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Bakersfield builder M.S. Walker Companies has won a design award for its Southern California Orthopedic Institute building at 2400 Bahamas Drive in the southwest.

The company won in the private sector-under $15 million category of the 2009 Design Build Industry Association, Western Pacific region.

Jurors said the building’s “striking architecture molded into a difficult site” set it apart from other entries, according to an M.S. Walker press release.
 

The lack of construction activity at the future site of a Hooters has sparked rumors that the Atlanta-based restaurant chain may be rethinking plans for Bakersfield, but the local franchisee says the eatery is still coming to Rosedale Square on Rosedale Highway.

The shell building is built and tenant improvement plans are proceeding through the county, according to Parco Holdings LP, which operates restaurants in Fresno, Sacramento and Hawaii.

The company says full build-out will take about five months from receiving the building permits, which Parco Holdings anticipates “receiving shortly,” it said.

Manpower put out its annual survey today on the 10 hardest jobs to fill, accoring to U.S. employers who respnded.

They are:

1. Engineers

2. Nurses

3. Skilled/Manual Trades

4. Teachers

5. Sales Representatives

6. Technicians

7. Drivers

8. IT Staff

9. Laborers

10. Machinist/Machine Operators

Does this hold true in Bakersfield?

A news release straight from Naval Air Weapons Station:

NAVAL AIR WEAPONS STATION CHINA LAKE, Calif. - The Fleet and Family Support Center will host a job fair at the Paradise Community Center on Station Thursday, July 16, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.  Anyone looking for a job or who have current or future employment opportunities available are invited to participate.

Personnel interested in employment should bring copies of their resume and come dressed for success.  This is a chance to speak directly with employment recruiters and gather career information.

Companies interested in participating will be assigned a six-foot table to display materials.  Additional display systems are also welcome.  If you wish to conduct on-site interviews, please let the coordinator, Joan Telles, know in advance at (760) 939-4553.  Pre-registration is required and may be made by calling Telles.

Employers who have already registered for the event include DCS Corporation, Computer Science Corporation, Booz Allen Hamilton, Jacobs Naval System Group, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Employment Development Department; AECOM/AGS, Systems Application & Technologies, New Direction Technologies Inc., Saalex Solutions Inc., Wyle Laboratories, the Naval Air Warfare Center,  the Naval Air Weapons Station Community Support Department, Cerro Coso Community College, Embry Riddle, AltaOne Federal Credit Union and Dynamics Information Technology.

For more information, please contact Telles at the above number or Andrew Lara at (760) 939-4545.

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Get a glimpse of the homes that are selling in Bakersfield on our maps.

See a year’s worth of sales data and maps.

We publish single-family home sale transactions, as well as foreclosures.

The homes are color-coded by price, with information from First American Real Estate Solutions.

This week’s data, which covers March 30 to April 5, is spread over two maps, one for March and one for April.

Highlights include:

106 homes are newly plotted on the maps.

Priciest? One sold for $585,000 in the 93311 ZIP code. It was 4,683 square feet.

Cheapest? One sold for $41,000 in the 93305 ZIP code. It was 1,212 square feet.

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Financial complications have again delayed the reopening of downtown's landmark Padre Hotel, reporter John Cox writes.

Unable to get an acceptable loan for the hotel's furniture, fixtures and equipment, the Padre's owners have asked the city of Bakersfield to borrow $1.8 million in federal money to cover some of their costs. The property's owners -- and not the city -- would be expected to repay the sum.

The Padre is considered key to downtown's tourism and entertainment future. It was to reopen as a boutique hotel by late June, following multiple delays under former and current ownership.

Read the full story here.

To support surging demand for mobile broadband in its greater Los Angeles region, which includes Bakersfield, AT&T has strengthened 3G wireless coverage by launching additional wireless spectrum.

The new spectrum improves in-building wireless coverage and adds capacity to support more mobile data use, the company said.

The new spectrum, 850 MHz, has been added to the existing 1,900 MHz spectrum in the region. The result is an increase in overall network capacity, especially for AT&T 3G customers, who should receive improved quality and coverage throughout the area, AT&T said.

Lift-You-Up make-up studio and spa and The Lounge Barber Shop opened in downtown’s Wall Street alley April 30, and will stage a grand opening celebration at 5 p.m. Saturday.

The grand opening will feature tours, food and music at the adjoined barber shop and spa, which are next to Guthrie’s at 1520 Wall Street Alley, Suite A.

Donna Sam, a stylist, opened the 1,200-square-foot business with her son, Matthew, a barber, and her daughter Natasha, a makeup artist.

