The Friends of the Nature Trail volunteering their time to upkeep the local thoroughfare and putting a garbage can at the base of the trail, making trash and doggy dropping disposal inexcusably convenient
 		  
 
DHS student Abe Ott, 16, for winning the prestigious Congressional Leadership Award for his more than 100 hours of community service  
 
“Tea Party Queen” Michelle Bachmann announcing that she will not run for re-election in 2014, signaling a hopeful end to politics’ short but alarming backwards slide into the dark ages   
 		  
Local firefighters responding to 28 forest fires so far this season, the majority of which were caused by careless campers who left fires unattended or did not extinguish them fully
 
 

Bureau of Reclamation’s recent revelation that by 2060, the Colorado River Basin will see a shortage of 3.2 million acre-feet of water, enough to supply 6 million households a year
 

  
 
   
History repeating itself, with signs of another housing bubble as house-flipping hits a feverish 10-year high in California and the local market appears to be returning to a pre-recession frenzy