California sales tax on its way up

California's sales tax is set to increase one-fourth of a percent on January 1. That means your purchases in most of Orange County will be taxed at 8 percent, up from the current rate of 7.75 percent.

In short, you'll pay an extra quarter for every $100 you spend in 2013.

Shoppers at Toyota of Tustin examine vehicles Monday and consider deals in advance of January's sales tax increase.

JOSHUA SUDOCK, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Sales tax savings

Here is how much you can save by purchasing certain items before the new sales tax rate goes into effect.

Cup of coffee: 1 cent

Olloclip lens for iPhone: 17 cents

Nice dinner for two: 35 cents

Western Digital hard drive: 85 cents

Oakley Airwave goggles: $1.50

Vizio 60" big-screen TV: $2.50

Kia Rio: $34.00

State voters approved the quarter-cent tax hike on the November ballot as part of Proposition 30, although the measure received a 59 percent "no" vote in Orange County. Funds raised by the increase will go to K-12 schools and community colleges.

Consumers can save money by making any major purchases before Tuesday.

"It won't matter unless you're buying a big ticket item like a car," said Dennis Malloy, a salesperson at Easylife Furniture in Costa Mesa.

Malloy said none of his customers have mentioned the tax hike, which won't make much of a difference when purchasing couches and beds that sell for hundreds of dollars. "But if you're getting a car, you better buy now."

Tustin Toyota is using its web site, email blasts and radio spots to urge people to make purchases now and "beat the burden of the tax increase." The year-end marketing blitz has been successful. December sales are up 50 percent compared to the same time last year, said new car director Greg Vernon, speculating that a key reason for that bump is that people want to pay less on taxes.

"Quite a few customers have mentioned the tax hike," Vernon said. The big seller this month has been the Sienna XLE minivan, with a retail price of $33,360. "Even if it's just two or three hundred dollars, that's a substantial savings," he said.

But not everyone is talking up the tax hike to hike up business. Americans face a far bigger financial uncertainty as the "fiscal cliff" negotiations over federal tax increase and spending cuts remain unresolved.

Sean Taylor, member services manager for the Orange County Automobile Dealers Association, said he hasn't heard of other car dealers incorporating the impending tax increase into marketing campaigns.

Even people who would save the most by making an early purchase are seemingly unfazed about paying more sales tax next year. Acquiring a 2013 Lamborghini Aventador for $397,500 before 2013 would yield almost $1,000 in sales tax savings. "But that only works if you're buying the car in cash," said Pietro Frigerio, general manager of Lamborghini Newport Beach in Costa Mesa. None of his customers have mentioned the tax hike. Most of his clients lease, so Frigerio said they would only save a couple of dollars per month.

In La Habra, where voters approved a 20-year half-cent hike four years ago, sales tax will increase to 8.5 percent. That is still lower than the Los Angeles County, where consumers will pay 9 to 10 percent for retail purchases next year. Los Angeles city voters will vote in March on another half-cent hike.

On Twitter, the social network where consumers often air complaints about companies and government, much of the recent Orange County chatter about tax hikes has centered around the "fiscal cliff" stalemate and national policy, with very little mention of California's tax increases.

Although the statewide tax hike is just one-fourth of a percent, the tax increase still could have a marginal effect on consumer spending, said Scott W. Drenkard, economist with the Tax Foundation think tank in Washington, D.C. "When prices go up, demand goes down. It's just the law of supply and demand."

"I'm more concerned about the income tax hike that was already retroactively imposed," Drenkard said. That increase, also a part of Prop. 30, will affect households that earn more than $250,000 a year, and will apply to income earned during 2012.

Contact the writer: 714-796-3589 or ksablan@ocregister.com

Source: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/tax-382037-hike-increase.html

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Retail Events: Bring More Business into Your Retail Store

Retailers?are always looking for a way to stand out from the crowd, to be memorable and, most importantly, to be a customer?s sole source for whatever products you offer. There are countless ways to do this and you are most likely already sitting on your biggest goldmine? your customer database.

What do you do with all those names in your?point of sale system database?? You have been collecting names from every shopper who makes a?credit card purchase?and your POS technology will tell you who bought what, who shops sales, and who spends the most.

Make the most of your technology systems by using that customer database to have trunk shows for specific designers, wine and cheese parties to meet a rep from a particular line of merchandise, or better yet, a local manufacturer of something you carry,?always with ?special invitations? to those customers that have purchased these lines in the past.

