On Friday afternoon, Bryan Tassey explained to a group of men at the new Felix Torres Family Farmworker Housing complex in Planada the right way to plant a tree.

More than 200 trees were donated by the Tree Partners Foundation and the Merced Irrigation District.

The lower than expected annualized growth rate of 2.8 percent reported Friday for the final three months of 2011 raises doubts about the strength of the U.S. recovery and concerns that 2012 may be another year of muddling along.

Most mainstream economists had expected the fourth quarter number to come in at 3 percent or higher. The lower final number from the Commerce Department meant that the U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 1.7 percent for all of last year.

After six years of steady decline, overall reported crime in Merced rose 5 percent in 2011, according to statistics released by the Police Department this week.

On a more encouraging note, the number of reported crimes is still far below the levels reported in 2004, when crime in the city reached its highest point since 2000.