Ojai Valley News Blog

By Logan Hall

Ninety-two-year-old Jim Weblemoe is no stranger to helping others. He raised a family, worked for the military as a civilian and an enlisted sailor in the Navy, and has done extensive volunteer work for  Help of Ojai at their West Campus.

Born in Northwood, Iowa, on April 1, 1918, Weblemoe graduated from school and became a professor of physics in Fremont, Neb. Soon after that, he joined the Navy where he served for a short while in 1945 toward the end of World War II.

In 1953, his father suffered a heart attack, and Weblemoe had to take over the family business, R.M. Weblemoe Sand and Gravel. “I had to go back to run my dad’s sand and gravel business until he got back on his feet.” said Weblemoe. “We shipped a lot of gravel to the railroads from 1953 to 1957.”

Among the many things that he has been involved with in his life, Weblemoe has been the president of three different Optimist clubs in Fremont, Neb., in Corona after he moved to California in 1957, and finally in Ojai, where he is still an Optimist Club member today. “The Optimist Club is dedicated to helping youth,” he said. “We have a number of programs that are designed to help the schools.”

Since moving to Ojai in 1971 with his family, he has been involved with the community in many ways. He has worked as a volunteer for Help of Ojai for many years, where he helped them set up a carpentry and welding shop that has given Help of Ojai the opportunity to work on the extensive repairs that have been needed at the West Campus facility. “We’ve had to do a lot of converting and repair out there,” said Weblemoe. “The buildings need a lot of repair and adaptation for what they are used for.”

Weblemoe has been honored several times in his life for the various ways he contributes to society. “A couple of years ago, I received a national honor for my work with Help of Ojai,” he said about being awarded the annual Older Volunteers Enrich America Award. “I went to Washington, D.C., and the award was presented in the new Reagan building.”

Most recently, Weblemoe has been honored by his community as one of this year’s Living Treasures. This recognition is awarded every year by the Rotary Clubs of Ojai to individuals who serve their community above and beyond the call of duty. Weblemoe is humble about the award and says it’s not just him who is deserving. “I hope that the honor really goes to Help of Ojai and the things they are trying to do,” he said. “Perhaps it will help them get the job done.”

Former councilman cites leadership of attorney running for vacated seat

Former Ojai City Councilman Joe DeVito has announced that he is endorsing Paul Blatz for the Ojai City Council special election, taking place on June 8. In his announcement, the six-term Ojai City Council member and five-time mayor said, “I am endorsing Paul Blatz for the June 8 City Council election. I have known Paul for several years and I have seen his leadership firsthand. Paul was a valuable asset to Ojai when he worked directly with the city as chairman of the Planning Commission and on the Redevelopment Commission. His experience working with the city on various commissions gives him the experience necessary to immediately tackle the important issues facing our city.

“Paul’s ability to lead is evidenced by his hard work on the Pergola Committee, the Libbey Bowl Project, and the Performing Arts Theater Foundation. His commitment to working with volunteer groups to create the Rotary Community Park and the shelters along the bike path shows that he knows how to get things done without asking the city to do all the work.”

In a statement following DeVito’s announcement, Blatz said, “I am honored and extremely appreciative of Joe’s endorsement. Joe has always felt that public service is both a privilege and a responsibility and to have his trust and his vote means a great deal to me.”

Visit Ojaivalleynews.com for an In-Depth interview with Paul Blatz. Scheduled next week is Blatz’s opponent, Len Klaif.

Sheriff’s Deputy Gunnar Dike loves his family, job and the community in which he lives. Photo by Logan Hall

Nine-year veteran deputy chosen by peers to receive Kiwanis award

By Logan Hall

“Ma’am, I pulled you over because you were talking on your cell phone,” said Sheriff’s Deputy Gunnar Dike.

“No I wasn’t,” said the motorist as she hung up her phone.

This is one of the many diverse situations that Dike is knee-deep in on any given day during a shift with the department.

On May 28, Dike will be recognized by the Kiwanis Clubs of Ventura County as Ojai’s Officer of the Year in their annual Law Day Awards. Each year, the Kiwanis Clubs put together an awards ceremony to honor various law enforcement officers from different agencies throughout the county including the California Highway Patrol, Ventura Police Department, and the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, which is contracted to operate the Ojai Police Department. Officers and deputies are recognized for exemplary service within their agencies.

Dike, who has been with the Sheriff’s Department for more than nine years, and assigned to the Ojai substation for the last three years, works a 12-hour shift on the days that he’s on duty, encountering many different people doing many different things.

“I like to be out in the field,” said Dike. “A big part of being on the job is making contacts.”

Dike began his duty with the Sheriff’s Department working custody in the Ventura County Main Jail. He spent more than six years working in various detention facilities including the old Honor Farm on Baldwin Road. For the last three years, he has been working patrol in the Ojai Valley, where he lives with his wife and 4-year-old son.

“Everything I do is to better this community,” said Dike. “You can’t ask for a better environment. Ojai is a beautiful place to live, and a great place to raise a family.”

Dike is well respected by his supervisors in the department, and it’s no surprise that he has received recognition for his service.

“He has a positive, proactive approach to law enforcement,” said Ojai Police Chief Chris Dunn about Dike‘s work within the department. “He’s got a high level of self-initiative, and he has a good balance when dealing with the community.”

When asked about his service, Dike’s peers gave him similar praise. “Gunnar is very deserving of the award,” said Deputy Sara Valenzuela, who has been with the Sheriff‘s Department for 15 years, having served the last three of them with Dike. “He’s just an all-around good deputy. He works well with the public and with other deputies. You can always count on him.”

Dike’s attitude toward the community and his fellow deputies is one of many reasons he was selected as this year’s Officer of the Year and he seems to genuinely enjoy protecting and serving the public. “One of his most positive attributes is that he’s really approachable,” said Dunn. “We routinely get positive feedback about him from the community. He‘s just a nice guy.”

4.5 tons collected for Food Bank of Ojai

By Misty Volaski

Since the fall of 2008, the Food Bank of the Ojai Valley has seen a 200 percent increase in food requests —- that’s twice as many families needing assistance, just in the Ojai Valley alone.

Thankfully, that hasn’t translated into a shortage of food. It’s actually the opposite, said Help of Ojai’s executive director Terri Wolfe, “Donations have actually increased!”

Especially since last Saturday.

The Food Bank of Ojai Valley received donations by the truckload on May 8, when mail carriers serving Upper Ojai to Casitas Springs brought in a total of 4.5 tons — yes, tons — of food to Help of Ojai’s Little House campus.

It was all part of the National Association of Letter Carriers Stamp Out Hunger Day, in which residents place sacks of food by their mailboxes for mail carriers to bring to designated drop-off stations. This year, 15 volunteers from the community and 15 from Villanova Preparatory, Besant Hill and Oak Grove schools sorted the heaps of food by food type and expiration date, then packed it into volunteer trucks to be carted over to Help’s West Campus, the new site of the FBOV.

“It was great having the teenagers help,” said Wolfe. “All that boundless energy and enthusiasm really helps!”

Increased fees for services probable

By Sondra Murphy
Projected city revenue losses are already having a negative impact on many of the programs the people have come to expect. At the heart of these are recreation opportunities for valley citizens of all ages.

Historically, Ojai Recreation Department has been subsidized by the general fund to offset the cost of operating the facility and programs. ORD took budget hits in 2004-2005 that eliminated two-and-a-half positions, capital improvement funds, in-house maintenance, boxing and the Easter and Halloween community events, as well as severely stripped the teen program, Ojai Day funding, Skate Park maintenance and increased user fees.

In February, city manager Jere Kersnar presented a midyear budget report that showed it would be necessary to make further budget adjustments in order to achieve the City Council-directed balanced budget. The Parks and Recreation Commission was given the challenge of cutting $150,000 from its 2010-2011 budget through cost cutting, fee increases and reducing or eliminating programs. With 8,000 city residents, but up to 37,000 estimated residents valleywide, county support of Ojai’s recreational facilities are slim at best, adding to the responsibility shouldered by ORD.

The Recreation Commis-sion met twice in March in order to take on the reduction needs. “The commissioners really took their task to heart,” said ORD director Dale Sumersille. “They agreed they wanted to restore youth programs. We need to be good stewards and provide recreation programs.” She said that the commission hoped that parent volunteers would step up to the plate in helping to officiate and coach future leagues and programs.

The outcome of the meetings was a report presented by Sumersille at last week’s City Council meeting. “Staff has reviewed each program area and line item very carefully. To keep the Recreation Department self-sustaining to the greatest extent possible, the following regrettable recommendations are proposed,” Sumersille reported. Eliminations included teen dances and the teen boxing program; the aquatics program and Ojai Day event; eliminating the haunted house event; and changing one full-time position to a part-time position. The commission also recommended reducing all contract instructors by 5 percent and various program supplies and equipment, such as T-shirts or awards. Also proposed were increases in registration fees by $5, adult sports programs by $25 per team, and out-of-city fees to $7 per activity and per participant.

Those recommendations allowed the commission to cut $133,395.75, so they further recommended cut ting the following programs: fall and spring day camps; youth softball class; youth flag football league; youth and peewee soccer leagues and classes; adult basketball league; adult flag football league; and adult volleyball, including leagues and the annual Gasaway Tournament.

“Going to the Parks and Recreation Commission meeting was very enlightening because they dealt with it head-on,” said Kersnar. “They said, ‘We know what the problem is and here’s what we’re going to do,’ even though they didn’t want any cuts, so they decided to try and save youth programs, thin it out, in order to keep the program at a reduced cost. They spent a lot of time on it and I would go along with their recommendations.”

But the council was flabbergasted. “I’m just disappointed that it took so long to come before us because it puts us in a very tough position,” said Councilwoman Betsy Clapp.

“As far as the process, as far as the $150,000, we want you to see the impacts and, if you don’t like it, you can change it,” said Kersnar. The Ojai Parks and Recreation Commission is an advisory group to the City Council. The council alone has authority to make policy decisions and direct staff.

“But, really, I don’t want to know what we need to cut,” said Councilwoman Sue Horgan. “What we need is a vigorous program with wide participation.” She asked for staff to revisit the budget and bring back a new proposal. “I think we’re better off to offer the programs with increased fees rather than have no programs.”

The council then voted to reinstate the aquatics program, raise out-of-city fees to $10 per child, per activity, and increase adult sports programs by the recommended $25 per team. County property taxes contribute little or nothing to the Recreation Department. Sumersille said she was hoping the county supervisors would soon vote to give $16,500 to ORD for scholarships.

“It’s the kids who need these programs who end up suffering,” said Sumersille about the program cuts.

Parks and Recreation Commissioner Sage Intner concurred. “We want to prioritize, keeping youth sports as strong as possible,” she said. “We are a linchpin for the community … This is where we’re establishing what Ojai is.”

Intner pointed out that staff already volunteers at the department. “So you’re looking at cutting staff hours for hours they’re not even being paid for,” Intner said. “We cut out our teen dances and it seems small, but those are contact points.”

The issue of Ojai Day was touched upon as to whether it even belonged as part of the recreation budget. Last year’s Ojai Day cost $53,768 to fund but brought in $40,000 in revenues for a net cost to the city of $13,768. Organizers estimated that if various stipends were eliminated, it could add up to more than $5,000 in additional savings and result in less than $9,000 of city support.

Sumersille said, since the council meeting, subsequent Parks and Recreation Commission meetings have netted $157,316 in cuts.

Program decisions need to be made soon so ORD may order accurate summer programs brochures. The item will again appear on the Ojai City Council agenda Tuesday, as Sumersille brings back details about further commission discussion and staff ideas. That meeting is at 7:30 p.m. in the Council Chambers, 401 S. Ventura St.

Without volunteers’ clean-up efforts, this and other truckloads of trash would probably still be on the ground at Cherry Creek.

TVs, computers, furniture dumped  at shooting area

By Logan Hall
For many years, Cherry Creek shooting range has been a popular destination for locals to fire off some rounds with family and friends. Located about 30 miles up Highway 33 in Los Padres National Forest, Cherry Creek offers seasonal target shooting areas that are free for the public to enjoy. In recent years however, Cherry Creek and many other recreational locations in the mountains surrounding Ojai have been inundated with trash and vandalism.

For many people, the shooting range has been a pristine location for the sport they love so much. Some have called it a sanctuary and a special place to get away from the stresses of everyday life. For others, it’s simply a clean, safe place for target shooting. Lately, local marksmen have noticed an alarming trend that is transforming Cherry Creek into a veritable dumping ground for “targets” that are left behind by careless gunslingers. Everything from TVs, computers and other electronics to furniture are being used as cannon fodder. Most of the time, the piles of torn-up metal and plastic are just left behind with little or no regard to the surrounding environment.

Brian Reid, valley resident and avid marksman, has witnessed the fallout of such carelessness firsthand. “I learned to shoot at Cherry Creek,” said Reid, who also proposed to his wife in the area. “I’m really enraged at what people are doing up there.”

Rather than just sit and complain about the situation, Reid chose to take a more proactive approach and organize a cleanup effort in conjunction with the Ojai Ranger District that involved 12 volunteers. With three trucks, a large roll-off dumpster, and a little elbow grease, they were able to make some headway in the lengthy process of litter removal, and an estimated 5 tons of material was hauled out by Reid and his volunteers. Reid says that this is only one piece of the puzzle, however, and the real solution is to spread awareness and get people to be responsible for the cleanup of their own mess. “Too many people just don’t care,” said Reid. “I organized a small cleanup a year ago with a couple of friends, but every time I go up there, the trash always comes back.”

In his first cleanup effort, Reid and his two friends encountered an industrial microwave that weighed 200 to 300 pounds. The implications for the impact that such things could have on the environment and the general aesthetic beauty of the area are very serious. “The metal and plastic they leave behind will stay there forever,” added Reid. “We have to keep our environment clean.”

Reid says he would eventually like to organize a quarterly cleanup effort to help maintain the area and hopes to get many more volunteers for the next event. “It’s an ongoing problem that causes a lot of junk to be accumulated,” said Charlie Robinson, Ojai Ranger District recreation officer. “Some items have toxic materials and are in close proximity to certain creeks and streams.”

Volunteer Cody Silvestri also shares a similar viewpoint with Reid and Robinson. “I’ve been going to Cherry Creek since I was 12 years old,” said Silvestri, who is now 28. “I feel sick to my stomach when I see all the trash. These people don’t get it. You have to pack out what you pack in.”

Another problem that has risen, is the actual shooting of trees and other structures in the area. According to Ojai Ranger District officials, some trees such as oaks have been partially cut down by firearm projectiles. Aside from the debris, garbage and overall property damage, there has also been vandalism in the form of graffiti on rocks, trees and anything else that vandals can get their hands on.

Cherry Creek hasn’t been the only place affected. Strewn garbage and vandalism have been reported in many areas including Lions Camp and other areas in Rose Valley. Similar to the problems faced by users of Shelf Road and its nearby property owners, visitors and residents of the mountains up Highway 33 are encountering vandalism, underage drinking, and garbage left behind by inconsiderate people.

Because of the many incidents involving misuse of various facilities, Robinson has indicated that the Ojai Ranger District might ban target shooting altogether from their section of National Forest, which encompasses an area from Pine Mountain Ridge down to Piru Creek, and over to the Ventura-Santa Barbara County line. “We are moving forward on an effort to shut down target shooting in the Ojai district of the Los Padres National Forest,” said Robinson, who said the banning of target shooting is not a matter of if, but when. “Once shut down, anyone caught target shooting in any areas such as Cherry Creek could face citations which would involve confiscation of their firearms, a fine of up to $5,000, and or up to six months in jail.”

The hope is that with a little awareness and effort by everyone enjoying Ojai’s mountains, the problem can be kept in check and will help return these locations back into the pristine sanctuaries they once were. “Brian and his volunteers did a great job in Cherry Creek,” said Robinson. “We appreciate them helping out and always welcome volunteers to pitch in, but until people learn to bring back out what they bring in, there will continue to be an environmental impact on the area.”

Task team trying to keep venue financially accessible to nonprofits

By Sondra Murphy
With the Libbey Bowl renovation established as an official construction project, the Ojai City Council discussed the venue’s future operations last week. A task team has been researching and discussing methods of making the upgraded facility cost effective without pricing out local nonprofit organizations.

Ojai Public Works Director Mike Culver explained the task team required council input on operations policies before it could progress to the next stage of meetings. With a goal of keeping the bowl financially accessible to local nonprofit groups, the team has met with experts in the field to develop a system that would not only enable community use, but support ongoing maintenance for the venue.

When the Libbey family donated the park property to the Ojai Civic Association in 1917, they imposed conditions. These are that no private parties or corporations be allowed to occupy or use the property for profit; no manufacture, disposal or permitted sale of alcohol would be allowed on the property; and approaches and roads leading to the park would be kept clean and sanitary.

Nonprofit groups using the bowl have often struggled over the years with not only covering their costs, but earning enough to give them a start-up budget for the next effort. With this in mind, the issue came before the council because the committee needed direction in order to proceed.

“There’s a need to develop some sort of organization strategy for how this facility can and will be used for the best benefit of all,” said Culver. “Currently, the policy is the bowl is used for nonprofit organizations only.”

He said use fees are established merely to cover the staff time for preparation and emergency needs during a group’s production at Libbey Bowl and does nothing to help with long-term maintenance of the facility. The operations task team wants to implement policies that allow the city to accumulate enough revenues to properly maintain the rebuilt bowl to avoid the types of deterioration that is now making necessary its rebuild.

Culver presented a use history from the past five years. In 2009, only 9 groups rented the bowl and three of those were groups that are not charged: the Fourth of July committee, Ojai Music Festival and Mexican Fiesta. Culver provided the council with the cost of bowl use. It includes a $100 processing fee, plus daily charges for use, setup, rehearsal and teardown. “Basically, any nonprofit that comes in to use the bowl, there’s a minimum $350 charge,” he said. Use costs $250 per day.

He also came up with a preliminary maintenance plan. “I tried to project what I saw as long-term maintenance needs, projecting that out on what I expect the life span is, so 20 years from now, when it needs a new roof, we have the funds for that,” said Culver. He projected the bowl would need to set aside about $20,000 annually for long-term roofing, seating, painting and miscellaneous repairs.

With ongoing and event-specific maintenance estimations, the total estimation is $31,550. “That is what I believe is going to be the minimal impact on the city, regardless of use,” Culver said.

The dilemma brought to the council, then, was whether to alter Libbey Bowl’s use policies to allow for limited for-profit agencies to use the facility and whether council members would consider allowing the sale of beer or wine at certain events. Before continuing to develop the operations recommendations, the committee wanted the council to tell them if they were open or opposed to exploring either of those two concepts into the operations policy.

Public speakers and council members alike expressed hesitation over both breaks from tradition, including fear that the bowl would usurp the community theater venues, be too costly for local nonprofit agencies and require increased law enforcement to keep alcohol consumption in check.

“I think that, in sitting on the task force and listening, the bottom line is there needs to be revenue to maintain this bowl,” said Mayor Steve Olsen. He reiterated that local nonprofits would be favored in Libbey Bowl scheduling. “This facility is being built for them.”

“We’re talking about a midway step, then bringing it back to public hearing,” Mayor Pro-Tem Carol Smith summed up.

After acknowledging the pros and cons both changes might mean, the council members determined they were amenable to at least exploring the concepts and getting more information from the committee, as well as hearing from the community about the changes.

City manager Jere Kersnar estimated the operations committee would be able to submit a business plan in four to six weeks that offered different options for the council to consider.

This discussion was an act of faith that the final donations will be received in time to begin rebuilding Libbey Bowl in June. The council approved the call for bids the same day in order to keep up with the tight construction schedule, with bid opening set for May 12.

Approximately $350,000 is still needed for the project estimated to cost $3.2 million. The city and OMF have pledged two-thirds of the amount, with the Save Libbey Bowl campaign accepting responsibility to procure the remainder. To donate to or finalize a contribution to the reconstruction project, call 646-3117 or visit the web site at LibbeyBowl.org.

By Sondra Murphy
The Ojai City Council was quick to stray from the path of scheduling changes for the Ojai Trolley Service as users packed city hall Tuesday to give input about their need for the useful, but often sparsely populated, form of public transit. If the trolley had evening service hours, perhaps even more would have been in attendance.

The subject was on the Ojai City Council agenda again after last month’s report showing a transit budget shortfall of $117,826 is expected for fiscal year 2010-2011. Public Works director Mike Culver was directed by council in March to come back with specifics on what a possible 25 percent cut in services would entail.

Culver returned with multiple options for the council to consider in dealing with the deficit in the $820,952 system’s budget. The shortfall is caused by a decrease in gasoline sales tax and federal funding that is used to supplement mass transit throughout the state that is distributed county by county based on population statistics and other mind-boggling formulas.

Projected farebox earnings being an anemic $35,000 of the budget lent to entertaining a scheduling cutback that included recommendations for a number of changes. These included cutting weekend service in half by returning to once-hourly stops; eliminating Sunday services completely while cutting Saturday services in half; and eliminating all weekend services.

“We want to make cuts where they will have the least impact on ridership,” said Culver. “Clearly, Sunday is the least used day, Saturday is next and, on the weekdays, it nearly doubles.”

Culver also prepared options for cutting weekday services and said that peak usage times would be factored into such cuts. His two options were to cut the first and last stop times from the schedule or else create overlapping routes with 30-minute service routes during peak times and one-hour routes during non-peak times.

Of the expenditure reduction options, Culver and staff recommended adoption of shortening overall service on weekday trolleys by eliminating the first and last stops and to eliminate Sunday service and cut Saturday service in half. He said this would result in a 7-percent and 16.9-percent service reduction overall and 34 hours. Keeping reductions below 25 percent was a goal in order to avoid costly civil rights and environmental impact studies.

“The city of Ojai sees only about 51 cents in actual budget reduction for every dollar saved. In addition, the reduced service levels will result in reduced farebox revenues,” Culver reported, adding the cuts would also reduce the city’s contribution to countywide transit, resulting in a projected $649,005 in revenues, down from $820,952, and leaving a shortfall of 71,699.

After reporting on the data and giving his recommendation, Council-woman Sue Horgan chimed in with a comment that changed the trajectory of the proceedings. “Your conclusion is wrong,” said Horgan. “Service reduction is not our goal. Our goal is to have the best service we can.” From the audience came a collective sigh of relief.

Public comments were overwhelmingly against any service reduction and involved accounts of the imperative need the Ojai Trolley System fills. Seniors and those with physical limitations were particularly distraught over the thought of losing their primary mode of transportation.

Marshall Kilpatrick was especially concerned about cutting weekend service. “As you can see, the trolley is very important to me. I always count on it to get me to church on Sunday.”

Carlene Sucorsky said impairments prohibit her from driving and that she moved to Ojai because of the trolley that she and other disabled people rely on. “My life depends on the Ojai Trolley,” she said. “I ask you to please consider us when you make your decision as to what to do.”

“There’s a constituency that you’re seeing here tonight that represents just the tip of the iceberg and they’re pretty much disenfranchised,” said Sheri Ann Cate. She asked that the needs of the speakers be considered as important by the council members as the needs of the business, art and tourism communities. “There has to be other options before you start disenfranchising these people further.”

Carolee Nelson contradicted previous discussions that predicted loss of customers by raising fares. “We want to pay fares,” she said. A one-way trolley trip currently costs 50 cents or 25 cents for students and seniors. There are a number of people who pay nothing due to bus transfers and various waivers.

Several speakers also lamented the elimination of bus service to the downtown Park & Ride lot, lack of schedule postings at stops and the uncivilized nature of the stop at the “Y” shopping center, the hub of transfer between the trolley and Gold Coast Transit Service into Ventura and Oxnard.

Ojai Trolley transit operations supervisor Drew Lurie and driver Guy Ring each presented ideas to increase revenues.  Ring brought up the possibility that Ojai Unified School District may be eliminating bus service next year and, if so, expected it to increase the trolley need for students throughout the valley. He also had ideas for renegotiating GCT’s No. 16 bus route into Ojai to save money while better serving the needs of riders.

Lurie reminded all that the trolley would be out in full force on April 24 in commemoration of Earth Day activities at Ojai Rotary Park and Besant Meadows Preserve and would be offering free rides.

Addressing some of the obvious animosity speakers directed toward Culver, Councilwoman Carol Smith explained that he was given a council mandate to take no more money from the general fund due to the recent losses in revenues the city has experienced and the many cutback Ojai would be making in the months to come. “I’d like to be on a committee with Drew and others to work on how to do more marketing,” said Smith. “Eliminating Sunday I’m against, not only for people who need to get to church, but because I think some of the mystique of Ojai is the trolley and I’d like to see it included into the marketing plan.”

Smith said she was not willing to cut any trolley services at this point and suggested forming an ad hoc committee, ideas that the other members supported. Councilwoman Betsy Clapp asked city attorney Monte Widders to remind everyone why the trolley may not be used by private parties.

“There is a federal transit administration regulation which prohibits the public sector from competing with the private sector in providing transit services to private parties as long as anyone is willing to provide the service,” said Widders.

Culver elaborated. “Every single time we get a request for trolley service, we have to notify every single private transportation service,” he said. “There are companies from Virginia and Maine and, I think one in Alaska, saying they’ll provide services in Ventura County and if one of them responds, then we’re out of the game and it’s not dependent on them actually providing services, but just to say they are interested.”

“I think we are probably not going to take a vote on any of these issues tonight,” said Mayor Steve Olsen. Smith then moved to form an ad hoc committee solely aimed at marketing the Ojai Trolley in order to increase farebox revenues. It passed unanimously.

By Sondra Murphy
The Ojai City Council performed a leap of faith Tuesday when it voted to designate the Libbey Bowl Reconstruction Project an official project in spite of being short the full amount estimated for renovation.

Ojai Public Works director Mike Culver reported that, of the $820,000 contributed by the city so far to the effort, approximately $780,000 has been spent or allocated for various costs, including consulting functions and architectural design, and an additional $40,000 will be used for continued consulting services. This leaves nothing available for actual construction, making the fund-raising efforts by local groups and volunteers more essential than ever.

The Ojai Music Festival and Ojai Service Foundation, instrumental in generating donations to rebuild the decaying amphitheater at the heart of the city, originally set a $3 million goal for the effort that has since been upgraded to a $3.2 million price tag. The city and OMF pledged two-thirds of the amount, with the Save Libbey Bowl campaign accepting responsibility to procure the remainder.

Bill Burr Jr., vice president of OSF, reported that the project is not out of the woods yet. “We have a total of $2.8 million,” said Burr. “Now is the time for everybody who waits till the last minute to make their donation.”

While the council members were hesitant to direct staff to call for bids without having all the money raised, they also expressed awe for the community support and hope that the last dollars needed will materialize. Delays in initiating the bid process would have threatened to disrupt the tight construction time line that calls for demolition immediately following this year’s Music Festival season in order to see completion before next year’s season.

With the call for bids made Wednesday, bid opening scheduled for May 12 and contract awards set for May 25, this will allow construction work to begin June 21 in anticipation of an April 11, 2011 completion, giving nearly a two-month buffer before the grand opening June 9 to 11, 2011.

“I knew we were going to get to the point where we had to fish or cut bait,” said Councilwoman Sue Horgan, “but I think you have a lot of steam rolling and I’m willing to take this step.” Always a stickler on budgetary concerns, Horgan reminded all that she will not vote to award a contract if the money is not in the bank by the time the project returns to the City Council for approval.

Councilwoman Betsy Clapp took the sentiment a step further in stating that she could not support the project’s designation because management of the completed bowl had not yet been worked out. She cited issues that were to be addressed in the following agenda item submitted by the Libbey Bowl Operations Task Team looking for policy direction for the amphitheater’s management.

“I share your concerns, however Libbey Bowl is falling apart,” said Councilwoman Carol Smith. “It’s becoming a blighted bowl. I think that I will go with hope that the rest of the money will be raised … Libbey Bowl is our star to bring tourists here during the week.” Smith expressed hope that the rebuilt bowl would attract events that enhanced Ojai’s cultural image.

City attorney Monte Widders said that there is a standard 60-day window between bid awarding and first payment installment and contractors know their bids hold until then. “At that time, if the funds are not secured, then staff would recommend that the council reject all bids,” said Widders.

“We need to move forward,” said Mayor Steve Olsen. “Mr. Widders explained what the process is and there are stop gaps in place if the money is not in place.”

The motion passed, 3-1, with Clapp dissenting.

“We’re thrilled that the city of Ojai has managed this project so well,” said OMF executive director Jeff Haydon. “They’ve had a lot of leadership and vision and are not only getting it out to bid on time, but out during the most favorable construction pricing climate in recent history.”

Haydon also acknowledged the efforts of volunteers and donors and said that more than $2,000 has been raised in the Bakers for the Bowl efforts and nearly $1,000 has come in from the Save Libbey Bowl collection jars placed at businesses around the valley. “That’s a lot of change,” he said.

He also emphasized that time is of the essence. “We’re thrilled with the outgrowth of community generosity and we’ve raised almost $850,000 in four months,” Haydon said. “All of us working on the project, fund raisers and the city alike, we need to know we have people’s cash for pledges in the next few weeks in order for these bids to come in, so timing is critical.”

Libbey Bowl amphitheater has been serving the community since it was built in the 1950s and is currently used by as many as 30 nonprofit groups for more than 50 events each year. It is estimated that 1,000 performances of plays, concerts and other civic events, such as the Ojai Music Festival, have been staged at Libbey Bowl since 1957.

Designed by Austen Pierpont and Roy Wilson, Ojai Festival Bowl” renamed Libbey Bowl in the 1970s, cost $12,000 to build the stage and shell section back in 1957. In recent years, spot repairs have been unable to keep up with the steady deterioration of the largely wooden structure. Termite damage, wood rot and other forms of decay have added safety issues to the list of concerns about the bowl’s endurance.

To donate to or finalize a contribution to the reconstruction project, call 646-3117 or visit the web site at LibbeyBowl.org.

Look for Part 2 of this report in next week’s OVN regarding the Libbey Bowl Operations Task Team report to City Council and the decisions made.

Stop the Trucks movement again targets two area mines

By Sondra Murphy

Since the Stop the Trucks Coalition has submitted dozens of additional complaints regarding recent gravel truck violations down Highway 33 through Ojai, Ventura County is in the investigation phase. Although there’s annual violation monitoring for the mines, additional investigations are largely complaint based, so the coalition submissions are needed for the county to proceed.

