After early start, worst of flu season may be over

NEW YORK (AP) — The worst of the flu season appears to be over.

The number of states reporting intense or widespread illnesses dropped again last week, and in a few states there was very little flu going around, U.S. health officials said Friday.

The season started earlier than normal, first in the Southeast and then spreading. But now, by some measures, flu activity has been ebbing for at least four weeks in much of the country. Flu and pneumonia deaths also dropped the last two weeks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

"It's likely that the worst of the current flu season is over," CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said.

But flu is hard to predict, he and others stressed, and there have been spikes late in the season in the past.

For now, states like Georgia and New York — where doctor's offices were jammed a few weeks ago — are reporting low flu activity. The hot spots are now the West Coast and the Southwest.

Among the places that have seen a drop: Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest in Allentown, Pa., which put up a tent outside its emergency room last month to help deal with the steady stream of patients. There were about 100 patients each day back then. Now it's down to 25 and the hospital may pack up its tent next week, said Terry Burger, director of infection control and prevention for the hospital.

"There's no question that we're seeing a decline," she said.

In early December, CDC officials announced flu season had arrived, a month earlier than usual. They were worried, saying it had been nine years since a winter flu season started like this one. That was 2003-04 — one of the deadliest seasons in the past 35 years, with more than 48,000 deaths.

Like this year, the major flu strain was one that tends to make people sicker, especially the elderly, who are most vulnerable to flu and its complications

But back then, that year's flu vaccine wasn't made to protect against that bug, and fewer people got flu shots. The vaccine is reformulated almost every year, and the CDC has said this year's vaccine is a good match to the types that are circulating. A preliminary CDC study showed it is about 60 percent effective, which is close to the average.

So far, the season has been labeled moderately severe.

Like others, Lehigh Valley's Burger was cautious about making predictions. "I'm not certain we're completely out of the woods," with more wintry weather ahead and people likely to be packed indoors where flu can spread around, she said.

The government does not keep a running tally of flu-related deaths in adults, but has received reports of 59 deaths in children. The most — nine — were in Texas, where flu activity was still high last week. Roughly 100 children die in an average flu season, the CDC says

On average, about 24,000 Americans die each flu season, according to the CDC.

According to the CDC report, the number of states with intense activity is down to 19, from 24 the previous week, and flu is widespread in 38 states, down from 42.

Flu is now minimal in Florida, Kentucky, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

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Online:

CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/

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Villaraigosa backs half-cent hike in sales tax

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa on Friday backed the half-cent sales tax hike on the March 5 ballot, which is being pushed as a way to shield the Police Department and other public safety agencies from employee cuts.

The increase, which is backed by some key business leaders and labor leaders as a means to preserve public services, would push the city's sales tax rate to 9.5%, among the highest in the state.

Villaraigosa did not give his reasons for backing Proposition A, saying through a spokesman that he would make a statement next week. A day earlier, the city's top budget analyst warned that a defeat of the measure, which would generate nearly enough to erase a $216-million budget shortfall, could require cutting at least 500 police officers.

That would largely undo one of Villaraigosa's signature accomplishments during his two terms in office: adding 800 officers to the LAPD, despite a major recession.

Mayoral candidate Kevin James, who opposes the tax increase, said it would hurt the city's economy. He also questioned Villaraigosa's insistence on keeping LAPD staffing at 10,000 officers.

"It's not about any magic number. It's about the number of officers out in the community. And when we have so many officers behind the desk because of outdated technology and outdated policies, that's where the failed leadership is," he said.

Villaraigosa spokesman Peter Sanders declined to respond, but noted in an email that the city's crime rates are "at their lowest since the 1950s."

If Proposition A passes, Villaraigosa will conclude his time in office with a sales tax increase focused on public safety — an idea he fiercely denounced the year he became mayor.

In 2005, Villaraigosa — then seeking to unseat Mayor James Hahn — blocked Hahn's effort to place a sales tax increase on the ballot to pay for 1,000 more officers. That vote came at a time of intense debate over how to pay for an expansion of the LAPD.

Villaraigosa promised to find another way to pay for 1,000 additional officers and succeed where Hahn failed.

As mayor, Villaraigosa convinced the City Council to triple the trash fee for homeowners from $11 to $36.32 per month, saying that the proceeds would pay for more police. Once the budget crisis hit, however, the city found that it did not have enough money for both the police buildup and other programs.