For information call the salon and spa at 377-0338 or the barber shop at 377-0339.
 

Home prices in Bakersfield fell 25.16 percent in March compared with a year earlier, while national housing prices fell 11.5 percent during the same period, according to First American CoreLogic’s Home Price Index.

In February, Bakersfield home prices fell 27.88 percent compared to one year prior.

Two trends are emerging: Price declines are slowing in the states that have had the highest declines over the past three years, but declines are accelerating in states that have been experiencing only moderate decreases, First American CoreLogic said.

Price declines gained steam in 33 states in the last three months. Forty-four states saw home prices fall in March, compared with 30 states a year ago.

Nevada (-25.9 percent) remained the top ranked state for annual price depreciation, followed closely by California (-24.9 percent).

Santa Ana-based First American CoreLogic produces data and analytic tools for the real estate industry.

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This summer, some workers may be spending less time at the beach and more time in the office. 

More than 35 percent of survey respondents said they haven’t gone on or aren’t planning to take a vacation this year, according to CareerBuilder.com.

The survey also reported that one in five workers are either afraid of losing their jobs if they go on vacation, or feel guilty being away from the office. Plus, 50 percent of employers said they expect workers to check in with the office while they’re away.

What are people in Bakersfield doing? Read reporter Katie Steiner's full story here.

What are your plans?

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Murray Family Farms’ pick-your-own fruit season officially opens Friday.

The family business has locations at 6700 General Beale Road at Highway 58 and 9557 Copus Road at Interstate 5.

Murray Family Farms, owned by Vicki and Steve Murray, will be open 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day. The Highway 58 location has an ant farm and petting zoo.

Carters Machine recently expanded its family owned business to include a facility at 1066 Carrier Parkway Ave.

The machining business first opened in 2001 at 1830 Norris Road, owner Barbara Carter said. The new facility opened in February.

Carter said it’s challenging to find skilled employees to help with its technology, which range from food processing to aerospace equipment.

A ribbon cutting for the new facility will be held at 1 p.m. Saturday.

The Kern County Society for Human Resource Management received the Superior Merit Chapter award from the Society for Human Resource Management.

Brandi Evans, marketing director for the local society’s board of directors, said the recognition means the Kern County chapter met the national organizations’s standards for serving the human resources community.

“It’s to say we’re doing above and beyond what we’re supposed to be doing,” she said.

The local chapter is one of 43 receiving the distinction in SHRM’s Pacific West Region, which is made up of nine states.

A new apartment complex for senior citizens has opened in Bakersfield.

The Village Park Senior Apartments, 2300 R St., features 56 one-bedroom and four two-bedroom apartments.

Since the facility opened April 15, 45 residents have moved in, said Stephen Pelz, executive director of the Housing Authority of the County of Kern.

Pelz said the rest of the apartments should be filled by the end of the month. However, applications are still being accepted.

One bedroom apartments rent for $273 a month, while the two-bedroom units go for $324.

A grand opening for the apartments will be held at 10 a.m. May 28.

U.S. Bank signs have gone up at 173 former Downey Savings & Loan locations in California and Arizona, including the one at 4550 Coffee Road in Bakersfield.

The sign change happened Saturday as part of U.S. Bank’s acquisition of Newport Beach, Calif.-based Downey Savings & Loan.

All former Downey customers can now do business at any of the 2,847 U.S. Bank offices throughout the United States.

U.S. Bank now has a total of 559 branches and 890 ATMs in California. Locally, it has ATMS inside four Walgreens drug stores.

Minneapolis-based U.S. Bancorp (NYSE: USB), with $264 billion in assets, is the parent company of U.S. Bank, the sixth largest commercial bank in the United States.

It acquired Downey Savings & Loan and PFF Bank & Trust, headquartered in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. last November.

Two Kern-based banks — Bakersfield’s Mission Bank and Mojave Desert Bank N.A., of Mojave — have made it onto a list of the state’s top performers in 2008.

Based on their year-end operating results, Mission Bank was rated “super premier” by The Findley Reports, and Mojave Desert Bank was rated “premier.”

The list also ranked two other institutions with strong local ties. They are: Ontario-based Citizens Business Bank (“super premier”), and Porterville’s Bank of the Sierra (“premier”).

Thomasville Furniture Industries says it will stand behind local customers who purchased furniture from a bankrupt independent dealer that closed before customers got refunds or their furniture.

TJ3 Styles of Santa Clarita, owner of Thomasville Home Furnishings of Bakersfield, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection in March, but was taking deposits on new orders just days before it closed last week.

