The four-lane Highway through American Canyon will have to be widened to six lanes to meet the ever-growing number of cars and commercial trucks, according to a city study.

No formal budget process. No rules to prevent fraud. Few rules for the role of executive director.

A very close contest at the Napa City Council ended with a 4-1 score in favor of the Napa Little League’s controversial, partially-built batting cage at Garfield Park.

The 2007 weed abatement season has started, and the city of Napa fire department is taking it seriously.

A preliminary investigation of a fire that destroyed a garage in the 2400 block of Shoreline Drive on Monday afternoon points to a running dryer.

Federal scientists confirmed to Napa County officials Tuesday that a moth caught earlier this month in central Napa is a foreign grape pest that could spread through the wine country this summer.

A woman came home to find a man inside the common area of her apartment in a Victorian house in the 700 block of Seminary Street.

A defect in the Imola water tank’s automatic valve may be to blame for the over-chlorination of tens of thousands of gallons of Napa city water Monday morning.

An Upcoming Services item on May 15 misstated the date of services for Peter Marciano. The services are May 28 at 10:30 a.m. at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church in Calistoga.

The city of Napa will soon grow to by 142 acres, as the Napa City Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to annex south Napa properties owned by the Ghisletta family and the Napa Valley Horsemen’s Association.

Two Calistoga children were able Tuesday to get away from a man who police said was trying to sexually assault them.

HAVANA — The golden arches are nowhere to be found. There’s not a single Starbucks or Wal-Mart, and no way to buy a Budweiser, a Corvette or a Dell.

WASHINGTON  — The House voted Tuesday to pay off up to $60,000 in student loans for lawyers who commit to working as public defenders or prosecutors for at least three years.

CHICAGO — The U.S. health care system is “a dysfunctional mess” and politicians who insist otherwise look ignorant, according to a medical journal essay by a prominent ethicist at the National Institutes of Health.

WASHINGTON — President Bush loves fishing, so people aiming to impress him often go that direction. Last year alone, he was given three rods and three reels along with assorted other equipment to the tune of more than $2,600. That’s in addition to at least eight other rods he’s received as gifts during his presidency.

SACRAMENTO  — Severe prison crowding is complicating efforts to improve California’s abysmal inmate health care system, a court-appointed receiver warned Tuesday in a report that also said any remedies will be costly.

SAN FRANCISCO — The Schwarzenegger administration proposed completing a new execution chamber at San Quentin State Prison and providing more oversight of prison officials Tuesday, seeking to satisfy a federal judge who ordered California to come up with a more humane way of executing death row inmates.

LYNCHBURG, Va. — The Rev. Jerry Falwell collapsed at his campus office and died Tuesday after a career in which the evangelist used the power of television to transform the religious right into a mighty force in American politics. He was 73.

LAFAYETTE, Tenn.  — The state has closed a day care facility after a worker allegedly hid crying infants in a storage room during an unannounced inspection, possibly to disguise inadequate staffing, officials said.

DENVER — Severe thunderstorms sent normally placid streams over their banks across the Denver area, sweeping away a 2-year-old boy in a stroller and a teenager who was trying to help with a rescue. Both were presumed dead, police said.

LOS ANGELES — A jury recommended death Tuesday for a one-time pizza deliveryman who strangled 10 women and killed a victim’s fetus in drug-plagued areas of the city.

McLEAN, Va.  — XM Satellite Radio suspended shock jocks Opie and Anthony for 30 days Tuesday, one week after they aired crude sex comments about Condoleezza Rice, Laura Bush and Queen Elizabeth and one day after they made light of the incident in their broadcast.

DALLAS — Latino activists and civil liberties advocates asked a federal judge Tuesday to block a voter-approved ordinance that prohibits landlords from renting apartments to most illegal immigrants in the Dallas suburb of Farmers Branch.

ELIZABETH, N.J. — A judge threw out convictions Tuesday against a man who served more than two decades in prison for the rape and murder of two children after a DNA test showed a neighbor may have committed the crimes.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Under pressure from their rivals, the leading Republican presidential contenders defended their conservative credentials on abortion, gun control and tax cuts in a feisty debate Tuesday night.

WASHINGTON — A top Justice Department official thought President Bush’s no-warrant wiretapping program was so questionable that he refused for a time to reauthorize it, leading to a standoff with White House officials at the bedside of the ailing attorney general, a Senate panel was told Tuesday.

SAN FRANCISCO — Veterinarians are seeking a new home for Astro, the young sea lion who crashed a walk-a-thon last week and completed one lap in the elementary school fundraiser.

Nurses at the Veterans Home of California at Yountville call 88-year-old resident Marie Lumos "a pistol," and it's easy to see why.

When it comes to games based on movies, the rule generally is that the game isn't going to be very good. In fact, the game is usually going to be bad -- a poorly created rush job with nothing but money in mind.

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