Thousands of positions in other departments were reduced as the hiring of additional officers continued.

Villaraigosa previously said he would not support the tax unless the City Council took steps to ensure that the number of police officers would not be reduced. He also demanded that the council eliminate 209 civilian positions, a majority of them in the LAPD.

City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana said Friday that those positions no longer exist.

david.zahniser@latimes.com

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Lens Blog: Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen's Photos of Her Newcastle Neighborhood

On clear days in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, a small yet bustling working-class city in northeast England, the view from the hills of Byker can be spectacular. That shabby neighborhood’s rows of brick houses and terraced streets overlook a historic city center, the river and sometimes far beyond.

Those vistas were rare in 1969, when Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen, a 21-year-old Finnish photographer, arrived. The landscape was cloaked in an industrial fog belched from the coal and shipbuilding industries.

Despite the grayness, the laughter and vivacity that radiated from this close-knit community appealed to Ms. Konttinen. It welcomed a young foreigner whose presence stoked curiosity, but also generosity. They joked with her in pubs. Some of the older women took her under their wing — she kindled a protective instinct in them.

“People were baffled by my choice to live there,” Ms. Konttinen recalled. “Not that many people had any idea where Finland was, but if they did, they thought it such a beautiful clean country, and why would I choose to come to Byker?”

She had ventured there because of Amber Collective, a progressive documentary project that she helped found, which chronicled the lives of working people in northeast England. The group was formed in London by a handful of students who made a film following Vietnam War demonstrations at Grosvenor Square that turned violent. Titled “All You Need Is Dynamite,” it was just a student effort, but its makers found they shared a philosophy.

Before long, they had relocated to Newcastle.

The city was in decline. Urban planners sought flashy new development projects, and some sections, like Byker, were scheduled for demolition. Ms. Konttinen was unaware that she was documenting a place that was about to disappear. Not drawn to gloomy topics, she found the place spirited and interesting.

“Initially, I don’t think we ever thought that we need to document it because it will be the only thing left for people to remember the place and what the area was like,” she said. “I personally have never felt that that was my mission.”

The Amber Collective has produced an enormous amount of material, dating back decades, that is focused on the communities of northeast England, although Ms. Konttinen’s Byker pictures are probably the collective’s best-known project. That work was published as a book in 1983; Amber also released a film companion of the same name, and in 2011 her documentation was registered with the Unesco U.K. Memory of the World. For the first time in a commercial art space, photographs from the series will be shown in the United States, on view at the L. Parker Stephenson Gallery from Feb. 15 through May 11. Ms. Konttinen will also deliver a lecture at the International Center for Photography on Feb. 13.

In recent years, she returned to Byker. The new Byker is changed — more on that Friday — and the changes required her to reconsider her approach when she decided to photograph it. The newer project, “Byker Revisited,” is a result of a far more collaborative endeavor. Not that she hadn’t collaborated in other ways with a subject before. Her 1971 photo of Heather (Slide 3) brought about one such relationship.

“I heard music coming from a derelict house,” she said. “This was one of the last terraces before the final demolition, and there were no steps left to the house, but upstairs I heard music, piano, coming out the windows.”

She entered the house, climbing a rickety staircase to where the music was coming from. She found a girl, Heather, “playing the piano, banging the notes that were kind of stuck and unstuck.”

Ms. Konttinen and Heather started talking, and Ms. Konttinen taught her a simple tune.

“I told her if she ever wanted to come and play, she could come and play it again on my piano,” Ms. Konttinen said. Heather showed up a few days later, with her little brother. On Ms. Konttinen’s piano, they played the tune together.

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Friday: Returning to Byker, in color.

Photographs from “Byker” will be on view at the L. Parker Stephenson Gallery from Feb. 15 through May 11. Ms. Konttinen will also deliver a lecture at the International Center for Photography on Feb. 13.

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American Idol: Early Favorites Eliminated in Hollywood

TV Watch

American Idol

By Steve Helling

02/07/2013 at 10:30 PM EST

From left: Randy Jackson, Mariah Carey, Ryan Seacrest, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban

Michael Becker/FOX.

