No reception for stealth cell-phone antenna

There will be no cell-phone antenna inside a cross atop the Parish Center at St. William Church, the Los Altos City Council decided Sept. 26.

Since early August, the contentious issue has begged the question of how Los Altos community leaders would address the placement of cell-phone antennas and whether the current rules should be amended.

Squirrel problem is broader than Cuesta Park

The much-publicized squirrel attack on 4-year-old Andrew Packard Sept. 25 in Mountain View’s Cuesta Park had Los Altos officials looking on with interest.

“We’re aware of the situation in Mountain View,” said Los Altos Recreation Director Dave Brees. “We’re reviewing procedures in our parks.”

Hidden Villa reinstates summer camp after outcry

The board of directors at Hidden Villa nature preserve in Los Altos Hills made it official last week, fulfilling a promise to retain the 12-day multicultural summer camp that board members had elected to discontinue earlier this year.

At their meeting last Thursday, board members agreed to allocate $125,000 for the 12-day camp for fiscal year 2006-2007. Board Chairman Lee Price said funding allows for a “somewhat reduced” camp from this past year, where approximately 950 youth participated. Price figured as many as 750-800 could participate in 2007.

LAH council nears sewer agreement, nixes undergrounding

The city of Los Altos Hills is within days of completing a sewer agreement with the city of Los Altos, the culmination of five years of planning by both towns. The agreement will enable other sewer-related projects in the Hills, including refurbishing a town pump station, extending town sewer mains and annexing unincorporated areas that currently lack access.

About half the homes in Los Altos Hills connect to sewer lines, which feed into the Los Altos or Palo Alto sewer systems. The others rely on septic systems. These systems, which grow faulty with age, are “an environmental disaster waiting to happen,” according to Los Altos Hills City Councilman Mike O’Malley, who has a septic tank.

The ax falls on plaza’s ‘Rotary Tree’

The Los Altos Rotary Club’s board of directors last week voted to remove the longstanding “Rotary Tree” in the center of the downtown Community Plaza in favor of an alternative plaza centerpiece.

Rotary Club President Sam Pesner confirmed the board’s decision Thursday, noting, “The club has been in favor of removing the current tree because of its dilapidated state.”

News Briefs

Blach students pampered with Perrier
Blach Intermediate School shut off its water Sept. 27 after students complained it had a bad taste.
Service representatives from the California Water Service Company tested the water’s pH level and found it to be above normal. A high pH level indicates the water is hard, which does not […]

Governor vetoes bill benefiting ECH unions

In a move that clearly sides with El Camino Hospital management, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger Sept. 29 vetoed AB 759, a bill that would have benefited the hospital’s unions.

The bill, proposed by Assemblywoman Sally Lieber, would have declared that, as a public entity, the hospital would have to abide by laws that govern other entities in such matters as financial disclosures and employee rights.

Racial bias charged in Westwind legal case

Allegations of racial discrimination and financial improprieties mark a civil complaint filed Sept. 18 in the matter of Westwind Barn and the treatment of its former ranch hands.

Former barn employees Ignacio “Nacho” Carranza and Gregorio Rodriguez sued Friends of Westwind Barn, former Friends President Sharon O’Malley and the town of Los Altos Hills. The suit is in addition to an ongoing suit filed with the State Labor Commission. According to commission spokesman Dean Fryer, a formal hearing for that case is being scheduled for November or December.

Editorials

Antenna rationale not coming in clear
We understand and appreciate the concerns of those opposing a cellular-phone antenna tower at St. William Church. That said, we don’t understand the council majority’s rationale for denying it.
The council voted 4-1 last week, Councilman Curtis Cole dissenting, to reject a MetroPCS antenna proposal on the […]

Letters to the Editor

Impressed with courtesy at council meeting
After living in Los Altos since 1964 and teaching here for nearly 20 years, I went to a meeting of the Los Altos City Council for the first time.
My husband and I were stirred enough by the news of a major project in the San Antonio/El Camino […]

Reconnecting to the past, capturing the present

I’ve often thought that weekends were meant for catching up on laundry, grocery shopping and that never ending to-do list. Now, I can add “emotional roller coaster” to the description. I have dubbed my September 2006 weekends, “The past, the present, and the future.”

On Sept. 15, I went to what has become an annual “B Club” reunion. The “B” comes from the maiden names of my dear friends from junior high, Bates, Bates, Baxter, Bayliff, Bell, Bitney. We are six women nearing middle age but holding on to our junior high memories. We formed a bond back in 1972 during roll call. We decided we needed to make a commitment to meet once a year, sans the husbands and kids, and keep the B Club ablazing.