The store's Thomasville, N.C., supplier says it never got the money, but will honor those orders anyway.

"Please understand that this process may take several weeks," company spokesman John Hastings wrote in an e-mail sent over the weekend. "Thomasville needs to obtain sales records from the store owner and transfer inventory to a new location."

In the coming weeks, customers will be contacted by Thomasville Furniture Industry's customer service department to fill them in on the status of their purchases and arrange delivery dates, Hastings wrote.

Anyone with questions may contact customer service at (800) 225-0265 or info@thomasville.com.

— Courtenay Edelhart

Small businesses suffering financial hardship as a result of the slow economy may be eligible to receive temporary relief through a new loan program the U.S. Small Business Administration announced Monday.

Starting June 15, SBA will start guaranteeing America’s Recovery Capital (ARC) loans. ARC loans are deferred-payment loans of up to $35,000. The loans are interest-free and have no SBA fees.

The ARC program was created as part of the Recovery Act to help small businesses that have a history of good performance, but are struggling to make debt payments since the recession.

The loans will be made by commercial lenders, not SBA directly. For more information visit www.sba.gov.

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There are lots of good home deals out there. Get a snapshot of what's selling on our maps.

See a year's worth of sales data and maps.

We publish single-family home sale transactions, as well as foreclosures.

The homes are color-coded by price, with information from First American Real Estate Solutions.

Highlights for March 22 to 29:

118 homes are newly listed on the map.

Priciest? One sold for $557,000 in the 93314 ZIP code. It was 3,531 square feet.

Cheapest? Two sold for $45,000 each. Both in the 93305 ZIP code, one was a duplex with 2,407 square feet and the other was a single-family home at 893 square feet.

Usually around this time of year, teenagers have no trouble lining up jobs for the summer. This year, however, they'll probably find there aren't many jobs out there.

Renee Wood, founder of Teens4Hire.org, described the situation as a "doomsday forecast" and said only one out of three teenagers will find a job for this summer.

And with Kern County's unemployment rate soaring to 15.9 percent in March, it looks like teens here will face an uphill battle when looking for summer employment.

"It's not like before, when they applied for jobs they just got them," said Salvador Gochez, counselor for the Kern High School District Regional Occupational Center. "There were a lot of jobs open. Now they don't have that many openings out there."

READ THE FULL STORY HERE

So what was your first summer job? How much did you make? 

M.D. Manufacturing, a Bakersfield maker of central vacuum cleaners, has expanded into a new building at 34970 McMurtrey Ave.

The 74,000-square-foot facility, built to suit by MS Walker & Associates, is twice the size of the building M.D. Manufacturing vacated in early April at Union Avenue and Brundage Lane. It houses all the company’s manufacturing, inventory, sales and support staff.

M.D. Manufacturing employs about 30 workers, up from six when the company started in 1988. It has dealers nationwide, and its products are sold in 50 countries.

John William University has announced it will close its four-year Bakersfield law program and move to new offices in the same 19th Street building where it will continue to offer a paralegal certification program.

Since opening five years ago at 1527 19th St., the school has struggled to attract a sufficient number of students, spokeswoman Sharon Kinney said in a news release. This semester will be the law school’s last, the release states.

The paralegal program begun about a year ago will continue to operate in the same building but in new quarters at 1525 19th St., according to the release.
 

The U.S. Census Bureau is opening 27 new offices in its southern California region to get ready for next year’s decennial survey. One of them will be in Bakersfield.

Census officials are still scouting locations so it’s not clear exactly where the new office will be, but the government is looking to hire six local managers to work in the facility overseeing legions of enumerator/listers and support personnel.

The management jobs to be filled are: assistant manager for technology, assistant manager for quality assurance, assistant manager for recruiting and assistant manager for administration, all of which pay $19.25 an hour; as well as an assistant manager for field operations, $22.50; and local census office manager, $27 an hour.

Applicants for those positions will need to have prior management experience, said Aaron Garcia, an assistant manager for recruiting in the census’ Fresno office.

All census applicants, including those vying for non-management positions, need to take a basic skills test to measure reading, writing and computation skills.

To find the time and location of an upcoming test, call (866) 861-2010.
 

State Farm announced Thursday that it will cut rates paid by its California auto insurance customers by an average of 8 percent, for a total of $219 million, effective July 6.

The insurer said the reduction, the size of which may vary among individual customers, is based on a long-term trend of improving claims submitted by ratepayers.

State Farm, which touts itself as California’s largest auto insurer with 3.3 million policies statewide, said it has cut its rates four times since 2004, resulting in total customer savings of more than $1 billion.