Two mines are targeted: Ozena Valley Ranch Mine and Ojai Quarry. “In the last few weeks, we’ve received about 60 complaints potentially involving Ozena or Ojai Quarry,” said Dan Klemann, manager, commercial and industrial permit section for the Ventura County Planning Division. “We now have a staff person working just on these complaints. He’s going through and screening them.”

Klemann said the process is time-consuming and there are different conditions imposed on the two mines. Generally, traffic restrictions were created to address congestion issues, but the mines have additional requirements regarding allowed hours of operation through Ojai.

According to Klemann, Ozena delivery trucks are limited to traveling through the Highway 33 restricted route between 6 to 7 a.m. and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on weekdays and 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturdays. They are further limited to 50 round trips during any given 24-hour period and may not exceed 10,197 trips in any given year. “Ojai Quarry does not have the same conditions,” said Klemann.

“Ojai Quarry is only allowed to operate Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. In addition to that, two additional conditions also limit trips through Ojai to 20 times a day.” He added that whenever loaded product trucks travel within the city of Ojai, they are supposed to submit a report to the Ojai Police Department.

Once the Planning Division receives a complaint, Klemann’s department must first assess the complaint for violation potential before opening up a case. They next prepare an alleged notice of violation to the mines in question and send it out. Depending on the number of alleged violations involved, the mine has a certain amount of time to respond by supplying copies of weigh ticket data, which includes license plate number, weight and time of each truck as it leaves.

Then county staff study the information to determine if the ticket data could have resulted in each truck passing through Ojai during their specific mine’s restricted travel time window. “I drove from Ozena and back —- three times — during the times when they are not allowed to drive to get an estimate of time,” said Klemann. The department then looks at the truck’s destination and applies the drive time formula to the trip to confirm or refute a violation.

“Another complicating factor is, let’s assume we did confirm a violation,” Klemann said. “We must determine what sort of penalties should ensue. With recurring violations, we can say, ‘With each day you don’t address this we’re going to penalize you by so much.’” With independent trucking contractors involved, it makes it challenging to show recurrence and, with one-time confirmed violations, the per-day penalty is moot.

“We do have a requirement that miners must inform their truckers of the restricted zones,” said Klemann. He added that the current economic downturn resulting in fewer construction projects has resulted in mines and truck drivers needing as much work as possible, just like most other businesses.

The most recent complaints generated by Stop the Trucks Coalition range in dates between January and March, with most incidents cited from March.

Stop the Trucks Coalition was formed about three years ago when residents were disturbed by gravel truck traffic along Maricopa Highway and began complaining to each other. Looking into the matter, they discovered Ozena Valley Ranch Mine trucks were one of four companies contributing to the disturbance and found conditional use permits that restricted the hours for deliveries. Since then, the coalition maintains that there have been numerous violations by gravel trucks traveling along this Highway 33 corridor during forbidden hours.

Since the Stop the Trucks Coalition was initially organized, an executive committee representing some broad interest and leadership from throughout the Ojai Valley has led it. Michael Shapiro is the current chairman, having taken over the reins from founding member Howard Smith. “In the coming weeks and months, we’re planning on expanding the Executive Committee to encompass representatives from Meiners Oaks, Oak View and Mira Monte,” said Shapiro.

stopthetrucks.shtml.

Public invited to April 29 event

Submitted by Ojai Valley Chamber of Commerce
‘Tis the political season in Ojai, as elsewhere around the country, and the upcoming Ojai City Council election promises to be as hotly contested as any other.

Attorneys Paul Blatz and Lenny Klaif are running for the vacated seat of former Councilman Joe DeVito, who resigned late in 2009. The election is slated for June 8.

In an effort at ensuring its membership is wholly informed about the two candidates, the Ojai Valley Chamber of Commerce, which represents hundreds of valley retailers and service providers, will present a Candidates Forum on April 29 at the Soule Park Golf Course banquet facility.

The forum will be open to the public, and will begin at 5:30 p.m. The event will continue until “… all our questions have been answered,” said Bob Kemper, chamber president.

“It is our intent,” Kemper continued, “to orient our questions specifically toward issues most relevant to the chamber membership. For example, we want to know how each candidate feels about promoting the business community of Ojai, and its long-term financial well-being.” To that end, as soon as the candidate filing period closed March 15, the chamber board posed four questions to each candidate. Why are you running for City Council? What do you perceive are the strengths and weaknesses of Ojai’s current City Council? What do you perceive are the strengths and weaknesses of current Ojai city government? Do you think City Council should be willing to address issues outside Ojai city limits?

The chamber board reviewed the answers to these questions and interviewed each candidate at its monthly board meeting on April 7. The candidates’ answers to these questions will also be distributed at the Candidates Forum.

In addition, the chamber membership has been solicited for questions of more specific interest, which will be asked at the forum. One example: Do you think the City Council bears any responsibility for helping maintain the economic vitality of Ojai’s business community?

The forum will be moderated by Jeff Haydon, former chamber president and executive director of the Ojai Music Festival, and is designed to last approximately one hour. However, the moderator may ask follow-up questions of the candidates, and the audience will have an opportunity to ask questions as well.

“We’re very excited about this event,” Kemper said, “as it will provide an opportunity for all of us to learn how the candidates feel about the issues of specific interest to the well-being of our business community.

“Everyone living in the Ojai Valley knows our local businesses, and the economy, generally, are hurting. Who we elect to the City Council could well have a positive impact on changing that environment.”

The forum is being sponsored by the Ojai Valley Directory and Ojai Community Bank. Admission is free. Light beverages will be available.

FROM: Sgt. Randy Watkins
The Ventura County Sheriff’s Department has launched a new website (same Internet address: www.vcsd.org ) that is designed to be more interactive with frequently updated content and accomplished, in part, through the use of popular social networking mediums such as YouTube, Twitter, and Nixle.

New features include an embedded YouTube window on the home page along with a Nixle/Twitter Newswire, scrolling photo gallery, and Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) display. The Nixle/Twitter Newswire displays press releases and other important department communication. These same messages are capable of being pushed to smart phones and other hand-held mobile devices to individuals who register with those services. The CAD display refreshes every 60 seconds and allows anyone to view the majority of patrol activity occurring within the Sheriff’s jurisdiction while providing a short time delay for safety and security considerations.

The website also provides statistical crime data for the department’s jurisdictions and has many links to important resources such as inmate information, Crime Stoppers, and REVERSE 911®. The department intends to enhance the capabilities of the website over time and plans to add features in the future such as Crime/Arrest Logs and Google maps. Visitors to the website are encouraged to provide feedback, which will be used to aid in decision making for enhancements in the future.

Greg Webster and Erin Miller have been riding dirt bikes for more than 20 years.

Webster first, Miller second in Cal State Championship

By Logan Hall
When Erin Miller and Greg Webster get ready for a day of hill climbing, they don’t put on hiking boots or carry a backpack. The two Ojai Valley residents strap on their protective gear, hop onto their modified dirt bikes, and roar full throttle up the trail. Miller and Webster are hillclimb competitors, using Webster’s modified dirt bikes to tackle steep hillsides that most would have difficulty making it up on foot.

This year, in the California State Championship Hillclimb and Verticross Pro-Am event, held in Tracy in March, both riders did very well. Webster took first place out of 25 riders in the 450cc stock verticross competition, taking down many seasoned riders including professional Robie Peterson. Miller, in one of her first competitions, took an impressive second place in the women’s stock class, also getting the best of most of the veterans of the sport, many of whom have big sponsors that allow them to pursue the sport full time.

“It’s pretty competitive,” said Miller who used Webster’s 2007 KTM xsf 450 in her competition. “There are so many good riders there. Most of those girls have their own custom bikes and can race all the time.”

Webster seems to be pretty seasoned when it comes to the world of hillclimb competition and has participated in many events for the sport. He also has some solid sponsors to back him up, including Cal Coast Motorsports, Six Six One, GSS Raceporting and Bravo Condoms, whose owner started the company after losing a friend to the AIDS virus.

Both Miller and Webster have been riding motorcycles for more than 20 years, giving them the experience they needed to edge out the competition, but they also have full-time pursuits that don’t allow for a consistent race or practice schedule. Miller, who was born and raised in Ojai, is currently completing her prerequisite classes to enroll in the Ventura College nursing program. Webster owns and operates Greg Rents, a full-service rental yard in Oak View.

Webster is also an active member of the community. Greg Rents is a member of the Ojai Valley Chamber of Commerce, and he is the second vice president of the Oak View City Council. He is also pushing to get a place set aside for local kids to ride dirt bikes. “Riding has always helped keep me out of the gutter,” he said. “I want to give all these kids around here something to do, and get them off the streets.”

Despite fierce competition and the inherent dangers of hillclimb and motorcycles in general, Miller and Webster will continue to compete in and enjoy the sport that they love so much.

“I’ll tell you what,” said Miller, who broke both of her arms seven years ago riding in the river bottom. “I learned to never give up no matter what.”

Ventura County 1st District Supervisor Steve Bennett discuses the removal of boulders at the Gridley Road mouth of Shelf Road with equipment operator Rago Loera. After discussing the action with the county’s Public Works director, it was determined that the boulders were “inappropriately placed.”

County orders removal of obstructing boulders

By Sondra Murphy
The private property owners of land bordering Shelf Road access on Gridley Road have taken drastic means to protect their land against trespassers. Greg Culbert decided to place large boulders in a traditional parking area, leading to an outcry of protest among hikers.

Whether the through-way is public or private is a matter of dispute, but the county wasted little time in addressing the blockage. “It’s clear that he’s moved some of those materials onto the public right of way where people are allowed to park and so we’re going to be talking with him about removing the obstructions,” said 1st District Supervisor Steve Bennett. “There is public access that the public has had access to for decades in terms of this property.”

“This property is a trust, the Culbert Family Partnership,” said Culbert. “We have been the owners for six generations, so we’re not newcomers by any means.” Culbert, a single father, who also cares for his sister and 90-year-old father, tends to the 75-acre parcel, including orchards, which the family has owned since the 19th century.

Ventura County closed Shelf Road to vehicular traffic in 1976 and, in 1990, terminated maintenance, but, according to Bennett, never abandoned its easement. “We’ve examined this and those boulders were inappropriately placed on public property,” Bennett said. “We are going to remove them and open this back up for the public and charge the property owner.” The county took on the task of hauling away the giant rocks yesterday in order to clear the parking area for the weekend. Bennett said it will be much safer for hikers to be able to park nestled off the street instead of out on the narrow and curvy Gridley Road.

Prior to the county’s heavy equipment arrival, Dick Fernow, who voluntarily delivers water and Mutt Mitts to either end of Shelf Road, told the OVN that the supply stations had been vandalized on the Gridley Road side.

Damage has often occurred on the other side of the property line, as well. Culbert said that he had grown tired of dealing with disrespectful trespassers before resorting to placing the rocks along the mouth of Shelf Road where people commonly park to access the throughway. “The Fire Department complained about me blocking the fire lane, but parked cars block it all the time and are never cited,” said Culbert. “We have a problem with underage drinkers and drug users, sometimes 50 at a time up there. When I yell that they’re on private property, you can imagine what kind of gestures I get.”

Culbert said he has been harassed many times by hikers while accessing or working on his own property. In addition to having “Private Property” signs continuously removed, people throw dog manure and beer bottles at family members, roll boulders from his land down the hill and have cut down his sons’ living Christmas tree — twice. He said he has also been shot at and struck by ricocheting bullets.

“The problem is the desecration of the area atop the hill, just west of my house — a place called by the users ‘couch rock,’” said Culbert, adding he plans to measure from benchmark points and GPS waypoints to determine the exact property line. “I have contacted the civil engineer that my father employed in 1996. At that time, my dad and an employee cleared and marked the line with long PVC pipe sections. These markers have long since been vandalized. The situation at couch rock is deplorable.”

“As it relates to the Fire Department, we have an encroachment permit from county Public Works to maintain the road to some degree so fire equipment may access it, and that’s basically as far as it goes,” said Kevin Nestor, deputy fire chief of Ventura County. “We don’t involve ourselves as to public right of way.”

“There are different departments at work here,” Bennett said. “Overall, county government is concerned about the ability for people to enjoy one of the most popular hiking spots in the county, including the ability to park.” The parking problem is mainly what Bennett’s office is hoping to remedy.

“That is not private property, it’s a public road used by hundreds of people a day,” said Bennett. “The county never gave up our right-of-way. He has no right to deny the public right-of- way or easement on the side of the road … If he has a trespassing problem, the solution is not to deny the public access to park there and to just bulldoze blockages onto the public’s property. There may be a dispute as to where the line is, but he’s way onto public property.”

“I didn’t block the Fire Department, I got their attention,” Culbert said, adding that even signs set in concrete have been repeatedly removed. “I had to create a sheer, 12-foot wall and paint ‘Private Property’ on it because people pull the signs down.” He said he has to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in liability insurance on the property. He takes issue to being called “reckless,” saying he is trying to defend his family against potential lawsuits. “If someone got hurt, because the county doesn’t maintain it, guess who they’d sue first?” said Culbert. “I don’t have any desire to deal with litigation.”

The incidents are taking their toll on Culbert and he feels he has gotten no support from the various county agencies in the matter. “We’ve tried to have a peaceful coexistence in all the generations that have lived here,” said Culbert. “I’ve turned away developers because I want to keep it pristine. I’ve been complaining about it for years to the different entities. I don’t have time to deal with vandals while caring for my dad, my sister and sons, as well as taking care of my orchards. This isn’t just where I work, this is where I live.”

Culbert questions the lack of respect for his property rights. “A similar experience would be if I were to walk down Bryant Street and just go into the gym and use the facilities there. Do you think I’d be arrested?”

Most anyone can empathize with the hardships caused by living next to a popular hiking trail frequented by inconsiderate partying people, but the county is unclear about the location of the property lines impacted by Culbert’s boulder placement.

“I’ve been nice to anyone I’ve come across who’s been pleasant,” said Culbert. “But the gloves are off … My grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather would never have stood for this.” As a property trustee, Culbert consulted his father, Phillip Culbert, the owner of record, about the problem. “My dad said, ‘Kick them off.’”

Culbert said he would like the county to better patrol the area and enforce violations. “I take ownership for my actions; the county should take ownership of theirs. They can’t have it both ways. They can’t allow access, but deny liability,” Culbert said. “If the public wants access, they had better damn well behave themselves. Getting $75 million to sell it to some developer doesn’t seem so bad sometimes. Let people deal with them instead of me.”

Staff declares problem ‘chronic’

By Logan Hall
Casitas Municipal Water District Board members last week heard the Lake Casitas staff’s concern for the “chronic issues” of underage drinking within the park. The park allows customers age 18 and over to reserve campsites, and park service officers have repeatedly identified individuals that are under the age of 21 as possessing or consuming alcoholic beverages within the park itself.

Due to park staff previously relying on the Ventura County Sheriff to deal with alcohol-related issues, the Water District board passed an amendment to the ordinance that will allow park officers to issue citations directly to underage individuals who are consuming or in the possession of alcohol. “It starts with people just drinking, and tends to escalate,” said park service officer R.J. Faddis on the problems that arise with alcohol-related incidents. “This will be a deterrent and, hopefully, word will spread that we are taking action.”

There were some questions raised about the concern for park officers’ safety in dealing directly with the citations. Director Jim Word repeatedly expressed an “uneasy feeling” in putting the park officers in that position, however, Carol Belser, Casitas park service manager, indicated that staff would receive additional training to handle such situations that should help curtail the issue of underage drinking within the park.

Another agenda item that the board passed unanimously was the sale of up to 2,000 acre-feet of Casitas water to Luz Solar Partners, Ltd. for assistance in the start-up of their new solar power plant, the Mojave Solar Park, in the Mojave Desert. According to internet sources, upon its completion, set for 2011, it will be the largest solar power plant in the world covering an anticipated nine square miles and generating 553 megawatts that will power the equivalent of an estimated 400,000 homes.

City Council hopefuls Paul Blatz, right, and Leonard Klaif field questions Monday night at the Art Center in a debate hosted by the Ojai Valley Democratic Club. Photo by Logan Hall

Attorneys share priority of keeping Ojai quaint

By Daryl Kelley
The two candidates for a vacant seat on the Ojai City Council attempted Monday evening to define themselves as distinctly different from their opponent, despite similarities in political goals and philosophy.

Both Paul Blatz and Leonard Klaif are lawyers.

Klaif is 61, Blatz 58. Both have been active in community affairs for many years and have run for City Council previously.

Both are critical of current city leadership. And both say their primary goal is to keep Ojai the quaint village they love, but with a more environmentally friendly “green” slant.

During a lively but polite two-hour forum before the Ojai Valley Democratic Club, their first joint appearance of the young campaign, Blatz emphasized his business expertise, fiscal conservatism and long study of Ojai’s building codes as a city planning commissioner.

“I am a conservative when it comes to fiscal responsibility,” Blatz told a gathering of several dozen at the Ojai Art Center. “But I’m a liberal progressive when it comes to social issues.”

Klaif stressed his efforts as a community activist who jumps into the middle of issues feet first.

“The difference, I think, is leadership, passion and commitment,” Klaif said. “I don’t think anyone has gone to more council meetings than I have.”

As for what voters can expect before the June 8 special election, Blatz and Klaif seemed ready to stress their own platforms and characteristics, rather than criticize their opponent.

“I’ve known Paul for 15 years or so,” Klaif said in his introductory comments. “I like Paul and he likes me … He’s a good guy.”

But Klaif’s approach was more of an outspoken citizen watchdog, holding the City Council accountable, while Blatz said he wanted to take on the establishment as one who worked within it for nine years as a planning commissioner.

Klaif is a criminal appeals lawyer, while Blatz specializes in business law.

At Monday’s forum there were differences, too, in style and delivery.

Klaif was highly opinionated, sometimes caustic and sometimes funny, but also well informed on the issues. At one point, Klaif proposed replacing city attorney Monte Widders.

“We need a new city attorney,” he said, “because the city attorney that we have is the biggest single impediment we have to finding solutions.

“‘You can’t do that, you can’t do that,’” is how Widders advises the council on myriad proposals, Klaif said.

“The answers are here,” he said. “We just have to do.”

Blatz was generally more careful, while also stating his opinions strongly.

When asked about a series of huge water rate increases by the privately owned water company in Ojai, Blatz responded: “It’s absolutely a crime what Golden State Water is doing.” He said he favors “somehow” turning Ojai’s water delivery over to a publicly managed system. Golden State has failed to maintain its system, while reaping a profit, and it is now saddling ratepayers with the huge cost of repairs, he said.

Klaif said he has a history of testifying against Golden State’s rate requests, and once shook a bottle of its water at a public hearing “and made it rattle” with impurities. He said he agrees with Councilwoman Betsy Clapp that the city should look into a possible condemnation of the Golden State system and taking it over through eminent domain laws.

In a lengthy question-and-answer session, both candidates appeared versed on many details of city government, although Blatz fumbled a question about law enforcement costs.

When asked about the city’s stalled Housing Element strategy that is a legally mandated part of the city’s General Plan for development, Klaif said that if he had to vote today, he’d vote for the current proposal. The City Council, after 18 months of study, recently delayed action on the plan again.

“There are great risks to the city in doing nothing,” Klaif said. The state, which requires local governments to approve a plan for their housing needs every five years, could declare Ojai an “open city” because it does not have a complete General Plan, he said. That would open the city to new, unplanned construction. A housing plan could call for construction of very few new houses, he said.

Klaif criticized city planners for not yet defining how to convert illegal granny flats into legal dwellings, thus helping to meet state mandates for low-income housing.

Blatz said he probably would vote yes on the pending proposal, too, if he had to vote today.

“But I don’t think the council has enough information to vote,” he said. Ojai has a number of issues it  has  to solve before approving new housing, he said. Those are a shortage of water, traffic congestion and illegal residences.

The state has concluded that Ojai should provide more than 400 more dwellings over the next five years to meet its obligations to provide for growth.

Both candidates expressed frustration with how the city fails to deal with long-standing problems. Klaif noted that when he and Blatz ran for council in 2002 both advocated construction of a new Skate Park.

“Who would have thought we would have a new (national) health plan before we’d have a new Skate Park,” Klaif said to laughter. While at least one council member has expressed embarrassment at the slow pace of building a Skate Park, Klaif said, “It’s not enough to be embarrassed … You have to do.”

Skate Park plans are moving forward within city government and construction is expected this year after completion last year of a $350,000 fund-raising effort, including $100,000 of city funds.

The candidates dealt with numerous other questions, with both agreeing the city should work more closely with the owners of the Ojai Valley Inn, the city’s principle taxpayer, to bring guests at the luxury hotel into the city.

Klaif criticized the inn for not building low-income housing units for employees that were promised when the city approved construction of a new house for the Crown family owners five years ago. Klaif said the inn has tried to keep guests at the inn and away from downtown restaurants and theaters. Blatz said he sees the inn two ways, as a chief employer and taxpayer, but also as an entity that should work more closely with the rest of the community.

Addressing the issue of Ojai’s large cost for law enforcement, forum moderator Sean Keenan said that only three of 16 small cities his group had surveyed used county sheriff’s departments as city police forces, including Ojai. And he said Ojai’s per capita cost was the highest of the 16.

Blatz said he thought the per capita costs were high because the sheriff patrols the entire 35,000-resident Ojai Valley, not just Ojai. But he added, that a city Police Department might make sense. “You look at everything in how it makes sense,” he said. “Why Ojai wouldn’t have our police force is beyond me.”

Klaif said he was open to the possibility of a city police force, but he noted accurately that Ojai city does not pay for policing the rest of the valley. And he said that the city has to consider laboratory and technical services it receives with its sheriff’s contract.

“It’s the cost of the whole thing,” Klaif said. “There are lots of questions that need to be answered.”

(Ojai had its own Police Department until 1980, when it was absorbed into the Sheriff’s Department because of a wider array of services.)

Asked about term limits on council members, Blatz said he’d favor a limit of three terms, or 12 years, to bring in new blood. But Klaif said term limits were “a cop-out. If you don’t like people in office, go out and vote them out. Term limits is the lazy person’s way out.”

Asked what the candidates would do to support the city’s business district, Blatz said the city is now taking steps with the Chamber of Commerce to market Ojai, but that the city needs to recruit new businesses that “cater to people in Ojai, rather than catering to people who come here.”

Klaif lauded the new cooperation between the city and the chamber, “but prior to that there was a lot of antagonism … The city wasn’t very supportive.”

Both candidates stressed their backgrounds: Blatz grew up in a 1,500-person community in Connecticut (“that’s one of the things that drew me to Ojai.”). Klaif is the child of two community activists. (His parents marched in protests. His dad was a volunteer newspaper editor, his mom a PTA president.)

For more information on the candidates see their web sites: BlatzforOjai.com and klaif4ojai.com. To watch the Democratic Club-produced video of the debate, click HERE.

Approval pending enactment of Senate bill, EIR evaluation

By Sondra Murphy
Traffic, growth control, affordable housing, water supply and sustainability.

Look through any OVN archive from its nearly 120-year history and one will find these issues passionately addressed.

The topics are revisited in each of the city of Ojai’s efforts to finalize a Housing Element Plan — a required plan to accommodate new housing to be certified by the state based on the Regional Housing Needs Assessment mandated by state housing law as part of the periodic process of updating local housing elements.

The RHNA quantifies the need for housing within each jurisdiction during specified planning periods. In May 2008, City Council members said they were not ready to adopt a plan to accommodate 427 new housing units required by the state. In December 2008, the council determined it could not support any of the three options presented to accommodate a state mandate that conflicts with the city’s growth management plan.

In March 2009, the council voted to submit to the state a new Housing Element plan that would eventually add 427 legal dwellings in Ojai, using as a cornerstone an amnesty program that would encourage owners of about 300 illegal dwellings to upgrade them to legal standards. A June 2010 deadline for compliance and the beginning of implementation of a housing plan is set by the state.

The state responded positively to the amnesty proposal and, in July, the council directed staff to prepare a draft Environmental Impact Report complete with community comments, of which 16 were received. But when city consultant Tom Figg, brought the update to the council earlier this month, the process backpedaled.

The objections had not changed. While the council supported affordable housing as a concept, it was still skeptical about Ojai’s ability to accommodate more than 400 units.

“The council’s heart is in the right place. We want to build affordable housing,” said Mayor Pro-Tem Carol Smith, who added that she had faith in the amnesty program. “I want to spend money on doing programs to build affordable housing … I don’t want to spend another dime of taxpayers’ money on items that are not housing our very poor residents.” Smith said the council should stop paying consultants and move forward with the Housing Element plan.

But Councilwomen Sue Horgan and Betsy Clapp were not sold. “I feel we are being dictated to by the state,” Clapp said.

“This still doesn’t make sense to me,” said Horgan. “We’ve got environmental concerns bumping up against this housing mandate … Developers don’t have the money to develop anything. We have all these competing interests.”

Horgan brought up Senate Bill 375 and MS-4 as examples of these conflicts.

SB 375 strives to control greenhouse gas emissions by curbing sprawl. It provides emissions-reducing goals for which regions can plan, integrates disjointed planning activities, and provides incentives for local governments and developers to follow new “conscientiously planned” growth patterns, such as placing housing developments near transit hubs and jobs.

MS-4 refers to storm water discharge requirements. The city of Ojai is co-permittee under the Ventura County Storm Control Board and bound by the “requirements to implement pollution reduction and control measures for surface water discharged attributable to new development through low impact development and best management practices.” In addition to incorporating MS-4 requirements into their environmental review processes, cities must include water quality management considerations and policies in their general plans whenever amendments may impact land use, housing conservation or open space elements.

Also of concern to many of the public speakers, as well as the council, were the water reports cited in the DEIR, which are dated anywhere between 1959 and 2005 and include data from the Ojai Basin Groundwater Management Agency, as well as Golden State Water Company and Casitas Municipal Water District. Jim Ruch, OBGMA board member, reminded the council that the agency is in the midst of a water study that could impact the Housing Element plan. “I strongly recommend you recognize that we do, indeed, have a resource restraint,” said Ruch.

“We have another water study under way that’s going to be very extensive and is going to be critical for us,” said Clapp. “I don’t feel the least bit uncomfortable waiting for that.”

Horgan agreed. “This is bad legislation that is being foisted upon us,” she said. “I’d like to look for some of the specific things we can do now, but I’m not able to support this Housing Element right now.” Discussion touched on the RHNA-mandated number of units Ojai would be required to create.

“You asked what is the magic number. The answer is, whatever you want it to be. One way you can do it is to rely on existing units. You can even require occupancy restrictions,” said Figg. “There are ways to get to the numbers you want, so if you want to do a senior project, you can. I just recommend that you decide on something, whatever it may be.”

“The history of the RHNA numbers is the county said, ‘If you do not accept these numbers, then we will impose higher numbers on you,’” said Smith.

Clapp read from Biggs’ memo, page 3-161, stating that, “the city could legitimately find that the significant and unavoidable environmental impacts that would result from adoption of the Housing Element as identified in the DEIR violated the Congestion Management Program of CEQ and are to great that they pose a significant health, safety and general welfare risk to the community that cannot be overcome.”

“Help me with that,” Clapp then said. “It sounds to me that we can legitimately lower our numbers.”

“This difference, of course, is while that is true in that context, there are other considerations involved,” said Julie Biggs, Housing Element legal counsel to the city. “The reason this exists is because of your own city standards. In other words, you’ve created your own health and safety issue. It’s a trade-off in all of these things.”

Biggs then pointed to the next paragraph that said the DEIR has found water availability is not a significant issue. Clapp argued that the DEIR does not say that at all.

“All of this is very speculative,” said Smith. “To end this, either we resubmit to HCD without changes and say, ‘What do you think of this’ or we self-certify. Does anyone see any other choices?”

“We were told this is an urgent matter. I’m not there,” Horgan said. “One thing I don’t know how to get around is traffic impact. If we add one traffic trip to Highway 33, we can’t do it.”

“The rules are changing all the time, even as we speak, because of the recession,” said Mayor Steve Olsen. “If we do nothing, it might change again. We may never be able to reconcile the environmental impacts and housing impacts. They don’t go together.”

After spending nearly two hours on the agenda item, no progress was made. “Tonight’s action is conceptual approval of the DEIR,” said Olsen. “I’m not hearing that.”

“You don’t have a consensus on the element itself that underlies it,” Biggs observed. “What you submitted to HCD, that is what the draft EIR is predicated on. So what you submitted you are saying you are not comfortable with.”

Council members further discussed if they could modify a plan for submission before Horgan moved to table the decision, “Until such time as the information from OBGMA and Golden State is available.” The motion passed 3-1, with Smith casting the dissenting vote.

Blatz, Klaif qualify for June special election as Corbin
falls one qualifying signature short on filing deadline

By Daryl Kelley
Two Ojai lawyers involved with community groups for years have applied to fill a seat on the City Council vacated in December when veteran Councilman Joe DeVito retired. Both are critical of current city leadership.

But a professional actor and teacher who also submitted nomination papers on Friday fell one signature short of the required 20 eligible voters, and did not qualify for the June 8 election.

A split City Council voted in January to fill the last few months of DeVito’s term through a special election, instead of appointing a temporary replacement to serve until the fall general election.

Now, two candidates have qualified for the June ballot: Leonard Klaif, 61, who specializes in criminal appeals, and Paul Blatz, 58, who is primarily a business lawyer.

But actor Demitri Corbin, 49, a city arts commissioner, was notified by City Clerk Carlon Strobel on Tuesday that only 19 of his signatures qualified.

“So I won’t be a candidate,” Corbin said. “I’m surprised and still a little bit shocked.”

Corbin said he submitted 26 or 27 signatures, but apparently some of those who signed in support of Corbin did not live inside city boundaries.

“But there’s still an election in November,” Corbin said, “and I’m going to run.”

In addition to DeVito’s seat, two other council positions will be on the November ballot.

Klaif and Blatz have run for City Council before, and Klaif narrowly missed being elected in 2006. It would have been Corbin’s first run for council.

Blatz, a 26-year resident of Ojai, has served on both the city’s Redevelopment Commission and the Planning Commission, of which he was chairman.

Klaif, who has lived in Ojai for 17 years, is a trustee of the Ojai Art Center, and was president of that board for five years.

Klaif and Blatz said they are running to preserve the small-town qualities that attracted them to Ojai in the first place. And in interviews, they both criticized current city leadership.

“I’ve been watching and attending City Council meetings for all of the 17 years I’ve been in Ojai,” said Klaif, who has been endorsed by former Mayor Suza Francina. “Ojai is incredible, unique. And I think I can help preserve that small-town charm. The quality of the arts is top-notch.”