Obituary Notices

ROBERT L. HUGHES
Age 79 of Los Altos, died Sept 10th, 2006. Bob was born in Atlanta, Georgia on April 20, 1927 the fourth child of John and Edith Hughes. The family moved to Florida when he was one and to Staten Island, NY when he was eleven. Upon graduation from High […]

Weddings

Karen Cortopassi and Omar Hafez
Karen Cortopassi and Omar Hafez were married Sept. 2 in Palo Alto.
The bride is the daughter of Angelo and Lynne Cortopassi of Mountain View. She graduated from Mountain View High School and received a bachelor’s degree in biology from Stanford University. She is employed as a clinical […]

Artists flock to inaugural ‘Plein Air’ event

Canvases dotted downtown this past weekend as artists gathered to compete in Los Altos’ inaugural Plein Air Painting Competition and Arts Fest, sponsored by the Los Altos Cultural Association.

Painters from Los Altos and as far as Santa Cruz and Half Moon Bay set up easels on downtown streets Saturday to capture the early autumn morning. Their challenge was to capture a local scene on canvas before the end of the day.

Screech owls starring at Rancho San Antonio

What makes these wonderful creatures so special? They live in a valley oak tree right on the paved driveway leading to Deer Hollow Farm at Rancho San Antonio Open Space Preserve. Easy observation of these owls ranges from around 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

Western screech owls usually nest from April through July. These owls are comparatively small at maturity - about 8.5 inches. There are two young in the cavity with both mother and father as caregivers. The female sits on the eggs. Both are responsible for gathering small insects and rodents to feed the young.

Los Altos Waldorf School adds high school

The Waldorf School of the Peninsula has begun its search for local space to house its new high school. Last week, the school’s board of trustees approved the program to begin next year.

The Waldorf School, recognized for its unique approach to education, has educated students in Los Altos since 1984.

Schools Briefs

Pinewood presents ‘Laughing Stock’
Pinewood School’s Theater Arts has scheduled “Laughing Stock,” a comic look at a small troupe of struggling actors and their backstage mischief, 7 p.m. Nov. 2-4 at the Upper Campus Theater, 26800 Fremont Road, Los Altos Hills.
Tickets will be available at the door for a suggested donation of $5. […]

Local students qualify for National Merit Scholarships

Officials of the National Merit Scholarship Corp. (NMSC) announced the names of approximately 16,000 semifinalists in the 52nd annual National Merit Scholarship Program Sept. 13, including more than 50 local students from area high schools.

The semifinalists may continue in the competition for 8,200 Merit Scholarship awards, worth $33 million, that will be offered next spring.

Memorial Thursday for former LAHS vice principal

Former Los Altos High School vice principal Louis Tolbert, director of the El Cajon project serving at-risk students, died Sept. 26 after a long illness. Mr. Tolbert was 43.

Mr. Tolbert founded El Cajon in 1993. The program offers students who struggle with traditional curricula an opportunity to gain hands-on culinary experience.

LASD Superintendent ready to make recommendation for charter school placement

Los Altos School District Superintendent Tim Justus said he and his staff will make a recommendation to the board of trustees Monday regarding where the district should permanently place Bullis Charter School.

The district is deciding whether to place Bullis Charter School at Egan Junior High School (at a cost of $8.6 million), Covington Elementary School (at a cost of $3.7 million) or Bullis-Purissima School (at a cost of $6.2 million). If placed at either elementary school, the charter school would share a multipurpose room and library.

A rude awakening for Los Altos High

Reality bit the Los Altos High football team Friday night.

After fattening their record on three feeble foes, the Eagles faced a formidable team in Mountain View High - and lost 21-7.

Mustangs moving up and growing up

Jumping to a stronger division with only two seniors aboard, coach John Milkovich expects his Homestead High volleyball team to endure growing pains this season. Sometimes, though, the pains can be excruciating.

Take the Mustangs’ SCVAL De Anza Division opener against favored Palo Alto Sept. 19. Homestead took the Vikings to five games and had eight chances to put the match away. That winning point eluded the Mustangs, however, and visiting Paly rallied to beat them.

New coach Plumer, two-time Olympian, pushes Eagles to succeed in cross country

Patti Sue Plumer has a racer’s mentality, and that’s how she approaches her new job as Los Altos High cross-country coach.

A former distance champ who competed in two Olympics, Plumer knows what it takes to succeed in the sport. That’s why she is constantly challenging her Eagles to push themselves - whether it be working harder in practice or running faster in meets.

