Setter Scott Vegas was named Most Valuable Player in boys’ volleyball this spring. Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Palisades High setter Scott Vegas was named the City Section’s Most Valuable Player in boys’ volleyball this season. Vegas, a senior bound for UCLA, led the Dolphins to their 11th section title in May. Also making the All-City First Team were Dolphins teammates Matt Hanley, a junior outside hitter, and sophomore opposite hitter Kene Izuchuckwu. Jordan Cohen, who switched from outside hitter to libero for the playoffs, was a Second Team choice. In baseball, Palisades pitcher/third baseman Jonathan Moscot made the All-City First Team and senior catcher Garrett Champion made the Second Team. Pitcher Trevor Takeyama of City champion Chatsworth was named Most Valuable Player. In tennis, the Dolphins’ top duo of Jeremy Shore and Matt Goodman were First Team All-City selections after advancing to the finals of the City Individual doubles tournament. Kyung Choi and Ren Nielsen, who finished fourth overall, were also First Team picks. The duos of Ali Yazdi-Eric Eckhert and Spencer Lewin-Che Borja each made Third Team All-City along with singles players Brett Allchorn, Oliver Thornton and Trinity Thornton. Senior Nicole Torres of the Palisades High softball team was the Dolphins’ lone representative in the City’s inaugural Invitational Division vs. Small Schools All-Star game on June 5 at Contreras High.
On a Tuesday morning, in the kitchen of the Woman’s Clubhouse on Haverford, ten members of the Pacific Palisades Woman’s Club observe the man managing the cauldrons on the stove: a jovial, easy-going man with a Sicilian accent, wearing a goatee, a lone silver earring, and an apron over his black-stripe dress shirt. Chef Guiseppe Barravecchia is one of the partners of locally owned Pinocchio’s In Cucina on Monument at Sunset Blvd. With the help of the Italian deli’s assistant chef, Carolina Aviles, Barravecchia demonstrated how to prepare salad dressing for the arugula and blue cheese salad, two kinds of pasta”a rigatoni with eggplant and bow tie pasta with Bolognaise sauce (a beef-laden marinara)”and fresh tiramisu”all from scratch. As Woman’s Club co-president Trish Bowe explained: ‘We wanted to do something different to get more people in the community involved. This is something that’s never been done.’ ‘This’ being the ‘Romance of Italy Italian Cuisine’ luncheon. There’s always room for another first, even with an organization as venerable as the Woman’s Club, which began in 1925. And the June 9 event offered members a chance to not only serve lunch, but also create it. Following Barravecchia’s cooking demonstration, which began at 9 a.m., members helped the chef prepare the meal, which was followed by an 11 a.m. reception and the meal itself at noon, when the Club charged $15 per person to cover expenses. About 40 members and guests attended the luncheon. Organized by Bowe, ‘Romance of Italy’ was her first act as the just-sworn-in co-president. ‘She was very instrumental in putting together our ‘Coming Up Roses’ event back in March,’ co-president Jean Aroeste said. ‘She was the co-chair of that with Madeline Zaloon.’ ‘I go to Pinocchio’s all the time for lunch,’ Bowe said of ‘Romance”s genesis. ‘Every meal I’ve had has been incredible. It’s always amazing the flavors that Guiseppe marries. He does it with such panache. He’s a very colorful chef. So we were talking and I asked, ‘Would you be interested in cooking for the Woman’s Club?” The Woman’s Club certainly appreciated Chef Giuseppe’s efforts that morning. ‘He’s been very generous,’ said Bowe, who runs State Farm Insurance on Via de la Paz. ‘He knows we’re a nonprofit organization.’ ‘Romance’ represented the Club’s last monthly meeting before summer hiatus (although bridge and tai chi sessions will continue through the summer). The meetings return in October. Before Pinocchio’s, Barravecchia worked at a string of Italian eateries in West Hollywood and Beverly Hills. His immediate family still runs a restaurant, Pepito Ristorante, back in Sicily, so marinara sauce is in his blood. The soft-spoken Sicilian, prefaced by chopped cilantro and plum tomatoes, charmed the Club’s ladies as he spilled some secrets from his cucina. Among those accompanying Bowe in the kitchen was her sister, Betsy Bryan, and their mother, Katherine De Fosset, visiting from Ventura County. ‘You peel the eggplant so it doesn’t have that bitter taste,’ Bryan said. ‘Most people just cut it with the skin on.’ ‘He doesn’t fry it,’ said Alexa Csato, who owns the Peter and Alexa Hair Studio on Via de la Paz. ‘He bakes it in the oven.’ Bryan learned from Barravecchia, ‘If you use the hamburger, you don’t know what you’re getting. So just buy meat instead.’ Barravecchia had brought in a pre-made Bolognaise sauce just in case time was precious. But in the end, the pasta topping served at the luncheon was the batch which Woman’s Club members had assisted the Pinocchio’s chef with. So what did he think of the members’ contributions to the lavish Italian meal? Joked Barravecchia to his luncheon audience, ‘If I’m short on staff, I will call you.’ Over lunch, the Palisadian-Post shared a table with members Alexia Csato, Jo Keagy, Anne-Marie Rubin and Sylvia Grieb. ‘He was very kind and very patient,’ Bryan noted, merrily digging into her arugula salad with blue cheese and pecans, which was accompanied by fresh onion rolls. Among entrees, Bryan liked the eggplant entr’e. Grieb preferred the Bolognaise pasta. Minutes later, the Palisades Letter Shop owner parsed a mouthful of the tiramisu with her fork and declared, ‘It’s very delicate and very sweet.’ Marion Marshall, a Club member since 1965 and four-term past president, praised ‘Romance of Italy.’ ‘It’s the idea of everyone coming together and sharing the meal by making the meal,’ she said. ‘When you work together side by side, you bring people together.’
Walker Kehrer smacks a backhand winner during the CIF Division III finals May 28 in Claremont. Photo: Kaye Kittrell
Thanks in large part to the contributions of Palisadians Walker Kehrer and Casey Grindon, the Brentwood boys’ tennis team defeated Beverly Hills, 10-8, to win the CIF Southern Section Division III title May 28 at The Claremont Club. Kehrer, the Eagles’ top player, swept his three sets in dominating fashion to keep Brentwood well ahead on games. Kehrer set the tone with a 6-1 victory over the Normans’ top player, sophomore Daniel Ho, who nearly upset Kehrer at the Ojai tournament in April. “He’s a very good player when he’s on,” said Kehrer, now a junior, who played doubles his freshman year when Brentwood routed Beverly Hills 16-2 to win the Division IV title. “He had a match point on me in the third set there [at Ojai] so I knew I had to step it up today. I was very nervous the first couple of games but I got off to a quick start and that helped.” Chris Lord sealed the deal by upsetting Ho, 7-5, to give Brentwood its 10th point. Meanwhile, Grindon paired with Caleb Baer to win two out of three sets at No. 2 doubles. Brentwood (18-6) had beaten Beverly Hills by the same score in the regular season so Coach Lee Herzog did little tinkering with his lineup. His faith in Grindon and Jackson Isaacs, who swept his three sets at No. 1 doubles with Danny Sharon, was rewarded. “I figured we needed strong singles to win this thing and I had faith that my best doubles guys, Jackson and Casey, could win no matter who I paired them with,” Herzog said. “So I split them up with different partners. It was a bit of a gamble but it payed off.” Ethan Bond and Ujay Singh won two of three sets at No. 1 doubles for the No.2-seeded Normans (20-5), who lost their third section final in four years. It was Brentwood’s 11th consecutive appearance in a final.