And he added: “The biggest issue, because it really encompasses everything, is leadership.”

Blatz, a former professional sports agent, said his goal is also preserving the charms of this bucolic community.

“I grew up in a 1,500-person community in Connecticut,” Blatz said. “Ojai has all of the small-town qualities I was used to. But it seems like the city is lacking leadership. It seems tired. It’s an attitude. It seems like the people at City Hall, that we’re there for them rather than they’re there for us.”

The candidates have nearly three months to sway city voters. Neither anticipated spending a lot of money to make his case.

Klaif, who frequently speaks at City Council meetings, missed winning a council seat by 76 votes in 2006. And this time, he has campaigned aggressively, lobbying for an appointment to replace DeVito by placing an advertisement in the OVN while gaining the signatures of about 200 supporters.

Now, in kicking off his spring campaign, Klaif said Monday that he will bring to the council a zeal to get things done.

“How is it possible that we still do not have a permanent Skate Park?” he said. “Why is the public access cable channel without programming? Why do we not have a visible Visitor’s Center? Why is City Hall’s roof covered with a tarp? Why did the bicycle racks purchased by the city sit in storage for years? Why don’t we have a bike plan in place? A major part of the answer is lack of leadership, passion and commitment from the City Council.”

Klaif said that as president of the Ojai Art Center board, he led a renovation campaign and enlisted the city’s support in finally linking the center to Libbey Park with a foot bridge, an improvement planned since 1937.

Klaif stressed his history of taking staunch positions against projects that could erode Ojai’s small-town allure, “our villageness.”

He said he has attended an anti-chain store conference in Massachusetts, spoke against a permit for gravel trucks in Santa Maria, and argued against a cell phone company’s proposal to build 60-foot towers that would have marred views of Ojai Valley residents.

“I regularly attend City Council meetings, speaking clearly, emphatically, passionately, and occasionally caustically, in support of ‘small town’ in what is essentially a battle with ‘big money,’” Klaif said.

If elected, Klaif said he would also be a champion of the burgeoning “green” movement in the Ojai Valley. “The city should better utilize the expertise available from individuals and groups such as the Ojai Valley Green Coalition,” he said.

Klaif is also is a supporter of Theater 150 and the Ojai Film Society.

Blatz, who lost in council runs in 1996 and 2002, stressed his experience within government as an appointed city redevelopment commissioner for two years and planning commissioner for nine.

As a commissioner, “I learned what it takes to address and resolve important issues,” he said.

“I am acutely aware that what we cherish most about living in our beautiful valley could be easily lost without leadership on our City Council focused on protecting our village character and quality of life,” he wrote in his candidate statement.

“We must maintain the proper balance between our environmental and economic interests and appreciate and preserve our history in order to safeguard our future and achieve sustainability.”

Blatz said he is particularly bothered by the “eyesores” that dot Ojai’s main street —- two vacant gas stations and the old bowling alley.

“They’re right in the heart of our city,” he said. “Maybe the city code should be reworked” so officials can force improvements faster, he said.

Blatz said he would also like the council to focus on the escalating rates charged by Golden State Water Company to Ojai residents. “This is going to be a terrible burden on our citizens.”

Blatz cited his efforts with several local organizations, including the Chamber of Commerce, Land Conservancy, Rotary Club, Pergola Committee and Performing Arts Theater Foundation.

“As a member of the Ojai community for 26 years,” Blatz said, “I’ve worked with these Ojai organizations to make Ojai the best possible community it can be.”

At 94, The Gables Of Ojai resident Irene Janousek delivers a punch line to a packed house at the Ojai Valley Woman’s Club at Friday night’s “Ojai’s Got Talent” show.

Nonagenarian ‘kills’ at Woman’s Club show

By Logan Hall
Ojai has long been known for being a town of artists and creative minds of many types. Last weekend seemed to prove that, indeed, Ojai has talent. Hosted by the Ojai Valley Woman’s Club, with more than 20 acts scheduled ranging from a LED-light hula-hoop routine to live folk music, the show had something for everyone.

Of many highlights, one in particular seemed to get the crowd going: 94-year-old Irene Janousek, The Gables of Ojai resident and longtime comedian, carefully made her way to the microphone. With a little help from a walker and her daughter-in-law, she squared up to the crowd and began to deliver a series of jokes. Some of which weren’t entirely G-rated. “How do you make holy water?” asked Janousek into the mike, followed by a brief pause. “You boil the hell out of it.”

Born in Grafton, N.D., in 1916, Janousek moved to California in 1962 where she owned a beauty shop for more than 11 years in Glendale. “I told jokes to my customers,” she said on developing her act, “… and at our parties and family get-togethers.”

Janousek, who has seven grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren, moved to Ojai six years ago and now lives at The Gables where she performs regularly for the other residents. “She’s hilarious,” said Gables marketing director Christine Fenn. “Her jokes are amazing.” Everyone seems to get along with Janousek. She is quick witted and definitely seems willing to chat with her fans. “She’s so easy-going and a pleasure to be with,” added Fenn. “The other residents love her.”

Also performing later in the show was a trio of young gentlemen who paid homage to the forefathers of rock ‘n’ roll by firing off a few classics such as Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode.” Dressed up in black shirts and leather, they quickly had the crowd cheering for an encore.

Soon after, St. Thomas Aquinas College freshmen Liam Collins on the fiddle, and Daniel Bagdazian on acoustic guitar, proceeded to wow the audience with a few Irish jigs and folk instrumentals. The two seemed to have a chemistry that worked well, and everyone was tapping their feet and clapping in rhythm.

All in all, it would seem as though ticket holders got their money’s worth. With proceeds from ticket sales being given by the Woman’s Club to scholarships and various charities, the event has been a way to get the community together to share their talents and give something back. “This is really something special for Ojai,” commented Woman’s Club President Irene Petroff.

Does Ojai have talent? Come out to next year’s “Ojai Has Talent” show to find out.

By Nancy Gross
“This is very nice, very special,” said Ojai Studio Artist Ruth Farnham early Thursday evening, and indeed, the third Annual Ojai Valley Chamber of Commerce Awards Gala allowed chamber members to unwind, have fun and socialize in elegant comfort at the Ojai Valley Inn and Spa.

And to wear some fancy clothes. Chamber president Bob Kemper of Troop Real Estate said, “I don’t think I can recall seeing so many well-dressed people in Ojai, especially at the same time.”

Yet, coupled with the pleasures of talking and mingling, the gala is a significant opportunity for businesses to be invigorated by the work ethic, innovations and successes of one another. Monthly chamber mixers fulfill these aims also.

Kemper said, “The six businesses that will be recognized represent only a small segment of the excellent businesses in the Ojai Valley. This is an important event for all, a congratulatory event.”

The gala was also a time to reflect on the year. Roberta Raye of Made in Ojai said “I just keep thinking of where I was last year compared to this year. Right after this event we formed the co-op, and the chamber has been so supportive.”

The chamber’s chief executive officer Scott Eicher offered a statistic that testifies to the tenacity and forward thinking of Ojai business owners. After last year’s gala, the chamber held a series of workshops to help businesses cope creatively while facing a nationwide economic recovery. Eicher said that according to Bruce Stenslie, of the Economic Development Collaborative of Ventura County, the rest of the county had similar programs going, but Ojai’s were the best attended.

Additionally, it was mentioned that chamber services provide for many needs of nonmember businesses by default. “We are the voice of business in the Ojai Valley.”

During the cocktail hour some guests shared their thoughts about how they are managing while the economy moves sluggishly toward health. Interior designer Philip Brocious of Kava said, “I’ve been doing a lot of redesign which involves rearranging and fine tuning, suggesting paint colors. I charge per room and it is a lot about making suggestions.” He said it allows people to make small changes to their surroundings, and make purchases over time. “It shifts the energy completely and it spreads throughout the house.”

Amy Segovia, front office manager at The Ojai Valley Inn and Spa said the inn benefited from Valentine’s Day being on a long President’s Day weekend, and that spring break is about to start, and, due to different school schedules, it will cover many weeks.
Segovia added, “Guests enjoy going into town. We compliment the city and the city compliments us.”

After chatting, drinks, appetizers and photographs, Steve Vera’s large group of employees and family from Smart Technology Enablers, who offer managed services for computer networks, posed for a shot by one of the inn’s fireplaces, the guests moved over to the awards ceremony.

Before the awards were given to six businesses who had won through a balloting process, Eicher recognized his executive assistant Shannon Allen, who has gone above and beyond in her 10 years with the chamber, “improving the weekly e-blast and website, helping both the Lions and Woman’s Clubs meet their financial goals, changing the business and shopping map from a two-color map to a four-color map,” and creating an interactive online map that a visitor on the way to Ojai can access to navigate into and around town. Allen was awarded a spa day at Spa Ojai.

Roger Phelps handled the video and audio, as each of the three nominees in each category had been taped in their businesses by Olga and Aaron Singer, often speaking about the honor of being chosen, the privilege of working in Ojai and the benefits of working with the chamber.

The first category, Small Business of the Year, recognized a for-profit, locally owned business with no more than 10 employees, with an innovative approach to customer service. Emily Sandefur of Heritage Financial presented, and Feast Bistro took the prize.

Susan Coulter, chef and co-owner of Feast Bistro with Beryl Schwartz, accepted the award and said, “We’re all in this together. We rely on each other. We need each other. It’s important to be a part of the community. The chamber is the way to go” She especially thanked the merchants in the Arcade, and said, “I hope we’re around for a long time after this.”

The next honor was presented by Eicher, and Ojai Valley Directory’s Ren Adam, for the best Environmentally Conscious Business, and E.J. Harrison and Sons was chosen. Myron Harrison, the owner, who said he began driving a trash truck in 1965, accepted and also said, “I’d like to thank the chamber and the city of Ojai for all their efforts. “This is a family business. We love this valley,” Harrison said.

The Entrepreneurial Spirit award, presented by Kathy Hartley of the Ojai Theatre and the Lavender Inn, and Olga Singer of Graphics Unlimited, went to Lara Moga of Casa Bella residential care for Alzheimer’s and dementia patients. Her moving acceptance speech brought silence to everyone else in the room. She began, “I’m the luckiest person in the world because I get to take care of people.”

She thanked her father for his “grace and courage under unbelievable circumstances,” and told him repeatedly that she loved him, and that he had given her a great life. She also said, “Nobody gets anywhere alone. My husband Dorulet is my rock. As an engineer, he built Casa Bella for me.” She added some special phrases to Dorulet in Romanian, and lastly acknowledged her father one more time for being someone who “showed me you could do anything in life. He always asked, ‘why not?’”

The Tourism Development Award was given by Janis Clapoff, managing director for the Ojai Valley Inn and Spa, and Dave Brubaker, president and CEO of Ojai Community Bank. Ojai Studio Artists won in this category.

OSA president Linda Taylor accepted the honor and said “I’m very excited. We’ve had our open studio tour for 27 years. The chamber helps us so much. They sell our tickets. I want to thank Scott in particular. He is such a great support and always gives us so many great suggestions.”

The Heart of Ojai award was then given to a nonprofit chamber member offering enhanced quality of life for those living in the Ojai Valley. The Ojai Valley Youth Foundation took the honor, and Dan Burrell, interim executive director and Meg Wall, program manager accepted.

Burrell said, “I so wish that Cindy Jones was here,” and he commended her for her outstanding fundraising ability, saying that at a recent luncheon she was able to “raise 45,000 in one hour and 15 minutes, from this community, in this economy.”

Burrell also said that Wall “began with the Youth Foundation when she was 12 years old, and is now our amazing program director,” and Wall expressed thanks for the way the valley supports its teens.

The final award was the Cornerstone Award, given to a chamber member with more than 10 employees, making an investment to grow business in the valley. Dawn Shook, executive officer of the Ojai Board of Realtors, and Martha Dowden, branch manager for Los Padres Bank, presented the award to Rains Department Store.

Alan Rains was videotaped saying the store began in 1914. He kept his comments brief, expressing appreciation and thanks. “We’re not new to the block. We are a specialty department store. We are honored and humbled. Being a chamber member for more years than I remember is an asset to us.”

Throughout the evening, chamber members returned to the topic of tourism, and enthusiasm was expressed for the work of the chamber in securing $160,000 from the city of Ojai to begin a public relations and marketing campaign for Ojai as a tourist destination. Ruth Ballin’s PR firm has been chosen for this enterprise. Ballin currently oversees the Ojai Playwright’s Conference.

Eighty-five percent of budget goes to employee wages and benefits

By Daryl Kelley
For a decade, some Ojai teachers have received pink slips in mid-March, notifying them that their services might not be needed in the fall because of declining enrollment. Usually, most of those notices were rescinded.

But this time, the Ojai Unified School District may have no way to keep dozens of threatened teachers in their classrooms, because state and federal cuts, and fewer students, have left it with a nearly $3-million deficit next fall, a huge drop from this year’s budget of  nearly $25 million.

Distraught district trustees voted Tuesday evening to notify 51 part- and full-time educators, including several managers, that they may have no jobs after June. Pink slips went out on Wednesday and Thursday.

That’s fewer than the 76 termination notices sent last year, when few teachers were actually laid off. But this year, officials said, there is little wiggle room in the state budget, and no new federal stimulus money such as the $1.3 million that rolled in this year.

The district could balance its budget by laying off 27 full-time educators, including three managers, but 51 were notified to give the district more flexibility in where and how it makes cuts. State law prevents a teacher from being dismissed unless notice is given by March 15.

This year’s “pink slip list” is especially grim, superintendent Hank Bangser told trustees. And it could reach “a significant distance down the seniority list” of teachers in the district.

Because 85 percent of the district’s budget goes to employee wages and benefits, that’s where trustees must look to cut, Bangser said.

Trustees will also consider soon proportionate reductions in the size of the district’s non-teaching staff, such as aides, secretaries, custodians and bus drivers. Fifteen full-time non-teaching positions need to be eliminated to balance the budget.

“Nobody is feeling there is going to be any relief,” Bangser said. “This is the end” of dodging the budget bullet, he said.

“This is a structural deficit, which means it doesn’t go away.”

That means that Ojai’s public schools will have fewer teachers, fewer class options and more students per class, officials said. There might also be fewer days of school. But just ow that shakes down is still up in the air.

Trustees must make those difficult choices during the next three months, giving final notice to teachers by mid-May and approving a budget by June 30.

“We’re really at this sort of precipice that we’ve never been at before,” Trustee Pauline Mercado said.

Even programs that are popular with parents and teachers are on the chopping block this time.

Size reduction of primary grade classes — kindergarten through third — are at risk. Those reductions to the current 20 students per class could be replaced with classes of 30, saving the district $400,000 as about 10 jobs are eliminated, Bangser told trustees.

“This is not a recommendation,” he said, “but it might be a place we have to go.”

Other options include a compromise, keeping primary classes at about 25 students, which would still save more than $200,000 annually.

John LeSuer, principal at Topa Topa Elementary, asked the board to do everything it can to keep class sizes down.

“At Topa Topa, our low economic sub-groups have doubled,” he said. “It’s really important that we try to keep these class sizes down.”

Advanced placement classes at Nordhoff High School are also in jeopardy, principal Dan Musick told the board. He has already decided to cut Spanish 5 and AP World History from the curriculum next fall, because the budget simply cannot support them any more, Musick said.

“This is the first year that we’ve said we are not going to have these classes next year,” he said. “We’re still going to have Spanish 4, a college-level class. And we still have three AP offerings in history — U.S., European and government.”

A shortened school year is also a distinct possibility.

Last year, teaching days were cut by five to 175. And the president of the Ojai Federation of Teachers, Martha Ditchfield, said that might be an option teachers prefer instead of layoffs. The district saves $100,000 for each of these so-called furlough days.

The teachers’ union distributed a survey this week, asking instructors to list their preferred cuts. The survey should be back by Monday, Ditchfield said.

“We’re asking: ‘What’s most important for you to keep?’” she said. “’What are you willing to give up?’”

If the district follows its 51 educator notices by laying off the equivalent of 27 full-time teachers and managers, and then another 15 non-teaching staffers, that would cut $2.8 million from the 2010-2011 budget, district analysts said.

It would also cut 41 people from the district’s full-time work force of 281: That’s nearly 15 percent of workers.

Under the new budget plan, the district would also reduce its emergency reserves from $742,000 to $217,000, just 1 percent of the total budget. State law requires a 3 percent reserve, but a waiver can be granted in dire economic times such as these.

Board President Kathi Smith asked Bangser to do all he can to survey parents as well as teachers.

And trustees agreed that the district should place a survey form on each school’s web site to gather parents opinions.

She mentioned that district voters had defeated an $89 per parcel tax that could have helped balance this year’s budget by yielding $600,000. Sixty-five percent of voters approved the tax, but it failed by 77 votes.

“Our taxpayers are asking us to diminish the education in this district,” Smith said. “It’s going to get worse.”

Other trustees also expressed dismay.

“I don’t understand the world, almost,” Trustee Rikki Horne said. “Yet, with all that, we’ll continue to educate our kids.”

Linda Taylor, a board member and former teacher, said she can hardly sleep with the responsibility: “All the gains of the last 15 years are really being wiped out, just flushed down the toilet.”

Trustee Steve Fields noted that the district has been shrinking for a decade as Ojai has grown older more rapidly than the rest of the county or state. The 3,000-student district is down about 50 more students this year, but seems to be stabilizing.

“We’ve been cutting, cutting and cutting,” Fields said. “In spite of that we’ve been able to keep what makes the district great.

“But it’s a slow bleed,” he added. “And it’s wrenching.”

Gloria Claudette Grinnell holds a poster commemorating the Richmond 34 sit-in in 1960.

California native recalls discrimination, jail time in Virginia

By Nancy Gross
Things were different in 1960, especially in the South, where the movement toward civil rights was slow and discrimination was overt. Courageous people had to take a stand — or a sit — for fairness.

As part of Black History Month in February, Ojai resident, Gloria Claudette Grinnell returned to Richmond, Va., to mark the 50th anniversary of the downtown sit-ins in which she participated as a Virginia Union University student.

Grinnell had grown up in San Francisco and San Diego. Discrimination in her youth in California, she said, was covert. “The South was different, quite different.” Richmond had been the capital of the Confederacy, and Grinnell, though she had experienced racial slurs and stereotypes, was not used to the way the community’s black people were repeatedly spoken down to. She didn’t fully understand their difficulty speaking up.

The college, however, was an all-black school, and Grinnell said it was the first place she learned any black history. Her teachers and classmates called her “California.”

Martin Luther King Jr. had spoken to humanities classes at VUU. His message of nonviolent resistance rang in the years of two VUU ministry students, Charles M. Sherrod, now a college professor in Albany, Ga., and the late Frank G. Pinkston. They recruited students in the cafeteria to take some action.

For three days, hundreds of dressed-up VUU students went into downtown Richmond and sat down at department store lunch counters where only whites were served. In stores like Thalhimers, Woolworth’s and Grant’s, Grinnell said “You also couldn’t use the facilities. You couldn’t try on clothes.”

The students were denied service, but refused to leave.

The first attempts only caused the lunch counters to close for the day. The arrest on the third day was what the organizers were looking for, to call attention to the inequality in such a way that Jim Crow laws would come under legal scrutiny.

It was the holiday for George Washington’s birthday, Feb. 22, 1960, and 34 students, who came to be called the Richmond 34, were arrested at the Thalhimers lunch counter.

Grinnell said, after hours in jail, “The vice president of religion put his house up to bail us out.”

The students inspired others to picket, boycott and protest; within a year the stores opened their lunch counters to everyone. Three years later NAACP lawyers won a suit in the Supreme Court, and the arrests of the Richmond 34 were called unconstitutional.

These were important birth pains leading to the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

This untagged American bald eagle is drawing the attention of fishers and visitors to the valley’s lake.

Lake Casitas site of nesting pair

By Logan Hall
The Ojai Valley is home to many wild animals. It’s not uncommon to see a deer in a back yard or a coyote running down the street. Lately, one thing seems to have the wildlife community buzzing. The American bald eagle has recently been sighted hunting fish and small birds out at Lake Casitas.

Known for its trademark white head and yellow beak, the bald eagle is found in most of North America, but mainly resides in Alaska and the west coast of Canada. The bald eagle was once abundant in Central California, having a large population on the northern Channel Islands. Due to hunting and pesticide chemicals such as DDT, breeding eagles had disappeared from the islands by the mid-1950s. In 2002 Channel Islands National Park began reintroducing tagged bald eagles back to Santa Cruz Island, which have been spotted at the lake several times. The particular eagles that have recently taken up roost at Casitas, are not tagged. “The fact that they have no tags is exciting,” said Kim Stroud, director of the Ojai Raptor Center. “These are wild birds.”

The birds have mostly been sighted by boat on the northern part of the lake, but a few people have been lucky enough to see them from shore. Raptor Center volunteer and avid bird watcher, Becky Donahue, was walking along the east shore when she spotted an incoming eagle. “This bird just came out of nowhere,” she said. “It was so beautiful.”

Aside from a few fishermen and bird watchers, most people are unaware that America’s national bird is right in their own town. “I’ve never seen them out here,” said Lake Casitas park officer James Martinez. “I’ll be looking for them now though.”

So far, it appears that there is one adult male (white head and tail) and possibly a female and two juveniles. With a large food source available and very few predators to threaten them, the local eagles may have found a seasonal, if not permanent, home at Lake Casitas.

The American bald eagle, although no longer on the U.S. Department of the Interior’s endangered species list, is still protected under the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Anyone encountering the birds is urged to observe them from a distance, being careful not to disturb them.

For more imformation on the Ojai Raptor Center. visit ojairaptorcenter.org.

Bill Murphy

Navy pilot, Colorado transplant steps in as former director is remembered

By Nancy Gross
Bill Murphy has been appointed to fill the Division 7 seat on Ojai Valley Sanitary District’s governing board of directors. Division 7 covers the eastern portion of the city of Ojai, encompassing the Oak Glen-Gridley Road area, Golden West tract, Topa Topa School area, North Fulton and North Drown neighborhoods.

Murphy, his wife, Diane, and their daughter, Rae, moved into that area in June of 2009, after spending seven months renting in Mira Monte. Before that they lived in Colorado Springs.

“I want to try to make an impact on the community, to be a good steward,” Murphy said. “I have not served on this type of board. I have been on the alumni board for my college, Asbury College in Wilmore, Kentucky.” He has also sat on boards in the military. “I served 24 years as a Navy pilot.”

Murphy likes that he can walk to his work as program manager for the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation. “I volunteered for about six months before they hired me on.

“I like what they do. Nothing is the same day after day.”

Murphy is filling the seat vacated when Bill Lotts died on Jan. 2.

Lotts lived in Ojai beginning in 1948. He sat on the OVSD board for 21 years. Also a military man, he was at Point Mugu for 38 years, working in the weapons center.

Lotts’ friend Bruce Dunwoody said that Lotts’ last assignment at Point Mugu was being a target director. “I think he was flying drones.

“When he retired in 1985 he started an electrical contracting business,” Dunwoody said.

Dr. Fred Fauvre, who became Lotts primary care physician for 20 years said Lotts had been his electrician since he moved to the valley in 1975. “He occasionally made emergency visits when the electric stove or oven were on fire and took care of all of our electrical needs. Old houses have electrical needs.”

Like Murphy, Lotts was community service-minded. He was a charter member of Rotary Club of Ojai-West. Fauvre said he remembers serving with Lotts on Rotary projects, “including the Matilija portfolio project, interviewing Matilija Junior High students and giving them an exposure to a job interview and adults.”

Dunwoody said Lotts “was a pretty salty character. He had a moment of fame in 1992 when he went before City Council and demanded that they preserve the old jail building in Libbey Park, saying it was a historical building.”

Both Fauvre and Dunwoody shared the story of how Lotts had apparently spent one night in that jail. “He and a policeman were competing for the favors of a lady,” said Dunwoody. “Somehow he got locked in the jail, at least overnight, relating to that,” Fauvre said.

Lotts was also a substantial property owner in the valley, and raised five sons with his wife, Peggy. After Peggy’s death he married Gwen.

Two of Lotts’ children have relocated to Bakersfield and Reno, and of his sons who remain local, Fauvre said, “They are now populating and serving the valley in an honorable way — actually two of them are electricians.”

Issued 2/24/10 by  the Ojai Police Department

Good Afternoon Watchers,

One of our friends from Santa Barbara PD learned about this new credit card scam from a local banking official and passed along the following to us.  The banker’s message emphasizes just how important the 3 digit security code is on the back of our credit/debit cards.

THE SCAM

This one is pretty slick since they provide YOU with all the information, except the one piece they want.

Note, the callers do not ask for your card number; they already have it… This information is worth reading. By understanding how the VISA & Master Card Telephone Credit Card Scam works, you’ll be better prepared to protect yourself.

One of our employees was called on Wednesday from ‘VISA’, and I was called on Thursday from ‘Master Card’.. The scam works like this:

Caller: ‘This is (name), and I’m calling from the Security and Fraud Department at VISA. My Badge number is 12460. Your card has been flagged for an unusual purchase pattern, and I’m calling to verify. This would be on your VISA card which was issued by (name of bank). Did you purchase an Anti-Telemarketing Device for $497..99 from a Marketing company based in ?’

When you say ‘No’, the caller continues with, ‘Then we will be issuing a credit to your account. This is a company we have been watching and the charges range from $297 to $497, just under the $500 purchase pattern that flags most cards. Before your next statement, the credit will be sent to (gives you your address), i s that correct?’

You say ‘yes’. The caller continues – ‘I will be starting a Fraud investigation. If you have any questions, you should call the 1- 800 number listed on the back of your card (1-800 -VISA) and ask for Security.’

You will need to refer to this Control Number. The caller then gives you a 6 digit number. ‘Do you need me to read it again?’

Here’s the IMPORTANT part on how the scam works. The caller then says, ‘I need to verify you are in possession of your card’. He’ll ask you to ‘turn your card over and look for some numbers’. There are 7 numbers; the first 4 are part of your card number, the next 3 are the security Numbers that verify you are the possessor of the card. These are the numbers you sometimes use to make Internet purchases to prove you have the card. The caller will ask you to read the 3 numbers to him. After you tell the caller the 3 numbers, he’ll say, ‘That is correct, I just needed to verify that the card has not been lost or stolen, and that you still have your card. Do you have any other questions?’ After you say No, the caller then thanks you and states, ‘Don’t hesitate to call back if you do, and hangs up.

You actually say very little, and they never ask for or tell you the Card number.. But after we were called on Wednesday, we called back within 20 minutes to ask a question.. Are we glad we did! The REAL VISA Security Department told us it was a scam and in the last 15 minutes a new purchase of $497.99 was charged to our card.

Long story – short – we made a real fraud report and closed the VISA account. VISA is reissuing us a new number. What the scammers want is the 3-digit PIN number on the back of the card Don’t give it to them.

Instead, tell them you’ll call VISA or Master card directly for verification of their conversation.

The real VISA told us that they will never ask for anything on the card as they already know the information since they issued the card! If you give the scammers your 3 Digit PIN Number, you think you’re receiving a credit. However, by the time you get your statement you’ll see charges for purchases you didn’t make, and by then it’s almost too late and/or more difficult to actually file a fraud report.

If this has recently happened to you, immediately call your credit card company and ask to speak to their security office.  They will be able to check for any fraudulent charges based on your statement and advise you further.  If you do have a fraudulent charge, your credit card company will usually require a police report to verify the facts before removing the fraudulent charge(s).

PLEASE PASS THIS ALONG TO ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS AND RELATIVES.  THE POWER OF CITYWATCH IS THAT EACH OF US NETWORKING CAN COLLECTIVELY REACH THOUSANDS OF OTHERS BY FORWARDING THIS EMAIL. (link) http://ovnblog.com/?p=2582

Be Safe,

Randy

City manager expects trend to continue into upcoming fiscal year

By Sondra Murphy
Predicting government revenues is tricky in any climate, but the city of Ojai has tried to be conservative in the past few years. While city finances have looked better, the good news is that staff outlined ways in which to create a balanced budget in the upcoming fiscal year.

Not surprisingly, cutbacks figure prominently.

City manager Jere Kersnar presented the midyear budget report to the City Council Tuesday with two recommendations. The first sought authorization to budget adjustments for fiscal year 2009-2010; the second was for direction to staff in preparing the proposed fiscal year 2010-2011 budget based on projections contained in the midyear report.

He said he expected a shortfall in the current budget of 11 percent, or about $907,000. “Both the midyear budget report is sort of a preview of what the budget for 2010-2011 may look like, what’s on the horizon,” said Kersnar. “Early reports were looking grim and reports since are not looking better.”

Kersnar said the biggest factors to declining city revenues centered around sales and transient occupancy taxes. A drop in midweek business travel to Ojai combined with a decline in development activity has impacted city accounts. “As you know, we’ve already adjusted our staffing in response to that,” said Kersnar, referring to the limited planning division staffing. “One of the surprising things is our property tax has remained steady. I believe it to be because we have had relatively few turnovers.” He added that, while the market values of homes have fluctuated in recent years, the assessed values have remained steady, helping to maintain that source of city revenue.

Noting a more than 20-percent decline in revenues in the past two years, Kersnar estimated that the city budget is likely to be about  $7 million in 2010-2011. “Just to remind you, we adopted a $7.9 million budget for 2009-2010, down from $8.8 million, which we thought was a conservative number,” Kersnar said. “We are beginning to see glimmers of increases. Property tax is showing a 6-percent increase, our receipts have gone up and that’s a good figure … Sales tax, however, is negative 20 percent and TOT is even worse, down 27 percent.” He said that amounted to about $900,000 less than June projections.

But Kersnar said more cuts were needed in order to stay within actual revenues and to counter unplanned unbudgeted expenditures totaling $112,000. These are comprised of Stop the Trucks Coalition assistance at $18,000; Ventura County Homeless & Housing Coalition grant at $1,500; Student Resource Officer contribution at $75,000; and National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System cost overruns at $17,035.

Besides expenditure reductions currently in place, Kersnar’s proposed new cutbacks included a $4,000 cut to the Historic Preservation Commission; $4,000 savings through staff compensation time in lieu of overtime; $37,861 saved in the planner position; and $42,401 in contracted landscaped projects. “What we’re suggesting is we suspend all our contracts with maintenance and do those duties in house,” Kersnar said, adding that to continue outside maintenance contracts while eliminating staff would create problems with having enough staff to respond to issues such as pot holes or fallen tree limbs. “We don’t know what the impact will be on city services, but … that one will have the most notable impact.” The total savings for these cuts were estimated at $89,649.