At the beginning of Thursday's American Idol, there were 43 men left in the competition. The next hour was a bloodbath, with many tears and a few tantrums – as well as some standout performances. Curtis Finch Jr., for example, performed a version of Christina Perri's "Jar Of Hearts" that was arguably the strongest of the evening. It may be the season's most overdone song, yet Finch successfully infused it with a rising gospel vibe.

Like every reality show, the contestants learned valuable life lessons as they fought to stay in the game. Here are five:

1. Never Let Them See You Sweat
Paul Jolley looked like he was going to throw up when he took the stage. "I'm so nervous," he said as he fought back tears. The judges watched quietly as he pulled himself together and gave a strong performance of Carrie Underwood's "Blown Away." He advanced, but not before Nicki Minaj criticized him for showing his nerves. "You walked out so defeated and that really irritated me," she said. "Just give us one minute of professionalism."

2. Be Funny and Unexpected
Admit it: It was kind of funny watching Gurpreet Singh Sarin nail "Georgia On My Mind." The judges liked him, perhaps because he doesn't fit any mold. Neither does Charlie Askew, who worked his quirky awkwardness into an intriguing version of Gotye's "Somebody that I Used To Know," complete with a spoken-word intro. "I am obsessed with you," Minaj said, prompting Askew to respond, "Baby, I could say the same thing." She ate it up.

3. Too Much of A Good Thing Can Be Lethal
Matheus Fernandes, one of the standouts from the Los Angeles auditions, was eliminated after a shaky rendition of Kelly Clarkson's "Stronger." The 4'9" contestant made one too many self-depreciating comments about his height, prompting Minaj to say, "Sometimes things can go from being inspiring to becoming you wanting a pity party." When Carey called him a "good person," his face said it all – Fernandes knew he wouldn't be advancing to the next round. In contrast, Lazaro Arbos said nary a word about his stutter, yet he advanced easily, despite an unspectacular rendition of Lady Gaga's "Edge of Glory."

4. If You Lose, Lose Gracefully
The night's "Sour Grapes Award" goes to Papa Peachez, who performed a karaoke-worthy version of Gaga's "Yoü and I." Minaj was unimpressed. "I'm so disappointed," she said. "I don't know why you chose that song." After he was eliminated, Peachez decided he didn't want to win American Idol, after all. "This isn't the competition for me," he said. "I just don't like singing other people's songs."

5. Big Risks Can Reap Big Rewards
Nick Boddington was eliminated in Las Vegas last season, so he came back determined to take some risks. He accompanied himself on the piano while singing Grace Potter's "Stars." It was a strong performance that the judges loved.

After the dust settled, 28 contestants remained. The judges corralled them onto the stage and announced that they would eliminate eight more male contestants next week, after the ladies' auditions.

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Southern diet, fried foods, may raise stroke risk

Deep-fried foods may be causing trouble in the Deep South. People whose diets are heavy on them and sugary drinks like sweet tea and soda were more likely to suffer a stroke, a new study finds.

It's the first big look at diet and strokes, and researchers say it might help explain why blacks in the Southeast — the nation's "stroke belt" — suffer more of them.

Blacks were five times more likely than whites to have the Southern dietary pattern linked with the highest stroke risk. And blacks and whites who live in the South were more likely to eat this way than people in other parts of the country were. Diet might explain as much as two-thirds of the excess stroke risk seen in blacks versus whites, researchers concluded.

"We're talking about fried foods, french fries, hamburgers, processed meats, hot dogs," bacon, ham, liver, gizzards and sugary drinks, said the study's leader, Suzanne Judd of the University of Alabama in Birmingham.

People who ate about six meals a week featuring these sorts of foods had a 41 percent higher stroke risk than people who ate that way about once a month, researchers found.

In contrast, people whose diets were high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains and fish had a 29 percent lower stroke risk.

"It's a very big difference," Judd said. "The message for people in the middle is there's a graded risk" — the likelihood of suffering a stroke rises in proportion to each Southern meal in a week.

Results were reported Thursday at an American Stroke Association conference in Honolulu.

The federally funded study was launched in 2002 to explore regional variations in stroke risks and reasons for them. More than 20,000 people 45 or older — half of them black — from all 48 mainland states filled out food surveys and were sorted into one of five diet styles:

—Southern: Fried foods, processed meats (lunchmeat, jerky), red meat, eggs, sweet drinks and whole milk.

—Convenience: Mexican and Chinese food, pizza, pasta.