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The owner of Big West refinery in Bakersfield expects to sell the plant this summer, according to an internal memo that some suggest may be overly optimistic.

The May 4 memo, said to have been issued by top management at Utah-based Flying J Inc., states that interest in the refinery “has been good, but there is much work to do,” in part because of the company’s cumbersome bankruptcy case.

When the memo came up Wednesday in a meeting at the Rosedale Highway refinery, some in attendance expressed worries that workers laid off from jobs at the refinery would find hope in the document and stop looking for work elsewhere, union official Ed Huhn said.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE.

A Bakersfield warehouse equipment distributor, Power Machinery Center, has won a 2008 Dealer Service Excellence Program Award from Nissan Forklift Corp.

The company, which also has a location in Oxnard, was among 11 dealers nationwide awarded the corporation’s silver-level award. Seven won at the gold level, two at the bronze.

Nissan said companies are considered for the honor based on their after-market service management, product service and factory-supported training, service marketing and service finance and administration.

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Thirty-three students graduated Friday from the Greater Bakersfield Chamber of Commerce Youth Leadership program.

The sophomores, juniors and seniors from 15 high schools studied the community, met with local leaders and learned about careers and community service opportunities.

The graduates are: Amanda Acosta, Frontier; Taylor Alderete, Stockdale; Susan Beckerman, South; Jake Bentley, BHS; Emma Borba, Ridgeview; Ian Chiles, BHS; Joseph Cho, Ridgeview;  Stephanie Dittman, Centennial; Rachelle Ehteshami, Garces; Angelica Evans, East; Kristen Ewert, Centennial; Saleh Fadhel, Mira Monte;  Celina Franco, Mira Monte; Priscilla Gomez, Centennial; Samantha Gonzalez, Highland; Lauren Griggs, Ridgeview.

They also include: LeeAnna Horton, Golden Valley; Kuljeet Kaberwal, West; Adam Lewis, Foothill; Nicholas Lopez, Highland; Cassidy McGugan, Liberty; Rogelio Molina, BHS; Christopher Moore, Liberty; Andrew Morales, Highland; Amanda Mosby, North; Vincent Oddo, Bakersfield Christian; Yanneli Ponce, Highland; Crystal Rodriguez, Foothill; Danielle Rodriguez, East; Danitza Romo, Stockdale; Kori Thomas, Golden Valley; Jacob Williams, Ridgeview; and Maria Zepeda, Foothill.

 

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Auto insurer GEICO will host a grand opening for its newest office from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday at 5550 California Ave., Suite 101.

Sprint Cup Series #13 NASCAR show driver “Mad” Max Papis, who is sponsored by GEICO, will make a guest appearance handing out autograph cards.

The company’s gecko lizard mascot will make a guest appearance, too.

GEICO (Government Employees Insurance Co.) is the nation’s third largest car insurer.

The new office is its only location in Kern County.
 

Work Force Staffing, a locally owned employment firm, will break ground on a new facility at 9 a.m. Thursday at 300 Truxtun Ave.

Owned by Brooks and Donna Whitehead, Work Force Staffing has 13 permanent employees and provides hundreds of temporary employees in clerical and industrial services.

Its new facility will consist of two buildings. One will be 4,700 square feet and the other will be 8,000 square feet.

They’re designed by Roger Stevens Architect and will be built by Wallace and Smith Construction.

The project is scheduled for completion by December and the company plans to relocate from current offices at 5100 California Ave. in January.

Everyone has a story when it comes to how the economy is impacting them.

Have you cut back on or eliminated dinners out? Found a great new buy at a local store? Vowed to keep the air conditioner off? Started growing your own vegetables?

Perhaps we as a community can pick up some tips from one another.

Tell your story in no more than 250 words. Send a photo too, if you have one.

Be sure to include your name and phone number so we may consider your comments for publication. Send to: cpeterson@bakersfield.com or to Newsroom, The Bakersfield Californian, attention Christine Peterson, P.O. Bin 440, Bakersfield, CA 93302.

The due date is Tuesday, May 12.

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If you're curious about buying or selling a home, see what other property is going for on our maps.

Click to see a year's worth of sales data and maps.

We publish single-family home sale transactions, as well as foreclosures.

The homes are color-coded by price, with information from First American Real Estate Solutions.

Highlights for March 9 to 15:

105 homes are newly listed on the map.

Priciest? One sold for $599,000 in the 93311 ZIP code. It was 3,146 square feet.

Cheapest? One sold for $24,000 in the 93304 ZIP code. It was 1,097 square feet.

— Christine Peterson