Gift card confusion
Dear ER:
Please allow me to clarify a few points on which Doug Christensen was mistaken (“Real teacher appreciation, ” ER Letters, May 6, 2010). Teacher and Staff Appreciation Week is a function of the PTA, and as such has nothing to do with the RB Teachers Association or RB Education Foundation. No teacher or staff member at our school is “asking for gift cards.” They have far too much class. Like most beach cities schools, the PTA at Jefferson Elementary runs an on-going fundraiser by selling gift cards, a portion of which goes back to the school. Many parents want to acknowledge teacher and staff Appreciation Week by giving a token gift, but they don’t know how much to spend or what the recipient wants. So the PTA asks each faculty and staff member to tell us their top three preferred gift cards. The PTA publishes this list in our weekly newsletter prior to Appreciation Week. Parents appreciate the suggestions, teachers and staff members get a gift they can actually use and the PTA benefits from the sale. Everyone wins.
Christensen is understandably frustrated by the financial status of the California public schools and the layoff notices given to teachers and staff. I am certain that any teacher or staff member would sincerely appreciate a donation made in his or her name to RBEF. But make no mistake, the Jefferson PTA works with RBEF to help fill budget gaps in our school without direction from RBTA. We are acutely aware of the fact that in this economy, in this community, those who can donate to RBEF do so, separate from and above giving a little something personal to that special teacher or staff member who makes a difference in their children’s lives every day.
Tracy Mintz
VP, Communications
Jefferson Elementary Redondo Beach
Leaf blower ban
Dear ER:
It’s time for a ban on leaf blowers in Redondo Beach for the simple reason that they are bad for our health. These machines generate unacceptable amounts of air and noise pollution while doing little more than blowing debris, including dust, herbicides, pesticides, fungi, allergens, and animal waste into the air, city streets, and gutters. These pollutants pose a significant health threat to gardeners and residents.
Over 20 California cities, including Hermosa Beach and Manhattan Beach, have banned or severely restricted the use of leaf blowers, with no adverse impacts. I urge all concerned Redondo Beach residents to voice their opinion on this issue to their district Council Member.
David Waldner
Redondo Beach
Cell phone to motorcyclist
Dear ER:
On Wednesday April 28 at approximately 3 p.m. I was heading home on my motorcycle, westbound on Marine Avenue in Manhattan Beach. As I was crossing Sepulveda, half way through the intersection, a gal in a little, dark blue sport-ute, traveling south on Sepulveda was preparing to turn right on Marine. Talking on her phone, she pulled right out in to the path of my bike. While my sphincter tightened, I applied as much brake as I dared without dropping the two-wheeler or T-boning her car and learning to fly. Unable to completely stop, I sailed around her on the left.
Which brings me to the point of this letter. If someone reading this witnessed the incident described above that took place on Wednesday, April 28 at approximately 3 p.m. on Marine Avenue between Sepulveda Blvd. and Walnut Avenue, would you kindly phone me (310) 263-1185 and tell me what you saw.
Name withheld by request
Texas size problem
Dear ER:
On May 3, the campaign representing big Texas oil companies, Valero and Tesoro announced they have submitted enough signatures to put a deceptive proposition on the November 2010 ballot that would kill California’s clean energy and air pollution control standards, established by AB 32, the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.
Californians must be wary of a proposition supported by oil that would further permit polluting of our air and kill clean energy jobs.
According to the California Air Resources Board, killing efforts to reduce air pollution will lead to drastic increases in premature deaths, asthma attacks and emergency trips to the hospital, as a result of breathing dirty air.
Pollutant filled air also disproportionately affects people of color and low income communities. Five of the smoggiest cities are also the locations with the highest densities of people of color and low-income residents, according to Minding the Climate Gap, a PERE publication.
These Texas oil companies don’t get it. They want to kill all investment in clean energy technology and job creation at a time when our economy needs it the most. Jobs advancing renewable energy like solar and wind have grown nearly 10 times as fast as the statewide average. Not to mention, the increase cost to all at the gas pump if we allow this energy proposition to pass. According to a recent UC Berkeley study these added costs will hurt our economy by more than $80 billion and cost over a half million jobs by 2020.
Californians must stand up against this deceptive proposition and refuse to permit Texas oil companies to buy our votes. Reducing air pollution and advancing clean energy technology and jobs is good for our planet and our economy.
Sean Kelly
Hermosa Beach
Sponsorship job
Dear ER:
Do these supposed 60,000 people not generate additional sales tax, hotel tax, parking ticket tax (City says party is over for 6-Man Volleyball tournament,” ER May 5, 2010)? How do the local costume shops do? Grocery stores? Beauticians? Gyms? Babysitters? Where are those numbers figured in?
Only eight arrests with 60,000 people? Sounds like a homerun to me. And let’s please not go after the sponsors. A volleyball player finding a sponsor is like a normal person finding a job. Let’s not take away jobs while we’re trying to mess up one of the finest events that exist.