—Plant-based: Fruits, vegetables, juice, cereal, fish, poultry, yogurt, nuts and whole-grain bread.

—Sweets: Added fats, breads, chocolate, desserts, sweet breakfast foods.

—Alcohol: Beer, wine, liquor, green leafy vegetables, salad dressings, nuts and seeds, coffee.

"They're not mutually exclusive" — for example, hamburgers fall into both convenience and Southern diets, Judd said. Each person got a score for each diet, depending on how many meals leaned that way.

Over more than five years of follow-up, nearly 500 strokes occurred. Researchers saw clear patterns with the Southern and plant-based diets; the other three didn't seem to affect stroke risk.

There were 138 strokes among the 4,977 who ate the most Southern food, compared to 109 strokes among the 5,156 people eating the least of it.

There were 122 strokes among the 5,076 who ate the most plant-based meals, compared to 135 strokes among the 5,056 people who seldom ate that way.

The trends held up after researchers took into account other factors such as age, income, smoking, education, exercise and total calories consumed.

Fried foods tend to be eaten with lots of salt, which raises blood pressure — a known stroke risk factor, Judd said. And sweet drinks can contribute to diabetes, the disease that celebrity chef Paula Deen — the queen of Southern cuisine — revealed she had a year ago.

The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, drugmaker Amgen Inc. and General Mills Inc. funded the study.

"This study does strongly suggest that food does have an influence and people should be trying to avoid these kinds of fatty foods and high sugar content," said an independent expert, Dr. Brian Silver, a Brown University neurologist and stroke center director at Rhode Island Hospital.

"I don't mean to sound like an ogre. I know when I'm in New Orleans I certainly enjoy the food there. But you don't have to make a regular habit of eating all this stuff."

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Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP

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California Supreme Court alters how bias cases will be handled

Even if discrimination plays a role in a worker's firing, an employer will not be liable for back pay or other compensation if the employee would have been fired anyway for poor performance, the California Supreme Court decided Thursday.

The 6-0 ruling, with one justice recused, is likely to change the way most discrimination cases are handled in California, lawyers in the case said.

In the past, employees could receive compensation, including back pay and damages, and win reinstatement if they could prove that discrimination was "a motivating factor" in a firing.

Now, employees will have to show that bias was a substantial motive, and the employer will then get the chance to argue that performance alone would have resulted in the worker's termination.

The widely anticipated ruling was not a complete victory for employers, however. The court said employers would still have to pay a litigant's attorney fees if a jury finds that illegal bias was involved. A judge also would have the option of issuing an injunction ordering the company to end discrimination.

"There is no question that an employment decision motivated in substantial part by discrimination inflicts dignitary harm on the affected individual," Justice Goodwin Liu wrote for the court, "even if the employer would have made the same decision in the absence of discrimination."

The decision overturned a jury award to a Santa Monica bus driver who was fired after revealing she was pregnant.

The city's bus service insisted that she would have been fired regardless of her pregnancy because she had two accidents and failed twice to report to work on schedule. A jury awarded her about $178,000, mostly for mental suffering. Her sex discrimination complaint could be retried, but the jury would be instructed under the new rule.

Charlotte Fishman, an attorney for a lawyer group that represents workers in employment litigation, said the ruling would make it harder for workers to prevail in discrimination cases.

"This is kind of a surprise, and not a good one," Fishman said.

Paul W. Cane, who represented employer groups in the case, called the decision "a mixed bag."

"If the plaintiff lawyer can prove discrimination was a substantial motivating reason, they are going to put in large, attorney-fee bills even if their clients get nothing," Cane said.

David M. deRubertis, who represented the employee in the case, said he was disappointed that the court did not preserve damages for emotional distress and punitive damages, but added that the ruling would not affect which lawsuits he files.

maura.dolan@latimes.com

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Japan Spends Heavily to Keep Whaling Industry Afloat, Report Says

TOKYO — A wildlife conservation group said in a report on Wednesday that Japan has been propping up its whaling industry with nearly $400 million in tax money in recent years, stepping up subsidies even as consumption of whale meat here has slumped.

The report, compiled by the International Fund for Animal Welfare, in Yarmouth Port, Mass., challenges assertions by the Japanese government that whaling is a tradition with wide support among Japanese consumers.