Here are some events that I have seen our retailers recently organize:

Educational Classes

An excellent example is Joann?s Fabrics, who offer dozens of classes based around their products and demographics. What do your clients frequently ask you how to do? Your customers are likely to have similar points of interest and can be brought together into a community within your retail space; this adds value to your product or service.

Related:?Find the Right Retail Display For Your Event

Themed Events

Origins bring together ladies for movie night or ?Pajama Night? where girls can get complimentary facials and enjoy a movie (in store). Salons can offer blow outs at a discount, liquor stores can have a themed night and bring in a?food truck?to create a cohesive experience. There are numerous holidays, themes and even a movie can be used to inspire an event.

Block Parties

Get together with your neighboring retailers to create a group event, you can even get neighboring restaurants in on it by asking if they can sponsor the finger food served. The neighboring stores do not have to all have the same target audience but you will find couples, friends and even families may come out of the woodwork to check it out. If you do not have any local restaurants, consider calling a few food carts or trucks and inviting them to participate.

Crafting or DIY Events/Parties

This will depend on your store?s customer demographic and product but anything from necklace-making classes, screen printing parties, tie-dye parties, the sky is the limit!

• Screen printing parties: Customers bring garments to be screen printed with a cool set graphic, perhaps created by a local artist; you can, of course, include your logo or?website?at the bottom of the graphic or offer a graphic that is just your logo. Play some music, get some food and drinks sponsored and your customers and future customers are sure to have a good time and remember you.
• T-shirt Refurbish Party: Have your customers bring in old t-shirts and have stations where they can learn to transform them with scissors into an entirely different piece.

Make sure you maximize the benefits of the party by running a raffle or sign-in table to capture your visitor?s name and email. Gather contact data from everyone who attends your events and then get them entered into your POS?s customer relationship management system so you can promote to them in the future.? Even if they don?t buy something, they can be entered into your?POS system?for future promotions.

You can additionally promote your event in advance through local area event pages, social media, newspapers,?emails to existing clients?and more. By bringing in multiple parties (food or drink sponsors, for example) you can additionally ask if they can also promote the event through their promotional channels.

One Step Retail Solutions?is your one step resource for all of your retail technology needs. As a top nationwide point of sale reseller for over 27 years, One Step Retail Solutions has helped thousands of retailers achieve their goals through top-of-the-line technology resources, greatly improving profits and more efficient operations.

Experts: Schools need trained police, not just guard with a gun

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The student's attack began with a shotgun blast through the windows of a California high school. Rich Agundez, the El Cajon policeman assigned to the school, felt his mind shift into overdrive.

People yelled at him amid the chaos but he didn't hear. He experienced "a tunnel vision of concentration."

While two teachers and three students were injured when the glass shattered in the 2001 attack on Granite Hills High School, Agundez confronted the assailant and wounded him before he could get inside the school and use his second weapon, a handgun.

The National Rifle Association's response to a Connecticut school massacre envisions, in part, having trained, armed volunteers in every school in America. But Agundez, school safety experts and school board members say there's a huge difference between a trained law enforcement officer who becomes part of the school family ? and a guard with a gun.

The NRA's proposal has sparked a debate across the country as gun control rises once again as a national issue. President Barack Obama promised to present a plan in January to confront gun violence in the aftermath of the killing of 20 Sandy Hook Elementary School students and six teachers in Newtown, Conn.

Agundez said what happened before the shooting in the San Diego County school should frame the debate over the NRA's proposal.

With a shooting at another county school just weeks before, Agundez had trained the staff in how to lock down the school, assigned evacuation points, instructed teachers to lock doors, close curtains and turn off the lights. He even told them computers should be used where possible to communicate, to lessen the chaos.

And his training? A former SWAT team member, Agundez' preparation placed him in simulated stressful situations and taught him to evade a shooter's bullets. And the kids in the school knew to follow his advice because they knew him. He spoke in their classrooms and counseled them when they came to him with problems.

In the wake of the Sandy Hook massacre, school boards, administrators, teachers and parents are reviewing their security measures.

School security officers can range from the best-trained police officers to unarmed private guards. Some big-city districts with gang problems and crime formed their own police agencies years ago. Others, after the murder of 13 people at Columbine High School in 1999, started joint agreements with local police departments to have officers assigned to schools ? even though that was no guarantee of preventing violence. A trained police officer at Columbine confronted one of two shooters but couldn't prevent the death of 13 people.

"Our association would be uncomfortable with volunteers," said Mo Canady, executive director of the National Association of School Resource Officers ? whose members are mostly trained law enforcement officers who "become part of the school family.'"

Canady questioned how police officers responding to reports of a shooter would know whether the person with a gun is a volunteer or the assailant.