George Kunz. Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer Jean Leng Howe. Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Swiss WWII Veteran Recalls His Life, Career By DANIELLE GILLESPIE Staff Writer In his cozy Pacific Palisades home, George Kunz pointed to a drawing of a Morane fighter plane displayed on the wall. ‘I used to fly one of those,’ the 94-year-old said, recalling his days as a Swiss Air Force pilot flying France’s most important fighter during the opening months of World War II. Kunz joined the Swiss military, which was required for all young men in his country, in 1934. After completing various military training classes, he attended flight school in 1938. ‘It’s one of the toughest schools because they don’t care if you make it or not,’ said Kunz, who was required to pass exacting physical, mental and psychological tests. After finishing the six-month program, his first assignment was to patrol the country. Although Switzerland was a neutral country during the war, Germans and Americans still shot down some of the Swiss planes as they cut across the country. During that time, Kunz also worked for the Swiss Defense Department as a mechanical engineer, procuring and testing weaponry for the air force. In 1939, he met his future wife, Cora Bierbreauer, through her father, who was a business associate. Cora, who grew up in Switzerland, was a U.S. citizen because her parents were American. A year after they met, Cora left for the United States to attend Penn State University, where she earned a degree in animal husbandry. They wrote to each other, although many of their letters were destroyed because of the war. He proposed to her by telegram, and she returned to Switzerland after the war to marry him in 1946. ‘I was fortunate to meet her,’ Kunz said. Cora, 91, said her father, William, often told her how impressed he was with Kunz. A few days after they married, Kunz flew his new bride around the Matterhorn, Cora recalled, smiling. In 1948, the U.S. Navy invited Kunz to the United States after hearing about a rocket launcher that he had developed. The launcher, designed for small rockets, could be placed on the fuselage or the wing of an aircraft. The Navy offered him a job at the U.S. Bureau of Ordnance and the Naval Gun Factory in Washington, D.C., to build and test the launcher. ‘They were very generous,’ Kunz said. ‘They brought us over, sent an officer to the airplane to pick us up, and helped us find an apartment.’ Kunz worked on the project for five years and earned his citizenship in 1950. In 1953, he accepted a job with Hughes Aircraft Company in Culver City, and moved to Pacific Palisades with Cora and their two children, Marie and Stephanie. ‘We bought this house, and we have been here ever since,’ Kunz said, while sitting on the couch in his Fiske Street home. ‘We came here on the advice of Cora’s schoolmate from Penn State. We liked the surroundings, the small-city living.’ Kunz spent time with his children exploring the tide pools between Paradise Cove and Point Dume and flying kites with them in the park. He and Cora joined a square-dancing group. In 1961, Kunz took a job with Bell Aircraft Corporation, based in Buffalo, N.Y., to open an office in France. The Kunz family moved into an apartment in Paris. ‘That was an experience for our two girls,’ Kunz said. ‘They didn’t know a word of French.’ Kunz had learned French in Turkey, where he was born on May 9, 1914 to Julius and Marie Kunz. His father worked in the banking business and they lived in Adrianople (now called Edirne), Turkey until 1925. The Kunz daughters, who were 11 and 13 when they moved to Paris, attended private school to learn French. ‘By the end of six months, we were pretty fluent,’ said his daughter Marie Hoffman. Three years later, Kunz returned to Hughes Aircraft, where he worked until 1967. He then went to work for TRW in El Segundo and retired from that company in 1979. Throughout the years, Cora worked part-time at various jobs, but mostly stayed home to raise the children. Marie described her father as a hard worker who furthered his technical education by taking night classes. ‘Supporting the family well was all-important to him, and he spent many hours in the study working on finances,’ she said. After retiring, Kunz and Cora traveled around the world to places such as Egypt, France, Turkey and Austria. ‘These days, our father stays very busy keeping the household going for the two of them, including shopping, learning cooking, and even making strawberry jam and lemon and orange marmalades,’ Marie said. He and his wife of 61 years also enjoy spending time with daughters Marie of Washington, D.C., and Stephanie Brinker of Albuquerque, New Mexico, and their five grandchildren. ‘We’ve had a pretty good life,’ Kunz said. —————————————————— Jean Leng Howe Recounts Her Story From Staten Island to Pacific Palisades By LIBBY MOTIKA Senior Editor Were she to write her own biography, Jean Leng Howe would begin by telling you that she was born four months after the Titanic sank. While the worst peacetime maritime disaster in history did not touch her life directly, it does, in a way, provide an appropriate context for her destiny. Ocean liners, which dominated