact has been postponed until Sunday because of expected snow in Montreal. The Impact’s homeopener is being delayed by a day due to the fear of snow accumulation on the Olympic Stadium roof. The game will be played on Sunday at 4 p.m. EDT. Due to the instability of the stadium dome, which is in need of replacement or repair, events cannot be held there if more than an inch of snow is forecast. An accumulation of close to 6 inches has been predicted. The Impact’s first three regular season games are scheduled to be played at home, including a match on April 5 against the New York Red Bulls, and on April 12 against the Chicago Fire. There are also two Toronto Blue Jays preseason baseball games slated for the stadium next week.