Former Rep. Asa Hutchinson, who also was a top Homeland Security official and will head the NRA effort, said the program will have two key elements.

One is a model security plan "based on the latest, most up-to-date technical information from the foremost experts in their fields." Each school could tweak the plan to its own circumstances, and "armed, trained, qualified school security personnel will be but one element."

The second element may prove the more controversial because, to avoid massive funding for local authorities, it would use volunteers. Hutchinson said in his home state of Arkansas, his son was a volunteer with a local group "Watchdog Dads," who volunteered at schools to patrol playgrounds and provide added security.

He said retired police officers, former members of the military or rescue personnel would be among those likely to volunteer.

There's even debate over whether anyone should have a gun in a school, even a trained law enforcement officer.

"In general teachers don't want guns in schools period," said Dennis Van Roekel, president of the National Education Association, one of the two large unions representing teachers. He added that one size does not fit all districts and said the union has supported schools that wanted a trained officer. Most teachers, he said, do not want to be armed themselves.

"It's a school. It's not a place where guns should be," he commented.

The security situation around the country is mixed.

?Maricopa County, Ariz., Sheriff Joe Arpaio says he has the authority to mobilize private citizens to fight crime and plans to post armed private posse members around the perimeter of schools. He said he hasn't spoken to specific school districts and doesn't plan to have the citizen posse members inside the buildings.

?The Snohomish School District north of Seattle got rid of its school officers because of the expense.

?The Las Vegas-based Clark County School District has its own police department and places armed officers in and around its 49 high school campuses. Officers patrol outside elementary and middle schools. The Washoe County School District in Nevada also has a police force, but it was only about a decade ago that the officers were authorized to carry guns on campus.

?In Milwaukee, a dozen city police officers cover the school district but spend most of their time in seven of the 25 high schools. In Madison, Wis., an armed police officer has worked in each of the district's four high schools since the mid-1990s.

?For the last five years, an armed police officer has worked in each of the two high schools and three middle schools in Champaign, Ill. Board of Education member Kristine Chalifoux said there are no plans to increase security, adding, "I don't want our country to become an armed police state."

?A Utah group is offering free concealed-weapons permit training for teachers as a result of the Connecticut shootings. Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne proposed a plan to allow one educator in each school to carry a gun.

Ed Massey, vice chairman of the Boone County, Ky., school board and president of the National School Boards Association, said his district has nine trained law enforcement officers for 23 schools and "would love to have one in every school."

"They bring a sense of security and have done tremendous work in deterring problems in school," he said. "The number of expulsions have dramatically decreased. We used to have 15 or 20 a year. Now we have one or two in the last three years."

An officer, he said, "is not just a hired gun. They have an office in the school. They are trained in crisis management, handling mass casualties and medical emergencies."

He said a poster given out by the local sheriff's department shows one of the officers and talks about literacy and reading.

Kenneth Trump, president of the National School Safety and Security Services consulting firm, said having trained officers in schools is "more of a prevention program than a reactive program if you have the right officers who want to work with kids."

But he also criticized a drop in funding for school security, saying, "Congress and the last two administrations have chipped away to the point of elimination of every program for school security and emergency planning."

Dr. Ronald Stephens, executive director of the National School Safety Center that provides training to schools, said the NRA's suggestion of using volunteers "is a whole new concept of school safety." He questioned whether the NRA wants to bring the best sharpshooters on campus.

"How is that going to create a positive atmosphere for young people?" he asked. "How does that work on the prevention side?"

Agundez, 52, who retired as a policeman in 2010, learned shortly before his retirement just how much his trained reaction to a shooter affected students at Granite Hills High.

He was writing a traffic ticket and the driver's whole body started shaking. He had been a student that day nine years earlier.

"He gave me a hug," Agundez recalled. "He said 'I always wanted to thank you.' You saved our lives."

___

Associated Press writers Todd Richmond, Michael Tarm, Greg Moore, Ken Ritter, Sandra Chereb and Donna Blankinship contributed to this report.

___

Follow Larry Margasak on Twitter at http://Twitter.com/LarryMargasak

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/experts-trained-police-needed-school-security-091515160--politics.html

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Obama to discuss fiscal cliff on NBC's 'Meet the Press'

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-discuss-fiscal-cliff-nbcs-meet-press-233117592--business.html

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Din of Hammers, Oil Wells Signal Bakersfield Boom

For most of its existence, Bakersfield has inhabited that awkward in-between place. Not as sophisticated as Los Angeles, just over the Tehachapi Mountains to the south, not as wealthy as its longtime economic rival Fresno, equidistant to the north.

