62 AJ Teachers Get Lay-Off Letters
By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski
The News
The weekend before spring break, 62 Apache Junction Unified School District teachers or certified staff received letters indicating they would be laid off if the AJUSD Governing Board acted on a reduction in force (RIF).
  “We know we have to reduce the number of individuals in our system because of the financial issues that we’re facing,” said Superintendent Dr. Chad Wilson.
  “One of the things I wanted to do was to give people kind of a preliminary notice that if the board were to RIF at this stage of the game, then certain individuals would be recommended by me to be RIFed. The reason why I make that distinction is the board hasn’t acted on any of the letters, hasn’t RIFed anybody or anything like that.”
  Wilson explained he wanted to give employees a fair shot at finding a different job.
 “Folks in our system, they have lives and they have families,” Wilson said. “If there’s a chance they may not be employed by us next year, I wanted to let them know sooner rather than later to give them an opportunity potentially to make choices in their own personal lives. “The letters that went out [two weeks ago] weren’t actually letters saying ‘You’re RIFed.’ They were letters saying that should the board ask for recommendations from me to RIF, at this time they would be individuals that I would be recommending for a RIF.”
  Wilson said the situation is a Catch-22.
 “On the one hand, people have indicated to me that doing that so early is potentially going to cause tension in the system,” Wilson said. “We’re still responsible for educating our kids. At the same time, I think people have a right to know about their own personal lives sooner rather than later, if it’s going to be impacted. That’s why we choose to give the notices out as early as we did.”

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AJPD To Begin E-Ticketing
New process will save time, reduce errors
By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski
The News
Next week, the Apache Junction Police Department is scheduled to begin issuing electronic traffic tickets which will shorten an officer’s time with violators and cut down on minor mistakes within citations.
  “There are several agencies in Arizona that are already using them,” said the AJPD’s Capt. Arnold Freeman.
  “Because of the human error factor, occasionally (officers) will write down the wrong code or misspell something or put in the wrong date. It creates an issue that when the municipal court gets the citation, they have to turn around and file an amended charge. That creates that many more hours of human time and effort.”
  The electronic ticket machine has a magnetic stripe reader so the officer only has to swipe the violator’s driver’s license to collect information.
  “All 50 states have magnetic stripes on the back (of driver’s licenses),” Freeman said. “When we swipe it, it automatically populates the field directly from the driver’s license.\

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County’s New K-9s Ready
Will help improve sheriff’s office service, officials say
By Christina Fuoco-Karasinski
The News
“The Pinal County Sheriff’s Office K-9 unit has been the focus of recent change and reform,” said Lt. Tami Villar, the sheriff’s spokeswoman. Recent additions to the unit have been geared toward improving productivity and saving money, she said.
  “Since January, two new canines have been added to the unit and the investment is already proving beneficial,” Villar said.
  With support from Pinal County Risk Management and the Pinal County Adult Detention Facility K-9 Ares (pronounced “Are-ees”) and K-9 Solo were purchased and have been getting to know their new partners Deputies Daniel Lopez and Eric Berner.
  Ares is a 3-year-old Belgian Malinois from the Czech Republic. Ares is a dual purpose dog. A dual purpose K-9 is used for both narcotics detection and patrol functions such as handler protection and suspect apprehension. Berner and his K-9 partner Ares are currently in the K-9 academy at COTA in Tucson.
  Solo is a 3-year-old German Shepherd/Belgian Malinois mix. Solo is a large dog, weighing nearly 95 pounds. Solo was born in the Czech Republic and brought to the United States when he was 2 years old. Solo was trained at the World Wide Canine facility in Spring Branch, Texas. DeLopez and Solo have been partners since January and since then have collectively seized more than 1,300 pounds of marijuana.

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Baseball Team In Highland Tourney
By Chuck Baker
The News
While the Prospector starting pitching staff continued their early season struggles this past week in the Gilbert Highland Triple Play Baseball Tournament, the AJHS offense came to life in a big way, giving the Prospectors three huge wins in their five tournament games, including their biggest offensive explosion in their final game, a 23-12 blasting of Mesa Dobson last Thursday.
  Apache Junction opened tournament play on Monday of last week and dropped an 18-5 decision to Highland in their “pool play” game. But the Prospectors came back on Tuesday and downed Higley 11-8 in their first game, avenging an earlier 16-6 loss to the Knights two weeks ago, and then outslugged Mesa High 16-14 in their second game on Tuesday.
  The Prospectors then fell to Chandler Perry 9-6 on Wednesday to finish their pool play with a 2-2 record.
  Perry, at 3-1 in pool play games, advanced to one semifinal game on Thursday while Highland, 2-2 in pool play and by virtue of a team tie-breaker based on total runs allowed, also advanced to Thursday’s semifinals against the top two teams from a separate five-team bracket.
  Higley and Apache Junction, also 2-2 like Highland, played a consolation game on Thursday, again based on runs allowed in their four pool play games.
  In the five tournament games, Apache Junction pitchers gave up 61 runs on 62 hits and 29 base on balls. But the Prospector offense matched that run total, led by senior center fielder Mike Davalos, who had a monster tourney.

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