international travel, secured a livelihood for her father. As a young man James Smith, a Scotsman drawn to the sea, traveled back and forth across the Atlantic working as an engineer aboard White Star Line ships, the very company whose most famous flagship was the ill-fated RMS Titanic. In 1908, James, his wife Agnes and their two daughters Lena and Margaret left Southampton for Brooklyn, where they made their home in the Bay Ridge community. James found work as an engineer in the U.S. government’s Department of Steamboat inspection service, investigating sea disasters and overseeing the ferries that plied New York Harbor. Jean was born on August 22, 1912 and lived in the family home with her parents and older sisters. Summers were spent in the Catskills or Bay Side, Long Island, to avoid ‘Infantile Paralysis’–polio. Upon returning from a three-month visit with relatives in Scotland when Jean was 13, the family moved to Staten Island, where she would begin her lifelong love of journalism and meet the love of her life, Dick Leng, a fellow student at Port Richmond High School. Dick was an athletic young man who set his sights on Jean. But this was the girl voted the prettiest of the class of 1930 and certainly no wallflower. Dick was determined, and even took dancing lessons, which he paid for with his allowance, prepping to ask Jean to the senior prom. It was no use; she had already accepted another boy’s invitation. But Dick had a subtle sense of humor that amused his somewhat shy classmate. ‘He’d say something and it took a while until you’d catch on,’ Jean admits. ‘I learned a lot from him and relaxed a lot more.’ After the couple was engaged, Jean’s father put the poor boy through his paces. ‘Daddy would put him on a ship every summer, started him in the boiler room,’ she recalls. Following two years of business school after high school, Jean was lucky to find a job on a newspaper in the midst of the Depression. ‘I was visiting my sister, who had a job in New York City, and I noticed an advertisement for a classified ads person for the Staten Island Advance, which was S. I. Newhouse’s first paper,’ Jean recalls. She was hired and worked under Newhouse’s sister, Estelle. ‘It was a way to get my foot in the door, and eventually I submitted some stories to the night editor, who liked them and gave me my first byline’Jean Smith. ‘The excitement of covering a variety of stories from the confessions of a bigamist to a day in the hospital emergency rooms was added to the fun of writing about the arrival of the circus and the backstage interviews with well-known theater personalities,’ she recalls. Dick won over father and daughter, and he and Jean were married in 1936 and honeymooned in Bermuda before setting up home on Staten Island. Jean took to her in-laws right away. ‘I loved it when I came into their home library, which was filled with books wall to wall. There was a marble Victorian table in the middle of the room, Tilly on one side, Charlie on the other side, and the cat lying on top of the bookshelves. Tilly liked to cook, loved the garden and enjoyed playing bridge–activities that were not emphasized in Jean’s Scottish home life. Now, when walking through Jean’s home in the Palisades Riviera neighborhood, a visitor can feel the pride and pleasure that Jean takes in home and hearth. Her books, artwork, furniture and extensive dollhouse collection tell the story of her family, her travels and her enthusiasms. Dick Leng’s position as an engineer executive in the electronic industry meant a peripatetic life for the couple, who left Staten Island to further Dick’s career. They lived in Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Los Angeles areas for the next 30 years. The couple was unable to have children, so Jean continued freelancing for various newspapers on and off throughout her husband’s active career. In 1955, the couple found their place in Pacific Palisades when Dick started his own company. They moved into film and TV composer Lionel Newman’s former home (which he reportedly lost in a craps game), where Jean found the joys of homemaking and community. She had become quite good at assisting Dick in entertaining businessman, scientists and government officials from all over the world. She also continued her major interest in the Children’s Home Society, which entailed organizing an auxiliary and serving as president of the Los Angeles Council. Along the way, Jean always looked at each new experience as another delightful adventure’getting to know her city, making new friends and having the fun of golfing, bowling and swimming (‘none of them well-done,’ she swears). Widowed in 1983, Jean carried on alone for five years until at the urging of her friend and fellow Palisadian Martha Patterson, she met and married Alden Howe, a former vice president at Bank of America. The two enjoyed two and a half years together before his death, and Jean happily gained a son Jim and daughter-in-law Patty Howe. Jean answers the inevitable question of her secret to longevity with one word: attitude. ‘I’ve been lucky,’ she says with her ever-ready smile and devilish laugh. ‘ I had good parents, a good life. If I didn’t like something or someone, I didn’t bother with them.’
