SAN DIEGO

Wall St. restores city's credit rating

The city, shut out of the municipal bond market for four years because of its financial mess, is once again seen as a good credit risk by Wall Street, officials announced Thursday.

The Standard & Poor's Ratings Services, which had suspended the city's credit rating in 2004, announced it has restored the rating and given the city an outlook listed as "positive" and "stable."

"Today is the most significant day for residents of our city in the past four years," said Mayor Jerry Sanders.

The Standard & Poor's action means the city can go to the bond market to finance a series of water, sewer and other infrastructure projects that had been stalled.

Sanders and the City Council have reduced the city workforce, outsourced some jobs and increased payments to the pension system -- all in an effort to woo Wall Street.

San Diego lost its credit rating when it was disclosed that officials had understated the enormity of its pension fund deficit. That disclosure led to criminal and civil charges against several former high-ranking staff members and a political upheaval that led to Sanders' election as mayor.

-- Tony Perry

RIVERSIDE

University gets new chancellor

The next chancellor of UC Riverside will be Timothy P. White, a physiologist who has been president of the University of Idaho for the last four years, the UC Board of Regents announced Thursday.

White, 58, emigrated as a child with his family from Argentina to Canada and later to California, where he earned degrees at Cal State Fresno and Hayward and then a doctorate at UC Berkeley. An expert in human bio-dynamics and aging, he taught at UC Berkeley and held administrative posts at Oregon State University.

White, who will be paid $325,000 a year plus benefits, will start his position at the 17,000-student campus by September. He succeeds former UC Riverside Chancellor France A. Cordova, who resigned last year to become president of Purdue University.

In other action, UC regents gave final approval to a controversial 7.4%, or $490, raise in systemwide undergraduate fees and larger amounts for graduate students.

-- Larry Gordon

RAMONA

Dog-fighting ring believed broken

A suspected dog-fighting operation has been broken up, San Diego County animal services officials said Thursday.

Ten pit bull terriers believed used in fighting were seized in a raid after officials received a tip from a citizen. Some dogs were chained, others were entangled around stakes and many had scars on their faces and legs. The property owner was not home when search warrants were served.

The dogs were taken to a shelter in Carlsbad and information turned over to the district attorney's office for possible criminal charges.

Among the evidence seized were treadmills, medications, syringes and dog-fighting schedules, said Lt. Dan DeSousa, supervising animal control officer for the county's animal services department.

-- Tony Perry