“We had a surplus going into 2009. We now see a deficit of about $365,000,” said Kersnar. “That would come from reserves.” He said this would take the general fund balance reserve to about $3 million and should be a one-time, emergency use to allow them not to have to use reserves during the next fiscal year while maintaining a balanced budget.

Projections being an intangible element, much of the discussion about upcoming budget got as philosophical as accounting can. The council unanimously approved the proposed adjustments to the current budget, but were not so quick to direct staff to create the next budget based on the projections garnered from the exercise.

Kersnar projected more than an $824,000 reduction in 2010-2011 revenues, but presented possible expenditure reduction adjustments totaling $838,022. These adjustments included many of the reductions used to address this fiscal year’s shortfall, like planner position and landscape maintenance contract, as well as employee compensation strategies.

“I don’t feel there’s enough information for me to feel comfortable with the second recommendation,” said Councilwoman Betsy Clapp.

“It sounds like we’ve given a philosophy, but we’re going to wait and get more details on how we’re going to proceed.”

“All I was doing is putting it out to you: Are you satisfied with just a balanced budget?” Kersnar said. While he felt confident that staff could create a balanced budget without dipping into reserves again, he felt it unlikely that the city would be able to add to reserves, either.

Councilwoman Sue Horgan said she was comfortable for staff to proceed with that plan, expecting they would see all the details when it was presented to them. She brought up an issue discussed earlier in the agenda, that of changes in how cities must account for post-employment benefits.

With the implementation of the Government Accounting Standard Board Statement 45, post-retirement health benefits, the city faces a decision of whether to pay-as-you-go or pre-fund such benefits or explore other options. While pre-funding has many advantages, committing to the annual contributions would need to be addressed in the 2010-2011 budget. “Something we haven’t considered here is the previous discussion item, the GASB impacts, and that’s going to come into the discussion,” said Horgan.

The council and city staff voiced reluctance in cutting employee compensation in any way, but Kersnar said they would be looking into the possibility to include with the next budget report.

Mayor Pro-Tem Carol Smith moved to direct staff to prepare the proposed budget for fiscal year 2010-2011, “based on what our income will be and that it be balanced.” With this modification to the motion, it passed unanimously, as well.

Fifteen girls enter competition to name Miss Oak View, Teen and Pre-teen

By Sondra Murphy
Accentuating etiquette, confidence and inner beauty, the 2010 Oak View Pageant of Excellence is a long-time valley tradition. Scheduled for March 6 at the Oak View Community Center, 18 Valley Road, 16 young ladies have been busily preparing for their night to shine.

“The pageant contestants have been very busy preparing for this year’s pageant by visiting care facilities in the valley and will be writing their speeches according do what they experienced,” said Kim Armstrong, pageant coordinator. “They also have been rehearsing for their event by learning sign language, a new dance routine, walking the walk and gaining confidence in high heels.”

While the pageant is a great learning experience for contestants, it’s the year of community services which follows the pageant that helps them learn the importance of making a true difference in the world. The “court ladies” assist the Oak View Civic Council in its many events, such as the Easter egg hunt, Christmas tree lighting ceremony, plus help decorate floats and ride in cool cars during Oak View Memorial Day and Ojai Fourth of July parades.

To prepare for the pageant, “The girls attended a tea held at The Gables of Ojai and an etiquette class taught by Sandy Delaney at the Ojai Methodist Church in Ojai. Not to mention all this, they actually found time to do community service by helping the Park and Recreation Committee and the Oak View Civic Council’s fund-raiser ‘Treasure for Chairs’ and then serve at a Valentine’s dinner at the Ojai Methodist Church,” Armstrong said. “As you see these are very committed young ladies and I invite the community to come experience a wonderful evening watching these young ladies excel in the Pageant of Excellence. Our Theme, ‘Look Within,’ says it all!”

This year’s contestants are as follows: Miss Oak View, Layla Ramirez, Cathia Flores, Caitlin McComes; Miss Teen Oak View, Beth Angelini, Jordan Alvarez, Kiley Brunner, Karrissa O’Hearn, Melanie Woolwine, Lexi Hicks; Miss Pre-Teen Oak View, Cheyanne Lake, Mariah Hanline, Megan McGraw, Shyanne Ordoñez, Victoria Neumann and Carly Heath.

Tickets may be purchased at Olivares Allstate Insurance in the Purple Wagon Mall until March 1. The prime rib dinner costs $30 per person and will be served promptly at 5 p.m. General admission for the pageant itself is $10, with admission beginning at 6:15 p.m. and the event expected to begin no later than 6:45 p.m. Dinner and general admission tickets will also be sold at the door on the day of the pageant.

State Medical Board alleges gross negligence after overdose death

By Daryl Kelley
The state Medical Board has accused an Ojai psychiatrist of gross negligence in treating patients, including one who died from a drug overdose, complaints that could lead to revocation or suspension of the veteran doctor’s medical license.

In a written “accusation” filed recently, the Medical Board of California has maintained that Dr. John Nasse Jr., 76, was negligent in treating five patients, including an Ojai Valley man who died in 2006 from an overdose of three drugs prescribed by Nasse.

Nasse is accused of repeated acts of gross negligence in four of the cases, and a failure to maintain proper records in a fifth case. Treatment occurred from 2005 until 2008, according to the state filing.

One case involved a “patient” who was an undercover investigator for the Medical Board, according to the state filing by the attorney general’s office, which represents the Medical Board.

In the Jan. 28 filing, the Medical Board notes that Nasse, a doctor in California since 1967, has not yet had a hearing or been found guilty of any charges.

Nasse said in a brief interview last week that he and his lawyer are negotiating a settlement of the case.

“These things are in the process of negotiation,” he said. “It’s way up in the air. I can’t discuss any more. I can say nothing at this point.”

Nasse did say that he is offering a defense to the charges.

This case is the second state Medical Board action against Nasse in the last decade. He was accused in 2001 of “gross negligence, repeated negligent acts, incompetence and dishonest and corrupt acts” in regards to treatment of one patient between 1987 and 1997.

To resolve that case, Nasse stipulated that the board could establish a factual basis for those charges, and he gave up his right to contest them.

His medical license was revoked. But in a settlement agreement, that severe penalty was replaced by five years of probation against his license, a 15-day license suspension, 60 hours of community service annually, passage of an ethics course and payment of $2,000 to cover investigative costs, according to state records.

Nasse also was fined and his medical license suspended in the state of Hawaii in 2004, according to records on file in Sacramento.

In the current case, Nasse is accused of repeated acts of negligence in the treatment of Ms. C, a patient with multiple sclerosis and back and hip problems, who needed pain medication.

Beginning in 2005, Nasse prescribed hydrocodone 48 times in 30 months, in 100-tablet increments, far exceeding appropriate dosage levels, the state maintains.

Nasse’s “prescribing of hydrocodone in excessive amounts, failure to consult with Ms. C’s pain management physician to ensure that she did not abuse hydrocodone, or refer her to her pain management physician constituted acts of gross negligence and an extreme departure from the standard of care” required by the state medical code, according to the accusation.

In a 2006 case, Mr. J., died of a drug overdose “due to” a combination of three anti-depressant drugs prescribed by Nasse, the state maintains.

Nasse’s “failure to obtain tricyclic blood levels to establish the effective levels of the medications, and perform a drug screen to determine what other drugs the patient was taking constituted repeated acts of negligence,” according to the accusation.

Then, in 2007, when a Medical Board investigator posed as a patient, Nasse  “failed to conduct a comprehensive initial examination and evaluation.” Still, the doctor purportedly prescribed the drug. Diazepam, a tranquilizer and muscle relaxant, for the investigator, then failed to set up a follow-up examination within 30 days.

That scenario demonstrates gross negligence and repeated acts of negligence, the state maintains.

Again in 2007, in another case cited by the state, Nasse treated a Ms. T, who had been suffering from depression and alcohol abuse. About seven weeks into that treatment, the patient was admitted to Ojai Valley Community Hospital. She had a .217 blood-alcohol level and was having seizures. She also had an anti-epileptic drug in her system, investigators report.

The Medical Board maintains that Nasse prescribed Ms. T anti-anxiety medicines 19 times in one year, and it concludes:

“The prescription of benzodiazepines (anti-anxiety medications) to a patient who has a history of alcohol abuse and chloral hydrate (sedative) usage risks a potentially lethal outcome and constitutes gross negligence and an extreme departure from the applicable medical standard of care.”

Nor did Nasse refer Ms. T to a neurologist for her seizures or consult with her previous psychiatrist to determine her psychiatric history, the state maintains.

Nasse also failed to maintain adequate and accurate records for a fifth patient, the state finds.

The lawyer representing the Medical Board could not be reached for comment about how soon the case may be heard, or resolved; Nasse would not identify his own attorney.

This remembrance of Marty Fujita was written by family friend and former OVN intern Cole Bettles

This past Sunday, hundreds gathered at Meditation Mountain to celebrate the life of Marty Fujita. The service greatly reflected the positive impact she had on her community and the world at large. Amid the tears, upbeat music, laughter and a feeling of optimism filled the air on Meditation Mountain as friends and family reflected upon her life.

For 10 months, Fujita had been fighting lung cancer. Early on, she accepted the fate of this horrible disease, yet she spent her final months working ardently to see that her life’s mission of conserving our environment would be carried out by co-workers, friends and family. In fact, in the hospital during her final days, she was texting, e-mailing and calling others to plan various events.

Fujita had an ability to amalgamate individuals with a common vision and lead them to create change. Her elocution was loud and strong, but she always put the money where her mouth was. In Ojai, she co-founded Food for Thought Ojai, a community-based farm-to-school organization. She was a leading member of the Ventura Agriculture Futures Alliance, a program that advocates for the long-term viability of the region’s food system. In 2008, she contracted to serve as a director of the Social Justice Fund for Ventura County. That same year she contracted to oversee all retail operations and develop, implement and incorporate into all operations of the Ojai Music Festival, a “green plan” to work toward carbon-neutrality.

Recently she brought all of these local lessons and experiences to Hawaii where she served as advisor for the Kokua Hawaii Foundation’s ‘Aina In Schools program, a farm-to-school organization for Hawaii’s public schools. Fujita also helped to organize the Hawaii Ag Alliance, and was asked to become a board member of the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation.

In 1977, after receiving a bachelor’s in biology at the University of California at San Diego, she realized her love of the earth would become more than a passion — a career. She continued her studies at UCSD in sociobiology and population biology. Soon after, she took graduate courses in statistics and evolutionary biology at Iowa State University. Her studies drew her even farther east to Boston University. Here she earned a doctorate in ecology, evolution and behavior; her dissertation was on “Latitudinal comparison of growth and development in the little brown bat, Myotis lucifungus, with implications for geographic variation in adult morphology.” She finished up her education with postdoctoral research at Harvard University; she also taught behavioral ecology at Harvard.

Fujita’s impact went far beyond Ojai and Ventura. In the late ‘80s, she served as an assistant environmental advisor for the Latin America and Caribbean Bureau – U.S. Agency for International Development.  Thereafter, she served as an international conservation officer of the conservation and research center of the National Zoological Park, part of the Smithsonian Institution.  Here she was a liaison for conservation-oriented Smithsonian projects in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Washington, D.C. After spending some time in Indonesia for the Smithsonian Institution, she fell in love with the region and became director of the Pacific Region of The Nature Conservancy. Fujita brought success to this program and her extensive impact is evident today. It is during this time she met her husband, Chuck Cook, and gave birth to her twin daughters, Dana and Taylor.

But raising a familiy did not hold her up. In fact, Chuck, Dana and Taylor became closely integrated with her work and the family began their story in Indonesia. Fujita continued her work directing several more programs and projects to protect the environment in Palau and Indonesia. When her daughters turned 4, the family moved back to the states. In 2002, the family became residents of Ojai.

Chuck Cook and Fujita were a team, consistently working together to create, implement and manage their programs of interest.

Donations in honor of Fujita’s life and work can be made to Food for Thought Ojai: P.O. Box 1645, Ojai, CA 93024.

Casitas Municipal Water District’s rejection
of disposal plan threatens dam’s removal

By Daryl Kelley
The Casitas Municipal Water District refused Wednesday to endorse in concept disposal of 2.1 million cubic yards of silt behind obsolete Matilija Dam to a storage area above the dam, an alternative favored by county and federal agencies.

Casitas directors, on a 3-2 vote, refused to grant conceptual approval to an alternative proponent recommended to rescue the troubled $155-million dam demolition project by moving it along more quickly and for much less money.

Two other silt-removal alternatives had turned out to be either more expensive than expected or were blocked by uncooperative private property owners.

Casitas’ approval of the new alternative was considered essential because federal money, the bulk of the overall project’s funding,- cannot be pushed through Congress without Casitas on board, project backers said.

Conceptual approval by Casitas would have enabled federal officials to gain about $4 million needed to complete a final design of the project, backers said. About $4 million has already been spent on such studies.

But most Casitas directors said Wednesday that they did not have enough information to commit to the new alternative, even conceptually.

They said they needed to be convinced the project would not harm the quality of water in the huge Lake Casitas reservoir or interfere with the district’s federal mandate to assist migration of endangered steelhead trout.

They asked for more study, saying they felt they were being forced to make a decision prematurely or to take the blame for killing the overall project.

Indeed, after the vote, county and federal officials said Casitas’ position puts the entire project in jeopardy, because delay will allow scarce federal funds to go elsewhere.

“The project is at more risk now than it was before this vote,” said Ventura County Supervisor Steve Bennett, spokesman for groups favoring the newest alternative. “I remain committed to finding a way to overcome this setback, but this decision makes it much more difficult.”

Directors Russ Baggerly, Pete Kaiser and Richard Handley said they wanted more study before they could commit to the new storage concept, while Directors Bill Hicks and Jim Word voted for conceptual approval because of warnings that the project could die from delay.

Baggerly, frequently an ally with Bennett on environmental issues, said he had to break with the county supervisor this time, partly because he did not want to see a permanent silt storage area built in Matilija Canyon. Perhaps the silt could be stabilized above the dam by mixing it with soil, he said.

Baggerly said the new alternative would accomplish none of the goals set out by groups that have worked for more than a decade to remove Matilija Dam, which has been nearly filled with silt and sediment since the 1960s.

The alternative would not restore the Ventura River to its natural state, he said, nor would it bring sand to Ventura beaches, enhance recreational opportunities or assist migration of the endangered steelhead trout.

“We don’t necessarily have to jump into this today,” Baggerly said, complaining that Casitas had only weeks to study the new alternative, which is poorly defined so far.

“If we get our heads together we might be able to work something out,” he said. “But this dog won’t hunt … There are other alternatives.”

He asked Bennett and representatives of the county Watershed Protection District and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to bring in experts to answer Casitas’ questions about what might happen to the stored silts during heavy flooding and to study whether some of the silt stored in the canyon might be released over time, instead of placed in a de facto “landfill” permanently.

“I don’t want to endorse this preliminary idea until it is more thoroughly vetted,” Baggerly said.

A Corps of Engineers spokesman, Darrell Buxton, told the board that its approval would pave the way for a more complete analysis of the Matilija Canyon storage alternative.

“This is a conceptual design,” he said. “With your concurrence, we’ll go forward and answer a lot of these questions.”

Board member Hicks said he didn’t think Casitas had much choice.

“If we’re going to lose this funding, then where are we?” Hicks said. “If, in fact, the funding is going to go away, this is the lesser of three evils.”

But Baggerly, joined by Kaiser and, finally, Handley disagreed. They approved an amended statement of the Casitas position that called for more study instead of endorsing the behind-the-dam storage alternative.

“The proposed concept may have elements that could prove to be beneficial,” the Casitas statement said. “And, in the spirit of collaboration, there may be other ideas on the subject that may also prove to be useful.”

But, after the vote, Bennett said the county had no money for studies and that the Corps of Engineers had a very limited budget for such analysis.

So, Bennett said, Casitas’ position could derail removal of Matilija Dam, which had been on a fast track in Washington but could now be shunted aside in favor of other federal projects that are ready to go.

“After the millions that have been spent, Casitas asking for more expensive in-depth studies when they are not willing to even conceptually support the proposal likely dooms the project to the decades-long slow track,” Bennett said Thursday morning.

“The Army Corps has hundreds of underfunded projects,” he added. “Why would they spend their scarce dollars on expensive in-depth studies if the Casitas board is not willing to even conceptually support the proposal.”

Baggerly’s response was that it would have been “bad government” for Casitas to endorse so sketchy a proposal.

“Casitas told them publicly that if they could demonstrate that the fines (silt) could be stabilized upstream permanently, we could live with it,” he said Thursday. “To date they have not been able to answer one single question. The only answers we have received are ‘We don’t know,’ or ‘We will have to look at that.’”

Baggerly said project backers need to revisit an alternative embraced six years ago, to pump slurried silt from behind the dam to the Baldwin Road area, where it would have been spread along the Ventura River to wash downstream during storms.

The cost of that proposal skyrocketed from about $30 million to more than $50 million, so project backers looked for cheaper alternatives.

Baggerly said the Baldwin Road plan might be used in conjuction with other alternatives.

“Just as they have come up with a new concept,” he said, “I believe there may be some combination of concepts that may work.”

SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT PRESS RELEASE
Officer preparing release: Sgt. Bill Schierman
Narrative: Ventura Avenue gang member Jimmy Villalpando was sentenced to eight years in state prison today for shooting a rival gang member in 2007.

On 2-23-2007, Ojai patrol deputies responded to a report of a gunshot victim in the 300 block of N. Drown Avenue, Ojai.  When they arrived, they found victim Hugo Guerra suffering from two gunshot wounds to the chest. Guerra told deputies that he was parking his car in front of his house when a car pulled up alongside him.  One of the occupants yelled out a gang slogan then shot him.  Guerra was transported to the Ventura County Medical Center where he eventually recovered from his wounds.

The suspect in the shooting was quickly identified as Jimmy Villalpando.  He was located several hours later in the area of Oak View and arrested.

On 2-27-2007, the Ventura County District Attorney’s Office filed one count of shooting at an inhabited vehicle against Villalpando.  On 2-28-2007, Villalpando was released on 90,000 dollar bail.  On 3-1-2007, Villalpando failed to appear in court and a 250,000 dollar warrant was issued for his arrest.

Shortly after Villalpando failed to appear in court, the Sheriff’s Gang Unit attempted to locate him.  Gang investigators tracked him to an area near El Paso, Texas and developed information that he crossed the border into Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.  Gang investigators believe he remained in Mexico until September of 2009.

On 9-23-2009, the Sheriff’s Department received a tip that Villalpando had returned from Mexico and was staying at his parent’s house in the 200 block of Burnham Rd., Oak View.  Sheriff’s gang investigators and Ojai patrol deputies went to the house and located Villalpando hiding in the attic.  He was arrested and booked into the Ventura County Jail.

On 12-22-2009, Villalpando pled guilty to one count of assault with a firearm.  On 2-4-2010, he was sentenced to 8 years in state prison.

Wilma Melville with former search dog, Jem, and one of her current BFFs, Newton, the dachshund, at play. Melville will have at least one dog in the lead convertible at this year’s Ojai Independence Day parade, scheduled for Saturday, July 3.

NDSDF founder selected to lead 2010 Independence Day parade

By Nancy Gross
The 10 members of the Independence Day Committee unanimously chose Wilma Melville, of the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation, to be this year’s grand marshal for Ojai’s Fourth of July parade. Melville and her organization are sources of hometown pride, and national and international heroism.

Committee member Nancy Hill said the parade has taken place since 1921, the year her uncle was the grand marshal, both in Ojai and Oak View. “This particular committee formed 45 years ago. We are the people who do the work and actually put on the parade,” Hill said.

“Last year we had our veterans come in,” Hill said, adding that the 40 veterans marked a proud, historic moment for the parade. The committee tried to find an act to follow that one. They came up with the idea of honoring Melville and the unusual heroes her foundation trains. “We’re hoping to get some of those dogs in the parade. Those dogs are so special,” Hill said.

Melville said, “It’s certainly an honor. No doubt about it. I’m pleased to carry out the tradition.”

Melville plans to have at least one dog with her. “I’m going to bring Abby, a dog that went on numerous deployments. The largest was the World Trade Center. She was also at the Glendale train wreck and the La Conchita mud slide. She’s the hero, not me.”

And yet Melville’s vision, along with the contributions of those who have partnered with her, have made it so that there are more than 100 advanced certified disaster search dog and handler teams in the United States, when in 1995 there were only 15.

“I just wanted to learn how to train a dog,” Melville said when asked about her early experiences with her black Labrador, Murphy. It was something that interested the retired physical education teacher, having a highly trained dog. She found Pluis Davern at Sundowners Training Kennel in Gilroy.

Davern taught Melville and Murphy the skills that make a fine canine search team. “Murphy and I attained advanced disaster search dog certification with the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Murphy has written about what caused her to found NDSDF: “In April of 1995, Murphy and I were deployed to the terrorist bombed Federal Building in Oklahoma City. Murphy and the other search dogs covered large areas of rubble, barking loudly to indicate where victims were buried, thereby saving precious time for firefighters. This disaster made it clear that there were too few certified search dog-handler teams. Out of this heartbreaking experience came a determination to find a better way to create highly skilled canine search teams.

“My experience with trainer Pluis Davern taught me the three ingredients that are paramount: the right dog, matched with the right handler and professional training for both. This three-pronged combination not only addresses those pitfalls, but also accounts for our 85 percent success rate. The foundation chooses the dog, raises the funds to have the dog professionally trained, and then works with the handler and dog as a team until they reach certification and beyond. Another part of the success is that we use firefighters, who are first to a disaster, as the handlers.”

The dogs that are trained are rescued dogs, which make NDSDF a humane and humanitarian organization. They choose dogs with drive, focus and athleticism, and provide ongoing training for the dog’s 10-year working life, and lifetime care when the dog must be retired from their search team.

NDSDF reported at least eight rescues in Haiti, following the 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit on Jan. 12. Melville said, “I am glad the initial phase is over. It’s such a hard phase. Our handlers have learned a great deal. They will share that with us.”

Because the news from Haiti surprised many people with rescues occurring many days after the disaster struck, Melville added, “Earthquakes are like that. People can live through them. That’s why, in California, we prepare for them.

“We are heavily into planning a national training center. We’ll have props that simulate this disaster. That is how each disaster is. You have to learn from it.”

Visit searchdogfoundation.org.

Layoff notices due March 2

By Linda Harmon
In another long but productive meeting the Ojai Unified School District board heard the last of their school site reports for the year, positive results from a new math textbook trial, preliminary approval of proposed rules for the city’s new Skate Park, and received the newest estimates of the available funds for the 2010-2011 general fund budget.

“The board has received two iterations of the budget and everything that has happened over the last six weeks has been bad. Everything has been going in the wrong direction for us,” said superintendent Henry Bangser, introducing a presentation of the governor’s proposed state budget. “I’ve had several meetings with staff over the last few weeks for the purpose of getting ready for the dissemination of facts, answering questions, and looking at the basis of problem solving.”

Bangser then introduced assistant superintendent Dannielle Pusatere, who explained in detail staff’s two-page document with estimated figures for next year’s budget.

“These numbers are based on the governor’s January budget proposal,” said Pusatere. “They will change.”

Pusatere’s figures included $1.9 million in cuts with a 1 percent reserve, and include a total ongoing personnel reduction of 39.76 full-time positions for 2010-2011, even assuming the same cuts approved by the union last year.

“I’ll meet with anybody over the next month to make sure questions are answered. I realize there is a tremendous amount of anxiety, and rightfully so,” said Bangser of the outlook for job and program losses. “My plan is to have a clear, transparent and interactive process with staff and community.”

Bangser, who will be meeting with both Ojai Rotary clubs this week, acknowledged that the public has grown pessimistic about threats of layoffs and cuts due to increasing funding cuts.

“I’ve heard from numerous sources that over the last couple of years, right about this time, there were significant concerns raised about the ability to maintain the programs of that year the following year because of a financial challenge,” said Bangser. “I believe that. And I believe very intelligent minds came together. Dani worked her magic, Tim did his thing, the board did their thing, the union came together and, in some cases, gave up benefits and some cases, salaries. Whatever happened, the programs and the people were essentially retained in the following year.”

Bangser acknowledged that some things were cut, but in the grand scheme of things the public sees that many things were retained.

Not this year, as the 13 percent or $2,965,000 in reductions will be felt across the district.

“I absolutely assure you, next year’s staffing and programs will be markedly different than last year,” said Bangser. “It’s mathematics. A significant number of people that are here, will not be here next year. It breaks my heart that people who have been working here up to 10 years, may not be able to be retained.”

According to Bangser, he will have a list of names for pink slips by the end of this month for action on March 2, and a list of classified employees for next month. Bangser also said he will continue to work closely with staff and the union.

Union representative Martha Ditchfield said two-thirds of her union school site representatives may be getting pink slips but that she felt “good” about how Bangser was handling things on the whole.

At which point Board President Kathi Smith stated her understanding of budget figures saying, “but 85 percent of the district’s budget is people and 64 percent of that is teachers” — a fact Bangser acknowledged and to which Ditchfield added, “I just want to be sure that percentage stays the same. The concern of my budget committee is that we’ve already accepted cuts in benefits, increased workload, and a wage cut.”

Bangser said his main concern right now was “letting the public know” about the situation, even though no final figures are available.

“The budget will take effect mid- to late-August,” said Bangser, “You don’t start educating the public in late July or even on March 2.”

By Sondra Murphy
Last week’s presentation by a Golden State Water Company official to the Ojai City Council went over like a wet blanket. Ken Petersen, GSWC Coastal District regional manager, briefed the city on the 43 percent increase they are asking for from the California Public Utilities Commission. Petersen said a public meeting on the rate case was still under way at Nordhoff High School.

After a review of GSWC’s history, Petersen explained that the proposed increase, as reported in the OVN’s Jan. 22 issue, is to cover the cost of the deteriorating water system’s infrastructure and capital projects aimed at improving it. “We still have water mains that have been in the ground since 1929,” said Petersen, “and that, of course, affects water quality.”

If it sounds a bit like déjà vu to customers, it is because the same claims were cited by GSWC, an American States Water Company subsidiary, back in 2007. After going through an onerous CPUC hearing process, GSWC was allowed a 35 percent rate increase in 2008.

Petersen cited upgrades to aging pipes and supply wells, such as the San Antonio tank, as two of the reasons the increase is being sought. “Rates are established to allow recovery of operating costs and provide an opportunity to earn fair rate of return on investment,” Petersen said. “Since the last comprehensive general rate case in 2007, facility and operating costs have increased, resulting in the need to file the current proposal.”

Regarding increases in operating costs, Petersen specified water and electricity supply expenses, materials and supplies, group health insurance, property insurance, maintenance expenses, and postage. Petersen also said the company will be seeking a change from bi-monthly to monthly billing statements. “We have only five people working here in the coastal area and we would need an extra person reading that meter,” he said, if the rate case is approved.

“I’m sure we are all moved by your case for a rate increase, but what your customers are probably wondering is, ‘What are customers getting for these increases?,’” said Council-woman Sue Horgan. She added that it was her understanding that GSWC was directed at the last increase to submit reports to the city. “To my knowledge, we have received no such report.”

“The master plan that Mr. Petersen referenced is to be that report, but I have not yet seen it,” said city manager Jere Kersnar.

“I would suggest you start with those issues before giving us reasons for an increase,” Horgan advised Petersen.

“It sounds like you’re just assuring your rate of return to investors on the backs of the Ojai community,” said Councilwoman Betsy Clapp. “I’m fundamentally opposed to private water corporations owning public water. I think it’s pretty deplorable that, two years later, you’re asking for an increase of this amount.”

She then took it further. “I think it’s time for us to consider taking back the water,” said Clapp. “If we don’t, it’s just going to get worse and worse and worse and we’ll be hostage to a private company that has control over a public utility.” Clapp added that she would support looking into purchasing the city water supply through eminent domain and financing it through bonds.

GSWC has operated in Ojai under a long-standing, open-ended contract with the city and its service cannot be discontinued because it owns the pumps and water lines that serve the community, unless local water users buy the equipment.

Eminent domain is the inherent power of the government to seize private property, with due monetary compensation, but without the owner’s consent. The property is taken either for government use or by delegation to third parties who will devote it to public or civic use or, in some cases, economic development.

“It seems that not too long ago we did a study on the cost of taking over the system,” said Mayor Steve Olsen.

Sally Field at Matilija Auditorium

By Nancy Gross
Saturday’s Ojai Playwrights Conference winter gala and benefit, “Hearts on Fire,” featured stars Sally Field, John Glover, Dana Delany, Sandra Oh, Steven Weber, Noah Wyle, Amanda McBroom and Jane Kaczmarek on the Matilija Auditorium stage, performing selections from a number of plays by Terrence McNally.

The winter gala is intended to raise funds for the summer workshop program. The OPC believes that the value of theater as it is developed is linked to the value of theater as it takes its final form, and engages audiences, challenges ideas and changes the world.

The visuals for the show, which came before the food and festivities at St. Thomas Aquinas Center, relied on pared-down, grown-up elegance. The stars wore mostly black (accents included a grey sweater on Glover, Weber’s subtle lavender shirt and Oh’s lavender stockings, Delany’s pink and Field’s red shoes). The rich, red light-reflective curtains were like an open candy box, delivering differently concocted valentines, inspired treats, though glimpses of the human experience can’t be compared to sugary confections. Even so, the presentations were satisfying vignettes, not pessimistic.

Artistic director and producer Robert Egan said that he prepared for the event by trying to read through all of the plays of honoree playwright McNally. “I was struck,” Egan said, “not only by this man’s incredible output, but by his form, which is a mixture of naturalism and realism, and by the size of this man’s heart.”

At a row of black music stands, actors brought the scenes to life, with no costumes and very minimal stage direction. Introductions to the individual plays were brief; with each scene the audience was without much context, right in the middle of things.

It was a testimony to the ability of the actors and the honesty of the writing that convincing relationships appeared, and interactions created small affecting climaxes.

McNally would not want to credit the written play above the actors’ gifts for creating lives from thin air. Later in the evening he said, “I learn from my actors, my director, what the play is about. Theater is the most collaborative art.”

It is February, the month of Valentine’s Day, and the gala allowed for many examples of what it means to be relational.

“Frankie and Johnny at the Clair de Lune,” is a well-known McNally play because it was turned into the film, “Frankie and Johnny” with Michelle Pfeiffer and Al Pacino.

