Mike Osegueda is in Las Vegas taking a look at the world of hip-hop and rap fashion. Take a look at Sin City and suits twice a day this week through Mike's eyes.

Most of the big-name designers have their showrooms sealed off to regular folk. You have to be a buyer with an appointment to get in and check things out.

L-R-G, the popular clothing line aimed at the hip-hop and skating generation, opened its doors for us for a sneak preview of what's coming in Spring 2006.

The Santa Ana-based company, which has a roots/agriculture theme running through its designs, is venturing into new terrain with a line of outdoors accessories, including tents, sleeping bags and canteens in camouflage colors with unmistakeable urban flair.

Beyond that, they're launching a women's line, Luxirie, which will keep with that rootsy image in warm colors like greens, blues and purples.

With the men's line, L-R-G is raving about its new denim, with styles and textures they developed after a trip to Japan.

Beyond that, L-R-G is launching its own shoe line, details are under tight wraps right now, but having seen a few on the feet of the L-R-G elite, they definitely have a Bathing Ape / Nike Air Force 1 style to them.

L-R-G can be purchased in Fresno at Mainland, FTK and Skully Bros.

From Bee Business reporter Robert Rodriguez:

With the legislative session coming to a close, supporters of the Million Solar Roofs bill are touring the state, urging legislators to pass one of the nation's largest solar power initiatives.

If approved by the Assembly and signed by Gov. Schwarzenegger, Senate Bill 1 would build 3,000 megawatts of solar power from 1 million roofs over a 10-year period.

Mike Osegueda is in Las Vegas taking a look at the world of hip-hop and rap fashion. Take a look at Sin City and suits twice a day this week through Mike's eyes.

At MAGIC, presentation matters. Every booth here is different. Some are plain and simple. Some are big and flashy. Each one has a little personality.

Here's a photo gallery featuring 10 of my favorites.

In yesterday's Bee, reporters George Hostetter and John Ellis brought us a story heralding Fresno's imminent new fee structure for developers and laying out some of the difficulties for the city going forward. The story follows a flurry of activity and discussion on the subject last week. Expect more stories as the City Council continues taking action. Related: City Council member Jerry Duncan writes on his blog that he was misquoted in last week's L.A. Times story on the issue. (Correction: That is Jerry Duncan, not Brian, as an earlier posting misstated.)

Read below the fold for more news.

For years, Fresno has charged its developers less than other cities do to carry out construction projects. Throughout the '90s, while other cities were raising their development fees to keep up with growth and inflation, Fresno's fees stayed put. Now, those fees aren't enough to cover needed public improvements like parks and street lights and fire stations, say some City Council members.

Last year, they started doing something about it. They increased fees to bring in money for streets, bridges and parks in July. Then in November, they upped the fees to pay for traffic lights. Recently, they've been looking at raising fees to fund parks and fire stations, a measure that was supposed to be discussed this Tuesday, but didn't make it onto the agenda. Council member Brian Calhoun is talking about placing a moratorium on new development until the fees are raised.

Bee columnist Bill McEwen has been talking about this issue for a while now; here's his April 14 column on the matter, and here's one from today. In June, the Bee's editorial board chimed in in support of the fee increases.

With Tuesday's publication of an L.A. Times story about the situation, local bloggers have also been getting into the fray, from Fresno Famous to Dorktown to Dyerama.

Update (8/26): On Friday, The Bee's editorial board delivered a strongly-worded piece on the topic:

The way this issue has unfolded makes the city's leadership look inept.

Charging builders fair fees, which would be passed on to the homebuyer, is a proper strategy for providing services to the city's growth areas.

No more excuses. Get it done.

In today's Life section, Bee reporter Mike Oz looks at Club Casa Blanca, the five-month-old nightclub downtown. Mike describes it this way:

Here, his approach is all about options. Casa Blanca is open Friday and Saturday nights, flipping between club nights and concerts.

When in nightclub mode, Casa Blanca has three different rooms, each catering to a different crowd. ... When in concert mode, the walls and seats can be moved to give the look of a big, open concert.

According to at least one blog, this flexibility makes for nice ambience. LiveJournal user rathrberiding says:

Last night Tyler hooked Amanda and me up with free concert tickets to see Chris Cagle at Club Casablanca in downtown Fresno. It was awesome, lots of fun. The cool thing was it was not a formal concert, so little kids were on the stage, Chris was talking to us and it was just laid back and cool.