For 30 Years, Dr. Stuart Siegel Has Spearheaded the Drive to Establish Southern California
Dr. Stuart Siegel of Childrens Hospital and longtime leader of Ronald McDonald House Charities of Southern California.
‘House’ Call In 1977, there was Philadelphia, and there was Chicago’and that was it. Enter Dr. Stuart Siegel of Childrens Hospital, the man who put Los Angeles on the map. ‘Through my colleagues in the pediatric cancer field,’ Siegel tells the Palisadian-Post, ‘I became aware of the Ronald McDonald Houses in Philadelphia and Chicago, so I came back here to my colleagues in Los Angeles and said this is something beneficial. We need this.’ A Palisadian since May 2005, Siegel led the charge to create a third McDonald care hostel in Los Angeles. Ronald McDonald Houses serve as “homes-away-from-home’ for children undergoing treatment for cancer and other life-threatening illnesses at nearby hospitals, as well as the families of said kids. ‘It was a new concept, and the concept was embraced rapidly,’ recalls Siegel, 64. The effort has been so successful because it’s so easy to see the need. You’re directly helping children in your own community.’ At that time, the House started out as a partnerships between the hospital, McDonald’s fast food restaurant chain, and the Los Angeles Rams. ‘We got together in the restaurant of the Holiday Inn in Woodland Hills, right off the 101, and decided to build a Ronald McDonald House near Childrens Hospital,’ Siegel says. ‘About $6 million to $7 million was raised for that initial house,’ the doctor continues. ‘But the biggest problem is that we didn’t have land.’ ‘We were the first Ronald McDonald House to develop one from scratch,’ Siegel says of the Fountain and Lyman Place location, noting that the Chicago location was formerly a convent. ‘Fortunately, there was a piece of property on Fountain Avenue about a block and a half from the hospital. McDonald’s co-signed a loan and we were able to purchase it.’ Originally a 20-room house opened in September 1980, the Fountain Avenue location was eventually expanded into a 35-room complex. The extra rooms were for ‘transplant patients who couldn’t be mixed in with everyone because of the risk of infection.’ The L.A. facility now houses 80 rooms. Siegel has since led the charity to create additional McDonald Houses in Anaheim, Loma Linda, and Pasadena. Plans for a fifth House are under way in Long Beach. ‘I think it’s generally gotten easier,’ Siegel says of opening a new branch. ‘We’ve learned a lot about how to establish these houses. ‘I’m stepping down as president at the end of the year after 31 years,’ he says, but stresses that he will stay very much involved with the McDonald House organization, including remaining on the board, which he became president of in 1978. [DROPCAP] Siegel grew up in North Plainfield, New Jersey, and got his medical degrees at Boston University. He spent 1967-69 in pediatric residency at the University of Minnesota. After working at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, he came to the Childrens Hospital in 1972. Initially, the revered medical professional lived in Beverly Glen Canyon, then various parts east, before settling down in the Marquez area. As to why, Siegel quips, ‘It’s what’s known as ‘a marriage.” Siegel lives here with his wife, Barbara Kamenir Siegel, a high-profile attorney at Neighborhood Legal Services in Pacoima. His son from a previous marriage, Joshua, 36, works as an accountant clerk in Sebastopol, California, and lives with his two sons, David, 6, and Elijah, 5. The Childrens Hospital doctor insists that, despite what can be a hairy commute, he really digs living the Palisades. ‘I definitely enjoy the feeling of community,’ Siegel says. ‘I love the weather here. I lived in Arcadia, which is very hot. I really enjoy the temperate weather by the beach and the people in the area.’ [DROPCAP] With gas and hotel prices so prohibitive, a Ronald McDonald House not only assists patients, but offers their families hospital-adjacent housing and some solace. As leader of the McDonald’s charity, Siegel helped expand Ronald McDonald House’s mandate to include Camp Ronald McDonald for Good Times, a destination that originated on Malibu’s Calamigos Ranch and now has a permanent station near Idyllwild. The 65-acre Apple Canyon site, a year-round getaway, houses kids with such afflictions as brain tumors and leukemia, and offers patients and their families a fun-filled environment to help relieve them of some physical and psychological burden. ‘My primary work is taking care of children and their families. If the families can’t get to the hospital, then I can’t treat them,’ Siegel says. ‘The Ronald McDonald House is the most important part of the role to my profession to making sure that these kids can get the treatment they need. The camp is equally important to helping them have self esteem. Eighty percent of patients who receive treatment are successful, and it’s important that we see them through their treatment. So it’s all connected.’ For information on Ronald McDonald House Charities of Southern California, www.RMHCSC.org.