The story captures sorrow-infused hope, or hope-infused sorrow, a valentine to those who have known grown-up, high-cost heartbreak. Weber and Kaczmarek read the parts.

Frankie to Johnny: “Not everyone thinks life is a picnic. Some of us have problems, sorrows … You don’t just decide to fall in love with people out of the blue.”

Johnny to Frankie: “Why not? When it comes to love, life’s cheap and it’s short, so don’t f—— with it.”

McNally’s work does not focus only on romantically involved couples. “Lips Together Teeth Apart” displayed a relationship between a brother and sister with ties both simple and complex, a brother-in-law and sister-in-law sharing a confidence, and the tendency for couples to compare their relationships. There was even mention of the relationship with one’s unborn children.

In a brief conversation out of “Love! Valour! Compassion!” strangers with ties to a common love interest talked around their jealousy and wound up flirting.

Best friends traveling in India together were portrayed in a scene from “The Perfect Ganesh,” bickering, alternating between which one is the more prejudiced and small-minded, like kids going up and down on a seesaw.

Throughout the evening, words worked to create believable lines of affiliation, even with few actions to accompany them. The actors were chosen well: their voices, faces and minimal gestures offered the audience characters whose hearts became visible just beneath, and even in tandem with, the workings of the ego. Perhaps that is why McNally’s characters are so beautiful, they aren’t big dissimulators.

Highlights of the after-party were cranberry and pomegranate martinis, a glimpse of timelessly sweet and strong Field, Oh with her beautiful manner and voluptuous hair, the smile and wit of Delany and Weber, the hilarity of Glover and the brilliance of McBroom. The food was prepared by celebrity chef Michael Hollingsworth. A surprise: typically dense carrots can become a light and frothy mousse as a cinnamon-topped souffle.

The stars appeared to be having fun, genuine fun, well cared for by the OPC staff and volunteers. McNally said, “There is nothing more joyful than being in rehearsal with great actors. American stage needs the kind of development that places like Ojai provide.”

The OPC takes good care of Ojai also, reaching out to residents with new and affordable options in downtown last summer, including the inaugural Family Day. The 2010 season runs Aug. 10 through 15. Visit ojaiplays.org.

Ojai-Ventura Film Festival president claims OVN report innacurate

By Linda Harmon
In response to a report in the Jan. 27 edition of the Ojai Valley News, David Shor, former director and chairman of the Ojai Film Festival, addressed the apparent confusion created by an e-mail sent earlier this month announcing the formation of the new Ojai-Ventura International Film Festival.

Shor claims that the article, which stated he resigned in December leaving a large deficit and bad feelings behind, contains inaccuracies.

“I didn’t leave anything behind of the sort,” said Shor, in a phone conversation Jan. 27. “I’m a volunteer and I had nothing to do with the money.”

According to Steve Grumette, vice president and creative director of the Ojai Film Festival, at the end of 2007, Shor assumed the role of treasurer with an $80,000 debt. Monday, Shor countered that the debt was actually closer to $100,000 and he only temporarily held the position of treasurer for less than three months.

“I want to make it perfectly clear, he is not completely responsible for all of that, Grumette said Monday, adding the board opened a line of credit to cover deficits, backed by seven of the board’s members. Most of those members have resigned. Shor said he was not one of the board members backing that credit line.

On the Ojai Valley News web site blog, Shor added this comment: “In fact, a substantial (a)mount of money owed by Grumette’s Ojai Film Festival is owed to me for out of pocket costs I paid.” On Monday Shor estimated that the amount owed to him to be about $2,000.

Shor acknowledges sending out e-mails announcing his planned event, referred to as a Save the Dates notification.

“The article states I sent out a press release last week which, again, is an example of an inaccurate statement,” wrote Shor. “I issued no press releases.”

Several people, confused about whether the e-mail was coming from the Ojai Film Festival, contacted both Herb Hemming, the current president of the Ojai Film Festival, and Grumette.

“I think people are still confused,” Hemming said. “For nine years it was the Ojai Film Festival. For one year there were some people on the board who wanted to expand the festival into Ventura. So last year they named it The Ojai-Ventura Film Festival.”

Shor said he has registered the name Ojai-Ventura International Film Festival with the State of California.

“I own that name and I have every right to use that name anyway I want,” said Shor, “and I’ve chosen the way I want to do it.”

Grumette agrees.

“David, personally, did register the name Ojai-Ventura Film Festival for us to use,” said Grumette. “If he wants to use that name and put on events using it, we have no problem with that.

According to Hemming, the Ojai Film Festival’s board doesn’t want this to be a continuing fight and says they are working hard to put this behind them.

“When David resigned we lost several board members for various reasons,” said Hemming. “At the time Steve (Grumette), Vickie Baldwin and I made a commitment to keep the Ojai Film Festival going.”

The Ojai Film Festival Board now has eight members and two consultants focused on paying off the debt left after the 2009 Festival.

“Here’s the only info I know for sure. As of Dec. 11, 2009, the figures were: total assets: $7,628.33, total liabilities $59,523.91, Grumette reported. “I don’t know how those numbers fluctuated between the end of 2007, when we had a very large deficit, perhaps $80,000 – $90,000, and Dec. 11, 2009 when the figures were as shown above.”

Members include Hemming, Grumette, Baldwin, secretary-treasurer Stuart Crowner, Bob O’Connor, Ann Willard-Bevans, Sam Hamman, and Ruth Hemming are working on their 2010 Festival scheduled for Nov. 4 through 7.

“Basically there was a disagreement about the direction of the Film Festival,” said Hemming. “Some people had a much more grandiose vision of the Film Festival and some liked it as the Ojai Film Festival. That is in the past. We just want to move forward and put on a good festival for the people of Ojai.”

Construction set to begin in June, but $600k still needed

By Sondra Murphy
The money is still being collected, but the Ojai City Council is working to follow the time line necessary for the rebuilding of Libbey Bowl. On Tuesday, council members approved two items associated with the project to renovate the deteriorating facility in the heart of the city.

The city manager was authorized to execute a service agreement be-tween the city and Jones and Jones for construction management services during the approximately $3 million project, scheduled to begin in June at the conclusion of the 2010 Ojai Music Festival. Kevin Jones of the company acted as the project’s cost estimator during the conceptual design phase by David Bury & Company Architects, Ltd., then the city contracted with Jones and Jones directly last June to perform continued cost estimation services to assist in keeping the project design within the budget goal.

Ojai Public Works director Mike Culver said that there is now a need to hire a construction manager to act on behalf of the city throughout the bidding and construction phases. In November, Jones and Jones submitted a proposal to Culver for a fixed fee of $168,500 for construction management services for the duration of the project. “The typical fees for these services range from 5 to 10 percent of the total project cost, depending on the size and complexity of the project,” Culver reported. “This proposal amounts to 5.6 percent of the $3 million project cost.”

Councilwoman Betsy Clapp asked for specifics on the construction management job. “They will shepherd the process through the design phase, make sure cost strategies stay in place, assist with construction docs and bid docs,” said Culver. “Then, once the project starts, they will be the on-site manager.”

“We don’t pick the contractor, it’s let out to bid and the lowest responsible bidder gets the job,” said city attorney Monte Widders regarding the need for a manager to oversee the project.

Reimbursable expenses are anticipated not to exceed $5,000, making the total contract amount approved by the council $173,500. The agreement will include the standard termination clause that allows the city to end the agreement for any reason. Culver’s report said if, for any reason, the project did not proceed, the city would be able to terminate the agreement and would be liable only for expenses incurred to date by Jones and Jones.

Councilwoman Sue Horgan motioned for approval with the addition of a payments disbursement schedule for certain milestones. “I would just hate to run out of money before construction begins,” she said.

“I’m very happy that we have a local company,” said Mayor Pro-Tem Carol Smith. “We’re very privileged to have such an ethical company to work with it.”

The council next approved the recommended public art for Libbey Bowl. “This project requires public art, as does every public project above $300,000,” said city manager Jere Kersnar. “It’s a $40,000 minimum piece of art … the artist agrees it can be done for the budget amount. The amount was announced to all the applicants; we would like to have more, but that depends on donations.”

Kersnar added that the agreement would also include a termination clause in case the project does not come to fruition.

From a pool of 31 art proposals, Trimpin’s sound arch was recommended for selection by the Ojai Arts Commission and seven-member public art jury, which included members from the Ojai art community, Planning Commission, Arts Commission and Ojai Music Festival. Inspired by the curved shape of Libbey Bowl, the 12-foot arch will consist of 24 reclaimed metal tubes of varying lengths with resonators and internal mallet mechanisms that will produce chiming sounds similar to a xylophone.

Positioned at the entrance of the new Libbey Bowl, the sound arch will be activated by a motion sensor to play electronically pre-composed sequences. “The guiding principles of the concept was contrasting both simple and complex elements as well as produce a harmonious sculpture to highlight the Libbey Bowl’s presence,” said Trimpin in his proposal.

The sound arch will begin construction later this year and is part of the city of Ojai’s ongoing Public Arts Program. The sculpture will be officially unveiled during opening day for Libbey Bowl at the Day of Music on June 5, 2011. The drawings and artistic statement will be available on the city of Ojai web site at ci.ojai.us.

The council next heard more on the project itself. “To date we have secured $2.4 million. It’s coming in — in all shapes, forms and sizes,” said Bill Burr Jr., vice president of the Ojai Valley Service Foundation. “We expect that we will be able to fulfill the obligation to get the money in the bank so the city can get this built when it needs to be built. It’s probably one of the most exciting things, not only for the arts, but what it means for the community itself.”

Libbey Bowl amphitheater has been serving the community since it was built in the 1950s and is currently used by as many as 30 nonprofit groups for more than 50 events each year. It is estimated that 1,000 performances of plays, concerts and other civic events, such as OMF, have been staged at the bowl since 1957.

“Our plans are currently in the first round of plan check and we’re hoping to get them back next week,” said Culver. “Our expectation is we’ll come back to you March 23 to authorize bidding, so we’re full steam ahead.” Culver added that the base design cost estimate is $3,055,500, without the dressing room section Bury created, causing the features to become “add alternates” to include as bids dictate.

“We expect bids to come in very good and hope we can get all the add alternates,” Culver said. “We’re shooting for June 21 to start demolition and construction.”

“Save Libbey Bowl” is a communitywide project of the Ojai Valley Service Foundation, partnering with the city of Ojai, Civic Association, Ojai Music Festival, and other arts organizations to rebuild the outdoor amphitheater, the cultural hub of the Ojai Valley where more than a dozen performing arts events are held every year. To make a contribution to the Libbey Bowl reconstruction, call 646-3117 or visit LibbeyBowl.org.

Dolkar Tso, Norbu, Dorjee Tsewang, and Kangchen are shown in their back yard overlooking the Ojai Meadows Preserve.

By Nancy Gross
Immigrants from Tibet, Dorjee Tsewang and his wife, Dolkar Tso, said they wake up in their Taormina home every day happy to live in such a lovely place, with good friends close by, and a view of mountains and meadows from their back yard.

They miss Tibet, another place of great beauty, but their Tibetan Aid Foundation ties the two ends of their lives together like a strand of Tibetan prayer flags.

TAF, Inc. is nonprofit and non-political group, providing charitable and humanitarian aid. Having spent their young lives in Tibet, Tsewang and Tso know what kinds of projects can help with quality of life in a place dear to them.

They say it was in Ojai that the idea for the foundation came about, and began to grow quickly. “I feel that American people are very compassionate, very giving,” Tso said.

Tsewang said, “And our culture is based on compassion,” stating that giving back once they received assistance from others was what made sense.

“Our lives were enriched, and getting better in America. We had friends who wanted to help people in Tibet. We wanted to give out of our paychecks to pay back our sponsor, but he would not take the money and encouraged us to give to the people who need help, an extension of our happiness.”

They began TAF in 2004.

“We came to America with empty pockets,” Tsewang said.

“I had $50 in my pocket,” Tso said, laughing.

Their playfulness bears witness to the love they found in a refugee camp in India, prior to being sponsored and brought to the United States. They both agree, “America is a land of golden opportunity.”

Tsewang and Tso had never met in Tibet. He was from a small village, partially nomadic countryside and partially a plateau area with farming. She was from a much larger town about 150 miles away.

As young adults, having finished school, they both found themselves thinking about their future opportunities, and both decided to leave Tibet. Independent of one another, in 1995, they walked across the Himalayan Mountains into India, a journey of close to a month for each one. They met in Dharamsala, the current home of the Dalai Lama, and while they were falling in love with one another, they were also learning English. “The tourists teaching us got to know us. We bonded together,” Tsewang said. A Santa Barbara couple took a special interest in Tsewang and Tso.

Steve Harrison and Judy Flannery contributed funds for education and daily living, and brought Tsewang and Tso to America in 1997, at which time Tso attended an English language school in Pasadena, and Tsewang went to Ventura College. The two were married in 1998 and began living in Ojai.

Since coming to Ojai, Tsewang has worked at the Ojai Valley Inn & Spa, beginning as a pool boy, and becoming a manager of one of the inn’s restaurants. Tso cares for their two sons, ages 10 and 8.

In 2008, after 14 years away, they were able to take their boys and visit their homeland, reuniting with their parents. Sons Kangchen Tsering (who the family calls just Kangchen), and Kangchen Norbu (who they call Norbu) had another pretty landscape to play in. “They could go up on the mountain,” their mom said.

On Feb. 13 at 4:30 p.m. at the Ojai Theatre, Tsewang and Tso will present a documentary about the emotional reunions when they returned to Tibet. The film also follows the projects of TAF, while giving a glimpse of the land and Tibetan culture. The 17 hours of film shot by friend and Hollywood videographer David Luckenbach, were edited down to 25 minutes by Julia Green.

Luckenbach had insisted on accompanying Tsewang and Tso back to Tibet to capture the precious moments. Tso said, “Maybe it was his wife’s idea.” Luckenbach took his 12-year-old daughter to Tibet also.

Tsewang said, “The Tibetan Aid Foundation has become so many people’s lives. We have 300 donors since 2004.”  Projects concern education and health care.

“We sponsor seven kids to go to school. One has become a teacher, one a nurse. We have results.”

A hospital has been built in the Chazhu valley, and more than 3,000 people receive medical care. “We have two villages, 1,500 people receiving mountain spring water. Otherwise, every household has one family member dedicated to walking to get the water. At 14,000 feet above sea level, in the winter you have to break the ice to get the water.”

One family tells Tsewang that by bringing water into the community of people, “It frees up one daughter to go to school.”

Tsewang was one of nine children who grew up in a clay house. At times it would be 30 degrees below freezing both inside and outside of the house.

In early January, Tsewang and Tso both passed the tests to become American citizens. “We’re going to take our oath ceremony on Feb. 5 in L.A.,” Tsewang said.

“Sometimes we knock our own heads. We’re so blessed to be in this country.

“It is our American dream to give back. We’d like to have the whole valley be part of our lives.”

Ojai Theatre will present “Tsewang, Tso and Tibetan Aid Foundation” on Feb. 13 at 4:30 p.m. Visit tibetanaid.org.

Ojai businesswoman, activist selected as Adams’ replacement

By Sondra Murphy
The Ojai City Council appointed Kathleen Nolan to the Planning Commission on Tuesday less than a month after Tucker Adams retired from the position. After 10 years on the Ojai Planning Commission, Adams announced in December that she would be stepping down as of January.

Mayor Steve Olsen said that when he learned of Adams’ departure, he was anxious to get someone with similar skills in landscape design to help keep the commission well rounded. “Having worked with Kathleen Nolan on Libbey Bowl, I contacted her to see if she might be interested, and she responded,” said Olsen.

Councilwoman Sue Horgan also mentioned that she was impressed with Nolan while working with the Ojai Tree Committee.

Many locals are familiar with Nolan’s business, Studio Landscape, in Ojai. It is a landscape architecture design and consulting company. “I’ve had a couple of different business names and different partners,” said Nolan. “I was always attracted to nature and plants as a child and ended up studying horticulture and agriculture at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, and then landscape studies and architecture at UCLA.”

This interest has led to her involvement with the Tree Committee, as well as the Ojai Valley Green Coalition. “I do promote sustainability, so it will definitely figure into my thought process on the Planning Commission,” Nolan said. “I helped form the Ojai Tree Committee and am co-chair right now.”

Having lived in Santa Barbara, Nolan said she had visited Ojai before moving here 29 years ago. “We were buying property in Santa Barbara and the escrow fell through and we found out about a property here in Ojai,” said Nolan. “I just fell in love with it and have been here ever since.”

With her background, the appointment seems a perfect fit, for both Nolan and the commission. “Interestingly enough, at one point I looked at the planning graduate program at UCLA,” she said. “I love being involved in the community and one of my favorite things about design is the planning; looking at the long-term ramifications, the big picture, the future, past and present.”

Nolan, 56, has three adult children who all live in Ventura County. “One’s married and I have a little grandchild,” Nolan said. “They’re all local kids.”

The first item of business at Wednesday’s Ojai Planning Commission meeting is the oath of office for Nolan. That meeting will take place at 7:30 p.m. in Ojai City Hall, 401 S. Ventura St.

Trimpin’s proposed music machine awaits final city OK

By Sondra Murphy
With public art being a priority in Ojai and Libbey Bowl being a centerpiece of the city, the art chosen for the bowl’s make-over will be a crucial feature.

With public art being a priority in Ojai and Libbey Bowl being a centerpiece of the city, the art chosen for the bowl’s make-over will be a crucial feature.

The Ojai Planning Commission gave the go-ahead last week for the Art Commission’s recommendation for that art selection to progress to the Ojai City Council for final approval and it was an agenda item at last night’s meeting. The Planning Commission had previously approved the public art concept for the site, but was asked to verify that the piece selected was consistent with the design permit issued last year before being submitted to the council.

“I was the Planning Commission liaison to the selection committee,” said Commissioner John Mirk. “It was incredible. We had over 30 proposals, narrowed it down to three artists and that meeting went four hours because each of the proposals was great. What we chose with Trimpin’s work is just amazing. People will come from miles around just to see this.”

From three finalists, the selection jury unanimously picked the sound arch concept by Trimpin to serve as the art for the reconstructed Libbey Bowl, set for dismantling after the Ojai Music Festival ends this summer and expected to be finished before its next season in June 2011.

Trimpin is a Seattle-based kinetic sculptor and sound artist who has a history with Ojai. He was honored in May at the Ojai Valley Inn & Spa along with Joan Kemper by the MacArthur Foundation Fellows program and was a featured performer at the 2009 and 2006 OMF. His proposed sculpture is a one-of-a-kind work to be created for the bowl.

“The plan is to move the sidewalk from behind the tennis court bleachers out to the center of the lawn,” said city manager Jere Kersnar. The approximately 10-feet-tall by 15-feet-wide arch is to be installed at the new entryway. “It’s two octaves on a musical scale, so you can have all kinds of things.”

The tubular archway is inspired by the shape of the bowl’s shell and can be programmed for recurring tunes or sounds or even set up with motion sensors to create different tones depending on activity around Libbey Park. “I could see sensors that are triggered when a kid goes down the slide, for example, or when someone walks in a certain area,” Kersnar said.

“If you haven’t sent in your personal donation, now is the time to do so,” said Councilwoman Carol Smith, who attended the meeting and called Libbey Bowl a “world-class venue.” The city of Ojai and the Ojai Music Festival have already pledged two-thirds of the $3.3 million needed to rebuild the decaying facility in downtown Ojai. “Remember, they want the last million to come from the public, whether you have $10 or $1,000 to give,” said Smith.

Libbey Bowl amphitheater has been serving the community since it was built in the 1950s and is currently used by as many as 30 nonprofit groups for more than 50 events each year. It is estimated that 1,000 performances of plays, concerts and other civic events, such as OMF, have been staged at the bowl since 1957.

Designed by Austen Pierpont and Roy Wilson, Ojai Festival Bowl, renamed Libbey Bowl in the 1970s, cost $12,000 to build the stage and shell section back in 1957. In recent years, spot repairs have been unable to keep up with the steady deterioration of the largely wooden structure. Termite damage, wood rot and other forms of decay have added safety issues to the list of concerns about the bowl’s endurance.

Last year, the city hired David Bury & Company Architects, Ltd. for the concept designs of the bowl, which received glowing reviews in January 2009 during a historic special joint meeting of all major Ojai commissions and councils.

Bury has designed a number of other Ojai projects, such as the pergola, that merge historical designs with modern considerations. New laws and structural requirements, such as building codes and handicap accessibility, have been incorporated into the bowl’s redesign. Sustainability being a city policy, Bury is aware of green materials and has used appropriate technology throughout the design as the budget allows.

Bury’s plans have moderately increased the shell height and depth of the bowl while lowering the stage floor a bit. Currently, the shell slopes low at the back of the stage, restricting its use. Ramps and doorways that accommodate a variety of set and human concerns have also been incorporated into the plans. Storage, cable conduit and equipment posts will be added to improve sound and lighting.

To learn about volunteering for or making contributions to the Libbey Bowl reconstruction, call 646-3117 or visit the web site at LibbeyBowl.org.

Former president forming Ojai Ventura International Festival

By Linda Harmon
The Ojai Film Festival is a local tradition and its organizers take issue with the actions taken by David Shor, actions they say are capitalizing on their name and hard-won reputation.

“We are going to have to get a lawyer,” said Steve Grumette, the Ojai Film Festival’s vice president, “because it appears that he has appropriated our property.”

Shor, last year’s president and chairman of the board, resigned last month leaving behind bad feelings and a $90,000 deficit that Grumette and remaining board members, President Herb Hemming and Secretary-Treasurer Vickie Baldwin, had to address.

Now Shor has caused new confusion around area film festivals. Historically there have been two, Ojai’s own Ojai Film Festival and the Ventura-based Ventura Film Festival. Last week Shor sent out a press release for a new Ojai-Ventura International Film Festival to take place only a week later than the Ventura Festival in 2011, with similar events and using a logo very similar to the one used by the Ojai Film Festival last year.

On first glance the release appears to be coming from the Ojai Film Festival, but on closer examination, at the bottom of the page in small type, it gives new contact information listing a Santa Barbara address and a web address of ojaiventurafilmfestival

.com.

“That web site was originally our web site,” said Grumette, referring to the one listed by Shor. “You could get to our web site from there by entering ojaifilmfestival.com, which was OK last year.”

It is not OK this year.

“He’s creating enormous confusion,” said Grumette. “People think he’s still associated with us. And he’s not.”

The Ventura Film Society is not happy with Shor either.

“He has no affiliation with us at all,” said Jordan Older of the Ventura Film Festival. “We have trademarked the name and have written him several letters to tell him to stop using it.”

According to Grumette, it was under Shor that the Ojai Film Festival used the name, Ojai-Ventura Film Festival, in addition to Ojai Film Festival. Shor also added the additional web address, ojaiventurafilmfestival.com, to drive users to the original site. Grumette said Shor has refused to give the board the passwords he set to maintain the second web site.

They ended up taking away his access to the original site, but, according to Grumette, Shor still has a copy of the original site.

“He had access to it” said Grumette, “and now he’s set up his own site, which we don’t have access to, through Ojai-VenturaFilmfestival.com. He is showing all kinds of information about Haskell Wexler and Peter Graves that he has no right to, that information belongs to the Ojai Film Festival.”

If you Google Shor’s web site given on the press release, ojai-venturafilmfestival.com, you indeed see the home page from the 2009 Ojai-Ventura Film Festival web site which then directs you to Shor’s new  web site.

Shor also uses the same logo on his festival’s Facebook page, displaying information from previous Ojai-Ventura Film Festival events and states, “Established in 1999 as the Ojai Film Festival, the Ojai-Ventura International Film Festival, LLC is dedicated to promoting and supporting the art of the motion picture through the presentation of an annual multi-day festival.”

Shor’s press release also advertised special screenings and events March 17 through 20, 2011, including “the third annual Malcolm McDowell Celebrity Golf Tournament,” at the Ojai Valley Inn & Spa.

“We have not committed to host Shor’s event here,” said the Ojai Valley Inn’s representative Veronica Cole when contacted Monday.

Rich Fortenberry, the contact at Brooks Institute for festival events last year, was in Colorado at the Sundance Film Festival and remaining staff was not aware of any plans regarding the event.

Shor did not return e-mails and was unavailable for comment.

From the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department

Happy New Year Watchers!

Our local crime activity was relatively slow during the holiday season, which is always a good thing.  As we leave the holidays behind us, things are still slow.  However, a developing trend might put some Ojai Valley ranchers and rural property owners at risk for theft of their high $$$ equipment.

The cold wet weather we’ve been experiencing usually puts a damper on many police-related issues.  However, professional thieves steal for a living and never take a break.  These crooks often prefer to work in nasty weather.  Rain and wind help mask their activity making it difficult for anyone to catch them in the act.  We currently have some of these pros working down the Central Coast into our area stealing agricultural equipment under the cover of darkness and bad weather.

Detectives from Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and Ventura County have been monitoring an organized theft ring that has targeted pumps, generators, welders, air compressors, and spray rigs on ranch properties.  However, anything of value is fair game.  They usually break into storage containers (connex boxes, shipping containers) defeating the lock with bolt cutters.

These thieves were last reported to be working the north part of Santa Barbara County and are probably moving south.  The Ojai Valley area ranches and rural properties, especially along S.R. 150, are prime targets for this group.

This type of equipment is expensive and often difficult to replace.  I would suggest locking all containers, sheds and barns with a lock that has a hardened shackle.  This makes it very difficult to defeat with bolt-cutters.  Some locks even have modifications that shroud the shackle.  These types of locks make it nearly impossible for bolt cutters to get a grip on the shackle.

Recovering stolen property and proving who actually owns it can be very difficult for law enforcement.  I would suggest you write down the brand, model and serial number of your equipment.  These identifiers are critical in the investigative process and the return of your property.

The information you provide could solve a crime spree that spans across at least three counties.  Let’s catch these crooks!

Be Safe,

Randy

**************
This is a follow-up to yesterday’s alert.  One of our Watchers is a retired deputy sheriff and had some previous experience with similar theft rings.  He recalled the thieves used pickup trucks towing trailers (i.e. landscape, tree services, etc..) If you see something like this driving around in the middle of the night just right down a license plate if possible, the vehicle description , and the name of any business displayed.  These types of work trucks are rarely out on the road late at night.  You can then email me the info and I’ll pass it along to our detectives.

Typical user facing 43 percent hike, or $26 over next two years

By Daryl Kelley
The monthly water bill of the typical Ojai residential customer would be hiked 43 percent during  2011 and 2012, on top of a 30 percent increase two years ago, if the Golden State Water Company has its way.

“The new rates would cover the increasing costs to operate and maintain the local water system,” the company says in a press release, “and fund more than $8 million in local capital investments that are critical to providing reliable, high quality water to the area.”

About half of the new revenue would be used to operate the aging water system — some of which is about 80 years old — and half to update it, officials said.

The new rate increases would be far from the last for about 2,900 customers in the Ojai area, according to Golden State officials.

Ken Peterson, district manager for the San Dimas-based company, said Ojai customers should expect rate increases to pay for system replacement  until 2030.

“How systems are replaced depends on the need at the time,” he said. Water systems across the state and nation are dealing with the same issues of decay, he said.

“This country is dealing with infrastructure replacement,” he said. “Now it’s catching up to us.”

Golden State’s new proposal includes a 39.2 percent increase for residential customers with a 5/8-inch water meter  in 2011, then a 3.8 percent increase for inflation in 2012.

That’s an increase of  $23.27 in 2011 and an additional $3.16 in 2012, if the customer uses 1,300 cubic feet of water.

This is on top of a nearly 30 percent increase to about $59 a month in 2008 for customers with the same size meter and usage.

So the total monthly bill would be nearly $86 a month by 2012, including a hike in the basic service fee the company charges regardless of usage, which would jump from $24.15 to $33.75 a month for a 5/8-inch meter. Customers with larger meters would pay more.

About 70 percent of all residential customers, which make up the bulk of those served by Golden State, have 5/8-inch meters.

City manager Jere Kersnar said he had not yet received a copy of Golden State’s rate request. Nor has the city received a report on water quality and system maintenance, as required in a 2008 PUC ruling, he said.

“They came by and alerted us that they were filing for this new rate increase, and they said they’d provide a report,” he said.

Kersnar said he reminded the company that the water quality and maintenance report was overdue.

“They said they were still working on the master plan,” the city manager said.

The city of Ojai has no control over water rates, but it filed a protest letter in 2007 during the review of Golden State’s previous request. And the PUC, as part of its ruling, directed Golden State to provide the city with a detailed analysis of its Ojai service.

In 2007, about 100 angry customers showed up at a public hearing in Ojai. A petition signed by more than 500 upset customers was presented.

But the water company prevailed.

Even before the increases of recent years, Golden State’s rates were much higher than other local water agencies.

With the 2008 hike alone, Golden State’s rate increases in Ojai over the last two decades totaled 107 percent.

Golden State, the subsidiary of a large corporation traded on the New York Stock Exchange, has operated in Ojai under a long-standing, open-ended contract with the city. Its service cannot be discontinued since it owns the pumps and water lines that serve the community, unless local water users buy the waterworks.

And, according to Kersnar, the company has shown no interest in selling.

“That’s a huge issue,” he said. “They have resisted that to the utmost.”

Company officials have said Golden State’s rates are higher than those at nonprofit publicly run water companies because it has no taxpayer subsidies, has to pay taxes and must return a reasonable profit to investors.

The return on base water rates under the 2008 PUC ruling was 8.87 percent a year, lower than the 9.41 percent requested by Golden State but higher than the 8.80 percent requested by the PUC’s Ratepayer Advocates Office.

Under the ruling, the return on company equity was 10.2 percent, compared with a Golden State request for 11.25 percent and the ratepayer advocates’  recommendation of 10.09 percent.

U.S. Supreme Court rulings have upheld a private company’s right to a “reasonable” return on investment when operating a utility for the public, a PUC judge noted in the 2008 ruling.

At the hearings in 2007, Ojai residents and city officials asked the PUC to grant no rate increase until Golden State improved its service and water quality.

But the PUC found compelling Golden State’s argument that the steep increase was needed to upgrade the Ojai water delivery system and water quality.

Indeed, Golden State’s new request maintains that rate increases are needed to improve the quality of service, and to offset increasing costs.

“Costs have increased for items such as wholesale water, electricity, postage, liability insurance, depreciation, materials and supplies, cost of capital, general office support, labor and payroll taxes,” Golden State said in its recent press release.

