DUCK & COVER: Whereas the Northridge quake...

DUCK & COVER: Whereas the Northridge quake was only a “wake-up call,” the Ventura County Board of Supervisors declares April as Earthquake Preparedness Month. The supervisors kick off the month’s events by diving under their desks this morning in the annual “Duck, Cover and Hold” drill. All this is being taken more seriously, given the devastation of the Jan. 17 quake. “The idea is that wasn’t the big one,” said Dale Carnathan of the emergency services office. “The big one is still to come.”

STANDING FIRM: The futuristic radar tower perched on an Ojai hilltop has weathered another court challenge (B1). This time, a judge said the neighbors have no evidence the government misled the locals by suggesting the 98-foot tower would blend into the scenery. . . . But the neighbors are still fighting mad. One sounds a bit like the character he once played on “Dallas.” “They’re liars and cheaters and they’ve broken the law,” Larry Hagman said. “They can do things we’d be thrown in prison for.”

FAST BREAK: As March madness concluded with the NCAA championship game (C1), one of the year’s biggest winners wasn’t on either of the men’s teams. Marion Jones, the Thousand Oaks High grad and point guard for North Carolina, predicted her team would take the women’s title. . . . The dramatic victory over Louisiana Tech brings Jones and women’s basketball long-overdue notice. Thousand Oaks Athletic Director Anna Merriman sees yearly gains. “The girls are training appropriately and getting the attention they deserve.”

STILL GROWING: Amgen Inc., the biotech firm that competitors would love to clone, has moved up 22 places on the Fortune 500 list (Valley Business, Page 9). . . . The Thousand Oaks firm is now 304th in size. But its stock dropped last year prompting Fortune to ask: “Is red-hot Amgen, tops in 10-year total return to investors, cooling off? Sales of Epogen, its market-leading kidney treatment, have begun to slow down.”