LATE-SUMMER CLEANING: If you like pristine beaches,...

LATE-SUMMER CLEANING: If you like pristine beaches, Saturday is your day. Nearly 4,000 volunteers hit Orange County beaches last year in the state’s annual beach cleanup, collecting nearly 50,000 tons of debris. Most of it was plastic--like those plastic rings that go around a six-pack. . . . Want to help? Show up at any beach at 9 a.m. and plan to stay for three hours. (B3)

PRETTY PRISONS? Ever find yourself groaning when your neighbors want to drag out their color slides? Irvine City Council members this week were treated to slides of staff members’ trips to Texas and Florida--to visit federal prisons. This is all in case U.S. officials follow up on suggestions for a federal prison at El Toro Marine base. Though not ready to embrace the concept quite yet, Councilwoman Paula Werner remarked: “It looked more like a community college campus.”

CHEM ACE: Scientific awards are old hat for UC Irvine physical chemistry Professor A.J. Shaka. But Shaka headed to the U.S. Open in New York last week to for a prize of a different sort. Shaka, 36, was awarded the Rolex Achievement Award, given to ex-varsity college tennis players who later excel in their careers. Shaka won the NCAA Division III singles title while at Harvey Mudd College. . . . “I found out I had a knack for teaching when I taught tennis in the summers,” says Shaka. In tennis, as in chemistry, “you’ve got to do things over and over again if you want to get good at it.”

ANGEL LORE: Used to be Orange County’s biker clubs were the biggest gang threat. But when outlaw Hells Angels tried to establish a foothold in the 1970s, two Orange County Sheriff’s Department investigators and an informant put the kibosh on it, according to a new book entitled “Chain of Evidence” (E1). . . . “By infiltrating them with a woman--a female cop--it demoralized them,” said Sheriff’s Department Lt. Steve Carroll. “They really were very, very dangerous people.”

Beautiful Beaches

More than 4,000 volunteers are expected at the annual statewide beach cleanup Saturday. Tons of trash collected previously in Orange County:

1989: 5,421

1993: 47,870

Source: California Coastal Commission