In addition, costs must increase to pay for construction projects: The company said it spent $6.3 million on such capital improvements from 2000 through 2008.

The $8 million in proposed new projects include replacement of more than two miles of leaking, undersized and aging pipes, installation of a 500,000-gallon storage tank and drilling and equipping a new well, the company said.

Low-income customers may qualify for a 15 percent reduction in rates, the company said. A scale with income qualifications is available at the company’s local office at 1002-A E. Ojai Ave., across from Soule Park Golf Course. For example, households with one or two residents qualify if total income is $30,500 or less.

Matilija Dam, which has been scheduled for removal by the federal governement, overflowed Wednesday. The dam has received 20 inches of rain since Oct. 1. Photo by Scott Wintermute

By Daryl Kelley
For the latest storm totals, visit the OVN Weather Page

The strongest series of storms since 2005 rolled through the Ojai Valley this week, and as a final downpour hit Thursday evening, farmers and local officials said the results had been surprisingly benign — with little damage, flooding or mud slides.

The Ojai area did have six road closures by Thursday morning, but all were because of usual water flows during storms, said Gary Hart, battalion chief for the county Fire Department division that includes the Ojai Valley.

“We’re having the normal calls we have during storms,” Hart said. “Minor flooding because of water flows in roadways.”

Those temporary problems should be over by this afternoon as the fourth and final storm of the week passes, he said.

Temporary closures occurred on Highway 33 near Wheeler Gorge, on Camino Cielo, on McNell Road at Reeves Road, on Grand Avenue between McNell and McAndrew roads, on Matilija Canyon Road behind Matilija Dam and on Lockwood Valley Road at Chico Larsen.

A few buildings did experience minor flooding, Hart said.

“It’s all normal and we responded with sandbags,” Hart said of a few homes and Vons grocery at the “Y” intersection.

For farmers, the steady rains were all good news.

“We’ve had about 5 inches so far, so we don’t have to irrigate for maybe a month, I guess,” said farmer Tony Thacher. “But you know farmers like to complain. Right now we can’t pick anything. We’re itching to get back out and pick some tangerines this weekend.”

Steve Wickstrum, general manager of the valley’s largest water agency, said the four storms that began Sunday night had resulted in runoff that had only begun to fill Lake Casitas, the area’s primary source of water.

“I’ve been watching the storms, and we haven’t been slammed like some of the other areas,” Wickstrum said Thursday morning. “We’ve had some nice rains.”

By midday Thursday, however, those rains had resulted in diversions to the lake of only a few thousand acre-feet of water, said Wickstrum, who runs the Casitas Municipal Water District.

The huge Lake Casitas reservoir, which holds a maximum of 254,000 acre-feet, had risen only from about 73 percent full to 74.6 percent by noon Thursday. That’s an increase of about 4,300 acre-feet. (An acre-foot supplies two families for a year.)

“We’re at 189,531 acre feet right now,” Wickstrum said. “And we expect another 1,500 acre-feet by Friday. So it’s not the lake filler we had in 2005, but it’s not the catastrophe we had in 2005 either.”

A month of storms in 2005 filled the lake, but those rains also did a lot of damage, Wickstrum said.

“These storms have been very nice to us,” he said.

Wickstrum said he’d been tracking storms on his computer all week, but the yellows and reds that show downpours had consistently steered north or south of the Ojai Valley.

“Right now there’s a large area of heavy rain north of Santa Barbara and a squall through Thousand Oaks,” he said, awaiting what had been forecast as an intense local storm for Thursday afternoon.

Even as things stood at midday Thursday, the valley had received significant rain.

For example, Matilija Canyon had received in excess of 10 inches, while Ojai itself got more than 6 inches. Nordhoff Peak had received more than 7 inches, while the Upper Ojai’s total was about 6 inches. Casitas Dam had also received about 6 inches.

During this rainfall season, which began Oct. 1, precipitation has been about twice as much as normal, officials said. The largest rainfall months of the year are usually January and February, followed by March and December.

Officials are still hoping that the mild El Niño forecast last spring arrives.

A precursor was a 5-inch storm in Ojai last fall, which provided the wettest October in the last half century.

The Ojai Valley has received several significant rains since, but until this week, none had produced more than 2 or 3 inches.

In the winter of 2004-2005, Casitas Dam and the city of Ojai received more than 50 inches of rain and Nordhoff Peak drenched in more than 80 inches.

During the last rain year, the Ojai Valley received about 60 percent of normal rainfall, lowering the Lake Casitas, dropping groundwater levels and forcing farmers to water crops even during the wettest months.

It was the fourth extremely dry year in the last decade.

For example, only 11.55 inches fell at the Oak View measuring station last season, just 54.8 percent of the normal of 21.07 inches.

Only 12.61 inches fell at Casitas Dam, just 56.4 percent of the historic average of 22.37 inches.

Only 12.68 inches fell in Ojai, just 62.4 percent of the average of 20.33.

And at the wetter Matilija Dam station, only 16.53 inches fell, 61.1 percent of the average of 27.06 inches.

Update of zoning laws top discussion

By Sondra Murphy
Troy Becker was elected by his peers to chair the Ojai Planning Commission at Wednesday’s meeting, with Steven Foster assuming vice chair duties. Former Chair Susan Weaver stepped down as she passed the gavel to Becker for the remainder of the meeting and the light agenda facilitated much discussion about internal business of the commission and how best to spend the next several months.

City planner Katrina Rice Schmidt brought a discussion item to the agenda regarding zoning ordinance revisions that have been identified for amendment. She asked for commission direction for prioritizing the issues.

Schmidt reported that the most recent comprehensive update of the city’s zoning ordinance was adopted in 2004, with few changes since. She cited notable changes, which include an amendment to the commercial and manufacturing district development standards in 2005, adding a section regarding formula business establishments in 2007, revisions to the sign ordinance in 2008 and changes to allow outdoor displays in certain zones in 2009.

Schmidt said much of the needed changes were to create local codes that match new state regulations and a general cleaning up of language, omissions or areas of the ordinance that overlapped or clashed due to recent adoptions.

“Other areas that are probably worthy of more Planning Commission discussion are development standards for special housing, the downtown commercial overlay, and we probably need to modify our land use tables,” said Schmidt.

Commissioners briefly touched on the differences between guest houses vs. second units, animal uses, renewable energy sources, fence heights and lighting ordinance as areas they would like to update in the ordinance.

“There’s a lot of material for us to go through here,” said Foster. “It’s going to be a time-consuming process.”

“We’ve compiled ordinances, but haven’t don’t the formal drafting of the words,” Schmidt said.

“Another aspect would be some public outreach,” said Commissioner Paul Crab-tree. “We might want to invite certain civic groups or organizations to address some of these.”

Weaver pointed out that many of the revisions needed were simply to bring the city in line with other laws and so little discussion would be needed. “Probably 80 percent is primarily cleanup,” Schmidt agreed. “Staff could draft ordinances and bring it to you and if you have different ideas, you could pull and discuss them.”

Crabtree had a number of recommendations on discussion items, including multiple family dwellings, zero lot lines and front setbacks in the business districts and the Maricopa Highway area near the “Y” intersection. “It’s got the imprint of Caltrans on it and looks like a truck corridor,” he said. Crabtree also mentioned new storm water regulations were soon expected that the city would need to incorporate into its ordinance.

“All the technical materials and manuals are still under development, but we need to be cognizant of that,” city manager Jere Kersnar said. “How about if we come back to you at your first February meeting with breaking it down into chunks of the apple just to identify areas and you can tell us what order you want to take them in?”

The commission agreed to the idea, with Weaver requesting other items not referenced in Schmidt’s report being included, such as parking.

“I was excited when we had the forest master plan come through with neighborhoods and I would like to see that in the zoning ordinance too,” said Commissioner John Mirk.

“We ought to consider where we’re going to plug in those neighborhoods for planning and really have a discussion on them,” said Becker.

“It seems to me neighborhood plans should come from the top, from the general plan,” Schmidt said. “If we had it in the general plan, basically anything we did would come from that.

The Planning Commis-sion generally meets two Wednesdays a month at 7:30 p.m. in Ojai City Hall, 401 S. Ventura St. As of press time, the next meeting had not yet been scheduled.

County adopts procedural change in block grant funding application process

By Sondra Murphy
Changes in Ventura County procedures for applying for new Community Development Block Grant funds prompted the Ojai City Council to vote last week to serve as an evaluation committee to make recommendations to the county pertaining to any applications for public service organizations from Ojai.Each year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development provides funding to local communities through the CDBG program for both public service and capital projects. “The process for evaluating CDBG grant process has changed since last year,” Ojai Public Works director Mike Culver told the council. He said that previously the county would hold a hearing and then submit appropriate requests directly to cities, which would hold their own public hearings before making recommendations to the county.

Under the new system, applications will be given directly to Ventura County, who will forward them to appropriate jurisdictions for review and recommendations. Local jurisdictions are no longer required to hold public hearings regarding the allocation of funds.

The county held its initial application hearing in December and requires jurisdictional recommendations by Jan. 29. A second public hearing is scheduled by the county on March 10 to formalize the final allocations of funding, which are to be submitted to the Ventura County Board of Supervisors in May for final approval.

It is hoped the changes will streamline the process for all while continuing to allocate funding proportionally to each jurisdiction. Culver said smaller cities often have to roll over projects from year to year as funding is accumulated to initiate and complete them, such as the recent Boyd Center renovations at the Recreation Department.

“Rolling over presents a problem for the feds because they’re allocating money that’s not getting spent,” said city manager Jere Kersnar. “One of the criteria is for projects that they are ready to go.”

“The concept here is public service projects should receive the same fair share of funding that we were previously allocated within a 5 percent variance,” said Culver. He gave the council three options to adjust to the changes. The first option would involve the full council in review and recommendation of local grant requests. The second option would create an ad-hoc committee of two council members for grant prioritization. The third option was for no council involvement, allowing the county to administer without Ojai recommendation. The city recommended the second option in its report.

Help of Ojai executive director Terri Wolfe addressed the issue. “One of the key issues here is, in the past, the city of Ojai was pretty much guaranteed we would get public service money … Ojai projects were compared to Ojai projects. We are no longer in that position. Ojai projects must now compete with other projects in the county.”

Culver said the funds amounted to about $40,000 a year in the past and allocation is based on the income demographic of the community members.

Wolfe said applying projects will need to be very strong to compete for the funds. “I believe small cities and unincorporated are one group and large cities, like Ventura and Oxnard, are another, so we aren’t competing with them,” said Wolfe.

“I really think the full council should be involved in this because, although in the past the amounts of money have not been huge, they have been very important,” said Councilwoman Sue Horgan. She moved to adopt for full council involvement, which was unanimously supported, and asked that staff bring this year’s applicant list to the next meeting.

Trenches dug just in time to protect horses from flooded corral

By Nancy Gross
Friday was a pleasant day to be outdoors, and Navy volunteers from the Port Hueneme Naval Base visited Ojai to do a service project.

The Navy volunteers dug an extensive trench to get rid of standing water so that the health and comfort of rescued performance horses at The Equine Sanctuary would not be compromised during the rains.

The project was the next step after local builders installed shelters to keep the horses dry. Watkins Fence Co. made a sizeable contribution by doing the labor for free when providing roofs and fences, and Lee Rennacker donated the engineering for the drainage project.

“The fact that your guys are here doing all this digging saves us thousands and thousands of dollars,” said Equine Sanctuary founder and director Alexis Ells to one of the Navy officers. There were a few women among those working; the property, with pristine mountain views in either direction, was full of activity.

The volunteers helped with trench digging, or with clearing the horse corral of stones. “Rocks are a horse’s nemesis. They destroy their feet,” Ells said.

Mike Case from New York has been a Seabee for just over two years. Seabees are the Navy’s construction battalion; they build bases, roadways, and air strips, along with other military construction projects.

Case teased that he would like to go AWOL and “move up here. It gets us out of the classroom.”

Case was digging beside his buddy, Gerald Chandler, from San Diego, who said, “It’s good to be out here away from the base, to do some work.” He said that otherwise they would be having weapons training in class. “We’re going to Afghanistan. I’m not worried too much about it, though. We’re pretty safe over there.”

Xavier Spencer, from Panama City, Fla., said he’s been in the service for 11 months. “It’ll be a year in February. I’m going to Afghanistan in August. It’ll be fun. I’ve lived in Germany. My dad is military. He retired five months ago from the Air Force.

“It’s a nice place out here. I want to climb some of those mountains I’m seeing,” Spencer said.

Ells said the Navy has sent volunteers in the past to help TES, which has been in Ojai for 10 years. “But we are in constant need of volunteers,” Ells said.

“These famous horses, these athletes, when they’re injured, they’re not wanted by the industry anymore. This place is not just about the horses, it is also about the educational experience that teaches that life is not disposable.”

The rescued and rehabilitated horses have been racehorses, polo horses and other types of show event horses. If they can no longer perform and are seen as a burden and financial drain, they would typically be slaughtered, and their meat sold on the black market. “We have nine horses here now, and 22 up in Santa Ynez. They are our good will ambassadors for therapy, for foster kids, for developmentally disabled kids, for schools who visit.

“It’s just like with people. They have to be hand walked because of their injuries or their muscles will get stiff. They have to be fed and cared for in every way. This is a seven-day, 24-hour-a-day operation.”

Ells said most of their volunteers come from out of the area, and this leaves the sanctuary in a tight spot when weather makes it hard to drive. “It always surprises me that National Geogra-phic has featured us, but we need to have more needs met locally. I would like to see more volunteers from Ojai, people who love horses, people who want to make a difference.”

Of Rennacker she said, “He and his wife and daughters have been longtime volunteers. He took so much time to figure out the way the gutters would perform with different amounts of rainfall, and to design the grading, trenches and French drains. It was a major project.”

Some Navy helpers left partway through the day because not enough shovels had been supplied. Ells believes these were from among the Navy Fleet, and that the Seabees were the ones that stayed to the very end of the work.

“I was so grateful for all of them.” Ells said that several years ago she was contacted by the Navy Chaplain’s Office to see if sailors could come out to TES to do work as a part of helping them deal with deployment stress.

For more information, visit theequinesanctuary.org, call 453-4567 or e-mail theequinesanctuary@gmail

.com.

Preservation Commission grants status, owners may
get tax reduction to help with restoration, renovation

By Sondra Murphy

Ojai has a new historic landmark. Last week, the Ojai City Council unanimously approved the status for property owned by Robert and Tiese Quinn, located at the northwest corner or El Toro and Foothill roads. It is now Historic Landmark No. 16.

“Under the Mills Act Ordinance, owners of landmarks may enter into agreement to reduce taxes in order to put those funds into restoration, renovation and rehabilitation of the property,” city manager Jere Kersnar told the council. “The Historic Preservation Commission added not only maintenance of the exterior, but interior as well to maintain the historic condition of the property in general.”

Known as the George Washington Smith “Spec House A,” the owners applied for landmark designation status and a historic landmark property agreement with the city of Ojai, which was reviewed by the Ojai Historic Preservation Commission in December. Included with the application was a historic resources analysis report prepared by San Buenaventura Research Associates, which claimed the main residence and land of the subject property is significant because it meets several criteria of Section 4-8.07 of the Cultural and Historic Preservation Law, as follows.

• The property is significant for the role it played as one of the three speculation houses in the initial development of the Arbolada, which was part of Edward Drummond Libbey’s vision for the beautification of the residential development of the Ojai community.

• The property is significant for its identification with Libbey, who made important contributions to the economic and cultural development of Ojai and was one of the final projects that transformed the architectural image of Ojai to Mission and Spanish Revival theme.

• The main residence embodies the distinguishing characteristics of the rural Spanish architecture of the 1920s.

• The main residence is identified as the work of master architect George Washington Smith, whose work influenced the development of the community and creating an architectural theme that would harmonize with the natural beauty of the Ojai Valley.

• The main residence embodies elements of the medieval architecture of rural Spain as it was interpreted by Smith.

• The main residence has retained its integrity of location, design, materials and workmanship. Additions made to the residence were done using a compatible design, materials and workmanship.

Interior and exterior features were identified in the report. The OHPC toured the site last month and recommended to the city additional features that should be preserved and protected. Included on this list are tile floor, wall tiles, wrought iron stair railing, wood-beamed ceiling, wooden stairway grill and a built-in bookcase in the living room.

Exterior features recommended for preservation inclusion by the commission are Spanish clay tile roofs, tile vents, multi-paned wood casement windows, French doors, decorative grills, decorative Spanish tile and heavy-troweled stucco finish. Of landscape features, OHPC also recommended for preservation the tiled fountain and surrounding brick walkway and stone wall. Exteriors may use any of the three spec. house color palette combinations originally determined by Smith.

With landmark status, the property is subject to the Ojai Municipal Title 4, Chapter 8, Cultural and Historic Preservation law. Any proposed modification to the property will require review for compliance with the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation.

The status allows for certain property tax reduction in exchange for the owner’s commitment toward restoration, preservation and maintenance.  The ordinance authorizes local governments to enter into contracts with owners of historic landmark properties.

With their application, the Quinns submitted a proposed preservation and rehabilitation time line plan for expected maintenance of the property and are required to maintain all significant historic interior and exterior features as identified in the conditions of agreement.

Kersnar reported that property tax for the property will be re-evaluated by the Ventura County Assessor’s Office on the income approach to value, rather than market approach to value typically used. Property taxes may be reduced by as much as 60 percent, saving the owners as much as $11,200. “The city’s share of the loss would be 12.79 percent, or $1,422 per year,” Kersnar said.

Rain moves annual event
from Libbey Park to Chaparral

By Sondra Murphy

Where can one find herself shaking hands with Julie Tumamait and Julie Christensen? At an Ojai event that celebrates cultural diversity in all its forms.

The dramatic weather did little to daunt the Ojai Valley Youth Foundation’s annual celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. In fact, moving the event into Chaparral Auditorium allowed keynote speaker Toni-Mokjaetji Humber to incorporate images via PowerPoint into her address.

Colorfully adorned with artwork from local students, the hall was rocking previous to Humber’s time from Gill Sotu’s music. Sotu is an Ojai MLK regular and uses powerful music with audience participation to connect with the diverse audiences who attend the event. Sotu’s verses of “We shall” and “Overcome” were echoed by the crowd, on its feet and clapping in time before guitarist D-Flox ended the set with some impressive footwork of his own. “We always look forward to coming here,” said D-Flox as he stepped down from the stage. “This is the whole essence of what Gill Sotu does: unity. The power of music to change things, we live it.”

Humber was introduced by Gus Hoffman, who contacted her to appear last year. But when Barack Obama won the presidency, Humber had to decline the invitation, but agreed to show this year when Hoffman again asked her to speak.

Before beginning her address, Humber convinced the crowd to join hands. “I always start my classes in a circle,” said the professor of ethnic and women’s studies at California State Polytechnic University in Pomona. “It’s powerful for me … I started it after 9-11. It’s a check-in time and I find it is a connection between people.”

Humber spoke about King’s involvement in the civil rights movement by reviewing the climate he grew up in and events that led to his leadership role in the movement. “He brought a voice,” said Humber, “a strategy for protest.” She drew a connection between the civil rights movement and her own life, talking of her family. “My parents were products of the rural South,” said Humber. “They were what’s known as the ‘new negro’ moving to the urban areas.” She grew up in Watts then moved into the suburbs of Southern California, “… when I learned what the N-word means and how it pertains,” she said.

Reviewing indignities of the imagery of African Americans during King’s lifetime, Humber explained that the man “led a comfy life in a segregated world. He lived a

middle-class life, was a P.K. — a preacher’s kid. He did not have to get involved.”

Humber reviewed the events that became the catalyst for King to get drawn in to the civil rights movement, such as the famous Brown v. the Board of Education decision mandating integration in schools. Humber listed names of others who were working for equality. Charles Houston, who was the first African American editor of the Harvard Law Review and, as a lawyer, played a significant role in dismantling the laws allowing segregation; Linda Brown, the girl who sued the Board of Education in Kansas to attend a school in her own neighborhood; Rosa Parks whose arrest for refusing to give up her bus seat in 1955 Alabama prompted King’s involvement in the ensuing boycott; and Emmett Till, the 15-year-old who was brutally beaten to death over allegedly whistling at a white woman.

“This began indignation that got international attention,” said Humber. Quoting King’s “Letter for Birming-ham Jail,” Humber said King declared the world is “in dire need of creative extremists” akin to Jesus Christ, who he called “an extremist for love, truth and goodness.”

Humber also made mention of the many contributions Africans have made to humanity, recommending Imhotep, Ivan Van Serima, Gaspar Yanga, Vincente Guerrero, as well as Ruby Bridges and Harriet Tubman as people whose efforts and writings people should become familiar with in the quest for equality.

Before leaving, Humber presented Hoffman with a bracelet inscribed with, “Leaders inspire leaders.” Hoffman has been on the OVYF MLK Day Committee for six years and a co-chair with Mackenzie Russell for the past three years.

“It’s been good,” said Hoffman, a high school senior. “I might come help one more year.” He also said he wants to be involved in humanitarian efforts as he moves toward his college career.

The MLK Day Committee has met weekly for the past four months in preparation for the big day. Other student committee members this year were Emily Cohen, Andie Mendoza, Rocio Garcia, Noemi Hernandez, Zelda Grove and Matt Russell, plus the Oak View Teen Center volunteers. Adult committee members were Kate Hoffman, Lanny Kaufer, Rondia Kaufer and Kate Russell. OVYF staff Meg Wall and Laura Charles also participated in this year’s efforts.

A series of significant big-time winter storms could leave as much as 8 inches of rain on the valley’s floor, and up to 20 inches of rain in some local mountain areas between tonight at Friday, according to a National Weather Service forecast issued Sunday morning.

CLICK for the latest weather information.

NWS STATEMENT:

SEVERAL STORMS WILL AFFECT THE REGION THIS WEEK...BRINGING HEAVY
TO EXCESSIVE RAINS AND MOUNTAIN SNOWS AND A POTENTIAL FOR FLASH
FLOODING AND DEBRIS FLOW.

PERIODS OF GUSTY WINDS AND LARGE SURF WILL ALSO CAUSE PROBLEMS
ACROSS THE SOUTHLAND THIS WEEK.

A VERY POWERFUL WEST TO EAST JET STREAM SAGGING SOUTHWARD THROUGH
THE PACIFIC WILL ALLOW A SERIES OF STRONG STORM SYSTEMS TO TRACK
INTO SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA WHILE MAINTAINING A RICH SOURCE OF
SUBTROPICAL MOISTURE.

SIGNIFICANT AND POSSIBLY EXCESSIVE RAINFALL WILL OCCUR OVER
SOUTHWESTERN CALIFORNIA DURING THE UPCOMING WEEK. LIGHT RAIN
WILL LIKELY DEVELOP NORTH OF POINT CONCEPTION TODAY...THEN RAIN WILL
SPREAD SOUTHWARD INTO VENTURA AND LOS ANGELES COUNTIES TONIGHT.
RAIN COVERAGE AND INTENSITY IS EXPECTED TO INCREASE ACROSS THE
REGION MONDAY...WITH RAIN HEAVY AT TIMES MONDAY AFTERNOON INTO
MONDAY NIGHT. THERE WILL ALSO BE SCATTERED THUNDERSTORMS MONDAY
AFTERNOON AND EVENING. RAIN WILL BEGIN TO TAPER OFF BY LATE MONDAY
NIGHT OR EARLY TUESDAY. THIS FIRST STORM SYSTEM IS EXPECTED TO BRING
1 TO 3 INCHES OF RAIN TO MOST COASTAL AND VALLEY AREAS FROM TONIGHT
THROUGH MONDAY NIGHT...WITH 3 TO 5 INCHES ACROSS FOOTHILL AND
MOUNTAIN AREAS. LOCAL AMOUNTS UP TO 6 INCHES ARE POSSIBLE ACROSS
FAVORED SOUTH FACING SLOPES. THE STATION BURN AREA IS EXPECTED TO
RECEIVE 3 TO 6 INCHES OF RAIN WITH THIS FIRST STORM SYSTEM...WITH
THE HEAVIEST RAINFALL EXPECTED MONDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING. PEAK
RAINFALL RATES BETWEEN 0.75 INCHES AND 1 INCH PER HOUR ARE POSSIBLE
MONDAY AFTERNOON INTO MONDAY EVENING...WITH LOCAL RATES UP TO 1.25
INCHES PER HOUR ACROSS FAVORED SOUTH FACING SLOPES...INCLUDING THE
STATION AND MORRIS BURN AREAS...AND NEAR THUNDERSTORMS.

VERY STRONG TO DAMAGING SOUTH WINDS WILL LIKELY AFFECT SAN LUIS
OBISPO COUNTY...MUCH OF SANTA BARBARA COUNTY AND THE ANTELOPE VALLEY
MONDAY INTO MONDAY EVENING...AND HIGH WIND WATCHES ARE IN EFFECT FOR
THOSE AREAS. DAMAGING WIND GUSTS TO 70 MPH ARE POSSIBLE IN THE
MOUNTAINS. WIDESPREAD WIND ADVISORIES WILL LIKELY BE NEEDED IN
MANY LOWER ELEVATION LOCATIONS OF VENTURA AND LOS ANGELES COUNTIES
AS WINDS COULD GUSTS BETWEEN 30 AND 45 MPH. PLEASE REFER TO
(LAXNPWLOX) FOR ADDITIONAL WIND INFORMATION.

IN THE MOUNTAINS OF LOS ANGELES AND VENTURA COUNTIES...THE POTENTIAL
FOR HEAVY SNOW AND DAMAGING WINDS HAS PROMPTED THE ISSUANCE OF A
WINTER STORM WATCH FOR LATE TONIGHT THROUGH TUESDAY. SNOW LEVELS
WILL START OUT AROUND 7000 FEET TONIGHT AND MONDAY...THEN LOWER TO
BETWEEN 5000 AND 5500 FEET MONDAY NIGHT AND TUESDAY. THE POTENTIAL
EXISTS FOR 1 TO 3 FEET OF SNOW ABOVE 7000 FEET...AND 8 TO 12 INCHES
OF SNOW ABOVE 6000 FEET. PLEASE REFER TO (LAXWSWLOX) FOR DETAILED
INFORMATION ON THE POTENTIALLY SEVERE WINTER WEATHER.

ANOTHER BUT WEAKER STORM SYSTEM IS EXPECTED TO AFFECT THE REGION ON
TUESDAY. THE THIRD AND MOST LIKELY STRONGEST STORM SYSTEM IS
EXPECTED WEDNESDAY INTO THURSDAY. A COLD AND UNSTABLE AIR MASS WILL
CONTINUE TO KEEP A THREAT OF SHOWERS INTO AT LEAST FRIDAY. SNOW
LEVELS WILL GENERALLY RANGE FROM 4000 TO 5000 FEET WEDNESDAY THROUGH
FRIDAY. FOR THE ENTIRE WEEK...THERE IS THE POTENTIAL FOR RAINFALL
TOTALS OF 4 TO 8 INCHES IN COASTAL AND VALLEY AREAS...AND 8 TO 16
INCHES IN THE FOOTHILLS AND MOUNTAINS. LOCAL RAINFALL AMOUNTS OVER
20 INCHES ARE QUITE POSSIBLE ACROSS FAVORED SOUTH FACING COASTAL
SLOPES. THIS WILL LIKELY BE THE WETTEST WEEK SINCE EARLY 2005.
ADDITIONAL HEAVY SNOW TOTALS ARE EXPECTED IN THE MOUNTAINS WEDNESDAY
THROUGH FRIDAY.

THE LARGE AMOUNT OF EXPECTED PRECIPITATION...AS WELL AS THE
POTENTIAL FOR HIGH INTENSITY RAINFALL...WILL BRING A SIGNIFICANT
THREAT OF FLASH FLOODING AND DEBRIS FLOWS...ESPECIALLY TO THE RECENT
BURN AREAS. SINCE THERE WILL BE THE POTENTIAL FOR HIGH INTENSITY
RAINFALL...THERE WILL ALSO BE A THREAT OF URBAN AND SMALL STREAM
FLOODING AND NUMEROUS ROCKSLIDES...ESPECIALLY LATER IN THE WEEK AS
SOILS BECOME MORE SATURATED. IF THE STRONG STORM MATERIALIZES FOR
THE WEDNESDAY/THURSDAY TIME FRAME...THERE COULD ALSO BE SOME MAIN
STEM RIVER FLOODING CONCERNS.

DANGEROUS WEATHER CONDITIONS ARE EXPECTED ACROSS OUR COASTAL WATERS
THIS WEEK. PERIODS OF GALE FORCE WINDS...HIGH SURF
CONDITIONS...DANGEROUS RIP CURRENTS...COASTAL FLOODING...AND EVEN
WATERSPOUTS WILL ALL BE POSSIBLE. FOR FURTHER MARINE
INFORMATION...PLEASE REFER TO THE LATEST MARINE WEATHER STATEMENT
AND COASTAL FLOOD STATEMENT.

RESIDENTS OF SOUTHWESTERN CALIFORNIA ARE URGED TO STAY TUNED FOR THE
LATEST INFORMATION ON THESE POTENTIALLY STRONG STORM SYSTEMS. LISTEN
TO NOAA WEATHER RADIO OR YOUR FAVORITE MEDIA SOURCE...OR VISIT OUR
WEBSITE AT WEATHER.GOV/LOSANGELES FOR THE LATEST UPDATES OF
FORECASTS AND WARNINGS.

Governing body forced to close infant center

By Linda Harmon
Cuts to education were again the elephant in the room at Tuesday night’s Ojai Unified School District’s board meeting. Even though the budget was barely discussed its effect was felt as the board voted to close the district-run A Place to Grow Infant Center, effective June 30.

Cuts to education were again the elephant in the room at Tuesday night’s Ojai Unified School District’s board meeting. Even though the budget was barely discussed its effect was felt as the board voted to close the district-run A Place to Grow Infant Center, effective June 30.

“At the December meet-ing I articulated the issues that brought us here,” said superintendent Henry Bangser. “It is one of the hardest things to do as an administrator, to close an effective program … The reason is our declining resource base and our need to do anything we can do to stretch our resources. Closing the center allows us to focus on our preschool expansion.”

According to Bangser, “in an optimal world,” he would keep the center open and have early childhood education available to everyone as an entrance to kindergarten.

Supporters of the center hit the same note, but asked that the center be given a chance to become self-supporting.