Local vault company keeps it Los Altos confidential

These days, there aren’t many businesses that proudly declare that they don’t use a computer, don’t want your Social Security number and will personally meet you at 3 a.m. - no questions asked.

For Gerald Colombi, the owner of Los Altos Vault & Safe Deposit Co., this “Miami Vice”-like scene is not that hard to envision. Fact is, if you’re one of his clients and you need access to your safety deposit box at 3 a.m., he or one of his employees will be there to meet you.

Dow Jones index nears all-time high

The Dow Jones Industrial Average, a popular market barometer, has hit a 2006 high as of this writing and is near an all-time high.

The index comprises blue-chip stocks that are generally the leaders in their industry. Inclusion in the index is reserved for those companies with mature businesses, stable revenues and, in many cases, a history of solid earnings and dividends. Remember, a dividend is paid to shareholders from after-tax earnings, so profits need to be predictable for a company to pay a reliable dividend.

IRS shares good news with property owners

The Internal Revenue Service has good news for property owners: A taxpayer may now exclude $250,000 ($500,000 for certain joint filers) of capital gains realized and defer other capital gains through a 1031 Exchange on a single property. The new procedure applies to homeowners who use their property as their personal residence and also use the property for “investment business purposes.” Investment business purposes could include a home office or rental of a portion of the property.

Examples of property owners who could benefit:

Electric Auto Age

I

t’s not uncommon to see a fringe idea morph into a mainstream concern and then become commonplace. This appears to be the path ahead for electric vehicles. Once considered on the outer edge of transportation alternatives, electric vehicles are poised for a shift toward broader acceptance.

Land Rover LR3 HSE versus the Infiniti QX56

Coming into autumn, families can look forward to activities that require some serious hauling capacity: weekend getaways and holiday trips or just ferrying an athletic team or Scout troop to an away event. For these trips, you may need room for as many as seven passengers, a large cargo capacity and, in some cases, power to pull a heavy trailer.

If this is the case, then a sport-utility vehicle may be the only sensible choice, despite its thirst for gasoline.

Short-story collection walks high-wire as fiction without a net

“All my stories are about death,” said Eric Puchner, instructor of a Stanford Continuing Studies seminar about breaking the rules of fiction, where I was happy to find a fellow Los Altan and Town Crier contributor.

The class had been given the assignment of writing an excerpt from the point of view of an inanimate object. Puchner’s statement was in response to my question of why a pretentious toaster began to tell his life story, when my goal was to write something grand, perhaps from the point of view of the American flag. The flag sulked but the toaster blathered on, explaining how much he hated when people checked their teeth for spinach in his shiny chrome, how he deserved a granite countertop to stand on and how a toaster was the unsung hero of World War II. Puchner maintains that you can’t choose what you write, it chooses you.

Start the ski season early at rustic Mount Hood

Ahandful of lucky skiers are tearing up the slopes this month while the rest of the country dreams of far-off winter.

Mount Hood, a dormant volcano an hour east of Portland, Ore., offers year-round glacier skiing on its southern slopes, and the autumn season started with a fortuitous snowstorm in September. The 11,245-foot mountain, the highest in Oregon, hosts the rustic Timberline Lodge as well as a day lodge for skiers from the lowlands.

Bendigo sister cities visit spotlights Chinese culture and history

Longtime Los Altos residents Sylvia and Roger Eng, D.D.S., visited Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, last spring. As co-vice presidents of Los Altos Sister Cities Inc. in charge of Bendigo relationships, the Engs have close ties with the Australian city.

They traveled to Bendigo to observe the annual Bendigo Easter Fair and Parade, held continuously since 1871 to raise money for the local hospital.

Acting makes ‘Long Journey’ worth the trek

Resurrect the spirit of acclaimed playwright Eugene O’Neill, an ostensible depressive, and you’re likely to conjure that lone figure of Mary Tyrone, morphine addict and O’Neill’s real life mother, shrouded in white.

In Pear Avenue Theatre’s production of “Long Day’s Journey into Night,” the road to darkness descends quickly but without much novelty, inventive staging or even creative license, for that matter. But the considerably talented cast pulls off a solid production of the masterpiece. Special kudos should go to Diane Tasca, who is mesmerizing as Mrs. Tyrone in an unusually sophisticated, albeit desperate performance.

Datebook

Datebook items are run on a space-available basis for entertainment, non-profit events, low-cost classes and groups of wide interest in our circulation area. The deadline is noon Tuesday for the next week’s paper. Notices must be typed and include a contact name and phone number. Items may be submitted via e-mail (peteb@latc.com); fax (948-6647); or post (138 Main St., Los Altos, CA 94022).

THEATER