But as many communities continue to struggle economically, good things are happening in this place best known for endless oil fields and the "Bakersfield Sound" ? a twangy style of steel guitar music made popular by hometown country crooners Buck Owens and Merle Haggard.

Bakersfield and surrounding Kern County find themselves in lofty positions on key national lists measuring economic vitality: No. 1 metro area for long-term private sector job growth, No. 1 county for construction gains and No. 1 large metro area for annual economic growth.

Cheap land, affordable housing, proximity to Los Angeles, a location that's within a three-hour drive of 90 percent of the state's population, and a planning department that doesn't throw up roadblocks are driving the region's economic revolution, business leaders say.

Caterpillar's new parts distribution center at the confluence of Interstate 5 and Highway 99, the state's two major north-south transportation arteries, went from handshake to grand opening last August in just eight months. It joined 35 other logistics centers near there such as Ikea, Frito Lay, Dollar General, Famous Footwear and Target, drawn to the county because it is a one-day turnaround for truckers delivering from San Francisco to San Diego.

The demand for industrial and office space has left Kern County with little inventory.

"Everything is moving," said David Wagner, contractor Wallace & Smith's superintendent on a 28,000-square-foot business complex that's now a skeleton of I-beams. "The developer already has tenants for this and it won't open until April."

The contractor just finished a 160,000-square-foot cold storage facility in Delano, a NASCAR-style racetrack and a regional blood bank. It has four apartment complexes under construction and will break ground in February on a minor league baseball stadium.

Electrician Bryce McCall wondered during the downturn whether he had chosen the right profession. Not anymore.

"My wife and I would discuss whether I would be better off going to the oil fields," he said as he drilled wiring conduits in a new garage at a new development. "Now the jobs are happening and we're starting to pick up."

There's such an active business climate that this fall the Kern County Economic Development Corporation and Bakersfield Californian newspaper bucked industry trends by launching a print paper, the Kern Business Journal, now on its second edition. A new east-west freeway through the middle of town is paved and close to opening.

Long reliant on agriculture and oil, there's diversity of industries emerging, with renewable energy and aerospace gaining a foothold.

At the Mojave Air and Space Port in southeast Kern County, Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo preps for the day it will carry passengers into suborbital space, and Paul Allen's Stratolaunch Systems is building the world's largest aircraft ? one that will carry rockets with commercial cargo and, eventually, passengers to the edge of space.

The wider, extended runway the company needs already was built. The space port complex has 400 acres pre-approved for construction.

Source: http://feeds.abcnews.com/click.phdo?i=e83a411e8c3f46d64b1d49a4051bde9c

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Norman Schwarzkopf Dead: Retired General Dies At 78

WASHINGTON ? Truth is, retired Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf didn't care much for his popular "Stormin' Norman" nickname.

The seemingly no-nonsense Desert Storm commander's reputed temper with aides and subordinates supposedly earned him that rough-and-ready moniker. But others around the general, who died Thursday in Tampa, Fla., at age 78 from complications from pneumonia, knew him as a friendly, talkative and even jovial figure who preferred the somewhat milder sobriquet given by his troops: "The Bear."

That one perhaps suited him better later in his life, when he supported various national causes and children's charities while eschewing the spotlight and resisting efforts to draft him to run for political office.

He lived out a quiet retirement in Tampa, where he'd served his last military assignment and where an elementary school bearing his name is testament to his standing in the community.

Schwarzkopf capped an illustrious military career by commanding the U.S.-led international coalition that drove Saddam Hussein's forces out of Kuwait in 1991 ? but he'd managed to keep a low profile in the public debate over the second Gulf War against Iraq, saying at one point that he doubted victory would be as easy as the White House and the Pentagon predicted.

Schwarzkopf was named commander in chief of U.S. Central Command at Tampa's MacDill Air Force Base in 1988, overseeing the headquarters for U.S. military and security concerns in nearly two dozen countries stretching across the Middle East to Afghanistan and the rest of central Asia, plus Pakistan.

When Saddam invaded Kuwait two years later to punish it for allegedly stealing Iraqi oil reserves, Schwarzkopf commanded Operation Desert Storm, the coalition of some 30 countries organized by President George H.W. Bush that succeeded in driving the Iraqis out.

At the peak of his postwar national celebrity, Schwarzkopf ? a self-proclaimed political independent ? rejected suggestions that he run for office, and remained far more private than other generals, although he did serve briefly as a military commentator for NBC.