Palisades High School student Taylor Savage tutors junior Chelsea Scharf for the SAT Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Although many tutors are available in Pacific Palisades, Roto Tutor is the only one that advertises and lives up to the promise: ‘We don’t quit until it’s totally clear.’ Started by Palisades Charter High School junior Taylor Savage, the company’s driving purpose is that the tutor’s job is not done until the student understands the concept. Savage has structured his business around that idea, intentionally scheduling ample time between appointments so that if the student is still confused, Savage or another tutor will continue to work with the student. Roto Tutor’s founder, whose class load this year has included AP statistics, AP biology, AP U.S. history, AP English, AP microeconomics, Honors French 3, and a multivariable calculus course at Santa Monica College, started as a volunteer peer tutor at the PaliHi Study Center two years ago. ‘I really enjoyed teaching and working with students,’ he wrote in an e-mail to the Palisadian-Post. On the advice of a PaliHi counselor, Savage started tutoring privately last fall. Word of mouth helped his business grow, as well as referrals from previous high school and Paul Revere Middle School teachers. In January, Savage designed a Web site and in February he hired two additional tutors, a junior and a senior, who have similar academic credentials. The three work with students at all grade levels. Currently, their youngest client is in third grade and the oldest is a high school senior. Their focus is mainly on math, from basic arithmetic to calculus, but they also tutor many science subjects. ‘I personally focus on tutoring precalculus, calculus and SAT math prep to high school students, but do tutor younger students as well, for $40 per hour,’ Savage wrote. He plans to hire several more tutors this summer so that he can start the new school year with a larger client base. Savage would also like to expand Roto Tutor services to include languages, writing and history. The smart young Palisadian has another heavy course load planned for his senior year, including AP physics, AP environmental science, AP computer science, AP literature, AP government and AP European history. He will also return to play on PaliHi’s City championship volleyball team. He plans on continuing his business even when he goes away to college. ‘I may not be able to personally tutor, depending on where I end up, but I’ll continue to contact clients and hire tutors,’ said Savage, who is the son of Eileen and George Savage. His mother is a member of the PaliHi governing board. Savage’s Web site allows clients to schedule students, contact and rate tutors and even pay for appointments. Visit: www.rototutor.com
Carrie Kandasamy, daughter of Kanda and Linda Kandasamy of Pacific Palisades, and Marc Schneider, son of Russell and Maureen Schneider of Saratoga, California, were married on October 13, 2007. The bride’s sister Allison Kandasamy served as maid of honor. Rabbi Steven Carr Reuben of Kehillat Israel performed the wedding ceremony, which included a reading of the Hindu seven steps by Carrie’s uncle, Rasan Selvarajah. In celebration of their wedding, the couple donated 10 AfricaBikes to Biketown Africa to support AIDS relief workers in different parts of Africa. The bride attended Palisades Elementary, Paul Revere Middle School and Palisades High School, class of 1992. The couple met at the University of the Pacific in Stockton. Carrie is a second grade teacher at Graystone Elementary in the Almaden Valley and Marc is a store manager at Recreational Equipment Incorporated (REI) in Mountain View. After a honeymoon in Costa Rica, the couple is at home in Campbell, California.