David
Web comment
What’s music got to do with it?
Dear ER:
I have been to six-man the last 8 years (City says party is over for 6-Man Volleyball tournament,” ER May 5, 2010). There were not 60,000 people there last year, it was about 12,000 tops. This is a fun, annual event and if you need to limit the amount of drinking then check bags etc at entry but do not make the players pay for the City letting this get out of hand by turning a blind eye. And what does the music have to do with it? What a joke.
Jo Kingsely
Web comment
Budget solution
Dear ER:
This is a simple act of extortion (City says party is over for 6-Man Volleyball tournament,” ER May 5, 2010). These bureacratic entities can’t find a way to stay on a budget, so they have to fleece money out of us somehow.
David
Web comment
West side to North End
Dear ER:
Thanks to your review of North End Bar and Grill (“Over the top at the North End, ER Oct. 8, 2010), we have a new favorite place worth driving from West Los Angeles too. What a treat this bar and food really are. Fun and delicious. Thanks for turning us onto it.
Leanne Coronel
By email
The city should not intervene in an existing business transfer by imposing an early closing when the business has a 1:30 closing and the business has never violated its conditional use permit. Business owners’ rights must be
protected too. Evidence showed Il Boccaccio had the lowest number of calls for city services of all licensed establishments on Pier Ave. Howard Fishman and Pete Tucker’s justly decided not to appeal the ABC decision. The
same ABC that already ruled the city did not have grounds to protest the license in the first place. The ABC already denied the city’s request in April, 2010 and nothing has changed. If the license had been a new business CUP the Councilmen could have voted for early hours. But that is not the case when an existing business is transferred, and City Council must follow a fair and consistent pattern in making decisions. Instead of giving into pressure from Jim Lissner, a vocal critic of downtown Hermosa Beach, they analyzed the true facts and voted to follow the same protocol that they did in the transfer of Café Boogaloo and Underground Pub. A thriving downtown will support future city revenues. The city revenues are down in this economy and restaurants and bars are calmer than before the economic
slowdown. The city should not be wasting money on legal fees for an ABC board appeal.
While I’m not a Betsy Butler supporter, I would appreciate it if the Easy Reader would post an explanation for the anonymous attack ad printed at the top of page 5 in your May 13th issue. I thought that political ads were required to state who paid for them.
Re: The Vocal Minority
Facts don’t lie . . .
It seems detractors of election result are often quick to clarify that all of the “registered voters” didn’t actually vote (funny, this is never the case when the vote swings the other direction). These critics choose to discredit an outcome simply on low turnout or the large number of voters who didn’t show up on election day. Strange, these critics stop short of suggesting those absent may have just been disinterested, too busy, uninformed, or just too lazy to show up at the poles or send in their absentee ballot. If this article was meant to highlight the unfortunate fact of poor local election turnout, I absolutely agree with the writer, it’s truly sad to consider that people don’t exercise their right to participate at all levels government. If this was an article discounting the outcome of an election . . . the results speak for themselves and the votes of all those (involved) folks who thought this was important HAVE been counted. The results are clear, DD won by a margin of 18%, or 4,271 votes (a true landslide in election terms). BTW – I’ll have to disagree with the writer, based on our democratic system, Bill Brand speaks for ALL of the people in District 2 just as Steve Aspel speaks for ALL of the people in District 1.
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May 17, 2010
Dear ER:
Help Stop Hermosa’s raised, concrete-curbed, Pier Avenue MEDIAN MADNESS.
Time is running out to kill the insane, unnecessary, MEDIAN.
The MEDIAN is an expensive, silly, and unneeded Pier Avenue amateur design mistake.
The MEDIAN is skinny, just 5-feet wide and will destroy Pier Avenue’s beautiful historic openness that dates back to 1900.
The raised concrete MEDIAN will choke traffic and hinder the free movement of Police, Fire, and Paramedic vehicles.
The MEDIAN will destroy Pier Avenue for its St. Patrick’s Day Parade and other future parades and celebrations.
The MEDIAN will choke traffic flow, forcing additional cars, cabs and trucks onto 2nd, 8th, Monterey, Manhattan, and other residential streets.
Removing the unneeded MEDIAN simplifies and speeds up the completion of the Pier Avenue upgrades and saves scarce city money.
Important: Tell your Hermosa Councilmen, Commissioners, Chamber of Commerce, Police, Fire, and Public Works Department officials that you don’t want Pier Avenue’s historic openness destroyed with an unnecessary raised-curb, emergency vehicles hindering, parade wrecking, expensive, narrow, ugly, raised-concrete-curbed MEDIAN.
Time is running out to stop the MEDIAN.
Get involved. Help stop Pier Avenue’s MEDIAN MADNESS.
Howard Longacre
Hermosa Beach
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