Instead, government figures tallied in the report paint a picture of a struggling industry employing fewer than 1,000 people and dependent on public handouts, including money meant for reconstruction after the devastating earthquake and tsunami of March 2011.

Most Japanese consumers have turned away from whale meat. The industry shipped just 5,000 tons in 2011, compared with 233,000 tons at the peak in 1962, according to data from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. Demand this year is so low that the industry has cut its planned shipments by half, to 2,400 tons.

“Whaling is unprofitable, and survives only with substantial subsidies, something cultural and nationalist arguments for whaling obscure,” said Patrick Ramage, the director of the animal welfare fund’s whale program. He said the country would be better off economically and ecologically if it promoted whale-watching tourism instead of hunting whales.

Japan’s Fisheries Agency declined to comment on the report, saying it had not yet studied its contents.

But an official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said there was “nothing wrong with these subsidies, which fund an important program,” though it was “not the government’s responsibility to make whaling economically viable.”

A world moratorium on commercial whaling took effect in 1986, but Japan has taken advantage of an exception allowing whaling for research purposes to continue hunting, though environmental activists who chase whaling boats have made those hunts increasingly difficult. Japan has captured and killed more than 14,000 whales since the moratorium began.

The meat from the whales is sold off as “byproducts” of research, and it makes its way to supermarkets, restaurants and even school lunches. A government Web site says the most popular whale dishes are fried whale, whale sashimi and medium-rare whale steak.

According to figures from the Institute of Cetacean Research, the nonprofit organization set up to run the whaling program, income from whale meat has failed to cover the costs of whaling for the past five years. So subsidies have been increased, and some disaster aid has been diverted to the industry, prompting a public outcry.

The dire financial picture prompted the government to announce a plan last year to cut costs by reducing the annual catch and to sell more whale meat directly to schools for lunches. But experts doubt that those measures will make the whaling industry self-sufficient again. 

“The Japanese government has desperately defended whaling for years, but the question has increasingly become: for what?” said Yusuke Saskata, a professor of environmental economics at Kinki University in Osaka. “Supporting whaling culture is one thing, but maintaining whaling at this scale makes no sense.”

Hisako Ueno contributed research.

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American Idol: It's a Guys' Night in Hollywood

TV Watch

American Idol

By Jamie Bufalino

02/06/2013 at 11:00 PM EST

From left: Randy Jackson, Mariah Carey, Ryan Seacrest, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban

George Holz/FOX

Caution: Contains spoilers!

"It does feel a bit like The Hunger Games," said Keith Urban, ramping up the drama as American Idol kicked off the first day of Hollywood Week. Although producers didn't unleash any tracker jackers on the contestants, they did throw in a couple unexpected twists: This season the week started off as a guys-only competition (the girls arrive in Hollywood next week), and after surviving a round of sudden death solo sing-offs, contestants would then be put into groups from which they couldn't escape.

During the solo round, the standouts included two memorable contestants from the nationwide auditions. First up, Navy man Micah Johnson, who developed a speech impediment after suffering through a botched surgery to remove his tonsils. After a rousing rendition of Elton John's "Bennie and the Jets," Johnson was the first to get the green light to the next round.

Joining him soon after was Cuban-American Lazaro Arbos, a 21-year-old ice cream scooper from Naples, Fla., who speaks with a severe stutter but sings with ease. Although Arbos admitted to being both "scared" and "petrified," he quickly won the judges over – Nicki Minaj made her fingers into a heart-shape while he sang – with his take on the Robbie Williams hit, "Angels."

When it came time to form groups of four, the Idol producers threw a few more curveballs – such as pairing a couple of country crooners with two flamboyant (think glitter and faux fur) dudes Ryan Seacrest described as the show's "resident divas."

The result: a quartet that dubbed themselves Country Queen, which delivered a train wreck of a performance. Still, somehow three of the four made it through.

Meanwhile, Arbos's group experience also proved to be a bit of a disaster – which some of his cohorts blamed on his inability to quickly learn the lyrics and melody to the Beach Boys hit "Wouldn't It Be Nice." Although his main nemesis got the boot, a tearful Arbos got the chance to sing another day.

The day of auditions came to a close with what was possibly the most heartbreaking Idol exit ever. New York City subway singer Frankie Ford got a case of the jitters before going on stage, then proceeded to screw up the lyrics and sing off key – leaving the judges no choice but to pull the plug on his dreams. Before walking off into the night, a sobbing Ford stared into the camera and said, "I swear to God I'm coming back next year and I'm going to win."