• Not sure how we missed StuffOnMyCat.com, but would like to remedy the oversight as soon as possible. "Stuff + cats = awesome," asserts the site's banner, and the spread of pictures below it confirms that this is pretty much the truth. The site was created by Fresnovian designer Mario Garza.
• A thriving discussion continues on Famous about what the Mayor's Creative Economy Council should be recommending to bring creative professionals to Fresno. Anyone can add her opinion to the mix.
• George Berz of the streaming police scanner Web site ScanFresno.com (previously discussed here) sends along a note saying that he's switched to a new server and added some features to the site, including a discussion board.

From The Bee's editorial board: Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's office has informed the chancellor at the new UC Merced campus that he won't be present at the university's opening ceremony.

Do you think Gov. Schwarzenegger should attend the UC Merced grand opening? Share your thoughts in this thread.

In The Bee and on the blogs:

• Gas prices: Business reporter Bethany Clough reported on Saturday that Fresno's gas prices set record highs every day since Monday of last week. Last Wednesday, the Business section included an informative Associated Press Q&A: "Can the government do anything about soaring gas prices?" That same day, the Opinion page published a letter from local blogger Joel Dyer urging Fresnans to act in the face of gas price increases. Today, The Bee's editorial board spoke on the subject.
• Home prices: "Fresno is the most overpriced housing market in the nation, according to one economist," reports Sanford Nax in The Bee's business section. LiveJournal's Kniwt and The Editor over at Fresno Famous have some thoughts on this. (Previously on the Beehive.)
• Last week, The Bee's Metro section reported that the Fresno City Council had voted to use Fresno County jail inmates for city cleanup projects. IndyBay.org reports that John Crockford, co-chair of the Fresno County Peace and Freedom Party, isn't too happy about this.
• Blogger Neil'o Whispers offers a peek into the thought process behind his remarks in last week's Business story about the Indian Independence Day celebration.

A couple of highlights from this weekend's Bee:

• Dorm room challenge: The Bee invited three interior decorators to take a whack at freshening up a standard Fresno State dorm room. Whether your tastes run to fuchsia or feng shui, you might take away some ideas.
• Driver, 84, tells of carjacking in Fresno: Retiree Fay Allen talks about driving through town with her clean-cut, courteous carjacker.

Now Mayor Autry is getting the Richard Florida religion. As Bee business reporter E.J. Schultz tells us, the mayor is putting together a panel of Fresno's "knowledge worker" types*:

Hoping to give the city an edge in this competitive recruitment game, Fresno Mayor Alan Autry on Wednesday introduced a 12-person task force to recommend how the city can lure more software designers, artists, engineers and others whose "sole economic function is to create a new idea."

"Creative people of any age are a critical component of any successful city," Autry said, announcing the effort during a news conference at City Hall. "We will have strategies and tactics to reach that vision."

The "Mayor's Creative Economy Council" will meet weekly for 90 days. A report will be issued to the City Council, with recommendations on how to change city policies to draw more creative talent.

Fresno Famous has issued a call for anyone who wants to send the committee a message to post on the Sour Grapes blog. Jarah Euston, Famous' editor, is one of the invitees. (Update: Frank Delgado is also posting about the council on Urban Tribe Six.) Click the infobox in our story to view the others.

* "Knowledge workers?" See yesterday's Tim Stearns interview.

For our Newsmakers series following locals often quoted in The Bee, the Beehive spoke with Tim Stearns, director of the Lyles Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Read the interview and surf through an archive of stories from over the past decade, showing how Fresno has developed through the lens of this influential professor.

Last Thursday, Bee reporter Erin Kennedy tells us, FUSD superintendent Michael Hanson delivered a sobering speech to school administrators, laying out the difficult job they've got ahead of them.

From the story:

"I will say very clearly: 'We need to do better,'" Hanson said during the daylong administrators' retreat at the LaRyan Event Center in west-central Fresno. "These numbers aren't lying. We've got to call it. We've got to deal with it."

It was a stark contrast to his predecessor, Santiago Wood, who started his tenure in August 2000 with a 35-minute speech to 8,500 of the district's 10,000 employees at Fresno's Selland arena. Wood's thunderous voice, preacher-style homilies and passionate promises had the audience on its feet, hollering "Yeeah!" and raising fists in exuberant agreement.

We've republished Erin's story from August 2000 about Santiago Wood's rousing speech, for contrast. The Bee's editorial board approves of Hanson's approach.

"'Madden NFL 2006' scores," says the AP review of the latest game in Electronic Arts' blockbuster Madden franchise. "The newest Madden sucks," says Fresno blogger Neil'o Whispers. Both agree that the game's new "QB Vision" feature is a turnoff for casual users, but while the AP reviewers call the feature "innovative and realistic," Neil'o says it's "totally artificial." Any "Madden '06" players care to referee this dispute? Is the latest Madden lame or worth buying?

