SAN BENITO — Renovation of the old Harlingen police station is the first step in opening a new facility to be called The Bridge Community Outreach Center, which will be a joint program operated by Cameron County, the city of Harlingen, Harlingen school district and a half dozen social service agencies. Programs to combat delinquency, school truancy, illegal drug use and gang activity will be offered at the center, said Tommy Ramirez Jr., executive director of the Cameron County Juvenile Justice ...

If a high-ranking LAPD official can be believed, perhaps the Scientology-affiliated The Way To Happiness should take a page from its own teachings. Two of the Glendale-based nonprofit organization’s 21 guides to achieving happiness are “Be Worthy of Trust” and “Seek to Live the Truth,” neither of which were followed apparently in the group’s dealings with the LAPD and a city in Texas. Officials with the group, which over the past two decades has distributed booklets of the same name to ...

Harlingen — The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has filed a lawsuit on behalf of former employees of Harlingen Family Dentistry who refused to attend training courses reportedly containing scientology doctrine. The lawsuit, filed in a federal court in Brownsville, alleges religious discrimination and retaliation against the workers. According to Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, scientology is "a religious movement begun in 1952 by L. Ron Hubbard which teaches immortality and reincarnation and claims a sure psychotherapeutic method for freeing the individual ...

Being a native of Harlingen, a member of its school board since 1992, a professional in private dental practice for the last 13 years serving my community, I find it deplorable that my hometown newspaper diminishes the good work of its children while allowing one of its reporters to manufacture controversy where none exists. This letter is to clarify the facts which were incorrectly reported in Kate Mewhinney's article which appeared in Monday's edition of the Valley Morning Star. Those facts ...

HCISD board member distributes material with Scientologist links in classrooms A coalition of Harlingen minister has taken a stance against an essay contest for schoolchildren based on a book written by Church of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. The Harlingen Ministerial Alliance, which is made up of representatives from about 12 churches in Harlingen, said it is opposed to the distribution of The Way to Happiness booklets as part of the essay contest. "If this group is permitted in classrooms, then ...