Bombs away

A subsidiary of a company run by an Aleut shareholder-owned Alaska Native village corporation based on remote Saint Paul Island in the Bering Sea, 800 miles west-southwest of Anchorage, Alaska, is being sued by U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis for jeopardizing safety at Camp Pendleton. According to the suit, filed in federal court here September 3, Bering Sea Eccotech, Inc., was operating an ordnance-disposal facility at the Marine base under contract with the government. In June 2007, the suit says, technician Jonathan Molnar was fired after complaining about “lax safety procedures.” Molnar “witnessed explosions resulting from these unsafe procedures,” claims the government, which asks for unspecified damages. … The Environmental Health Coalition, whose executive director Diane Takvorian lost out on the City of San Diego council’s coveted appointment to the Port Commission earlier this year, has written a letter to the Chula Vista City Council promoting ex-mayor Steve Padilla as that city’s representative on the panel. “As a former Coastal Commissioner, Steve knows intimately what it takes for projects to succeed at the state level,” according to the letter. Three years ago, Padilla lost his reelection bid to current mayor Cheryl Cox.