At a recent Democratic gathering in Santa Monica, Fran Pavley, left, shares a warm moment with Sheila Kuehl, whose state Senate district she hopes to represent for the next four years. Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Those four hours of sleep Fran Pavley enjoyed Tuesday night were sound ones, offering a peaceful conclusion to her decisive primary victory for state senate. Pavley soundly beat her opponent, termed-out Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, in the Democratic election with 66.4 percent of the vote. In a district (the 23rd) with only 23 percent Republican registered voters, Pavley is expected to win easily in the November election against Republican candidate (Rick Montaine) and Libertarian candidate Colin Goldman. ‘The surprise for me was the gap in the absentee vote,’ Pavley told the Palisadian-Post Wednesday morning. ‘With a 20 point lead early in the evening, I expected it to narrow, but it kept growing.’ Citing Levine’s ‘last-minute hit pieces,’ Pavley felt ‘his negative mail campaign backfired. My supporters were incensed and put their energy to work and got their friends out to vote. I can thank all the volunteer support for my victory.’ Pavley also benefited from running to represent the Senate district, which encompasses about half of the Assembly district she represented for six years, beginning in 2000. ‘I had developed relationships with people that helped a lot,’ said Pavley, who started campaigning for Sheila Kuehl’s termed-out seat during her last year in the Assembly. ‘After all, politics is all about relationships, whether its passing legislation or being a representative for your constituents.’ While Pavley will campaign for the fall election, she admitted that it will not require the same kind of effort. ‘The Democratic headquarters in Santa Monica [supported by the Palisades Democratic Club] will continue to be open and I will spend more time there, especially after Labor Day.’ As she contemplated the victory on Wednesday, Pavley said that her immediate tasks are quite mundane. ‘Today, Andy is out picking up yard signs around the city. And we’ll have to move out of our campaign office in Woodland Hills before Friday. Now it’s clean-up time, which, if you win, is a lot easier.’ Looking towards her new job, which she will assume in January, Pavley is eyeing several Senate committees. ‘[Senate Majority Leader] Darrell Steinberg has already call twice,’ she said. ‘I am interested in sitting on committees that match the work that I have been doing in the Assembly: energy, education and probably one of the environmental committees. I’ll have more time in the Senate to spend on policy because of the four-year terms, so I’d like to add the health committee for consideration.’ Pavley is feeling quite comfortable returning to Sacramento, where she will encounter men and women whom she has worked with in the past, including key members of Gov. Schwarzenegger’s cabinet, such as Air Resources Board Chair Mary Nichols and California Environment Protection Agency head Linda Adams. As for Pacific Palisades, where she made her first campaign speech in 1999, Pavley says that she looks forward to again representing local residents. She may even walk with her dog in the Patriotic Pups brigade during the Fourth of July parade.
The Palisades-Malibu YMCA pool, located in Temescal Canyon on Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy land, closed in February due to necessary and expensive plumbing repairs (with guesses going as high as $400,000). Whether the pool ever reopens depends on an interpretation of ‘the useful life of the facility.’ In 1994, the YMCA and the Conservancy operated under a basic agreement: ‘Conservancy will honor the existing pool lease between the Synod and the YMCA for the term of that lease and will continue the lease on the same terms thereafter for the existing useful life of the existing pool. The parties agree that on the expiration of said existing life, the parties will enter into negotiations for the possible replacement of said pool on such reasonable conditions as can be agreed to at such time for the continued use and/or management of the facility by the YMCA.’ In a May 29 e-mail to the Palisadian-Post, the Conservancy’s executive director, Joe Edmiston, wrote: ‘The YMCA pool is at the end of its useful life and hundreds of thousands of dollars will be required to bring it up to standard.’ He cited the YMCA/Conservancy agreement and continued: ‘We expect to receive proposals from the YMCA (and perhaps other groups). Meanwhile, it is good news for the entire community that the Rose Gilbert Pool at Palisades High will be dedicated in August, with construction finished as soon as funding will allow. Perhaps those most interested in quickly resuming local swimming would be wise to consider a contribution to that pool.’ Carol Pfannkuche, the Y’s executive director, responded to Edmiston’s statement in an e-mail to Edmiston and the Post: ‘One point of clarification: the YMCA does not believe the pool has reached the end of its useful life. In past discussions, you have stated that you are not in the pool business and it is up to the YMCA to determine what needs to be fixed and how to pay for it. We have every hope and expectation that rehabilitation of the existing pool is possible.’ Edmiston responded, ‘A $400,000 fix may give the pool a new lease on life but that major investment doesn’t fall within the terms of the November 1994 agreement which speaks of the ‘existing useful life of the existing pool.’ ‘But, I’m no pool expert. We shall consult with such [experts] and with the Attorney General’s office with respect to the proper interpretation of the 1994 agreement. ‘Most importantly, we look forward to seeing your proposal soon and being able to evaluate it with respect to the mission of the Conservancy.’
