STORIES FROM THE PAST
50 years ago
A don’t-fence-me-in suit for $260,000 was filed in Superior Court here yesterday by Walter F. and Annette Southard, owner operators of Salton Bay Marina.
$50,000 of that is a complaint for damages for alleged slander of Mrs. Southard by Walter Wright, director of the Salton Community Services District (SCSD).
Wright is one of nine plaintiffs named in the complaint. The others: Burl Robinson, Frank S. Jensen, also SCSD director Bob George, manager of SCSD, Joe D. Brown and Daniel A. Weber as directors of Salton Sea Marina Estates, Imperial Irrigation District and Salton Riviera Marina, Inc.
The suit claims that the Southards have a valid easement to their property, known as the Middle Marina, via a macadam driveway over the adjacent Brown property to the south. Use of the driveway and a macadam parking lot on the Middle Marina were by implication, says the complaint, conveyed to the Southards in November, 1959.
40 years ago
Better jobs, higher pay and public welfare family support subsidies are attracting a near record number of illegal aliens to the United States, the Immigration and Naturalization Service reports.
Increase enter during March has prompted wide-scale border enforcement especially in the El Centro sector where Border Patrol officials are anticipating the largest, single-month illegal alien apprehension rate since the 1950’s.
And despite some published views that illegal aliens are normally employed in menial jobs most Americans refuse to consider, official 1976 apprehension figures indicate many illegal aliens are well positioned and well paid in the U.S.
One Mexican citizen apprehended last year for illegal residency was the owner of its own bar business.
30 years ago
CALEXICO — As the number of cars and people crossing the border here continues to plummet, complaints against port officials are on the rise.
In January and February the number of people crossing the border here declined by 500,000 compared to the number of crossers in the first two months of last year.
In recent months county Supervisor Luis Legaspi, the Calexico Chamber of Commerce, the Downtown Merchants Association and the mayor have written letters to federal representatives complaining about the delays at the port of entry which residents here say are driving Mexicali shoppers away and killing this city’s economy.