“I believe a cost-effective program is possible,” said Jean Smith, an educator with a background in early childhood development and a parent of former students. “Whatever you vote, I hope you learn from the experience of having an early childhood program.”

Mary Mashburn, an Infant Center parent, also asked that the center be spared and, if not, that special arrangements be made so that students now in the program and younger than 3 next fall, can be accepted into the expanded preschool program.

“Let these children who have already made friends and are secure with the staff be integrated into the program,” said Mashburn, whose 1.5-year-old son is in the center two days a week. “Where else am I going to put him? … This is a great preschool.”

Director of the Infant Center, Bonnie Patton, closed out the public comment.

“It’s been a long time, four and a half years now. I want to thank you for your patience and support,” said Patton. “I have children in my program from out of the district, we bring children into the school district … We don’t have to stay in this building. If you do close us, we’d like to see our 2-year-olds accepted into the new program.”

While Pauline Mercado, board member, noted she considered the center part of the district’s “vision,” the majority of the board expressed regret but spoke in support of closure.

“I have been continually moved by the discussion both inside the meetings and outside of them,” said Board Member Rikki Horne, recommending closure. “I remember a year ago talking about this and discussions of it becoming independent of the district. I still encourage it be pursued outside of the district.”

“I have been very supportive of the Infant Center all along the way … The issue I see as the problem is budget cuts,” said Board Member Linda Taylor. “I don’t think we can continue with all our staffing cuts. We can’t even have summer school for our kids who are struggling. If making it revenue neutral were possible, I think it would have already happened.”

“Although inspired by Pauline’s comments I don’t think we have the where-with-all to support the program,” said Board President Kathy Smith. “I don’t think the issue of the 2-year-olds is a board decision. I think the administration has the flexibility to make a decision about letting the 2-year-olds into the program along the way … We all appreciate Bonnie and the contributions she has made to the valley. It is a gem and I think it should be allowed to continue somewhere, somehow, maybe in a church.”

The board voted 4 to 1 for closure, with Mercado voting no.

With the votes concluded, the board received “the best possible report” on the annual districtwide audit from Kevin Brejnak of Nigro, Nigro, and White Certified Public Accountants. Brejnak’s company gave an unqualified report on the 2008-2009 school year for Ojai Unified and the Valley Oak Charter.

In the superintendent’s report, Bangser laid out plans for the upcoming district teacher in-service later this month, focusing on communication and correlation of math programs in grades kindergarten through 12 that will allow teachers to “learn from each other.” The day will be spent with grades divided into four subgroups, with a math expert at each level, going from an elementary level to high school level classrooms, to learn respective teaching methods and content.

“At the end of the day they will get back together to discuss what they’ve learned from each other,” said Bangser, who added Ojai’s relatively smaller size made that possible. “That’s a great advantage we have over Ventura Unified.”

By Lenny Roberts
yes its our dad! he apparently found a beautiful tree and sat under it and passed away….. thank you to all our friends and family for love and concerns and support!!!!!! love jenny

In a short posting on the original news report, Jenny Newell, daughter of Walt and Bonnie Lu Dohrn, confirmed the skeletal remains found near Cherry Valley over the weekend are those of her father, who disappeared July 5, 2009 after visiting friends in the desert community.

The remains, discovered by a group of boys riding off-road motorcycles Sunday afternoon, were identified Tuesday by dental records following an autopsy by the Riverside County Medical Examiner’s office.

Riverside Sheriff’s Investigator Robert Pierson said there was no evidence of foul play, adding there was no estimate of  when or how Dohrn died.

Since July, Niles Dohrn has made several trip to the area in search of his father. He said Thursday the discovery was made about a mile-and-a-half from where the his father was last seen. “We were so close,” Dohrn said.

Dohrn described his father as his very best friend.

“He will be missed like crazy. Everyone loved him. I appreciate all the help and support from the people of Ojai and to the detectives in Cherry Valley. The people who live there are super sweet. They were just great. And special thanks to the search party who came from Ojai.”

So many applicants, so little time

By Sondra Murphy

Tuesday’s meeting of the Ojai City Council was a bit anti-climactic. After voting 3-2 last month to appoint a replacement for the exiting Joe DeVito, the council reversed its decision Tuesday night and voted 3-1 in favor of holding a special election.

Finding a council member replacement has been a focus of the city since DeVito’s October announcement of his resignation effective Dec. 31. DeVito’s term would have naturally expired in 2010. His successor will therefore only fill the position through the next general election and so will need to run as a candidate on the November ballot to have a chance of continuing on the council.

Councilwomen Carol Smith and Betsy Clapp voted in the minority back in December, both supporting an election to fill the position. DeVito and Council Members Sue Horgan and Steve Olsen voted in favor of appointment, citing the time line and important issues needing the council’s immediate attention, such as fiscal concerns, Skate Park construction and Libbey Bowl renovation.

The council members acknowledged that the approximate cost of including a special election on the June primary ballot, estimated at $6,000, was not a lot compared with an individual special election, which would likely be between $30,000 and $36,000.

A June election means that a new council member would not be sworn in until July or August for a seat that will expire within a few months.

Since the decision for appointment, six city residents have applied. Ojai Unified School District board member Pauline Mercado submitted her application late Tuesday afternoon, joining Paul Blatz, Demitri Corbin, Mike Lenehan, Leonard Klaif and John Mirk. Blatz and Klaif are both attorneys active in the local community, while Corbin, Lenehan and Mirk serve on other city commissions.

Smith, who had voted for election, believed that the council should go through with the appointment process out of respect for the applicants. Mayor Olsen had spent time and energy developing the process to be used but was willing to discuss a change in how the position should be filled.

But it was Horgan who moved to reconsider. “We now have six very well-qualified people,” she said. “I want to discuss with my colleagues whether the city has been served well and if the applicants have been served fairly. Unfortunately because we didn’t put a time line on when the applications were due, not every applicant has had a chance to talk to us.”

“I don’t see how we can back pedal at this point,” Smith said. “I feel we really have no choice but to go through with it.”

Olsen said that he has had many discussions with constituents since the appointment decision and felt swayed by their arguments in favor of election.

The council listened to public comment. Ojai Valley Municipal Advisory Council Member Jerry Kaplan spoke in favor of appointment. “I come before you as one who believes in the election process,” he said. “We’re dealing with the ideal vs. the practical. This council has many important issues to deal with now, not six months from now, not nine months from now … By not appointing somebody now you are losing 20 percent of the mental input plus the expertise, plus the potential of having a split vote.”

Like most of the speakers, Ojai Valley Chamber of Commerce CEO Scott Eicher said the members continued to support letting the voters decide DeVito’s replacement. “The chamber urges you to proceed with a special election,” he said.

“But what about the people who showed up to speak,” asked Smith. “It’s like you show up and have the rug pulled out from under you. I’d like to hear from the applicants.”

“I disagree,” said Olsen. “I think this decision from the very beginning has been the council’s decision.” He said he would allow the applicants to speak following a decision about reconsidering, which was then unanimously supported by the council.

Among the applicants, only Corbin chose to speak, stating that he applied in order to have some cohesion in the months leading up to the November election. “I jumped into this fray because I knew that there were important issues and to finish what has been started from someone who knew the history,” he said. “To go through an election process will take me away from other work that I am doing for the city.”

Following public comments and council discussion, the members voted in favor of putting the item on a ballot. Smith cast the dissenting vote.

Horgan then moved for staff to come back to the Jan. 26 meeting with the necessary resolutions.

City attorney Monte Widders offered legal opinion about several technical questions, including split votes and quorum count. “If you deadlock, then no action is taken,” he said and added that even on a four-member council, three is considered a quorum for discussing business items. He also said the time line has been met for inclusion on the June ballot, but time was of the essence.

City Clerk Carlon Strobel said documents would need to be submitted to the county by Feb. 1 and the nomination period for June primary election inclusion would be Feb. 13 through March 12. She will return to the next meeting with more information about the time line and ballot process. That meeting is scheduled for Jan. 26 at 7:30 p.m. at Ojai City Hall, 401 S. Ventura St.

By Scott Wintermute
At around 12:30 Friday afternoon a late model Chevrolet Corvette Z06 was destroyed in a dramatic crash and ensuing fire near Mile Marker 30 on Maricopa Highway. Despite the presence of a rescue helicopter the driver of the $70,000 sports car was transported by ambulance to Community Memorial Hospital in Ventura as a precautionary measure. He apparently avoided major injuries, and was responsive and answering questions when CHP officers arrived.

Authorities became concerned when the man indicated that there was a gun in the car, kept in a lockbox in the trunk.

All indications are that the accident happened at a very high rate of speed as the car became airborne and rolled several times before coming to a rest and burning to a pile of scrap that could hardly be identified as a car.

The Corvette Z06 is an lighter, tighter and faster version of the famed muscle car, capable of reaching speeds just under 200 miles per hour. It appears that the driver was unable to keep the 505 horsepower vehicle on the ground. He lost control heading northbound after coming out of a sweeping turn and wrecked on the eastern side of the road.

By Sondra Murphy

On Tuesday, Ojai City Council members will be deliberating on applicants for the vacancy created by the resignation of Joe DeVito last month.

As of press time, five men had applied for the position, four of whom have previously been featured individually in the OVN: Paul Blatz, Demitri Corbin, Leonard Klaif and Mike Lenehan. Ojai Planning Commissioner John Mirk submitted his application Wednesday evening, and so is featured in today’s issue.

On Dec. 8, the Ojai City Council voted 3-2 in favor of appointing a replacement for the position vacated by Joe DeVito, whose term would have naturally expired in November of this year. At that time, it was the council’s hope that they would have enough qualified applicants from which to appoint the replacement on Jan. 12, but they would also be within the appointment time line if a choice was made at the Jan. 26 council meeting.

With DeVito gone, who voted with the majority for appointment, there is a possibility that the seat will go to special election. The council has not yet established dates for such an election. If embedded in the June primary ballot, the city has estimated the cost to be about $6,000. As an independent ballot, the cost to the city could be as high as $36,000.

“The choices are there, it’s now up to the council to decide what to do,” said city manager Jere Kersnar on Wednesday. The council meeting will be held at Ojai City Hall, 401 S. Ventura St., Tuesday at 7:30 p.m.

Following are the applicants, listed alphabetically.

Paul Blatz, age 58

Occupation: attorney

Education: George Washington University, B.S.; Ventura College of Law, J.D.

26-year Ojai resident

Affiliations: Rotary Club of Ojai-West; Ojai Valley Chamber of Commerce; Ojai Valley Living Treasures board; Ojai Performing Arts Theater Foundation; Ojai Pergola Committee; California and Ventura County bar associations; and Ventura County Superior Court Judge Pro-Tem

Concerns: Assuring fiscal responsibility while protecting the character of Ojai through preservation of open spaces, addressing traffic impacts and supporting youth programs.

“I felt the council, in terms of who they appoint, should have as many applicants as possible. And I truly believe that my presence on the council would help assure the sustainability of the community.”

•••

Demitri Corbin, age 48

Occupation: Professional actor

Education: Illinois State University, B.S. in theater; Chautauqua Professional Actor’s Studio

Eight-year Ojai resident

Affiliations: Ojai Arts Commission; Virginia Avenue Project; Peachtree Theater Company; Cardboard Fairytale Theater; Ojai Playwrights Conference; Ojai-Ventura Film Festival; Theater 150; Ojai Shakespeare Festival; Ojai Performing Arts Theater Foundation; Ojai Valley Youth Foundation; and Ojai Library After School Homework Lab

Concerns: Better utilization of the city’s nonprofit status in applying for public and private funding for artistic and educational projects to help promote tourism to Ojai.

“I want to be on City Council because I think I would bring insight into the arts community when decisions are made. All of these things lend to the profile that Ojai has as an artists community.”

•••

Leonard Klaif, age 61

Occupation: criminal attorney

Education: University of Iowa College of Law, J.D; State University of New York at Buffalo, B.A. in economics; Institute of Psycho-Structural Balancing, massage technician certificate

17-year Ojai resident

Affiliations: Ojai Art Center; Theater 150; Ojai Film Society; California Appellate Project; California State Bar; California Appellate Defense Council, South Bay and Ventura chapters; and Los Angeles County Juvenile Bar Association

Concerns: Fostering the arts, supporting local businesses and protecting the valley’s beauty and open spaces.

“I believe that I can make a valuable contribution as a member of the City Council. I am familiar with the issues as I regularly attend council meetings … We have incredibly interesting, smart, caring people in our valley and the city needs to better harness this most valuable resource.”

•••

Mike Lenehan, age 49

Occupation: federal investigator

Education: University of California at Santa Barbara, B.A. in law and society; Santa Barbara City College, A.A. in law and society; U.S. Army Command and General Staff College graduate

Nine-year Ojai resident

Affiliations: Ojai Parks & Recreation Commission; U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, retired; Ojai American Legion; Veterans of Foreign Wars, Ojai; Knights of Columbus, Ventura; Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association; Emerald Society of Federal Law Enforcement Agencies; Santa Barbara Irish Festival; and Nordhoff High and Villanova Preparatory schools, coach

Concerns: Promoting youth recreation programs while offering a conservative perspective to the collective decisions made by the city.

“I have a common person perspective that I think appeals to people who are in a like situation.”

•••

John Mirk, age 58

Occupation: IT support technician

Education: William Marsh Rice University, B.A. in architecture

16-year Ojai resident

Affiliations: Ojai Planning Commission; Housing Element Task Force; Ojai Public Art Review Committee; Libbey Park Public Art Selection Committee; Ojai Raptor Center; Theater 150; Patagonia Environmental Grants Committee; Nordhoff High School music department; Volunteers in Service to America; and Channel Islands Bike Club

Concerns: Affordable housing and developing standards and programs to enhance the city’s future while maintaining Ojai’s special character.

“I’ve enjoyed my service on the Planning Commission and am ready for new challenges. I consider service on the City Council to be one of the most demanding duties in our town, and see the chance to be directly responsible for the well-being of Ojai as one of the most rewarding opportunities in public service.”

Longtime Ojai Studio Artists member known as experimental expressionist

By Nancy Gross
Abstract expressionist Alberta Fins did not want services held for her after she passed away from stomach cancer on Dec. 17. But friends and admirers cannot stifle the desire to honor her for her work and her wonderful personality.

“She was such a natural artist. It came from her response to the world around her,” said friend and fellow Ojai Studio Artist, Karen Lewis, who paints landscapes and portraits somewhere between dreamy realism and hyperrealism.

Lewis added, “She was a longtime member of OSA and she was a good friend. She really had a unique art capacity. Her contributions to art are much more experimental, expressing herself with spontaneity, really trying to be ahead of the curve. She was not a figurative artist. She painted from emotions.”

Fins said of her own work that it was rarely sold in Ojai, but rather it would go straight from her studio into museum collections.

Donna Granata, of the Focus on the Masters program said, “I’ve always loved her work, which is so challenging for people to deal with because it is so dark. But it has a very sophisticated flavor. The most seasoned art lover would appreciate the work that went into it.”

Focus on the Masters is a nonprofit project that archives information about extraordinary local artists. Interviews, biographies and museum quality photographs of the artists and their work are collected and stored to support the artist and the art community. Additionally, the resources may be used for lectures and other kinds of educational outreach. A committee of leading art professionals including curators, gallery owners and participating artists, chooses artists for inclusion in FOTM.

Granata continued to describe Fins’ output, saying, “She could get pent-up emotions out by the physicality of making the work.” Fins is remembered for her superb sense of humor, but private challenges like the loss of her husband, and her own illness, were translated into her projects, which incorporated fabrics, cellophanes and canvases, where Fins would sometimes pour active chemicals, causing the images to deteriorate.

Fins tended not to speak about the sorrowful parts of her life, but she could not escape the difficulties. Granata photographed Fins peering out of a curtain while in a gallery containing her canvases, because this seemed the perfect metaphorical shot.

“She literally spilt herself into these canvases, which was very public,” but yet they offer a window into “what was private, behind the scenes,” Granata said. “I knew her very well, I had a tremendous affection for her.

“One of the big goals that we have at Focus on the Masters is to help people understand more challenging work and different subject matter,” Granata asserted.

Some of Fins’ works are referred to as assemblages; they use painting only as a starting point, and they extend beyond two dimensions. Granata believes Fins’ technique evolved when she was experimenting with ways to transfer images onto silks. As chemical reactions caused things to start rippling and bubbling, she found satisfaction and catharsis in what resulted.

Some of her training is grounded in the methods of print making, and Fins was a member of the Los Angeles Printmaking Society. She shared her love of printmaking with mixed media virtuoso, Linda Taylor, who said “I adored her. She just worked away — she had her own unique individual vision she was true to. She was in our Studio Artists from the very beginning. She was very dedicated to art.”

Taylor also said that while Fins was exhibited in many places, she did not brag, and “she supported her less well-off artist friends by purchasing their work.”

Fins was born in 1931, and a with move from New Jersey to California she began her formal study of art at Pasadena City College, Valley College and the University of California at Los Angeles.

Lewis also remarked that Fins was sensitive and troubled by political realities. “She was almost a news junkie. She had to watch the news and she’d lament and comment on the world situation in her art.”

In a 1991 Los Angeles Times article by Josef Woodard, Fins said, “I think art is what keeps me normal. I really have a sense of humor. I’m an up person and I do a lot of laughing. I think I have that side of me because I’m able to express the other side in the studio.”

Gayel Childress, another fellow OSA member, responded about Fins’ passing by saying, “What a loss, what a hole for our art community. She was an artists’ artist and I just loved her spirit. She twinkled inside.

“She had such serious art, when I met her I expected a very serious person, but she was so much fun. As a beginning artist, new to the art world, I visited her house, which was like a museum.

“Yet, she cherished a small whimsical piece, and seeing that in Alberta let me know my whimsy was OK. She kind of validated my quirkiness without her knowing she did. You never know when you are going to touch someone.”

John Mirk

Planner joins four others seeking city appointment

By Sondra Murphy

The city of Ojai has received a fifth application for the open council seat. Ojai Planning Commissioner John Mirk submitted his application Wednesday. His name joins those of Paul Blatz, Demitri Corbin, Leonard Klaif and Mike Lenehan.

Mirk is an IT support technician at Patagonia and has lived in Ojai for 16 years. He is married to book editor Marquita Flemming and they have two children, Dan and Sarah, now grown. Mirk is also a registered architect in California, having a bachelor’s in architecture from William Marsh Rice University.

“I’ve enjoyed my service on the Planning Commission and am ready for new challenges,” said Mirk. “I consider service on the City Council to be one of the most demanding duties in our town and see the chance to be directly responsible for the well-being of Ojai as one of the most rewarding opportunities in public service.”

In addition to serving on the Planning Commission for 12 years, Mirk is on the board of directors of the Ojai Raptor Center and was treasurer at Theater 150 in 2003 and 2004. Theater is one of his hobbies. “For the past 10 years, I have been the technical director for the Nordhoff music department spring musicals,” Mirk said. “Working with Dr. Marty Babayco, I designed the sets for everything from ‘42nd Street’ to ‘The Pirates of Penzance,’ then helped the students and parents build the sets.”

Mirk also is the Planning Commission’s representative to the Housing Element Task Force, and is a member of the Public Art Review Committee and the Libbey Bowl Public Art selection committee. He is also one of seven representatives to the Environmental Grants Committee that allocates a portion of Patagonia’s “1-percent for the Planet” funds to nonprofit environmental groups and is on Patagonia’s Environmental Internship Committee that provides up to one month’s paid leave for employees to work with nonprofit groups.

He is frequently seen cruising the valley on his bicycle. “I am an avid bike rider,” said Mirk. “I am a member of the Channel Islands Bike Club and edit the club newsletter. I commute to Patagonia twice a week by bike and, on the weekends, I can often be found riding up the Dennison Grade or over Casitas Pass.”

He credits his two “notorious” 15-year-old Siberian huskies, Milo and Tasha, with facilitating the meeting of many Ojai residents. “In their youth, they were wont to escape our fenced-in back yard and wander the streets of Ojai,” Mirk said. “One of our early introductions to our Ojai neighbors — the lady at the Christian Science Reading Room, and avocado farmer up on Gridley Road, and our own Ojai Valley News carrier — came when people called or stopped by to apprise us of the whereabouts of our dogs at one time or another.”

Mirk sees housing as an important issue to Ojai.

“Having spent the past year as the Planning Commission’s representative to the Housing Element Task Force I am acutely aware of the increasing demand for affordable housing in Ojai and the need to maintain viable jobs within the city,” he said.

He has other ideas for improving Ojai, as well. “I believe that as a city we need to set standards and develop programs which will enhance our future while maintaining the essential qualities that make Ojai a unique and special community,” said Mirk. “The year ahead will present many challenges. Our citizens comprise a tremendously talented community, with a fierce dedication to preserving the essence of Ojai. It is incumbent upon the council to work together so we can effectively focus on addressing the needs of our city.”

For more information about the City Council appointment and information on all five candidates, see related story.

Kersnar hopes to protect $3M in surplus cash

By Daryl Kelley
For Ojai, the new year is sure to herald an era of strict limits on municipal government, as revenues continue to fall and city services are likely to be cut.

A sharp decline in hotel and sales taxes has eliminated a once-robust budget surplus and the city is likely to dip into reserves before the end of this fiscal year on June 30, city manager Jere Kersnar said this week in a stark analysis of Ojai’s financial health.

“How to balance our budget will be the overwhelming issue in the coming year,” Kersnar said in an interview.

“We’re just starting to get the numbers, and they’re not good,” he said. “There’s a significant drop in revenue, so we’re going to have to look at cuts. And no one knows how long this is going to last.”

During the next few months, the City Council will face tough decisions about whether to use the city’s emergency fund to maintain services at current levels, or to balance its budget through cuts, Kersnar said.

“We have just over $3 million (in reserve), so we’re OK,” he said, “but good fiscal management says you shouldn’t go into your next year depending on your savings to balance your budget.”

As city analysts prepare a budget update this month, Kersnar said it should become clear how much the faltering economy has curtailed city revenue. But he said preliminary figures for the six months ending Dec. 31 already show a sharp decline.

“It is a significant drop,” he said. “It’s a lot in percentage terms.”

The council has already cut back spending by about $400,000, from a projected $8.4 million, for the 2009-2010 budget cycle, Kersnar said. But more cuts are needed to balance the city ledger next year, he said.

Since nearly one-third of the city’s general fund budget goes to police services, Ojai’s contract with the Sheriff’s Department will be analyzed, Kersnar said. “But they tell us we’re pretty much at the low end of the service level as it is right now,” he said. The city’s $75,000 contribution to place a deputy at Nordhoff High School might also be in question for the next school year, he said.

City staffing, 25 full-time employees, will also be eyed for reduction, he said. But the staff is already lean. One area in which a reduction might occur is elimination of the position of redevelopment manager, because the agency’s director, Kathleen McCann, retired last week.

In recent years, Ojai had been in a relatively good financial position because hotel bed taxes make up an unusually large portion of the city budget, about one-third. And local hotels, primarily the Ojai Valley Inn & Spa, have done relatively well until the last year, he said. Now, bed taxes are down sharply.

Many large businesses, stung by criticism of excess spending on conferences in these tough economic times, don’t want to risk the public relations damage a stay at a five-star resort could cause, Kersnar said.

“The biggest dip — in hotel tax  — seems to be a decline in business traffic,” he said. “Groups are not coming to the Ojai Valley Inn. Lots of businesses, even though they could afford it, have cut back.”

Sales taxes from local shops have also dropped, he said, but Ojai has been hurt less than many other cities, because it has no huge major retailers. Only about 15 percent of Ojai’s revenue comes from sales.

Not only have hotel and sales taxes plummeted, but housing prices have also reached levels not seen for nearly a decade. But the hit in property taxes has been modest, Kersnar said.

That’s because even with lower prices and widespread lower appraisals by the county assessor’s office, the turnover of houses tends to increase the tax base, since it brings dwellings that were taxed low under Proposition 13 up to current value.

Another big issue facing the city is change on the City Council itself. Three of its five seats are on the ballot in November, and the council will decide next Tuesday whether to appoint a replacement for Joe DeVito, who retired with a year left in his term last week.

If the remaining four members cannot decide on a replacement, the DeVito seat would be filled in an election — either the June statewide primary or the November general election.

“My sense is that it will end up in an election,” Kersnar said.

Indeed, the council split 3-to-2 in deciding last month to replace DeVito by appointment. And now there are only four votes left on the council. “I don’t sense there is a majority for appointment,” Kersnar said.

In December, Sue Horgan and Steve Olsen voted for appointment, while Betsy Clapp and Carol Smith favored filling the seat by election.

Regardless of its composition, the council will be faced with major issues in 2010.

First, it is set to conclude its lengthy ruminations about a new $350,000 skateboard park by awarding a construction contract at its Jan. 26 meeting. Four builders have been pre-qualified to do the job and have submitted bids, Kersnar said. The city has donated $100,000 to the project with the bulk raised through community donations.

The council will also monitor progress toward the $3.5 million reconstruction of Libbey Bowl, to which the city has contributed $750,000 and about $150,000 in services, the city manager said.

“These projects are there and they will proceed,” Kersnar said, although backers have yet to raise the final $1.5 million needed for the bowl rehabilitation.

Other construction projects are also expected to move forward in the coming year.

In March, the city plans to spend $350,000 to $400,000 in federal stimulus money on street resurfacing. Another pot of stimulus money could also yield a similar amount for street repair, Kersnar said.

In addition, the city has received word that it will get $900,000 in stimulus money to replace its two aging trolleys.

“It’s just a matter of getting all the state approvals,” Kersnar said. “People talk about federal delay, but the major problem is getting the money approved by the state.”

Still, some long-planned projects won’t happen this year. For example, the extension of Fulton Street to Bryant Street to reduce congestion out of the city’s industrial park is on a back burner. This 10-year effort has finally met environmental requirements and the city now owns the land, but there is no construction money, Kersnar said.

Another variable is how the state’s yawning $20-billion budget deficit over the next 18 months is going to affect Ojai, Kersnar said.

Although this city depends less on state funds than most, it could still be hit with cuts, he said.

Historically, in tough economic times, the state has balanced its budget by withdrawing tax money from local governments that it has pledged to pass through. These so-called SB 90 dollars are supposed to pay for programs the state has required local governments to provide without reliable funding.

Ojai could lose about $50,000 this way, Kersnar said.

Another $100,000 in state law enforcement grants could also go away, he said.

But the largest potential hit is in state attempts to capture redevelopment money from local governments. If the state is not blocked in court, Ojai would have to write a check for $592,000 to Sacramento in May, which is more than half of the $1 million the city receives in redevelopment property tax each year.

Courts struck down the state’s attempt to take local redevelopment money last year, but state officials have tried to change law to patch legal loopholes, Kersnar said.

“But our experts say what they’re doing is still unconstitutional,” he said.

Also near the top of the council agenda is the question of how it should meet state mandates to provide more affordable housing. One possible answer is to grant amnesty to those who have allowed illegal dwellings on their property if they will bring those substandard dwellings up to city code.

A city report determined that there are more than 300 illegal dwellings in the city. But the city has suspended discussions on that issue until after an environmental report on the city’s overall housing plan is complete in the next few months.

“We haven’t figured out how to do the (amnesty) plan,” Kersnar said.

At issue overall is how the city can address a state quota that requires it to provide 465 new affordable dwellings, despite a shortage of bare land and the traffic and smog problems that growth would bring to this narrow valley served by two-lane highways.

The council must also deal with a second bench mark plan within the first few months of 2010 — how to extend the life of its Redevelopment Agency.

The council, acting as the city’s Redevelopment Agency board, must focus on how it can continue to refurbish the city’s core as the agency approaches a cap on how much it can collect in property taxes.

Since its founding in 1972, the Redevelopment Agency has captured about $20 million in property tax that would otherwise have gone to other government entities. But, with soaring property values during the last decade, the agency is now approaching a $23.2-million cap on how much it can collect.

That means that by 2012, the agency could be effectively out of the redevelopment business, and the city would be hard-pressed to find another source for the $1 million a year the agency collects.

A top redevelopment lawyer has said the city may extend Redevelopment Agency collections, however. That’s because Ojai’s collections cap may apply only to its original redevelopment zone, its aging core, and not to two newer, smaller redevelopment zones for east and west Ojai Avenue and Bryant Street, the lawyer said.

The County of Ventura has challenged this move, and negotiations are under way to try reach a compromise that would allow Ojai to amend its plan and still collect millions more dollars during the next 30 years, while passing some along to the county.

Kersnar said he thinks a compromise could be reached by spring.

Even as the city and the county squabble over who would get extra taxes from new development, Kersnar said that for the first time in years there are no pending new home construction projects before the city, other than a long-standing plan to replace several cottages on Mallory Way with new condos.

Several small projects approved over the years still have not been built, but there’s nothing new on the horizon, he said.

“One thing that’s truly fascinating,” he said, “is that we have nothing residential in the pipeline.”

City, school board to resume talks for Channel 10 control

By Sondra Murphy

Last season’s mystery of Channel 10 ended with a cliffhanger and local cable television subscribers have yet to learn the outcome.

Time Warner Cable customers are still waiting for the public access station to air more comprehensive content about the Ojai Valley. Despite station management and funding logistics being a topic of much debate and effort last year by the Ojai City Council and staff, sparse offerings continue to be aired, consisting primarily of City Council and Planning Commission meetings with occasional calendar items.

Ojai Unified School District was meeting last spring with the city to hammer out a memo of understanding enabling its Nordhoff High School Media Arts Academy to manage Channel 10 when OUSD superintendent Tim Baird tendered his resignation. Baird’s departure and the search for and selection of current superintendent Henry Bangser, coupled with focus on Skate Park negotiations between the city and School District, sidelined further progress.

“I received a request from the School District to sit back down at the table with them,” said city Public Works director Mike Culver. “It kind of got put on hold with the new superintendent coming in, but now they’re ready to talk about it.” Culver expected he and city manager Jere Kersnar would meet with OUSD this month.

“Mike and Jere and I and a couple of leaders from the district, particularly Dan Musick and Greg Bayless from the high school, are going to be getting together in the next week or two to talk about some options for moving the issue forward,” said Bangser. “I have a few ideas and thoughts from people in the district and I want to see if they mesh with what the people over in the city want to help us accomplish.”

Bangser cited the Skate Park negotiations, infant center closure and educational issues for part of the break in talks, as well as time needed for him to learn the history of local public access efforts. “We haven’t dropped it. We’re getting up to it now in early 2010.”

