Library

Glendale plans to spend $1.2 million through next year on new sidewalks in the northwest part of the city. The project also includes addition of handicap access ramps at Brand Library in an ongoing effort to comply with federal disability laws. The City Council approved the project on Tuesday. Each year, the city installs new handicap access equipment to comply with the federal Americans with Disabilities Act. This year, new curb ramps will be placed at the main entrance to Brand Library.

Assistance League of Glendale members are a modest bunch. They don't usually blow their own horns. But on Oct. 11, they certainly did. A packed crowd of some 150 women and one man had the chance to hear about the league's philanthropy projects. League President Alma Tycer and Membership Vice President Rae McCormick welcomed members and guests. Each chairwoman described their program. Chairman Mary Margaret Smith described the league's monthly luncheons for seniors age 55 and older.

For 40 years, the Brand Library and Art Center in Glendale has produced a national juried art exhibition of works on paper submitted by artists from across the United States. “Brand 40: Fortieth annual National Juried Exhibition of Works on Paper: Entrances & Exits” was officiated by juror Peter Frank, an art critic and curator at the Riverside Museum of Art, who culled through hundreds of entries to organize the show. Of the 10 donor prizes awarded, the most significant is the “Jane Friend Purchase Award,” which purchases the winning art piece to add to the permanent Brand Library and Art Center collection.

As part of his tour of Southern California, the spiritual leader of Armenian Catholics is scheduled to visit the Brand Library in Glendale Wednesday. Hundreds of people are expected to turn up for a chance to meet His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos of the Great House of Cilicia and spiritual leader of Armenian Diaspora, who will speak during a forum titled "Community Forum entitled “The Armenian Church, Youth, & General Concerns of the Armenian People. " He will also be signing his book, "Taking the Church to the People.

Cal State Northridge officials planned to finish their search for a possible campus gunman Tuesday afternoon and reopen the evacuated Oviatt Library. Capt. Alfredo Fernandez of the campus police department said officers are waiting for a Los Angeles Police Department bomb-sniffing dog to arrive and go through the building before reopening the library. It was evacuated at 10:27 a.m. after a staffer reported that a man in the library said he had a gun. According to a statement sent out by the university, the man was described as 5-feet-8 with short, spiky hair, and wearing jeans and a white T-shirt that read "human rights violation.

I want to thank the Glendale City Council for voting to upgrade the entryway for Casa Verdugo Library and modifying the bathrooms there and in the adjacent fire station to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (“Bathroom fixes redefine blight,” Aug. 12). For the past several years I've been going to Casa Verdugo a couple of times a week to tutor my adult literacy student who lives nearby and doesn't drive. It's a lovely mid-century building but has a dated, ailing infrastructure.

The Burbank Library Buena Vista branch stayed open late Saturday and Sunday as a cooling station. City officials said a number of people took advantage of the air conditioning as temperatures flirted with the triple digits. 

More than 100 people gathered Wednesday morning at South Pasadena Middle School to celebrate its new gym and library.  The two new buildings are the jewels in the crown of a campus expansion effort that began with a school construction bond in 2002. Former Los Angeles Lakers star A.C. Green, who holds the NBA record for most consecutive games played with 1,192, was on hand to make the ceremonial first basket in the expansive new gym. The facility has a 144-foot by 80-foot play space and eight retractable basketball hoops, accommodating full-court team play allowing four simultaneous smaller-scale games.

Are bathrooms without handicap grab bars blight? According to the Glendale Redevelopment Agency, they are. On Tuesday, the agency declared bathrooms at Fire Station 26 and adjoining Casa Verdugo Library blighted in order to use $305,000 in redevelopment money to pay for upgrades at the facilities. The upgrades have been on the city's capital improvement wish list two years in a row, but budget shortfalls have kept them from being funded.  City officials said in a report to the City Council Tuesday that there were “no other reasonable means of financing the improvements.”  The move shows the extent to which Glendale relies on its Redevelopment Agency, which the state is trying to eliminate.

BURBANK - A mask with a baseball still lodged in the face guard that was used by one-eyed umpire Max McLeary; Ron Santo's partially burned toupee; the costume head of the San Diego Chicken and a box of balls with the forged signature of Mother Teresa. The items are only a small representation of the unique, interesting and often bizarre collection of memorabilia that is featured in the exhibition, "Not Exactly Cooperstown," that is currently on display at the Burbank Central Library.