There will be more solos Thursday (8 p.m. ET), as the judges have to whittle the 43 men left in the competition down to 20 lucky fellas.

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New whooping cough strain in US raises questions

NEW YORK (AP) — Researchers have discovered the first U.S. cases of whooping cough caused by a germ that may be resistant to the vaccine.

Health officials are looking into whether cases like the dozen found in Philadelphia might be one reason the nation just had its worst year for whooping cough in six decades. The new bug was previously reported in Japan, France and Finland.

"It's quite intriguing. It's the first time we've seen this here," said Dr. Tom Clark of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The U.S. cases are detailed in a brief report from the CDC and other researchers in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.

Whooping cough is a highly contagious disease that can strike people of any age but is most dangerous to children. It was once common, but cases in the U.S. dropped after a vaccine was introduced in the 1940s.

An increase in illnesses in recent years has been partially blamed on a version of the vaccine used since the 1990s, which doesn't last as long. Last year, the CDC received reports of 41,880 cases, according to a preliminary count. That included 18 deaths.

The new study suggests that the new whooping cough strain may be why more people have been getting sick. Experts don't think it's more deadly, but the shots may not work as well against it.

In a small, soon-to-be published study, French researchers found the vaccine seemed to lower the risk of severe disease from the new strain in infants. But it didn't prevent illness completely, said Nicole Guiso of the Pasteur Institute, one of the researchers.

The new germ was first identified in France, where more extensive testing is routinely done for whooping cough. The strain now accounts for 14 percent of cases there, Guiso said.

In the United States, doctors usually rely on a rapid test to help make a diagnosis. The extra lab work isn't done often enough to give health officials a good idea how common the new type is here, experts said.

"We definitely need some more information about this before we can draw any conclusions," the CDC's Clark said.

The U.S. cases were found in the past two years in patients at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children in Philadelphia. One of the study's researchers works for a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, which makes a version of the old whooping cough vaccine that is sold in other countries.

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JournaL: http://www.nejm.org

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Glendale, district settle ACLU suit over campus raid

The ACLU of Southern California announced Wednesday that it had reached settlements with the city of Glendale and the Glendale Unified School District on behalf of eight Latino students who alleged that officials engaged in racial profiling and illegal searches during a 2010 incident at Hoover High School.

On Sept. 24, 2010, more than 50 Latino students were allegedly detained by Glendale and Los Angeles police officers who questioned them about possible gang affiliations. The students were also allegedly forced to pose for mock police mug shots.

In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles in 2011, the ACLU alleged that officials targeted Latino students because of their race and that there was no evidence students were violating laws at the time they were questioned.

According to the settlement agreements, the city agreed to pay $50,000 to the ACLU of Southern California Client Trust Fund, and Glendale Unified and its defendants agreed to pay $50,000 to the ACLU Foundation of Southern California.

Claims against the Los Angeles County Probation Department and the Los Angeles Police Department are still pending "for their involvement in planning and executing the roundup," according to the ACLU.

"Unlike most cities, police departments or school districts, Glendale did not try to sweep this under the rug," said Bert Voorhees, who served as an attorney for the plaintiffs with the ACLU.

David Sapp — an attorney for the ACLU of Southern California — also commended the school district and city of Glendale for "using this incident as an opportunity to review their current practices and adopt new policies that will ensure that students' rights are protected on campus."

Under the agreement, Glendale Unified and the city's Police Department revised their policies regarding future police activities on school grounds.

The school board in November approved district-wide policy changes that require school officials to notify the parents of students who are questioned on campus by police.

The Glendale Police Department has updated training for officers, department spokesman Sgt. Tom Lorenz said.

"The no-racial-profiling policy has always been in effect," Lorenz said in an email. "We have taken steps so as to not have these types of 'allegations' occur in the future."

Glendale Unified and police officials also agreed to verify that information collected during the interrogations has been destroyed.

For her part, Ashley Flores — who was 16 years old and an A student when she was rounded up with other students for the detainment — said in a statement Wednesday that she was "happy that what happened to us won't happen to anyone else."

"I've never been in trouble and it was confusing, terrifying and humiliating," she added.

kelly.corrigan@latimes.com

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