Assembly Bill 2987, the 2006 Digital Infrastructure and Competition Act, proposed to equalize competition among cable providers by allowing them all to franchise with the state. Intending to open up access to various media providers by altering franchise regulations, cable providers such as Time Warner, which provides cable to Ojai, were able to reduce the number of local cable stations they facilitated.

AB 2987 also opened up the prospect for the city to assume management of Channel 10 and receive additional funds for the effort.

The City Council voted in 2008 to take on management of Channel 10 and its equipment, which would otherwise have gone dark Jan. 1, 2009.

After slow progress and hesitancy over assuming broadcast duties and responsibilities, a second reading of an ordinance adding a new chapter to the Ojai Municipal Code received unanimous support by the Ojai City Council in February 2009. The ordinance addresses state video franchises pursuant to Assembly Bill 2987, the Digital Infrastructure and Video Competition Act of 2006 as it relates to Channel 10.

The city has long gotten 5 percent of Time Warner’s revenues from customers in the city limits, which Culver estimated to be $88,000 annually that goes into the general fund. The council voted unanimously to pass the ordinance in February and, while supportive of taking over Channel 10, they still wanted assurances of the risks associated with any agreement between the city and OUSD.

Since March, the city has been collecting the extra amount from a percentage of Time Warner’s Ojai franchise profits into a special fund. “What we’ve gotten so far is $14,579,” said Kersnar. “It varies. We get paid quarterly, so it looks like we’re getting about $5,000 per quarter.” The amount is approximately 1 percent more than the city previously received and is figured by calculating the number of Time Warner Cable subscribers in the city of Ojai.

In November 2008, Culver formed a community task team of interested parties to work on a plan. That team consists of representatives from the City Council, city staff, the School District, Ministerial Association, and Ojai Valley News, as well as individuals experienced in emergency preparedness, technology and public access TV production. Once the station is capable of airing more comprehensive programming, the committee hopes to explore methods of collecting revenues for the unincorporated areas of the Ojai Valley, since these customers also have access to Channel 10.

Culver also convinced Time Warner to turn over to the city equipment to run the station, which is now housed at Public Works. The problem is there is no staff to accept and air content from the community at large, a crucial element in the concept of public access television.

Public access television must focus on three areas: public information, education and government (P.E.G.). With the city covering the government portion, the task team considered the other two components to Channel 10’s broadcasts of enabling community members to create and submit content.

In November 2008, Ojai Unified School District offered to run the station through its Media Arts Academy in exchange for the then-estimated $17,600 to begin the effort and had hoped to begin in January 2009.

That offer was supported by task team members, but negotiations between the city and OUSD stalled over operational logistics, as well as plans that were not detailed enough to satisfy the City Council.

Council members favorably viewed the later proposal submitted by Baird in February. In the proposal, Baird outlined a curriculum design for station management to be incorporated into the Media Arts Academy in order to provide eight hours of daily programming and allow for community involvement in several areas. Besides an advisory board of local media specialists, OUSD’s proposal encourages community submissions.

Again the community awaits an agreement between the two public organizations governed by procedural law and advised by often-conflicting legal representation. And so, like any engrossing mystery, the case of Channel 10 is to be continued.

Friends unite to stop home foreclosure

By Nancy Gross
On Saturday, beginning at 8 a.m., the parking lot of the New Wine Fellowship on Church Road will again be sudsy with love and service. A fund-raising car wash, like the one held last spring for the grieving Scarminach family, is being staged to help Frances Fraser hang onto her house. Fraser has been a gracious presence in Oak View and Ojai for many decades.

“She helps with everything. She’s losing her house to foreclosure,” said Sharyn Mathews, who is one of the organizers of the event. Mathews was also instrumental in making last year’s car wash benefit for the Scarminach family so successful, with thousands of dollars contributed by valley residents and businesses.

“It’s just a heart kind of thing. I remember when I went to Ventura High School and she was one of the security officers there, like a lunch cop. And she’s always been at H & R Block when I do my taxes,” Mathews said.

Another helper at last spring’s car wash, Claudia Decker, is assisting again. She said that Fraser “goes up and down the street and helps all the neighbors. She just had an operation, and she’s still helping others.”

And sure enough, when Fraser’s warm voice returns a phone call she missed, she says, “I have a friend who’s in a wheelchair and I was sort of watching her out in the yard while her husband did yard work.”

Fraser has lived in her house at 104 Grapevine for 50 years. “My son was just a baby when we moved here. I grew up on Burnham Road, on another part of the same property. I’ve always lived here since.

“I’m on Social Security. I do work at H & R Block during tax season,” Fraser said.

Danny Miller, pastor at New Wine Fellowship, said, “Her monthly mortgage is not terribly high. But she has been behind several of her mortgage payments.” He said there was some fraud to her bank account that brought about her current crisis.

“I just heard that the bank is holding off (on the foreclosure) until March. We’re trying to raise as much as we can to be a blessing to her,” Miller said. “She’s been part of the church for a couple of years, and she’s been active in the community.” Fraser has helped with food distribution at the First Baptist Church, and many people knew her as the scorekeeper for softball in the valley.

The Fraser family has long been integrated into the community, both giving and receiving. Daniel Fraser, one of Fraser’s sons and a well-loved softball player and manager, died in a car accident in 2002. “When my son died the Rec. Department and men’s softball put on a big tournament at Sarzotti Park.”

Fraser is waiting for more information from her bank, but hopes that several thousand dollars would allow her to get out of foreclosure. She could then return to making her monthly payments in the peace of the home she’s lived in for so long.

The event will commence Saturday at 8 a.m. at New Wine Fellowship, 441 Church Road, rain or shine. If you want to donate but cannot attend, call Mathews at 223-4314, or contact the church.

Sally Field joins Ojai’s Ted Danson and
Mary Steenburgen for this year’s event

By Sondra Murphy

Continuing a tradition of star-studded performances, the 13th annual Ojai Playwrights Conference winter benefit is set for this month at Matilija Auditor-ium.

The original evening of theater will be created and directed by Michael Morris and OPC artistic director and producer Robert Egan.

Demonstrating the clout the conference has cultivated over the years, prestigious actors will again participate in the “Hearts on Fire” winter benefit that will honor four-time Tony Award-winning playwright Terrence McNally with the 2010 OPC Award.

Born in 1939, McNally produced his first play in 1964 at the age of 25. Although several early comedies such as “Next” (1969) and “The Ritz” (1975) won McNally significant praise, it was not until later in his career that he would become internationally renowned with works such as “Frankie and Johnny at the Claire de Lune” (1987) for which he wrote the screen adaptation which starred Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer.

McNally has won four Tony awards and been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama for “A Perfect Ganesh.” Besides “Frankie and Johnny,” he is known for writing “Love! Valour! Compassion!,” television scripts and the book for the musicals, “The Full Monty,” “Ragtime” and “Kiss of the Spider Woman.”

“Terrence is one of America’s greatest living playwrights. So many awards, so much output, and so many extraordinary characters brought to life in his poignant plays,” said Egan. “McNally participated in the Ojai Playwrights Conference several years ago, and developed one of his plays here,” he added. “He said it was one of the best developmental experiences of his life.”

Featured actors this year are two-time Oscar and three-time Emmy winner Sally Field (“Places in the Heart,” “Norma Rae,” “Brothers & Sisters”); Golden Globe winner Sandra Oh (“Grey’s Anatomy,” “Sideways”); Emmy and Golden Globe winner Ted Danson (“Cheers,” “Becker”); and Oscar and Golden Globe winner Mary Steenburgen (“Melvin and Howard,” “Parenthood”). They will be in the cast for a one-night-only performance titled “Hearts on Fire.”

Also performing at the benefit are Emmy-winning actress Dana Delany (“China Beach,” “Desperate Housewives”); Emmy nominated and Tony winner John Glover (“Smallville,” “Love! Valour! Compassion!”); Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Jane Kaczmarek (“Malcolm in the Middle,” “Raising the Bar”); Golden Globe winning songwriter Amanda McBroom (“The Rose”); Zachary Quinto (“Heroes,” “Star Trek 2009”); Steven Weber (“Brothers & Sisters,” “Dracula: Dead and Loving It”) and Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Noah Wyle (“E.R.,” “The Librarian” series), and other talent still to be announced.

Egan promises an evening of heart-breaking, heart-lifting and heart-throbbing performances of an eclectic mix of works by some of America’s greatest playwrights, including McNally.

Egan has a history of bringing together major talent in Ojai for once-in-a-lifetime performances. “The OPC has become one of the most acclaimed new play and development programs in the country and these stars want to support our efforts,” said Egan. “We are the only one whose primary mission is to develop plays and writers whose focus is on the major social, political and ethical issues of our day.”

“Hearts on Fire” is set for Jan. 30 at 5:30 p.m. The actors rehearse the morning before the benefit readings and infuse adult humor into the performance, garnering a self-imposed PG rating in past years.

Ticket options are $85 for “Hearts on Fire” only, or $225 for the reading, plus the post-show dinner and live auction at St. Thomas Aquinas Hall. The auction will feature trips abroad, a set visit to “Desperate Housewives” courtesy of Delany, theater packages, and romantic getaways for Valentine’s Day. Many of this year’s performers will serve as auctioneers.

Award-winning chef Michael Hollingsworth, a favorite among political and artistic celebrities, is organizing the dinner.

VIP packages for eight cost $2,000 for preferred seating, dinner and a group photo with the cast. A limited number of back row tickets will be available for $70. Tickets may be purchased at ojaiplays.org or by calling 640-0400.

Proceeds benefit the Ojai Playwrights Conference, which takes place each summer as a means to foster creative technique in established and emerging playwrights, as well as develop and advance unproduced plays. More than 500 submissions were received this year and selections will be announced in spring.

The 13th annual OPC New Works Festival, scheduled for Aug. 10 through 15, is a two-week, intensive, in-residence workshop which culminates in special events and performances open to the public.

We take a quick look back at the stories that
made news during the last half of 2009

July
• K’Lynn Jackson, 17, an Ojai native, just won the title of Miss California High School Rodeo Queen 2009-2010.

• A design permit review for an interior remodel of Vons, exterior upgrade of the entire center and parking lot improvements was denied by the Ojai Planning Commission.

• The Ventura County District Attorney’s Office will charge Alex Medina, the 14-year-old suspect in the April 26 murder of Seth Scarminach as an adult. If convicted, the Mira Monte teen could face life in prison.

• According to authorities, longtime Ojai resident Walter Henry Dohrn Jr., 70, disappeared from a friend’s residence in Cherry Valley Sunday, about 150 miles east of Ojai in Riverside County.

• Sergio Aragones, who brings smiles to millions, will have his first solo exhibit at the Ojai Valley Museum.

• According to OUSD Board President Linda Taylor, the board has selected Dr. Henry Stephen Bangser as its new superintendent.

• Between May 1 and June 30, unknown suspect(s) placed “skimmers” on credit card readers on the gas pumps at Valero Gas stations in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties.

• Otto Heino, the soft-spoken potter who was one of Ojai’s and the world’s most revered artists, died after a short illness. He was 94 and still actively working.

• The federal government failed to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court on an appellate court decision which found that the government seized Casitas Municipal Water District property by forcing it to provide water for endangered steelhead trout.

• Ojai has earned a shot at becoming America’s “Best Tennis Town.”

• A 14-year-old Mira Monte resident, Alex Medina, pleaded not guilty to murdering a 16-year-old Chaparral High School student at an unsupervised teen party in April. Medina faces a charge of homicide with the use of a knife, and committing a crime for the benefit of a criminal street gang.

August
• The city expects to receive at least $850,000 in federal stimulus money for road paving and two new trolleys in the next few months, and may pick up $110,000 a year for three years from Washington for a school resource officer at Nordhoff High School.

• Ojai Valley Youth Foundation’s executive director Joanna Iwata was presented with an Inspiration Award from the National Teen Leadership Program on Aug. 2.

• Evan Graham, who lives in Ojai and will be a junior at Ojai Valley School in the fall, turned 16, accomplished his first five solo flights and set a world record.

• The Ojai City Council denied this week an appeal by the Ojai Unified School District that sought to delay approval of the design of a new, permanent skate park until district concerns had been addressed.

• After a federal agency failed to launch a rescue effort last month, at least 54 juvenile steelhead trout died in dry pools in the upper Ventura River near the $9-million Robles fish ladder, built to save endangered fish from extinction.

• The parking lot and the room were packed for the Ojai Valley Municipal Advisory Council meeting. The recurring questions of the evening were “Where are the people who initiated this review and these changes to the Scenic Resources Protection Overlay Zone, and isn’t enough bureaucratic intervention enough?” as far as architects, builders, graders and agriculture in the valley having to comply with already very strict codes and standards?

• Members of the Ojai Valley community who came together for the final Heal the Community meeting, or town hall on gang violence, were treated to a positive and constructive evening. “There was a lot of emotion at the last meeting,” said Police Chief Dunn. “People yelling out from the audience about ‘running them out of town,’ saying, ‘Why can’t you do more?’ ‘They’re illegals’ — I’d like to remind people that we have to operate within the guidelines set forth in the U.S. and California constitutions. We cannot operate like the Gestapo and run people out of town, nor would we.”

• After quizzing operators of Sea Fresh Seafood extensively, Ojai city planners moved toward approval of an expansion.

• The effects of the state’s budget crisis keep washing over California communities, prompting the OUSD to chop five days off the coming school year, reduce teacher salaries and begin to plan a cut in bus transportation.

• Ojai resident and Oscar-winning screenwriter Roger Avary, who earlier pleaded not guilty to gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated, resulting in a late-night car crash in Ojai on January 12, 2008, entered guilty pleas this week in Ventura County Superior Court.

• The Ojai Valley News won first place, third place and honorable mention awards from the National Newspaper Association.

• St. Joseph’s Health and Retirement Center and the Ojai community lost one of its treasures Thursday morning when cancer took the life of Brother Hugo Stippler, age 86.

September
• Ojai Valley citrus farmers, threatened by the discovery of a potentially disastrous infestation of a plant-eating, tree-jumping lice in Southern California, are asking local residents to not bring any fruit or trees purchased elsewhere into the valley.

• Ventura County fire crews worked to contain a brushfire that broke out near Lake Casitas, when a motorcycle crashed into the hillside.

• The U.S. Tennis Association’s Best Tennis Town contest yielded a second-place award for Ojai, a $50,000 prize, during the U.S. Open.

• Members of the local peace group, Living Peace in Ojai, plan on combining a celebration of International Peace Day with events that focus on “diversity, conflict and community.”

• “Micah’s March” was held for 14-month-old Micah Marshall, who has spinal muscular atrophy.

• Jenny Newell, Niles Dohrn and wife Tara, Jennel Dohrn and Walt Dohrn Jr. hope that a fund-raising event held at the restaurant named in honor of their mother, Bonnie Dohrn, can help them continue efforts to find their father, Walter Dohrn, who has been missing since July 5.

• A Pennsylvania-based private school operator, Nobel Learning Communities Inc. of West Chester, Pa., announced the purchase of Laurel Springs School for $12 million.

• Approximately 200 people attended Monday’s Municipal Advisory Council meeting and the MAC arrived at a unanimous decision against expanding the Ojai Valley Scenic Resource Protection Overlay Zone.

• Ventura County Environmental Health Division received confirmation from the State Department of Public Health that one wild bird collected by EHD vector control technicians the third week of September 2009 tested positive for the West Nile virus.

• Fire investigators are trying to determine the cause of an early-morning fire that destroyed a home at 411 Grand Ave. and caused extensive damage to the attic of a neighboring residence.

• Oscar-winning screenwriter and Ojai Valley resident Roger Avary was sentenced to one year in jail and five years probation for gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated.

• A traffic collision occurred involving a pickup truck and an Ojai Unified School District bus on Baldwin Road at Los Encinos Road. Kim Fullenwider, age 53 of Ojai, was driving the bus.

October
• The Erickson-Brosius family is still sorting out their lives after a quick-moving fire engulfed and destroyed their Grand Avenue residence.

•  Ojai Valley Community Hospital unveiled its new Emergency Room during a ribbon-cutting ceremony before about 200 supporters.

• Former tennis great Jack Kramer honored Ojai with a $25,000 posthumous donation to the Tennis Club.

• The American Red Cross of Ventura County recognizes Kathy Hartley’s gracious outreach and public concern, naming her Philanthropist of the Year.

• A large black bear made its way into town, climbing a tree near the corner of Signal and Aliso streets. After spending 20 hours up the pine tree it was a hard, final fall for the bear, when DFG wardens tranquilized and then euthanized it, to the dismay and outrage of many Ojai residents.

• Longtime Ojai City Council member and current Mayor Joe DeVito submitted his resignation.

• Just beginning a new rainfall year, the Ojai Valley experienced its second wettest October in the last half century, relieving farmers of irrigation costs.

• A 49-year-old Oak View woman, Laura Hanson, was killed in a single-vehicle crash off Highway 33 near Casitas Springs.

• Peter Graves, the silver-haired 6-foot-2 pilot from the classic comedy, “Airplane,” will be among the luminaries the Ojai-Ventura Film Festival will bring to town the first week of November.

• A dramatic fire broke out Monday afternoon at one of Ojai’s historic landmarks, the Theodore Woolsey House on East Ojai Avenue, injuring one Ventura County firefighter.

• Oscar-winning screenwriter and Ojai Valley resident Roger Avary was booked into Ventura County Jail on Monday to begin serving a one-year sentence for felony manslaughter, and was immediately placed in a work-furlough program.

• According to the Ojai Valley Community Hospital, visits by swine flu patients to the Emergency Room are steadily increasing.

November
• Hundreds of Ojai teenagers volunteered their innermost thoughts and a talented troupe of students and the Ojai Valley Youth Foundation brought those feelings to the stage in “Teens Talk … Will You Listen?” at Matilija High School Auditorium

• The next chapter in the Ojai Skate Park chronicles is complete. On Tuesday, the Ojai Unified School District board approved the city’s plans for downtown skate park construction, but not without some adjustments.

• At the Ojai Ventura Film Festival, the Best Documentary Short honored Ojai and Rich Reid for the film “Watershed Revolution.”

• Help of Ojai’s 2009 annual meeting combined efficiency with a warm sense of community, and under Terri Wolfe’s leadership, Help is in the black. County Supervisor Steve Bennett attended and spoke about Ojai’s high unemployment rate, and growing need for services.

• Organizers of last weekend’s Mentor Madness Poker Run and Car and Motorcycle Show are happy that the event was a success. “Approximately $7,000 was raised and there were a little over 100 poker run participants,” said Heal the Community co-founder Dusty Fernandez.

• In the ongoing efforts to raise $3 million for the Libbey Bowl restoration project, a new idea has emerged. The Ojai City Council staff brought a request to consider renaming the bowl in exchange for a $1 million donation.

• The Sheriff’s Gang Unit arrested Rutilio Huerta for the gang-related attempted murder of Joshua Powers that occurred in the city of Ojai on New Year’s Eve.

• The Ojai Film Society honored its 2009 Steenburgen Film Studies Scholarship winner on Sunday, and honoree and Brooks Institute student Sean Broadbent’s short film “Une Vie Merveilleuse” was screened.

• The Ojai Valley Youth Foundation has restructured, eliminating three positions, including that of executive director Joanna Iwata, and bringing in board member Dan Burrell to oversee operations.

• The Casitas Municipal Water District has requested that a federal agency seeking to restore endangered southern steelhead trout in the Ventura River to sustainable levels provide more solid information and be more precise and realistic in its goals.

• Peter Strauss recently made a decision not to run for Congress representing our 24th District. He was approached in June and met in Washington with Democratic Party officials and White House political directors.

• Darlene Mansfield, whose husband was “the whistling telephone man in this valley” put out a reprint of the 1954 Ojai Valley Directory.

• Almost 11 months after a near-fatal stabbing incident on Waite Street, 19-year-old Fidel Duran has pleaded guilty to multiple felonies.

• Ojai Police detectives warn Ojai Valley residents of an increase in reported vehicle burglaries and thefts from vehicles.

• Following a summer in which at least 54 steelhead trout died in dry pools in the upper Ventura River, federal officials who failed to launch a rescue effort are now devising a strategy that could save the endangered fish when they face death.

December
• A Superior Court judge this week ordered the mental evaluation of Alex Medina after defense lawyers said they had doubts about the youth’s ability to assist in his own defense. A competency hearing to discuss the evaluation was set for Jan. 8.

• Effective Dec. 1, Walter A. Einhart Jr. has been named editor and publisher of the Ojai Valley News.

• Sergio Ramos was sentenced this morning to 27 years in state prison for a shooting he committed in Oak View in 2008. Ramos, an Ojai gang member, has been in custody since his arrest in June of 2008.

• Two men died when their single-engine Piper Tomahawk crashed at 24 Krotona Road.

• Chairman and President David Shor announced his departure from the Ojai-Ventura Film Festival, and that of six other board members.

• Ojai City Councilwoman and former Mayor Sue Horgan announced Tuesday that she has entered the race for Ventura County Treasurer and Tax Collector.

• Lanie Springer, longtime champion of philanthropy and community service, died of pancreatic cancer.

• Actor and Ojai Arts Commissioner Demitri Corbin has thrown his hat into the ring for a City Council opening.

• Detectives from the Ojai sub-station and the Sheriff’s Gang Unit concluded a two-month investigation into a vehicle burglary ring with the arrest of five suspects.

• Parks & Recreation Commissioner Mike Lenehan submitted his application for a City Council seat.

We take a quick look back at the stories that
made news during the first six months of 2009

January
• The rumors are true: as of yesterday, texting while driving will be an illegal infraction in the state of California. The state Legislature and Gov. Schwar-zenegger signed the no-texting ban into law for the new year.

• Fresno resident Jerry Powers said his 27-year-old son, Oak View resident Joshua Ray Powers, was left for dead in the 200 block of Waite Street at 1:30 a.m. News Year’s Day after being stabbed 17 times.

• With a Meiners Oaks church refusing to lease Ventura river-bottom land, government agencies have been forced to back away from their top choice for disposal of a 20-foot-high mound of silt as part of the Matilija Dam removal project. Members of the Church of the Living Christ rejected a lease with Ventura County and the U.S. government that would have allowed 2.1 million cubic yards of slurried silt to be piped from behind the aging dam to a 74-acre site at the base of a bluff next to Rice Road.

• Ojai Planning Commission approved proposed general standards for outdoor merchandise displays drawn up by a committee of merchants and city representatives. Such displays have historically been prohibited in the city.

• After an extensive two-month search, Dave Neville, Help’s board chairperson, and director Kelly Randall, head of the executive director search committee, announced the hiring of Terri Wolfe as Help’s new executive director.

“I plan to provide ongoing and consistent leadership for the staff and volunteers so they can focus on the things they’re really good at,” said Wolfe. “After working with other not-for-profits around the country, I wanted to come back and do it in this community.”

• Seven drums, each carrying 300 to 400 gallons of diesel fuel, spilled from a large truck on Highway 33 at mile marker 40.84 before dawn after the truck ran off the highway. According to reports, 1,000 gallons spilled into Adobe Creek and 700 gallons spilled into the soil near the creek.

February
• Local cable TV subscribers may have noticed the programming on Channel 10 has dwindled to city meetings and a sparse bulletin. Starting in January, the city of Ojai took over the running of public access television.

• Gus Hoffman, a 17-year-old Nordhoff High School junior, has done something most students and many actors can only dream of, he’s co-starred in an original movie that will be broadcast into hundreds of thousands of living rooms across the nation on TNT.

• Once again a litany of economic woes topped the Ojai Unified School Board meeting. Superintendent Tim Baird outlined the grim economic picture he was given over three days of statewide meetings.

• Help of Ojai received an early Valentine’s Day gift from a former volunteer who remembered the organization in her will.

June Greiving left a bequest of $125,000 to Help.

March
• City Council members are bracing themselves for an emotion-fueled evening. At issue is the long-standing debate over the city’s enforcement — or lack thereof — of the merchandise display laws that have been on the books for years.

The topic, which has been on the City Council’s agenda for the past several sessions, threatens to turn into a bit of a brouhaha at Tuesday’s gathering as a result of the sudden issuing of several unexpected official “notices of violation” to local retailers last week, mainly along the Arcade, for such infractions as having a sign outside a shop or a small table or rack of goods on display.

• The Ojai Unified School District board voted to notify 74 teachers of impending layoffs, the teachers’ dreaded “pink slips.”

Positions scheduled to be noticed for layoffs include 32 elementary teachers, 31 secondary teachers, and 13 district positions such as English language support, elementary music and physical education.

• After several months spent examining neighborhood safety concerns at El Roblar Drive and Poli Avenue, the Ojai Valley Municipal Advisory Council decided against recommending stop signs or no parking zones along the little business district.

• Food For Thought, which last year received a grant for a pilot project called Up and Down the Waste Stream, has received a two-year $80,000 anonymous grant to continue greening our schools with its Green and Healthy Schools Program.

• A Mira Monte woman who refused to allow gypsy moth spraying on her property has complained to authorities about what she considers “strong-arm tactics” by a Ventura County biologist who urged her to reconsider that decision.

• The Ventura County Sheriff Gang Unit, assisted by several local and federal agencies, served 12 search warrants in two counties, as part of an ongoing investigation into a criminal street gang. The search warrants resulted in the seizure of nine handguns, methamphetamine, stolen motorcycles, prescription pills, and dangerous weapons.

• Appraising Libbey Bowl as a significant treasure to the community, the Ojai City Council voted unanimously to commit $500,000 in development funds to the next phase in its reconstruction.

• Serving court warrants, police-escorted state crews entered 27 Ojai area properties without permission to spray trees and shrubs with an organic pesticide to halt the spread of a tree-killing moth, a move some homeowners declared an outrage.

Officials said they’ve now treated all 577 properties within a designated spray zone in Mira Monte and Meiners Oaks just as caterpillars have hatched from larvae on their way to becoming gypsy moths.

• Landscaper Scot Olson was working in a yard in the 800 Block of Thomas Street in Oak View where he looked over at the pool and saw a toddler floating on the surface. He then pulled the floating child from the pool and began rescue breathing. A woman came running to the pool and dove in to retrieve another child from the bottom. Both girls had regained consciousness prior to the arrival of emergency medical services.  The children were transported to local area hospitals where they were treated and later released to their parents.

April
• The Ojai Valley Land Conservancy has completed its four-month search for a new executive director by signing a contract with Greg Gamble.

Gamble said he is excited about his new job and about becoming integrated with the Ojai community.

• A long-anticipated meeting between residents of the Ojai Valley and the Federal Emergency Management Agency took place at Matilija Auditorium, drawing about 200 people out in the rain to hear the latest developments on floodplain remapping efforts and levee certification processes.

• A long-anticipated meeting between residents of the Ojai Valley and the Federal Emergency Management Agency took place at Matilija Auditorium, drawing about 200 people out in the rain to hear the latest developments on floodplain remapping efforts and levee certification processes.

Ventura County 1st District Supervisor Steve Bennett served as moderator of the meeting in reviewing FEMA’s methods and answering questions from the community. Bennett said that FEMA has been working for the past 18 months on remapping the floodplains of this county, prompted by a 2005 federal mandate, and has just begun efforts in the Ojai Valley.

In addition, a recent letter was circulated by the county Board of Supervisors to those living near the Live Oak Acres Levee stating it would not meet new FEMA standards being enforced. The change is expected to rezone the neighborhoods into a floodplain, increasing meeting attendance from those in that neighborhood. Residents from other floodplain designations, such as those in Casitas Springs and the East End, were also present.

• A polite yet unhappy crowd faced the budget-weary OUSD board during the three-and-a-half hour public portion of the board meeting. The evening covered more budget cuts and city plans for the proposed skate park renovation.

• The Ojai City Council was faced with a debate as it considered a request from the Ojai Unified School District to help pay the cost for the school resource officer at Nordhoff High School.

Due to state-level cutbacks, funding for the police position will be short about $31,000 for the remainder of the school year. City staff recommended that the city cover the remainder of the officer’s salary for this year, as well as authorize application for a federal grant to cover the expense for three more years.

• Not all Ojai Valley banks are lining up for their share of nearly $1 billion in total national Troubled Asset Relief Program, or T.A.R.P. money.

“We haven’t taken any bailout money,” said Martha Dowden of Los Padres Bank, “at least not any I know about.”

“Too many strings when you take that money,” joined in Dowden’s colleague, Tom Farmer. “You take that money and when you have your stockholders meeting you’ve got someone from the government there.”

• As the rainfall season winds down, authorities report that the Ojai Valley has experienced another year of sub-par precipitation, lowering the Lake Casitas reservoir, dropping groundwater levels and forcing farmers to water crops even during the wettest months.

The county Watershed Protection District reported local rainfall totals since Oct. 1 at between 54 percent and 62 percent of normal as the Ojai Valley had its fourth extremely dry year in the last decade.

• A 16-year-old Chaparral High School student was stabbed to death at an unsupervised teen party early Sunday, and a 14-year-old Mira Monte resident was arrested that evening on suspicion of murder in what authorities described as a gang-related homicide.

In the Ojai Valley’s first slaying in 11 years, Seth Scarminach died in the driveway of a Meiners Oaks home from stab wounds to his neck and chest shortly before 2 a.m., authorities said.

Scarminach, a Meiners Oaks resident, had also been the victim of an armed robbery in Oak View earlier this year, police confirmed.

Sheriff’s investigators would not elaborate on why they described the killing as gang related except to say that the suspect was an associate of an Ojai-based Latino gang.

• Dan Salas of Ventura County Fire Department station 20 in Upper Ojai helped fight a structure fire on the corner of El Roblar and Encinal in Meiners Oaks around 10:30 a.m. Thursday. County firefighting crews from Ventura County, Ventura City, Fillmore and Santa Paula responded to the blaze and helped to knock down the flames. There were no injuries and while a neighboring house sustained only smoke damage and a few broken windows, the building appeared to be a total loss and multiple vehicles on the property were damaged by smoke and fire.

• The next round of battles against increased diesel truck traffic through Ojai is coming.

If approved, Ozena Valley Ranch Mine could bring 200 gravel trucks a day through the Ojai Valley on Highway 33, doubling their current allowance.

The Ventura County Planning Division has scheduled an environmental impact report-scoping meeting for May 6 at 6 p.m. in Chaparral Auditorium, 414 E. Ojai Ave.

• As the rainfall season winds down, authorities report that the Ojai Valley has experienced another year of sub-par precipitation, lowering the Lake Casitas reservoir, dropping groundwater levels and forcing farmers to water crops even during the wettest months.