The Golden Valley Cardinal Regime band will be the pride of Merced County as they ring in the New Year today at the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena. They will be performing "Take the A Train," "Mercy, Mercy" and "Boys of the Old Brigade" for a million bystanders and a national TV network audience.

Let's hope the pride on their faces serves as a sign of good things back home in 2009.
We enter the new year with the national, state and local economies as our biggest concerns.
The state’s anticipated budget shortfall has widened to $14 billion, and this will continue to affect city and county public services. Home foreclosures are not going away anytime soon in this hard-hit county, with some predicting more staggering figures for the first three months of the year. Gas prices have already started to inch up after a welcomed holiday respite — though $1.80 a gallon is still a lot better than $3 a gallon around this time in 2008.

There will be some new faces at new positions to tackle some of these problems on the county level.

Kathleen Crookham will no longer be with us as new Merced County Supervisor Hub Walsh takes over for District Two, and District Four Supervisor Deidre Kelsey steps up to be board chairperson.

They and the rest of the board members will be facing the threat of more budget cuts like the ones that hit the Human Services Agency recently. Employees at Human Services and the county's work force investment department will find out by mid-January who will be among the 35 to be laid off June 1.

As social services are being scaled back, the Merced City Council may choose to delay a planned Jan. 23 deadline to clean up homeless camps in Merced as part of a new no-camping ordinance.

In Atwater, the City Council ranks are uncertain due to the death of Councilman Joe Rivero. A special election in June is expected to be held to fill his seat.

Still, there's plenty of positive certainty to look forward to. There's no doubt that the Amgen Tour of California bicycle race will come to downtown Merced on Feb. 18. Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong and other top competitors are expected to draw as many as 10,000 spectators to the area, and this is good news to our struggling downtown merchants looking for more consumer traffic.

The event should also be good for the kids — and speaking of the kids — let's not forget the new and improved Kiddieland at Applegate Park coming back to life around Easter thanks to the good people over at the Kiwanis Club.

Of course, Mervyns is leaving but there's serious talk of a Kohl's coming in to take its prime spot at the Merced Mall. There's also a Wal-Mart Distribution Center to think about.
Merced is going to need more shopping options as UC Merced continues its expansion plans. The campus has already broken ground for a new social sciences building and plans for top-notch medical research are making headlines.

Merced College, already at an all-time high for full-time student enrollment (more than 10,500), is expected even more students over the next two years. But the college is also losing some state funding — potentially $2.9 million. Educators there will face a tough balancing act.

These are just a few things to think about as we start another year's journey.
Hold on tight.

Here we go again.