Los Angeles County

As Dawn Beno sat on a Burbank delivery table, breathing and pushing for the birth of her new baby, the attention in her hospital room turned toward a television screen and a countdown toward midnight Friday. Doctors, nurses and family members in the room at Providence St. Joseph Medical Center watched a replay of New Year’s festivities in New York City and cheered as the new decade began. “We counted down with Dick Clark,” Beno said. Twenty-three seconds later, Beno gave birth to her daughter, Khloe Renay Beno — the first child of the decade in Los Angeles County.

Local unemployment rates continued to fall in November as professional and business service sectors started to recover, state economic development officials reported Friday. The unemployment rate in Burbank fell to 9.9% last month from 10.3% in October. Glendale slid to 10.6% from 11% over the same period, according to the California Economic Development Department. In the La Crescenta-Montrose region, the unemployment rate fall from 5.8% in October to 5.6% last month. In La Cañada-Flintridge, the rate fell slightly by 0.2% to 4.5%.

Teen to stand trial for father?s death A 19-year-old man arrested in connection with the death of his father was ordered Tuesday to stand trial for one felony count of involuntary manslaughter. Noah Timothy Loock, of Burbank, was ordered to appear Jan. 15 in Los Angeles County Superior Court in Pasadena for a second arraignment following the 2008 death of his father, Timothy Loock, said Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley. Timothy Loock, 48, was rendered unconscious during a fight at his home Nov. 29, 2008, and taken to Providence St. Joseph Medical Center where he was pronounced dead, Burbank Police Sgt. Robert Quesada said.

I grew up in Pinellas County, Fla. It?s the birthplace of Hooters and, if a traveling insurance salesman I once met had his facts straight, it?s also the trailer park capital of the nation. If counties had flags, ours would have depicted a Budweiser bottle crossing a Coppertone bottle. There, the best jobs I could land were waitress jobs ? usually at places that serve beer by the pitcher and Chablis by the carafe. Now I live in Los Angeles County, which contrary to what a New Yorker would tell you, couldn?

Glendale resident Terry Engle isn’t used to living on the streets, not having money or a place to sleep at night. He was manager of an apartment building on Louise Street for 15 years until September, when the building’s management company decided they no longer needed his service. They told him he had to leave, but Engle didn’t have a place to go. With no other options, Engle opted to stay put. But sheriff’s deputies yanked him out of the apartment three weeks ago, and he’s been living on the street since, sleeping on the cold ground behind a city library.

LOS ANGELES ? Religious hate crimes, including a tagging incident at Glendale?s St. Peter Armenian Church, increased last year throughout Los Angeles County, according to a county report released Thursday. Religion was the basis for the third-largest group of hate crimes reported in Los Angeles County in 2008, according to the county?s Commission on Human Relations annual report. Hate crimes based on a person?s race or sexual orientation made up the largest and second-largest groups, respectively.

Local unemployment rates fell slightly in October, even as jobless figures across Los Angeles County rose 0.2%, the state’s Economic Development Department reported Friday. The unemployment rate in Burbank was 10.3% in October, down from 10.4% the month prior, according to the report. Glendale’s unemployment rate dropped to 11%, from 11.1% in September. The jobless figure in the La Crescenta-Montrose area also declined 0.1% from September’s rate, to 5.8%, although it held steady in La Cañada Flintridge, at 4.7%, according to the department.

BURBANK — Television, commercial and film production shoots have shown small gains from last quarter, but remain significantly down from last year. A writers strike at the end of 2007, screen actors’ turmoil last year and an economic collapse have dried up thousands of job opportunities in Glendale, Burbank and across the county. The latest figures from the main film production permitting group, FilmLA, represented the latest round of bad news for studio-rich Burbank and Glendale.