OK, no, probably not. But we're not above a little sensationalism now and then. While it may not bring about any high-profile indictments, PunkStory.com takes us back to the days of mohawks, leather, and fishnets, with a collection of photos from Fresno's punk scene in the early '80s. The folks behind PunkStory are combining those photos with interviews of people involved in that scene to bring us a documentary called "I Was There! A Punx Story." Read more about it on the Fresno '80s Punk Rock forum. See also: Fresno Punk Scene History and Fresno City Hardcore.

When Rachel Howard was 10 years old, she awoke one night to find her father dying, clutching at a knife in his neck, surrounded by blood in their Merced home. Her family moved to Fresno soon after, where she kept the fact of her father's demise a secret, even from her boyfriends. Now, almost 20 years after the murder, she's published the details of the tragedy in a memoir, The Lost Night, which has drawn ecstatic reviews from The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, among others.

Rachel will be reading from her book and signing copies at 6 p.m. today at Barnes & Noble, 7849 N. Blackstone Ave. For more about Rachel and The Lost Night, read her interview with Heather McLane (the voice of the Bee for anyone who calls our newsroom) from last week's Fresno Famous. Also see Bee reporter Don Mayhew's interview with Rachel from yesterday's Life section. You can also find Rachel's blog at RachelHoward.com.

As you may have noticed, we've changed up the look of our story-level pages on FresnoBee.com.

The main change: no longer does text flow around advertisements. Instead, ads and stories have been separated to appear side-by-side on the page. Also, instead of massive info-boxes taking up room in the story, we've given you expandable info-boxes which you can click if you want more information. Given how you use the site, we've taken away the left-rail navigation on story pages, and expanded the navigation at the top.

You'll find several other changes, and as with any new feature, a few bugs as well. Let us know of any bugs you find, or leave your comments on the new layout in this thread.

Fresh off the announcement that Fashion Fair Mall is bringing a Cheesecake Factory to Fresno, we learn from Bee business reporter Bethany Clough that Fashion Fair also will be bringing us four upscale retailers: Anthropologie, BEBE SPORT, Lucky Brand Jeans and Sephora. And if you missed Bethany's story on Friday, you might not know that Claim Jumper opened its River Park restaurant on Monday.

When Fresno Famous editor Jarah Euston went to the BlogHer conference, she was interviewed by online media pioneer J.D. Lasica (co-creator of OurMedia). In the video interview, she talks about the roots of Famous, her hopes for the site, and her thoughts on citizen journalism.

The Web continues to swarm with talk about Maribel Cuevas, the 11-year-old girl arrested by the Fresno P.D. after throwing a rock at a younger boy. Don't miss this update from The Bee: turns out Maribel won't get that felony trial after all.

After having grown up in Fresno, Janelle Aaron is leaving the city to try to make it as a country singer in Nashville. The Beehive got the jump on her potential stardom by making a music video, VH1-style.

A block of land central to downtown is getting lots of love from some excellent Fresno developers. Possibly too much love. If you're interested in what's happening in Fresno's downtown, read up on the developments around Broadway Row, the subject of Bee writer Bill McEwen's latest column, last week's Fresno Famous centerpiece, and KFSR's weekly San Joaquin Spotlight (featuring Famous editor Jarah Euston and former City of Fresno Economic Development Director Fred Burkhardt; here's a direct RealPlayer link to the show).

Please forgive the post title. Couldn't resist.

The Bee was onto the Atkins Diet way before 2002, when it became a frontrunner in the dizzy world of weight-loss routines. In 1996, Bee food editor Vivian Taylor talked about Atkins and other trendy diets of the day. By last year, when reporter Guy Keeler revisited the Atkins craze, it was an absolute force in the food industry. From that story:

It all started late last month when Subway Restaurants unveiled a new line of low-carbohydrate sandwiches called Atkins-Friendly Wraps. The next day, Carl's Jr. introduced its Low Carb Six Dollar Burger wrapped in iceberg lettuce leaves instead of the traditional bun. Then last week, Burger King pounded the drums for a new bunless Whopper, served in a plastic salad bowl and eaten with knife and fork.

This breadless revolution is being fueled by an army of low-carb dieters, most of whom are following a weight-loss plan developed by the late Dr. Robert Atkins.

What a difference a year makes. The great low-carb behemoth Atkins Nutritionals is filing for bankruptcy.

Famous alerts us to the creation of two shiny new multimedia products from the folks at Greytank/Gardenside Productions: 1) a Brad Basmajian videoblog and 2) a Greytank podcast.

Since we were on hiatus during the last half of last week, we missed pointing to some great reads you might not have seen from The Bee. Time to play catch-up. Look after the break for some links ...