While focused primarily on charitable enterprises in his later years, he campaigned for President George W. Bush in 2000, but was ambivalent about the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In early 2003 he told The Washington Post that the outcome was an unknown: "What is postwar Iraq going to look like, with the Kurds and the Sunnis and the Shiites? That's a huge question, to my mind. It really should be part of the overall campaign plan."

Initially Schwarzkopf had endorsed the invasion, saying he was convinced that Secretary of State Colin Powell had given the United Nations powerful evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. After that proved false, he said decisions to go to war should depend on what U.N. weapons inspectors found.

He seldom spoke up during the conflict, but in late 2004 he sharply criticized Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the Pentagon for mistakes that included erroneous judgments about Iraq and inadequate training for Army reservists sent there.

"In the final analysis I think we are behind schedule. ... I don't think we counted on it turning into jihad (holy war)," he said in an NBC interview.

Schwarzkopf was born Aug. 24, 1934, in Trenton, N.J., where his father, Col. H. Norman Schwarzkopf Jr., founder and commander of the New Jersey State Police, was then leading the investigation of the Lindbergh kidnap case. That investigation ended with the arrest and 1936 execution of German-born carpenter Richard Hauptmann for murdering famed aviator Charles Lindbergh's infant son.

The elder Schwarzkopf was named Herbert, but when the son was asked what his "H" stood for, he would reply, "H."

As a teenager Norman accompanied his father to Iran, where the elder Schwarzkopf trained the Iran's national police force and was an adviser to Reza Pahlavi, the young Shah of Iran.

Young Norman studied there and in Switzerland, Germany and Italy, then followed in his father's footsteps to West Point, graduating in 1956 with an engineering degree. After stints in the U.S. and abroad, he earned a master's degree in engineering at the University of Southern California and later taught missile engineering at West Point.

In 1966 he volunteered for Vietnam and served two tours, first as a U.S. adviser to South Vietnamese paratroops and later as a battalion commander in the U.S. Army's Americal Division. He earned three Silver Stars for valor ? including one for saving troops from a minefield ? plus a Bronze Star, a Purple Heart and three Distinguished Service Medals.

While many career officers left military service embittered by Vietnam, Schwarzkopf was among those who opted to stay and help rebuild the tattered Army into a potent, modernized all-volunteer force.

After Saddam invaded Kuwait in August 1990, Schwarzkopf played a key diplomatic role by helping persuade Saudi Arabia's King Fahd to allow U.S. and other foreign troops to deploy on Saudi territory as a staging area for the war to come.

On Jan. 17, 1991, a five-month buildup called Desert Shield became Operation Desert Storm as allied aircraft attacked Iraqi bases and Baghdad government facilities. The six-week aerial campaign climaxed with a massive ground offensive on Feb. 24-28, routing the Iraqis from Kuwait in 100 hours before U.S. officials called a halt.

Schwarzkopf said afterward he agreed with Bush's decision to stop the war rather than drive to Baghdad to capture Saddam, as his mission had been only to oust the Iraqis from Kuwait.

But in a desert tent meeting with vanquished Iraqi generals, he allowed a key concession on Iraq's use of helicopters, which later backfired by enabling Saddam to crack down more easily on rebellious Shiites and Kurds.

While he later avoided the public second-guessing by academics and think tank experts over the ambiguous outcome of the first Gulf War and its impact on the second Gulf War, he told The Washington Post in 2003, "You can't help but ... with 20/20 hindsight, go back and say, `Look, had we done something different, we probably wouldn't be facing what we are facing today.'"

After retiring from the Army in 1992, Schwarzkopf wrote a best-selling autobiography, "It Doesn't Take A Hero." Of his Gulf War role, he said: "I like to say I'm not a hero. I was lucky enough to lead a very successful war." He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II and honored with decorations from France, Britain, Belgium, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Bahrain.

Schwarzkopf was a national spokesman for prostate cancer awareness and for Recovery of the Grizzly Bear, served on the Nature Conservancy board of governors and was active in various charities for chronically ill children.

"I may have made my reputation as a general in the Army and I'm very proud of that," he once told The Associated Press. "But I've always felt that I was more than one-dimensional. I'd like to think I'm a caring human being. ... It's nice to feel that you have a purpose."

Schwarzkopf and his wife, Brenda, had three children: Cynthia, Jessica and Christian.

___

Stacy was the AP's Tampa, Fla., correspondent when he prepared this report on Schwarzkopf's life; he now reports from the AP bureau in Columbus, Ohio. Associated Press writers Richard Pyle in New York and Jay Lindsay in Boston contributed to this report.

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/27/norman-schwarzkopf-dead_n_2372657.html

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