Pacific Palisades resident Amy Carlton has spent the past nine months spearheading an effort to prevent the installation of a cell phone tower in her neighborhood. And her efforts have paid off. ‘I can’t say how relieved I am as well as all the neighbors,’ said Carlton, who lives on Charmel Place in the Marquez Knolls area. On May 21, the West Los Angeles Commissioners upheld Associate Zoning Administrator Patricia Brown’s decision to deny a conditional use permit to T-Mobile for the construction of an antenna at 1343 Charmel Place. T-Mobile wanted to place a cell tower disguised as a palm tree next to a water tank on land owned by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and 20 feet from Carlton’s home. On March 10, Brown denied the conditional use permit, citing that the 45-foot antenna would be too close to four homes and would not be consistent with the character of the neighborhood. She found that T-Mobile had failed to identify alternative sites. T-Mobile appealed Brown’s decision because ‘We felt we came in with a good product that would serve the community,’ said Clark Harris, T-Mobile senior development manager for Los Angeles. The company believed that the cell tower fit in with the palm and eucalyptus trees on the property. ‘We were on a utility property, and we thought the visual ‘ to the best of our ability ‘ matched the existing foliage,’ Harris said. Since losing the appeal, Harris said the company has realized that the Charmel location will not work and does not plan to pursue the possibility further. ‘We have not finalized whether we are going to look for another location,’ Harris said. Carlton and her neighbors presented their case against the installation of a cell tower before Brown and again in front of the West L.A. Commission. Carlton had solicited and received the support of many community groups, including the Pacific Palisades Community Council, the Pacific Palisades Civic League, the Pacific Palisades Residents Association and the Marquez Knolls Property Owners Association. The Council opposed the cell tower during a November 2007 meeting, citing that the tower does not match the neighborhood aesthetically because the homes are restricted to a height limit of 35 feet and there are no above ground utilities. The Council also expressed concern that the tower could commercialize a primarily residential neighborhood and be a potential safety hazard if it fell in an earthquake. Community groups and neighbors also argued that the Santa Ana winds could cause the tower to fall on nearby houses, Carlton said. In addition, Carlton and her neighbors expressed concern about the property value of their homes, contending that the tower might scare away potential buyers. Carlton said she is grateful to all of the support she received. She did, however, encounter some resistance from community members who wanted the tower installed. ‘We understand everyone wants cell service, but it shouldn’t be against the zoning laws,’ Carlton said. Haldis Toppel, president of the Marquez Knolls Property Owners Association, said the cell service in the neighborhood is fractured because of the mountainous topography, and community members do want better service for personal and business use. It’s also important to have the service in case of an emergency because the police and fire departments rely on cell phones for communication. But the neighborhood was not the proper location for the tower. ‘T-Mobile ignored the fact that the developers of that neighborhood had gone through great pain and expense to move the blight of public utilities underground,’ Toppel said. She believes the zoning administrator and commissioners’ decision was influenced by the fact that there are alternative sites available, and ‘it was clearly driven by the solidarity of the Marquez Knolls residents and the Palisades civic organizations in opposing the proposed site in order to make our community a better place to live.’
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